Happy Sunday Everyone:
Common theme right now, and seems to always be, is around leadership. Some leaders are frustrated with their teams, and many teams are frustrated with their leader, so is it the chicken or the egg? Thinking about this, I asked my team Friday to write me 3 bullets they think I do well as a leader and 3 bullets I need to work on. I’ll save the bullets but in a nutshell the positive was they believe I care deeply about them, in and out of the office, I am honest and transparent with them, I attack the problem, not them, I have high expectations but fair. Negative, I don’t always follow my own rules, I’m light on details after client communication back to them & I’m too hard on myself i.e. be happier, which leaks over to the team. I have the luxury of having a small team relative to folks on this email but I think it applies across the board, the leader dictates everything to a team, or to a company. Sounds obvious but not sure we spend enough time thinking about it. A mediocre leader will attract a mediocre team, a strong leader will attract a strong team. you need to ask yourself the question “if you were you, which of course you are, would you work for you? would you be on your team? and if yes or no, why?” What’s your mindset around your single employee, your team, your branch, or your company with your employees? If you resent them, I can all but guarantee they resent you, or certainly will soon, if you care about them, genuinely, they will care about you and your business, and they will give you more. I believe I have the right team now and by having this belief, I trust them, I trust their opinion, I trust their advice, so when they tell me I need to follow my own rules more, I take stock and recognize my own feeling on people who don’t practice what the preach, and I hate it…so this is feedback I need and will work on. I don’t think we need to wait for annual reviews, I think in large part they’re b.s. Sometimes we just need to get a gut checks from the people we work with. The best teams I see out there, a combination of good volume and great moral, all have leaders who put time and energy into being strong leaders.
Perhaps you might take a few minutes to take stock on what kind of a leader you are. For me personally I have a long way to go but I’ve been focused on it for the past 5 years and I can see a change in my own team and how we work together, all of which is positive.
Hope you have a great week.