Innerleadershipparameters

Leadership is complex, with various parameters; complex in that there are so many traits and characteristics that are considered when evaluating leadership effectiveness.

Leadership is supposed to be the guiding force in the enterprise, envisioning and leading the business towards its future. Leadership is a sophisticated discipline and it becomes more complex due to the exponential growth of information and frequent disruptions. A leader changes the course of the business by seeing beyond what all others see; and by understanding issues from different angles or unique perspectives. The high-effective leadership is based on varying parameters that can be weighed in to improve leadership effectiveness and maturity.

Growth mindset: Leadership is a journey of driving upwards changes. To make a digital paradigm shift requires a growth mindset from top-down and having an in-depth understanding that things cannot stay the same. To deal with exponential growth of information, dynamic environment, and fierce competitions, growth mindset and cognitive intelligence are in strong demand to ride learning curves and make the progressive movement.

However, in many traditional organizations, some managers still apply a silo mindset to a new way of organizing and this legacy of the old economy limits many organizations to unleash their full growth potential. Thus, an inclusive and growth mindset is the prerequisite of being a good leader; as the digital transformation has to go a few inches deeper for capturing business insight, tap diverse resources, recognize merit and ideas, no matter where they come from, to unlock business potential.

Communication: Communication is the bridge between people and it is the tool to solve problems; consistent, clear communication between all stakeholders is the key to harmonize business relationships and make leadership influence. Communication is not for its own sake, but for making right decisions, solving tough problems, and making progressive changes. Leadership communication effectiveness sets culture tones and drives the long term business competency.

In practice, communication needs to be concise enough to convey the key message; empathetic enough to understand others and creative enough to connect the heterogeneous team-setting. To avoid “lost in translation” syndrome or break down communication bottleneck which is often caused by out of date processes, procedures, practices, culture, politics or leadership style, etc, good communication is based on expertise, contextual understanding, and deep insight. Communication as the soft skill has to be integrated into the effective leadership discipline.

Credibility: Leadership is the capacity to influence others through vision birthed by a conviction of a sense of purpose, motivate the team by a passion, and lead teams by credibility and example. Sound judgment is a hardcore skill to build leadership credibility; consistence in thinking, speaking, action is a trait to enhance credibility. Having a sound judgment and discerning mind to make right decisions is critical to build leadership credibility in today's business dynamic with increasing pace of changes.

Credibility is not the same thing as being likable. It has a number of elements, such as integrity, trustfulness, competence (expertise), sound judgment, accountability, relational sensitivity, and likeability. If you always over promise, and under-deliver, you could end up committing to something that you cannot successfully make; lose credibility. You know people, especially leaders, with high credibility, do what they say, and deliver what they do. So you trust them, and they can make an influence on building a culture of credibility and develop a high performance team and organization.

Professional competency: Strong leadership is the right mix of character and competency. Character is based on authenticity - who you are inside, and competency comes from discovering, sharpening your strength and unleashing your potential. To build influential leadership competency, being an authentic leader is critical because if you know yourself, you are better suited to tackle different challenges that will come your way as a leader; to make you think about what truly drives you to lead and why.

Competencies are interrelated with the traits, and experience. Neither one overshadows the other. Effective leaders are not only experts, being fluent in making professional deliveries, but also becoming more influential on innovating, coaching, and driving transformative changes. Great leaders can integrate their professional competency with leadership vision and influence to create a ripple effect and make a high impact.

Emotional intelligence: Because we live in such a fast-changing, complex, uncertain and ambiguous world, business leaders with high emotional excellence can adapt to change seamlessly, solve problems effortlessly. As we know the cool-headed decision-makers have better emotional management skills for overcoming unconscious bias, taking logic, and making information-based decisions.

Emotional intelligence as one of the essential qualities that makes an effective leader, directly decides one’s adaptability, empathy and maturity. It helps you have an open mind, minimize biases, be cautiously optimistic, be an effective listener and be more creative. Further, business leaders with high emotional intelligence can cultivate a discerning mindset, develop their own language, make the proper framing in order to understand issues or each other with profundity for making sound judgments.

Leadership is complex, with various parameters; complex in that there are so many traits and characteristics that are considered when evaluating leadership effectiveness. Contemporary leadership skills required in any organization must be built on the foundation of the moral competencies –wisdom, justice, courage, and temperance, etc., leads the right direction with clear vision, sound judgment, creativity, empathy, humility and shared human values. in order to build strong influential competency and amplify leadership influence.

Posted in: Future of Leadership,Leadership Master