Are You a Leader?

In some recent interaction with others about leadership, we discussed the importance of realism in assessment of ourselves and others regarding strengths, weaknesses, and limits. This was prompted by a question that an aspiring leader asked me some time back: “Would you consider me to be a leader?” My observation is that many people, especially men, do not have an honest and accurate view of themselves regarding leadership. Some of this is a result of a lack of honest feedback from others, who know and care about us. Another reason is confusion between leadership style and leadership ability. People influence others, based on how they are wired, so it does not look the same for all people. Still another might be the confusion between charisma and leadership. While there are people, who have more natural attractiveness and influence than others, the most effective leaders may not be the most charismatic people. Jim Collins confirmed this in his book Good to Great. All of this gives rise to an important question: “What characterizes true leaders?” While I have some thoughts on this, I am curious as to the thoughts of others.

Values

Values: As a result of some research that I conducted on organizational leadership some time back, I discovered several things related to values:
-People tend to be more impacted by an organization’s values than its vision.
-People learn values more by what is actually done than from what is written on paper.
-Organizational culture, in large measure, is a reflection of an organization’s values.
-Leadership has the greatest impact on organizational values and culture.
-Changing culture necessitates changing values, and the time needed to make that change depends in large measure on how ingrained the values are. The change must begin with leadership. Sometimes leaders make the mistake of trying to implement such change without a proper understanding of the values and trying to bring it about too quickly.
-Lack of agreement with and commitment to values can cause serious morale issues.
-It is the responsibility of leadership to operate in line with the values and to clarify them with others.
-If one is not in agreement with an organization’s values, he/she needs to change or possibly to leave the situation.

All of this challenges me to:
-Assess my personal values.
-Assess the values of my organization and how consistently we practice what is written on paper.
-Assess the values of other organizations with which I am a part.

In my recent reflections on leadership, I was reminded of the need to communicate truthfully to others. This can be hard, because people may not be receptive to the truth and/or we may not communicate it clearly or discreetly. One area where honesty is needed is in the communication of expectations and limits. For example, in seeking to recruit a person recently I was reluctant to mention to him that he would have to work some on the midnight to eight shift, fearing that I would lose him. With another person I had to clarify his boundaries, as he tended to take on more authority than he had been given at times. Another area where honesty is needed is in the communication of people’s weaknesses and limits, as people tend to be unrealistic at times in their evaluation of themselves. However, it does them a great service to help them to see themselves as they really are, so that they can focus on what they do best. Along these lines I recently had to convey to an employee that she was weak in the area of organization when she viewed herself differently.