On Leadership
When you think of leaders do you always think of those at the top of a company or organisation those leading the whole organisation?
Should leaders only be at the top of the organisation or would we benefit from having leaders throughout organisations - could we do things differently?
How many people lead within your business now?
We know that developing and nurturing future leaders is critical to sustained success and growth, we also know that this is not always easy to achieve. How do we identify our future leaders? Would supporting developing leaders throughout the business support this more easily?
There are many opportunities to identify how people are developing their skills outside of the business. Identify existing untapped skills and support people to use and develop their leadership skills to take on a particular challenge or to transfer these back into the workplace, alongside more formal leadership development.
What would it look and feel like if we had leaders throughout our business, leading projects, creating solutions and ensuring effective communication?
In truth there usually are people in most businesses who lead without officially being asked or given a title, they see a problem and aim to solve it, or lead in the moment when needed in their team; they lead themselves well and deliver outcomes or they may lead the social activities and hopefully they are encouraged and recognised.
Often however there are bottle necks within businesses where the people on the front line can clearly see problems that need to be resolved, and could offer solutions but have no access or authority to do this. Managers may have heavy workloads, feel overworked and communication often stalls here from the leadership team to the staff and from the staff to the leadership team. This can be due to a hectic schedule, lack of, or poor delegation, protecting their positions, or the fear of making themselves redundant (and this is a big one). All of which are costly when the need to able to anticipate and react to a constantly changing environment and marketplace with agility and speed to survive and evolve is continually growing.
What if there was the opportunity for people at all levels to propose solutions and build and lead themselves or small teams to test solutions, improve them and implement if workable and solving problems, with support and coaching? How much would this motivate, encourage and empower?
Considering Future Leaders
Ahh, but we have developed managers throughout the business and from these managers we will find our future leaders, and they will identify our talent some may be thinking. In response I would ask these questions:-
Should we only manage processes, risk, resources, and quality?
and
Should we always lead people?
I have had a variety of responses to this question in workshops, from; but people need to be managed; how would people know what to do; how would I then do my performance management; to those having an AH HA moment of how they could do things differently.
Leadership development is an ongoing journey for those who really want to develop and not one stop - I went on a course or my company ran a programme. I have found that as much benefit is derived from peer learning, sharing of experiences, and learning to see others’ perspectives as from formal learning.
Leadership development doesn’t have to always or only be formal training and development. Although a useful part of the journey, it doesn’t have to be reserved for an elite few. People can often develop these skills through their passions outside of work, be that in a sport, the PTA, arts, a charity or another area of keen interest. They will often not recognise this though and utilise it at work, and it is the role of leaders within the business to find this out and develop it.
We know that developing and nurturing future leaders is critical to sustained success and growth, we also know that this is not always easy to achieve. How do we identify our future leaders?
I recently heard a young entrepreneur speak about how much he had learned through being part of his community council. He learned how local government worked, how to effectively communicate with people at all levels of organisations, team-working, how to influence and negotiate, all of which have been of great benefit in his own leadership journey in building a very successful business.
Untapped Potential
I was also recently told about someone who had, had a team member for years who did an okay job but nothing exceptional, was always out of the door at 5pm sharp and hadn’t been considered for promotion. This was until someone realised he was managing and coaching a local football team that had just done exceptionally well and had some press coverage. On engaging with him on this and working with him to harness these skills to lead a project and then a team, he is now an exceptional member of the team who is fully engaged, loving his work and an active and contributing leader within the business.
There are many opportunities to identify how people are developing their skills outside of the business. Identify existing untapped skills and support people to use and develop their leadership skills to take on a particular challenge or to transfer these back into the workplace, alongside more formal leadership development.
Many charities and other organisations are looking for help and support not only on their boards but also with fundraising and volunteering in a number of ways. This is a great way for people to pursue their passions, not be consumed by work, develop leadership skills, gain a wider perspective and broader lens through which to view the world and reflect and use these back in their organisation.
Many organisations embrace giving employees time during the year to volunteer or support a charity or social enterprise, but few spend time to find out what has been learned and how this could be transferred into the workplace to benefit the organisation.
It would be more beneficial to plan with the team how they are going to use their volunteer days to support something that they are passionate about, and from which they could develop their leadership skills and then to consider how they will be supported to use what they learn back in the business, to support leadership throughout the business.
As well as considering these and other potential external avenues to support the development of leaders at all levels, what could you do to give a challenge to your people and teams and keep them interested, engaged and test their potential internally?
How could you help to prepare them to sound out their appetite and aptitude for current and future leadership and help both them and you to harness more of their skills and abilities?
For Consideration
Potential = the ability, skills and attributes within each individual that are there to be tapped into and developed. Too often performance is managed as opposed to potential being led and developed.
Some questions to consider on your knowledge of your team:-
- What do you know about where / when and how your team lead?
- What do you know about what they are passionate about outside work?
- How can you tap into and use these skills and this potential?
- What other skills and attributes do your team have that you may be unaware of?
How can you create opportunities to develop others to lead in the business?
- Can you nominate team members to lead team meetings?
- Could a team member lead a project?
- Could a team member lead a staff initiative or programme?
- Could a colleague or team member lead a process improvement?
- Could a team member lead a customer service initiative?
How can you make your CSR projects really meaningful to the company as well as the cause?
- Could you discuss the skills a volunteering opportunity could develop?
- How could this person identify and clarify the opportunity for skills development when engaging and agreeing volunteering?
- How will you follow up with them once they have volunteered?
- How will you continue to develop this back in the business?
Also from Kirsty Bathgate:-
What Do Your Values Say About You
Kirsty Bathgate is the founder of Gearing for Growth working with growing businesses and leaders to support them to perform at their best, with a clear vision, values led culture, less stress, better returns and more time for the important things in life. Kirsty can be contacted on 07425 629816 or email kirsty@gearingforgrowth.com (www.gearingforgrowth.com)