Leadership

I heard a great quote last week,

“The responsibility of leadership is not to come up with all the ideas

but to create an environment in which great ideas can happen.”

This is the key difference between being a manager and being a leader in our organizations.

Good managers organize process, in other words they have the keen ability to implement and drive processes in areas such as: Recruiting & Hiring Process, Performance Process (accountability), Developing sales people, coaching etc.

Leaders on the other hand manage the people side of the business which include: building the team, recognizing potential, leading effective meetings and inspiring others.

I have often said that as leaders we cannot motivate others, all we can do is inspire people and teams to motivate themselves. In a recent survey 55% respondents said inspiration is the number one thing that people look for in their manager but only 11% suggested that they were receiving this.

So how do we inspire others?

This takes time by getting to know our people and what is important to them.  Dale Carnegie suggested these human relation principles for true leadership:

Begin with praise and honest appreciation.

Call attention to people’s mistakes indirectly.

Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person.

Ask questions instead of giving direct orders.

Let the other person save face.

Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement.  Be hearty in your approbation and lavish in your praise.

Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to.

Use encouragement.   Make the fault seem easy to correct.

Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest.

If you use these principles you will find that you will earn the respect of your team and they will want to follow you.