Followers need leaders that tell them the truth AND help them find the path out if they choose to work through a challenge. Here is a story about telling the truth, leadership, followership, and how it can make a big difference in a life.
Leaders need to know others and be known by others. Here is a tool to help start those conversations – it is great leadership and great followership.
Refocusing on Employee Engagement is an important topic right now as the economy turns, but stop and think of what too many organizations/leaders stopped doing that got us here. Here are four habits that will make at least part of this initiative go away.
Keeping key people that are dissatisfied is critical for your business. It is also free. Here is one idea that was shared with me that is not new, but it is well timed by a small organization that wants to win the talent war.
Laughter is good medicine for any workplace. Here is one idea that helps teams have a little fun together. Any to add?
Leadership is challenging. One challenge is creating a safe place for conversations and still have boundaries when problems come to you that are beyond what you can help solve. The formal name is Employee Assistance Program, but another good name is Leadership Assistance Program.
Performance. Accountability. Terms used often in organizations and yet our actions as leaders send a message that our job is to fix people. A leaders job is to care for people and give them an opportunity to join the discussion.
As leaders, are we really in charge of what our people finish. Does the accountability discussion start with a question or a statement? Help people find a few key things, and they will finish.
Helping people define a future place/role they aspire to is challenging because the outcome takes time. Tyranny of the urgent makes these conversations hare, even though the questions to answer are simple. It takes great leadership and great followership to make these conversations and the outcomes happen.
So is the person failing because they are a rotten apple or are they in a rotten barrel? A question worth asking and some perspective on how it can be a powerful question for both leaders and followers.
Seth Godin talks about people as artists and their work as art. Think about the artists you work with and what they produce. What is your art?
Use these three adjectives to drive and measure your efforts to develop as a leader.