Positive Leadership Qualities
Negative leadership has a lasting impact too… the difference between leading for the right and the wrong reasons… Manipulation vs inspiration… Using others or serving others…
I was very intentional about the verbiage I used when emphasizing The Lasting Impact of Positive Leadership. Make no mistake though, the impact of a negative leader can be just as powerful and last just as long. With that in mind, let’s make sure we have a crystal-clear understanding of the differences between the two - and we’re clear on what drives someone in one direction or the other…
Several years ago as Cindy and I were leading a group through an in depth study of John Maxwell’s book Everyone Communicates, Few Connect, working through various principles and practices we can apply to communicate effectively with the teams we lead, one participant kept asking what would prevent someone from using the things we were discussing to manipulate the people around them. Quite honestly, I had never considered that before they asked (and I’ve never had anyone ask that question since). We bantered back and forth for a while until I finally had my fill. I ended discussion on that particular point by saying that the best way I knew for someone to not be manipulative was for someone to not be manipulative! That individual didn’t receive it all that well but everyone else in the group seemed relieved.
While that exchange was focused on communication, we have been asked similar questions about what leadership really is. And if you pay much attention to how nearly anyone in a position of authority tends to be referred to as a leader, there’s no wonder! Before we look at any positive leadership qualities at all, let’s make sure we’re on the same page with what leadership truly is… I believe leadership is an action, and that action is seen by others as we work to help those around us become better than they would have been without us. When we do this in a way that inspires them to achieve results that serve everyone involved, it’s the kind of positive leadership that makes a lasting impact. But if we use our position or authority to push the people around us to perform better, serving our own purposes over theirs, that’s manipulation - and not going to make the lasting impact of positive leadership…
If you’d like to dig further into the differences, Cindy shares some excellent examples in lesson two of our Emerging Leader Development course!
When it comes to identifying positive leadership qualities, there’s no shortage of articles to be found through an internet search; I don’t think even Homer Simpson could find the end of that and he’s the one who found the end of the internet! I believe the secret to making sure the rubber meets the road with whatever positive leadership qualities we focus on is for us to be absolutely certain the qualities, traits, skills, or whatever we call them are based on the values we’re building into our organization’s culture!
Value In Every Role
In digging through all the various lists detailing positive leadership qualities from a simple internet search, I found one from PositivePsychology.com called Positive Leadership: 30 Must-Have Traits and Skills. Whew! That’s a bunch… Quite honestly, I almost skipped it altogether. The idea of learning 30 of anything is a bit daunting but with leadership already requiring so much from us, it may as well have been 3,000! That said, the article did a fair job of segmenting the 30 so it wasn’t quite as overwhelming as the title suggested…
The list of five that I found from Abilene Christian University was a bit easier to digest. Truthfully, the four that Gallup picked were even closer to something I felt like most leaders could add to their current workload (not specifically those four, just the idea of focusing on only four…). But I think we can simplify it even more!
Here’s the part I found most interesting: there was almost no overlap in any of the lists I read through. And I don’t have a huge issue with that. As much as I hate to admit it, I can't rip off my dress shirt to reveal a giant S on my t-shirt (you know, for Superman…). I’ve had to come to terms with the idea that I cannot be all things to all people, and I really don’t want to be! As leaders, we need to accept that we just won’t be great at everything our organizations need. To that end, even our organizations won’t be great at everything. When it comes right down to it, we’ll need to identify which positive leadership qualities we can do better than anyone else and make sure that’s exactly what we’re doing!
A friend responded to a message I sent to the folks who are part of A Daily Dose Of Leadership that touched on what I detailed above by sharing how she never expected her team members to do something that she wasn’t willing to do herself. While that can be tough at times, especially when the whole reason we have team members in certain roles is because we don’t have time to do everything ourselves, I believe that really boils down to humility. In all the years I was responsible for orientation with new employees, regardless of the organization signing the check at the time, I hammered the point that no one in the company was better than anyone else. We all had a job to do and everyone should be shown respect. Whether it was emptying the trash, negotiating with a vendor, making sure we had enough on staff, or overseeing the whole shooting match, the job mattered! Otherwise, we shouldn’t have someone in the role. And while each of those tasks required a different level of skill, that should have no bearing on the value of the individual.
When we’re willing to exemplify humility in every aspect of our leadership role, we show that we value our team members just as much (or even more) for who they are as we do for what they contribute to the organization. As we maintain that standard for all the leaders on our team, we’ll soon start seeing the lasting impact that only positive leadership can have - with our team members, as well as with the people in their lives.
Now let’s dig into a positive leadership quality that’s so important, we would rarely do business with someone who hasn’t earned it!
Something You Just Can’t Buy
In addition to showing humility to every individual on the teams we lead in a way that exemplifies just how much we truly value them as individuals, we need to do everything in our power to earn something from them that can never be bought…
For more than twenty years now, I’ve heard John Maxwell emphasize that “Leadership is influence. Nothing more, nothing less.” While there are plenty of organizations out there that serve as examples for getting results through sheer force, cracking the whip or simply flexing the muscles of positional authority, that’s always going to require direct oversight. You’ve heard the phrase, when the cat’s away…? Well, if we’re going to treat our team members like mice, we should probably expect them to play when we’re away!
But if we’re serious about developing the positive leadership qualities that have a lasting impact on the individuals we lead, we’re not gonna get it done by looming over them with some sort of threat if they’re not heeding our every command. That’s actually an incredibly effective way to enhance the recruiting process - for our competitors! If we want to earn the kind of authentic influence that folks will buy into and support whether we’re watching their every move or not (and I’ve never seen a leader who’s had time for that kind of surveillance), there’s a positive leadership quality that can’t be overlooked…Our teams have to be able to trust us unequivocally!
I’m guessing you’re familiar with the idea that we do business with people we know, like, and trust… As I’ve dug into the science that backs the DISC Model of Human Behavior, I’ve come to understand that idea varies slightly depending on whether our primary focus is the task at hand or the people involved in that particular task. As someone who’s a bit more task focused, I need to trust someone before I can really like them. Folks who are more people focused will usually need to like someone before they’re willing to trust them. In either case, very little influence is ever gained without trust being in place!
In that same second lesson of our Emerging Leader Development course that I referenced before, we challenge participants to think about the leaders they’ve had to that point in their own careers who they knew cared for them, they knew could help them, and they could trust implicitly. We often ask for examples, and end up hearing some amazing stories! As we consider the importance of trust as a positive leadership quality, I’ll ask you to consider whether there’s ever been a leader in your life who’s had a lasting impact that you weren’t able to trust… I’d be stunned if there was!
Now, just like we do in that session, let’s flip things around… How would your team members answer those questions about you? Most importantly right now, do they know they can trust you? Are they 100% certain that you’re focused on what’s best for the entire team (leadership inspiration) over what helps you the most (authoritative manipulation)? This is something we just can’t buy, but when our motives are pure, this shouldn’t be all that hard to earn. It always requires work so let’s look at the positive leadership quality we can apply to make that work even more effective…
This Makes Leading So Much Easier…
Let’s be honest, carrying all the responsibility that comes with leadership is never easy. And if we really want to make the kind of lasting impact that only comes from developing the positive leadership qualities we’ve been working through to this point, we’ll have our hands full - even with the humility and trust we just looked at firmly in place! But what if I told you there was one thing we could each do to lead with humility and earn trust fast? Would that help make developing those positive leadership qualities any easier?
Cindy and I open several of the different sessions we do covering the foundations of recognizing and understanding communication styles by facilitating an exercise that shows how much more effective we can be in nearly anything we do when we have a format in place or a pattern to follow. Earning the authentic influence we’ll need to lead our teams well and have a lasting positive impact on their lives is no different. And when we get this one positive leadership quality right, making it part of who we are, there won’t be any question as to whether we’re working to manipulate or to inspire!
So what could be that effective and still be a simple quality to develop?
I’ve said countless times that I don’t believe leadership comes from a position or a title; it’s not a thing we can be or have. I’m convinced that leadership should be viewed as a verb; an action we take. And the most powerful positive leadership quality I’ve ever seen that exemplifies that action is service! When we look for ways we can serve our team, helping them be more effective in everything they do, and ways we can eliminate turmoil or conflict from their jobs, we make a lasting impact that won’t likely be matched by many other things.
Don’t misunderstand what I mean by service though! I’m not suggesting that we do things for our team members that they’re required to do. Just like catering to a child’s every desire typically creates an entitled adult, not holding our team members accountable to do what they’re required to do is anything but serving them…
The kind of service I’m referring to from a leadership perspective is doing the things to help our team members be more effective that can’t do for themselves, the things that only a leader has the power or authority to do. That will look different in any organization, but the intent will not! When we can identify the specific things we can do to truly serve our teams, eliminating conflict and providing them with the resources they need to be the best they can be, we impact their performance right away but we also set an example they can follow from that point forward.
Next time, we’ll take a look at a few folks throughout history who have lived out positive leadership qualities. After that, we wrap this all up by looking at some tangible benefits we can expect to see in our organizations from how these qualities make a lasting impact on our teams.