Are you prepared for the increasing demand of highly skilled managers and leaders? From what I observe in my work, many leaders remain confused about how to strengthen leadership competencies. I don’t believe that formal training and higher education has sufficiently prepared leaders for what lies ahead. Consider this…
Leadership Development
Organizational psychologists have applied the basic tenets of adult developmental stages to leadership development. To summarize:
- Just as children improve their cognitive capacities with age, so do adults. Adults, however, develop according to needs and opportunities, not because of age.
- Not all adults progress through all stages. Some adults can function only at lower levels of development. A small percentage attains higher levels of awareness, wisdom and compassion.
- As leaders progress through developmental levels, they expand their mental and emotional capacities and become increasingly skilled at handling complexity.
- Each stage describes a form of mind: a way of thinking about responsibility, conflicts, perspective and assumptions (about self, others and the world).
- Leaders may operate partially at one stage and occasionally at the next, but return to old habits before transitioning. Transitioning requires changing one’s previous assumptions to expand consciousness.
- Leaders who function at higher developmental stages produce significantly improved business results.
- Knowing a leader’s developmental level, coupled with behavioral action plans and coaching, provides a measure of competitive advantage or disadvantage.
Developmental-stage theory is relatively new and even more cutting-edge when applied to leadership programs. Rather than focusing on training, skills and knowledge, it involves expanding one’s mindset and “forms of mind” (defined by New Zealand leadership coach Jennifer Garvey Berger as our changing capacity to cope with complexity, multiple perspectives and abstraction).
Leadership Mindset
Many people embark on the leadership path with an unfortunate mindset about leadership. Historic self-serving mindsets have contributed to the high degree of employee dissatisfaction and disengagement today. Some experts argue that this trend hasn’t changed much in several generations.
Employees have long indicated what leader character traits engage or compel, and which alienate and cause them to leave. Contrary to old-school thinking, leadership does not succeed when leaders focus on “what’s in it for me.” Leadership prospers only when it aims to benefit the organization; the people they lead. This bashes the notion that leadership is about the four Ps: Power, Prestige, Perks and Privileges.
Leadership author and speaker Kevin Kruse defines leadership as, “a process of social influence which maximizes the efforts of others toward the achievement of a goal.” In other words, leaders employ skills to unify people and guide them along a plan that offers a prosperous future.
Many experts regard leading as the ability to deal with people, visions and ideas, while managing is the ability to coordinate things or tasks. Leaders who are best prepared to lead in 2019 have the right blend of:
- Leadership skills
- Management skills
- People skills
What do you think? Are leaders in your organization prepared? You can call me at 561-582-6060, let’s talk. And as always, I can be reached here, or on LinkedIn.
