Getting Started

Thoughts on Leadership

If you’re a job hunter, matching your skills with the job requirements will bring you closer to landing a job. For instance, the accounting field requires strong math skills, electricians should understand circuits and conductivity, and structural engineers must apply principles of load, support and strength to construction design. Opportunities for leadership often present themselves in specialized fields, like these. The accountant may become CFO with an office staff, the electrician, a project manager overseeing work crews, and the engineer may head a structural design department. Along with their technical knowledge, some professionals find themselves in leadership roles.

This begs the question, are people who lead automatically good at it? Have you ever known a bad or a good leader? And how does one become good at leadership? While some people advance to positions of leadership because they have acquired more knowledge or skills, I’d say that knowledge doesn’t automatically prepare someone to lead others. After thinking about this, I came up with a list of qualities that could define a strong leader.

Productive

A leader does her own share of the work. It’s important that leaders recognize what needs to be done and set goals for completion to keep the team moving forward. But the role doesn’t end there—leaders set the example. Someone with a role-up-your-sleeves and pitch-in attitude is seen as “one of us” when it comes to getting the job done and people are more willing to follow suit. When co-workers need clarification, or re-direction as problems occur, the leader is right there to trouble shoot. 

Egalitarian

A leader sees everyone as equal to the task and each contribution as vital. Here, the leader sets an expectation for success, and shows great confidence in each member of the team. What’s more, people get an ego boost when they know that someone is counting on them to fulfill a job suited to their skills. They try hard not to disappoint. Think of it as an orchestra: individual instruments combine their voices to produce a full, harmonious sound. A successful project depends on the equal contribution of all those involved.

Communicative

Falling within the topic of communication is listener. People have genuine concerns about the way to get something done and, generally, emails and memos cannot take the place of real conversation. Communication through conferencing, inter-office calls and short briefings may interfere with productivity, but the payoff is loyalty to the leader who wants to know what people think. A leader is directly involved in production and project planning.

Delegating

Detail oriented people sometimes have a hard time letting go of the tiniest details. They wear themselves out trying to oversee everything and in the worst-case scenario, they create a non-productive impasse. Individuals can’t move ahead with their work because they aren’t entrusted with responsibility for their share of the job. To delegate is to coordinate the work of the team and dole out tasks. Next, bring everyone back to check-in, re-direct, even re-state the goal and send them back to smooth out the details.

Coalescing

Let’s agree that some people work better alone, and others prefer partnerships, depending on personalities. A leader knows his crew and sets tasks that allow for cooperative groups and the input from individuals. In the end, after the productivity and reviews, a team needs to come together over one best way to move forward. A common agreement is easier to reach when all parties feel that they played a part in choosing the right approach and can back a united effort.

Reflective

Could I have done something different with X team today? Are we on track to finish by Y date? I need to know what Z team needs to become more productive. Questions like these are useful for quick analysis and by attending to small details, the leader can focus on the big picture. Leadership requires practice and it may not suit everyone. But those who adopt positions of leadership can guide and inspire others to achieve greater success.