What makes a really great
leader? In our view the most important criterion is that they genuinely care
about the success of all their key stakeholders. Obviously, they also have an
interest in their own success and ambitions – they have to get something out of
the endeavour for themselves – but they are also working for something bigger.
Great leaders take responsibility for the organisation – their job can be the toughest of all. It’s not a reward for what they’ve done in the past, or something they have a right to, it’s something they really want to contribute to, and develop as a legacy for the future.
Many people are in leadership positions, but a surprising few are really great
at the role. This creates a miserable environment for their colleagues,
and squanders many chances to maximise success. Why is this the
case? What makes a great leader?
All great leaders need to have, and be able to
communicate, a clear vision of where the organisation is heading, and
why. They need to be brave and show integrity, honesty, and humility.
They must not be afraid to roll up their sleeves and get involved at any level
of the organisation. A great leader understands their own strengths and
isn’t afraid to hire and learn from people who are more skilled than
them. Great leaders are genuinely proud of their team’s accomplishments
and genuinely care about helping them succeed.
Leadership Framework
It’s worth taking time to stand back and clarify
the elements that we consider will lead to success as a leader. We may then
decide that we’re already well on track, or that to reach success in the longer
term we need to review our approach.
As a starting point, it’s worth asking:
1.
Where we are
against the elements below?
2.
What would be
the benefit of clarifying which are important to us?
3.
What is the
likely benefit of adhering to them more closely?
4.
What are the
implications and costs of not having a strong leadership framework?
If we want to improve our leadership framework, a
good start is to answer the questions in the ‘Creating rules and clarity’
section, and then develop a plan based on what we discover.
What’s important in leadership?
These five elements are vital for great leadership:
1.
Developing an
agreed purpose and vision and knowing what leads to success.
2.
Building a
cohesive leadership team.
3.
Creating
rules and clarity.
4.
Creating a
clear meeting structure.
5.
Continually
developing leadership competencies.
Each division should have its own vision and
purpose that links to the overall vision and purpose, and likewise each area of
the company.
LEADERSHIP COMPETENCIES CHECKJLIST
A great leader needs to determine, in conjunction
with stakeholders, which are the key competencies for him/her to help the
organisation, the team, and themselves. They continually seek ideas and take
action to improve their performance in each. Leadership competency examples,
these will vary depending on the context:
1.
Demonstrating
integrity.
2.
Encouraging
constructive dialogue.
3.
Creating a
shared vision.
4.
Developing
people.
5.
Building
partnerships.
6.
Sharing
leaderships.
7.
Empowering
people.
8.
Thinking
globally.
9.
Appreciating
diversity.
10.
Developing
technological savvy.
11.
Ensuring
customer satisfaction.
12.
Maintaining a
competitive advantage.
13.
Achieving
personal mastery.
14.
Anticipating
opportunities.
15.
Leading
change.
KEYS TO SUCCESS
We believe these are the keys to success:
1. The leader’s purpose is to be responsible for helping all stakeholders succeed.
2. Success in any project needs discovery, leadership, management (planning and effective use of resources), a safe space to develop action, action, and review.
3. Creating and achieving buy-in for the vision.
4. Developing an appropriate culture. Hiring, promoting, and firing as needed.
5. Creating, implementing, and reviewing strategy.
6. Setting priorities and measurement.
7. Building, communicating, and reinforcing clarity almost daily.
Building a cohesive leadership team
The leader’s behaviour sets the tone for the behaviour of the leadership team and, through them, the organisation. It’s based on creating an environment of vulnerability-based trust and creative conflict. Achieving results is dependent on achieving the first four capabilities.
1. Vulnerability-based trust.
2. Mastering conflict.
3. Achieving commitment.
4. Embrace accountability.
5. Focus on results (e.g. balance 60% tea, 40% individual.)
DELIVER VALUE
BY CONVERTING DECISIONS INTO ACTIONS.
Knowing how to manage time effectively is probably the most important trait of a leader. Focusing on contribution, impact and efficiency are a leader's primary goals. Yet, success is not a one-man-show: a synergy of communication, teamwork, self-development, and development of others are essential markers for productive organizations.
Success happens to companies with the executive ability to
"concentrate on the few major areas where superior performance will
produce outstanding results," as well defined by Peter Drucker in the
inspiring "The Effective Executive" book. This means that management teams must
be vigilant and proactively analyze the future, focusing on the opportunity
rather than the problem, continuously delivering value , building on company
strengths, and setting the pace to differentiate from the competition.
Spending time identifying a company's value and
having vigorous debate on scenarios to execute the best plan to bring to market
solutions that solve critical needs are managements' most important agenda:
1. How do we turn knowledge into value and decisions?
2. Why is it so important to turn decisions into right
actions and behavior?
3. How can effectiveness be translated into
outstanding results?
Choose value by
making effective decisions
When debating
over roadmap priorities and innovation pipelines, it is key to be able to
differentiate a generic situation from exceptions. Assumptions are important,
validating them even more so. No one wants to develop products for an
exceptional/extreme customer, but rather aim for greater scale through a
broader customer reach.
Defining management decision's output requires
clear specifications, for example, minimum goals, boundaries, and a clear
understanding of what's right versus what is acceptable.
For example, executive management may decide to:
·
Concentrate on
value performance for the business-partner ecosystem
·
Diversification
of the business portfolio
·
Optimization of
the customer journey (e.g., access, end-to-end experience)
·
Operational
efficiency and productivity
·
Partnerships
(e.g., growth in scale, increase in number, strategic interactions)
Drilling down into details cross-department is key
to evaluate feasibility (cost, quality, timing). Validating with stakeholders
is key to measure utilization and purchase intent, both being critical for
estimating growth and scale.
DELIVER VALUE
BY CONVERTING DECISIONS INTO ACTIONS
Once
the management decision is clear, and the detailed scope is validated, two best
practices are important to follow through. First, management should be looking
to gain continuous feedback from the field, both to optimize and nurture
adoption, and to manage internal bias. Second, the team should invest in
continuous testing against other solutions in the market. Only this way can companies
guarantee the superior performance of their business portfolio.
Different organizations chose different strategies
at different points in time, based on maturity of their products and market.
Whether it's enabling cloud-based systems at scale to become agile and
efficient, software offerings to monetize directly, or digital offerings that
feature advanced analytics or
AI; or by adding technologies to enhance existing offerings or building
exclusive technology partnerships
to access capabilities or integrated offerings, actionable decisions endure
when field work is properly done. Having a business process to ensure these
steps are ongoing is key for leadership control of plans and fast
decision-making to optimize/iterate/pivot or abandon when required.
FINAL WORD : MAKING A DIFFERENCE
"Leadership
is an action, not a position." The most effective leaders build
bridges between knowledge and decisions, and between decisions and actions, and
they act quickly when new action-plans are required. Leaders understand the
need to measure action versus non-action to grow a company, differentiate it,
and avoid placing it at risk. They generate trust because of their willingness
to act. They are not limited by fear or by making a mistake. They are focused
on priorities, managing business processes, and educating the market. They are
passionate about pursuing dreams and challenging the status quo. Most of them
enjoy high-level relationship-building skills, based on trust, respect, and
self-awareness. They cultivate comfortable settings that enhance the confidence
of peers to express opinions, brainstorm, and embrace new ideas.
When people around them see
the successes of working together, overall engagement and productivity climbs.
And this is the foundation for an organization to focus on opportunities, to
embrace change, create, and innovate. Effective leaders are women and men out
there, bringing outstanding results together with their team. True heroes:
genuine, confident, humble, trustworthy, positive, and fun!
With best compliments
Dr Wilfred Monteiro
