And then the sunbeams appeared!

How can so many people in leadership positions be so dim?? To me, the logic for success for most organisations is simple:

• the organisation will succeed through the performance of its people
• so they need to be engaged rather than talked at, and
• a major part of what people want to be engaged in is an uplifting and energising sense of the future.

That is, Deliver flows from Engage which needs articulation of a compelling Future. That is, F then E then D!

So why am I still meeting senior players of major organisations who don’t see this and are stuck in some ‘Super Manager’ rather than Leader Mode? If you work in such an organisation, please introduce them to The Work Foundation research into outstanding leadership. It finds:

Outstanding leaders see people as the route to performance. They are deeply people- and relationship-centred rather than just people-oriented. They give significant amounts of time and focus to people. For good leaders, people are one group among many that need attention. For outstanding leaders, they are the only route to sustainable performance. They not only like and care about people, but have come to understand at a deep level that the capability and engagement of people is how they achieve exceptional performance.

So this week, first check in on how you’re doing as a leader in this regard. And then send colleagues and bosses the attached summary of the research and get some new conversations going about how good is the leadership around here and what can we do to improve it?

For more information feel free to download the Outstanding Leadership: Research Highlights.

By Steve Radcliffe