Successful leadership stems from connection, communication, and collaboration.
Did you resolve to be a better leader in 2022? How’s it going so far?
In December of 2021, CBS News asked 1,009 adults what sort of New Year’s resolutions they’d be making for 2022. The top 3 answers were:
- Losing Weight/Improving Health (26%)
- Improving Finances (20%)
- Enjoying Life More (10%)
If this year’s resolutions reflect previous years’ resolutions, 80% of people will fail. Why such little success? Unfortunately, the seeds of failure are built into the resolutions themselves. Though crafted with good intentions, these resolutions are all framed as outcomes. For example, losing weight isn’t something you do; it’s an outcome of other things you do (e.g., change your diet, exercise).
If you want to be a better leader, you need to do what better leaders do. To create sustainable change, it helps to know how behavior change works. People are much less rational than we’d like to believe, and much more impulsive creatures of habit. Studies have found that 95% of our behaviors are habitual. Tony Schwartz, CEO of The Energy Project writes, “In order to make change that lasts, we must rely less on our prefrontal cortex, and more on co-opting the primitive parts of our brain in which habits are formed. Put simply, the more behaviors are ritualized and routinized — in the form of a deliberate practice — the less energy they require to launch, and the more they recur automatically.”
Being a successful leader is an outcome, not an action. Jim Rohn wrote, “Success is neither magical nor mysterious. Success is the natural consequence of consistently applying the basic fundamentals.” When it comes to the basic fundamentals of leadership, there are three key categories to focus on:
1. Connection
2. Communication
3. Collaboration
While there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to leading, there are practices that work in the vast majority of situations. Consider adopting one or more of these behaviors as a habit to increase your influence and raise your leadership game.
CONNECTION
1. Set your intention.
At its core, leadership is a relationship between two people. How do you want to be perceived by those who follow you? As you begin your day, review the day’s calendar. Who are you going to interact with? How do you want to show up in those meetings?
2. Put people before task.
In the busy-ness of the day to day, you may feel compelled to jump into task mode. People perform better when they feel cared for personally. By taking a brief amount of time to start meetings with personal conversations, you build trust, engagement, and commitment.
3. Listen.
We’ve moved from the digital age to the distractible age. Are you truly present and focused? Have you shut off all auto-notifications? Do you listen for the meaning behind the words? Are you listening with a goal of shared understanding?
4. Empathize.
Empathy means showing people you understand them and care how they feel. The days of “check your feelings at the door” are long gone. The silver lining of the pandemic is that the crucial conversations of well-being are now front and center. People yearn to bring their whole selves to work. Empathy will help them do that.
COMMUNICATION
5. Have a clear central message.
You don’t like having to scroll through lines of text to figure out the point of a message. Neither does anyone else. Begin with your central message at the top, and then expand on the core theme with the details below.
6. Ask for a receipt.
A receipts is a confirmation of a completed transaction. When you end your meetings, take a few minutes to go around and confirm that everyone is on the same page with what was said, what was meant, and what will be done next. It might take some more time upfront, but it will save you time (and headaches) in the long run.
7. Be willing to say “I don’t know”.
In today’s complex world, playing the role of the all-knowing leader won’t cut it. Too much is changing too fast. Be more concerned with being a learn-it-all than a know-it-all. Creating a culture of curiosity taps into today’s most important skill: Learning how to learn.
8. Set communication boundaries.
Technology allows you to communicate 24/7/365. Yet, just because you can doesn’t mean that you should. Communicate clear boundaries about when it’s okay and not okay to send emails. Give people a genuine break from work. If you’re moved to work at all hours, that’s fine. Just put those messages into draft and/or delay delivery for agreed upon work hours.
COLLABORATION
9. To build trust, go first.
People will only go as deep in their honesty as the leader models. If you want to create a culture of candor, set the tone. Yes, this takes courage. That’s why it’s called leadership.
10. Create equal airtime.
For people to feel included, each team member needs to feel that their voice is heard as equally as everyone else’s. Draw out the quiet people, and make sure that the more vocal people don’t dominate discussions.
11. Ask, rather than tell.
People haven’t really shown up until their voice is in the room. If you lead by telling, people can be passive recipients and check out. To build interest and engagement, start by asking questions and soliciting input. It’s a game-changer.
12. Build in breaks.
While digital calendars can book back-to-back-to-back meetings with ease, what works on paper doesn’t work so well in real life. Set your default settings for 25 or 50 minutes, so people can transition from one focus to the next. If you’re planning on meeting for more than 90 minutes, build in a break. Remember, you’re leading people, not “human resources”.
If there’s one leadership trait that successful leaders share, it’s consistency. Habits are best built in small doses, repeated and strengthened over time. Leadership success comes from the unglamorous work of consistently applying these fundamentals. As philosopher William James said over 100 years ago, “Small, seldom-seen habits have the power to bear us irresistibly toward our destiny.”
