Ask any company owner or Chief Operating Officer (CEO), if they would like to have managers and specialist who would be acting as true leaders and you will hear the answer loud and clear, that yes, this is what they are looking for. There are certain personal skills that every leader should have or gain in order to be a good leader, but if person have skills, there is a question still: is every company ready for certain level of leadership?
Leader is an individual who acts as an owner and does not demand for instructions.
Person with leadership skills normally are the ones who set their own rules, know and understand what their long term goal is and like to have certain amount of freedom to implement improvements in the organization. Leaders are the ones who can stand behind their opinion and look for potential solutions in the areas where things are not working. He / she will always question the state of mind and will not use first no as an ultimate answer, but instead will try at least 3-5 various ways to change status quo in the organization.
As nice organization full of leaders would look like, it is important to understand is your organization ready for such people to pitch in.
One of the most important things for person who wants to improve status quo in the organization has a mandate of implementing things:
if culture in the organization is that every single tiny thing needs to be aligned and discussed, it will be a buzz killer for any leader to do what is right, because person is just stuck in endless conversations. It does not mean that there should not be anything aligned, but there should be clear border line, where you give leader a mandate to move ahead. Without it may look that you do not trust the person, therefore you expect person not to move any direction without informing or aligning things with others.
if company style of working is to have numerous catch up's, reports, check in's during the week, that will create feeling of mistrust as well. Such environment encourages to question whether you are seen as a task doer or the one who can work in self- organized manner and deliver the result at the end of it.
if company higher leadership do not show signs of encouraging people to act as owners of their area, that will keep people in the state of asking for directions. How higher management can show that they want people to act as leaders? Simple - by getting their hands dirty and coming up with improvements and implementing them.
if company is asking and making instructions on every step, it actually limits opportunities for the people to be more independent and approach things in their own manner. This one is very hard to overcome, because organizations have instructions mostly because people would know what to do and save time, but down side of it, is that no new thing, will work without somebody holding hand, will not encourage people to look for optimal ways of how to do it and eventually you will find yourself in a situation that no new assignments can be delivered without clear step by step instruction. Such environment often kills any opportunities for leadership skills growth within existing company community.
Final thoughts.
If your aspiration is company being driven by leaders, there are certain things that you need to fix, before even asking to act as a leader: give freedom to act, stop checking on every step of the way, stop giving instructions, instead ask to come up with their own path, how things need to work. All of these may become a buzz kill for any person with leadership skills package.
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