How much honesty is enough / needed? = how much authenticity is required for different relationships?
If we are told that being authentic is essential to building trust with others, then how much do we reveal of ourselves while being authentic in our relationships with them.
Here's an interesting Ted Talk on authenticity and leadership from psychopaths.
While the similarities to leadership are intriguing, the speaker raises critical points about how much authenticity is required for us in our relationships.
Who do you consider to be a leader worth admiring? By admire I mean that you are so impressed by them (vision, accomplishments, style, etc) that you celebrate them, become their fan and would like to adopt some of their behaviours into your life.
So... Gandhi? Hitler? Churchill? Your neighbourhood businessman? A preacher / priest? A film actor? A family member? A friend? Well, that's your choice.
Now, consider this Ted Talk by Martin Gutmann (the trigger for this short article) that tries to understand this by asking if, by actually celebrating the wrong leaders, we are thereby creating an aspiration to become what might actually be an ineffective leader? If so, what could be the repercussions (on self / team / organization / society) when we celebrate the only shiny (media / social media) side of leadership?
There's a lot of food for thought in this video. For me, one of the most provoking ideas was about what are the measures by which we tend to judge leaders. Or rather, which measures are most appropriate to evaluate leaders?
This further reminded me of discussions I have had during my corporate days while hiring candidates at any level or promoting employees. Practically everyone at the discussion had a different criterion preference when evaluating the person, and it would frequently take us time to understand the other person's perspective when we didn't understand and disagreed with the evaluation.
Things moved forward only when we shared our perspective on the factors we looked at when evaluating the candidate.
And the two final thoughts that struck me from this video:
Is there a leader authentic enough to be worth admiring, particularly when we look at the current behaviours of some of the world's politicians and business leaders?
How do I leverage my strengths to become a leader authentic enough to be admired?
Ethics and leadership are regularly discussed together, especially over the past decade or so. Corporate scams that have led to C-suite leaders facing jail time are in the news often.
One often wonders what if any ethics were considered and why ethics were not followed by those leaders.
Here's a superb and practical article on how to develop #ethicalleadership.
I love the questions for self-inquiry provided in it.
From the article: "It’s important to remember that whatever we think, say or do has consequences on ourselves and others – however small our actions are."
Photo by Wallace Chuck from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/wooden-chair-in-dark-room-3842213/
From the article - "The world is not black and white, and the really good CEOs will need to draw on curiosity and conviction to navigate this,”
For me - more than traits, these are actually things that the future #leader must do pretty much daily, irrespective of their level in the organization. So a lot of skill will have to go into delivering on these areas.
By the way - it wouldn't hurt individuals and aspiring leaders to adopt these traits as early as possible.
If as a leader / learning / HR professional, you are thinking about making #coaching and #mentoring available for more people instead of only leaders, this article will help you work out the benefits of this approach.
From the article - "With employee demand increasing for more customized learning and development experiences, coaching can help boost learning, especially in digital or hybrid environments."
Trainers, consultants, facilitators and coaches are often called in by organizations to make things right. This generally involves'fixing' some process or someone.
Sometimes, they forget that people can't really be fixed, or that a lot of other things, including themselves, will also have to #change.
Interestingly, changing oneself first is the only and best option towards changing others.
Here is another list of #expectations of #skills and capabilities that a #leader should have / develop. Read the article here.
I don't personally see anything new in this list (Read the book "How Did They Manage?" for more about leadership management).
Here's what I know:
The Strategically Smart leader knows that he cannot know and do it all, so he hires a team that complements his weaknesses with their #strengths and hires a Strengths coach to support them all.
The job of the C-Suite folk just got tougher over the past 2 years. Well-being is one of the many items at the forefront of the already numerous things they have to focus on in 2022 and beyond. They have to really, really prepare themselves for all these challenges.
This article talks about 7 areas they can focus their self-development efforts on.
My thoughts - The C-suite has to work as a well-oiled team, simply because no one person has all the answers. The need to hire people with #complimentingstrengths is stronger now than ever before. So there must also be focus on building this team of complementing talents through strengths based hiring.
Interesting read on how #leaders can become a #confidencebuilder for their #team members.
From the article: "Most managers dread giving feedback. Offering a blend of praise and
criticism is supposed to help your team members do more of what they’re
good at and improve in areas where they’ve missed the mark. But research
shows it rarely works that way"
Here's an excellent read on what can help a leader excel as a #leader. The article talks of the leader being able to leverage both his #strengths and his team's strengths, which in turn leads to better results. Read on... here
Feel glad that I am a #strengthscoach and a #situationalleadership certified trainer.
As a member of the IAF (International Association of Facilitators), we celebrate FacWeek every year in the month of October where we facilitators go out and do 90 minute sessions for corporates, NGOs and Educational Institutes - probono.
I have been doing this for IAF since 2018, and this year was no exception. I did four sessions on topics chosen by that organization. Here is the feedback from "The Resilient Leader" session that I did for two organizations. In one of the sessions, I had the pleasure of having Hardy Alexander as my co-facilitator.
Have a look at the feedback and let me know what you think.
If you want me to do this session (it's actually a full two-day workshop, write to me at ryanbbarretto@hotmail.com
Wondering if you should be hiring a coach? Read this lucid article to get your answer.
Contact me to know how strengths coaching will get you results. With my coaching, you will become a strong, empathetic and focused leader and will enable you to grow your organization successfully.
