10 Things We All Want From Our Leaders
Success includes avoiding useless behaviors, paying attention to people, and tending to small things.
12 things we wish our leaders would stop:
- Tolerating high performers who act like jerks.
- Avoiding tough issues.
- Giving themselves special privileges.
- Ignoring morale.
- Throwing people into situations without preparation.
- Pushing, pushing, pushing.
- Meddling in everyone’s business.
- Throwing tantrums like babies.
- Rushing around like chickens with their heads cut off.
- Treating people like tools.
- Complaining about how tough their job is.
- Forgetting what it’s like to worry about paying the bills.
Success is more about people than you think.
10 things we all want from our leaders:
- Please get jazzed about something. I’m tired of long faces on my leaders. You think it makes you look important. In reality, you look depressed.
- Tell others about my extraordinary effort, remarkable results, and positive energy.
- Say thank you. So what if I’m paid to do the job. Gratitude is cost effective.
- The leaders who influence me the most have been in my life the longest. Hang with me when times are tough.
- Let me know how I’m doing. Nearly every person I ask says they would like more feedback.
- Lead me to do things that matter with other team members. Adopt an orphan as a team. Serve a local non-profit.
- Don’t pretend it’s easy, just believe we can find a way forward if we all pull together.
- Tell me where we’re going and trust me to make wise decisions to get there.
- See life from my point of view, not just yours.
- Tell me what I need to get ahead.
Bonus: Have a life outside of work. Encourage me to do the same.
What do you wish leaders would stop?
What do you want from your leaders?
Excellent post Dan. Universal truth! I particularly loved – Have a life outside of work. Encourage me to do the same. This one hit home…I am self employed but I realize i could sometimes take this entire success journey a tad to seriously “You think it makes you look important. In reality, you look depressed.” I am jazzed about what I’m doing yet my seriousness sometimes makes my family uncomfortable. Thanks for making me aware. You can’t change what you don’t see 🙂
Thanks Giselle. It’s so true. We get consumed in with a project or business and forget about people. Sometimes, I wonder why others aren’t as consumed as I am. 🙂
Wow, Dan. Sold. There are a couple of folks to whom I would like to send this link, but I fear it would swamp their canoes. I think this is another one for the Rockwall. 😀
I wish leaders would stop with holding information! I see this as a major marker of their insecurity and as an obstacle that prevents me and my team from making informed decisions. I want honesty and integrity from my leaders. It would also be nice to see a bit more compassion for colleagues and team members when they need it. And finally – I love #1 – Get jazzed about something! Work and life are so much better when there is joy and meaning in what you do. This tip should apply to everyone, not just leaders. Smiling is infectious… : )
Good stuff! The list of 12 ‘stop doings’ is a good one and #1 ranks in my top 5 pet peeves. Being a high performer is good thing. Being a high performer and behaving like a professional is a great thing.
With the younger ones (aka “Millennials”) entering mid-level management, people skills become more important in leading them.
An executive’s or leader’s technical skills become less important and the people skills become more important as he or she rises up the ladder and the size of the unit increases. And you can’t lead people who don’t trust you!
Dan two adds to your list
1. Leaders need to stop being afraid-of decisions or their bosses, etc.
2. Leaders should take accountability for their or the team’s decisions-good or bad.
Good subject!
Brad
Brad James, blogger
http://www.bradszootales.com
Dan, in your post today I see behaviors of “high consideration,” simple things we do and fail to do—words of reward and approbation, for example, and junk like neglecting esprit de corps, and common decency like goodness and kindness, or selfish conduct.
I believe staff members want their leadership to be emotionally well, knowledgeable, and spiritually strong “when they need them.” They want to trust our emotions, our sincerity, integrity, our ability to teach, and our willingness to guide them onward and upward in their quest for performance fulfillment. They want a leader to demonstrate what’s possible. And, I believe, they want a leader’s commitment to be connected with how they treat their fellow human beings.
Is it too much for staff members to ask of leadership that we not be intellectual giants and emotional dwarfs…theoretically knowing and spiritually ignorant?
I say if we are going to push and put any stress on our staff members let it be EUSTRESS…a positive push, the kind that gets their blood pumping to prepare them for the performance that is healthful and fulfilling. Isn’t this what we as leaders want for ourselves?
Man, that’s good stuff. Been of the office all week learning about new opportunities to challenge and move our group forward
I’m struggling between over excitement to share what I learned and how I will get caught up from being out. Thanks for the well needed reminder that is all about them and not me.
Well put! You could also add ‘no change for changes sake.’ So many times I have seen subordinates become the collateral damage of organisational change – paying the highest, and worst costs of change in their personal and financial lives – and when you catch up 6 months or a year later and ask “So how are the numbers?” or “What was the outcome?” you find out that all of that change has not advanced the organisation ANY further. And there is no accountability for leaders who create great damage to peoples lives yet achieve NOTHING for it. A surprisingly large number of managers have no formal training in management. Whilst leaders can sit around boardroom tables and feel great about making decisions, unless a comprehensive strategic and operational plan has been (unfortunately tediously and laboriously) put together after possibly many drafts, outcomes and objectives will need a miracle to be met. Competency levels can be much higher if senior leaders hire the the right people, with the right training, who are not afraid to disagree with decisions and only too happy to shirk the ‘Yes Man’ tag. This is a big task, and it is all too easy to walk away from doing the hard stuff and just make a decision anyway.
My first rule of leadership: The privilege of leading confers an obligation to serve others, not a license to indulge oneself.
Stop institutionalized ” cronyism “.
Want leaders who have the moral & ethical backbones to stop “Stop institutionalized cronyism”; especially in the highest management and C-suite levels!
This most might be AKA “The Dos and Don’ts of Effective Leadership.”
Good information but we all need to be aware that sharing the responsibility must also include accountability.