As a leader, I am sure you take great pride in your work. This perhaps speaks to why you’ve been promoted to a top position or are successfully leading your own small business. Innately, you probably also strive to become the best leader in your industry, field or organization. Regardless of industry, in today’s dynamic work, it is important not just to be a leader but to become a top coach.
In this week’s blog post, I’ll share three leaderships tips that will help keep you at the top of your field. After all, growth is constant and learning is a life long journey.
Say it with me….Let’s jump in!
Leadership Life Lesson #1- Create a Coaching Down Culture
In my book, Serve Up, Coach Down, I spend quite some time explaining why it is important to create a culture that aligns with this principle. Gone are the days of the archaic ‘servant’ leadership. Instead, leaders, especially those in the middle, must come to realize that the potential for greatness lays in coaching their employees.
Here’s why:
“The best leaders in the middle know that when they start caring about their employees’ professional and personal development, those employees will care more about the business and its success. But that requires spending time with them to make them better.”
Quote from Serve up, Coach Down
If you want dedicated employees, you must invest time in their growth. Coaching down enables a team culture that leads to better company buy-in, more committed employees and better quality work.
Now, let me be very clear, coaching is not coddling. It’s not about removing challenges but instead creating an environment where employees become result-oriented through problem-solving issues, not running away. If this means a temporary failure, then ok, it is a part of the learning process. As long as they are coached to fail up, then they will learn a very valuable lesson from you about persevering to achieve success.
Leadership Life Lesson #2- Empowerment is Your Best Tool
Earlier we spoke about problem-solving issues, but to get to this place employees must feel empowered to own their decision. They need to be coached to identify with the decision vs against going along with it.
In fact, research shows that empowered employees are more likely to demonstrated higher job performance and experience better job satisfaction. This is what I call a winner-takes-all situation, because not only is the employee happy and engaged but the organization benefits from high performing individuals.
After all,
“The knowledge gap is only present when someone decides not to execute and a leader decides to accept it… success only comes when you believe in what you’re doing and see the reward to be worth the sacrifice you must make to achieve it.”
Quote from Serve up, Coach Down
In my book I give an example of Mark. He’s a good boss who empowers his employees and this makes them more efficient to serve him as a leader. By coaching down, Mark established a very clear rule; never make excuses. For his employees, this is so ingrained in their corporate culture that there is less time wasted on blame and more time spent focusing on important tasks that get the job done. Be like Mark!
Leadership Life Lesson #3- Create a Change Enabling Environment
In today’s work, everything can change with just the click of a button (or a government announcement). Your job as a good leader will require you to quickly adapt to these changes.
Those leaders that can get their teams to change faster, quicker, with more committed employees- win every time.
Change is universal to all businesses, so the specifics don’t matter much across industries. What matters is the level of certainty and speed, leaders ( especially LIMs), are in a position to facilitate. This needs to be firmly in place BEFORE change happens.
If your team trusts you as a leader, there will be less time spent on why things are changing and more time focused on adapting to these changes. As a good LIM (leader in the middle), there is even a more delicate balance of managing the change and valuing the insight that your team can also add to the process. I guarantee you, that if you spend the time coaching your team for the inevitable – change, your team will be ready for whatever comes your way.
For more tips on leadership, check out my book Serve Up, Coach Down.
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