Business Tips from SCORE: Leaders, not managers, lead to business success
Many people think that successful businesses, especially small businesses, have great managers. But the reality is that really successful businesses have great leaders.
Leaders achieve the goals and objectives of an enterprise through their teams. Leaders are people-focused and managers tend to be structure focused. Many professionals think that you have to be an effective manager first before you become an outstanding leader.
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Effective leadership is manifest in a number of qualities.
Leaders know themselves. They know their strengths and their weaknesses. They are able to assess their performance objectively and adjust when needed. Strong leaders ask for feedback and take action to correct deficiencies.
Leaders have a vision for their business. They have a clear sense of where they want the business to go and how they want to get there.
They are big-picture people and see beyond opening the door each day. They are planners and set out a roadmap for their team to follow.
Strong leaders take risks. They have the courage to evaluate situations and act where the outcome is not guaranteed. Leaders understand that risking failure is part of the formula for success. In doing so, they are decision-makers. It means defining, analyzing and assessing the elements of a given situation. Some of those decisions may be difficult and maybe unpopular, but they understand by not making the decision will have a long-term negative effect on the business.
Leaders build teams that are productive and motivated to achieve the leader’s vision. They inspire the best in the teams to achieve results in their work they did not believe possible.
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Strong leaders are trustworthy and can be depended on to support team members who experience failure. Before employees will follow, they need to have trust in their leaders. Warren Bennis, The Leadership Institute of Northern California says qualities that establish trust are: competence, consistency and caring.
Lifelong learning is another quality that is manifest in strong leaders. They have the curiosity to learn something new every day and are continually learning and sharing with others.
Communication is the basis for all positive actions and for leaders to be effective they need to master the skill of customizing their communications to the person and situation they are engaging. Whether it be persuading, negotiating or just listening, good leaders understand that communication is both verbal and nonverbal.
One characteristic of successful, strong leaders is they want to help others. They go out of their way to help others achieve their objectives and personal potential.
Dr. David Weiss, of Weiss International, uses the acronym SNACK to reach mindfulness, however, this can be applied to leadership.
STOP — just stop whatever you are doing and be aware of the environment in which your team is working. Stopping means slowing down, being present and paying attention to what your team is experiencing regardless of what you are engaged in.
NOTICE — take notice of what is happening in that moment. Is your team member engaged with a disgruntled customer? Are they attempting to unravel a technical problem and are frustrated? Are they lost as to what is the next step in whatever task they are doing?
ACCEPT — accept whatever the situation is without judgment and offer assistance in working through to a solution. When employees are struggling, they need judgment-free acceptance of their situation to feel free to share their situation with you.
CURIOUS — the best way to address a situation is to understand it by being curious and ask well thought out questions that allow the team member to share their frustration, concern or problem facing them. It also makes sense of what your employees are feeling and thinking so as a leader you can act accordingly.
KINDNESS — this value is not always thought of as part of business leadership (or management), however, when leaders respond to situations of distress with kindness, they are able to reach a positive solution for the employee and the enterprise. Kindness means being empathetic and understanding by responding to the situation without judgment.
Contributed by Marc L. Goldberg, Certified Mentor, SCORE Cape Cod & the Islands, Contact us for free and confidential mentoring. www.score.org/capecod, capecodscore@scorevolunteer.org, 508-775-4884. Sources: Dr. David Weiss, Weiss International, Carla Naumburg, Naumburg.org, VibrantLifeForce – Mindful.org, Pinterest infographic by Akrikah.
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This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: Business tips from SCORE: Strong leaders behind successful businesses
