Leadership has to be seen to be done

This is the first of a 3 part series on my top 3 attributes of a dream company.

Taking a cue from the judicial principle that says

Justice has to be seen to be done,

I feel that for building a good organization

Leadership has to be seen to be done.

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

There are leaders who can plan well. There are leaders who can communicate well. There are leaders who can motivate well. But leaders who can assimilate many desirable traits and create a culture of high trust and high performance are rare.

Creating trust among people requires charismatic and inspiring leadership skills. Charisma in this context is the ability to inspire people to do their best towards the objective of the organization. Here are 5 things leaders can do to become more charismatic:

5 Traits of Charismatic Leadership:

1. Connect with people genuinely. Understand them in context, Listen more, speak when necessary. Remember “You are what you speak”
2. Create a shared understanding of the organisation vision. Spend time having real conversations. Encourage questions and clarify doubts. Accept and acknowledge good suggestions, even if you cannot implement them right away.
3. Delegate work, keep the ball moving, don’t become a bottleneck. Once the vision and objective are understood clearly, delegation is easier and effective. Delegating also makes people feel capable and motivates them.

4. Don’t Preach, Persuade when necessary. People change when you demonstrate trust, emotion and logic. If your vision is well-understood and aligned, persuasion is easier. Caution: Don’t over-sell

5. Respect different perspectives, synthesize them and make decisions. As a leader, it is not just about skills, but about perspectives.

There are many other good things that leaders do like strategy, planning, firefighting, policy-making, etc. But unless these activities have an impact on the organisation, they’re not of much value. To have an impact, all stakeholders in the organization need to understand and see these in action. The 5 traits above can help leaders have an impact, in other words — Leadership is seen to be done.

Leadership is measured by impact, not popularity

Go to Part 2 — Innovation

Go to Part 3 — Culture