How to Improve Leadership Qualities

Sum up the high quality leader - being great in Attitude, Aptitude and Altitude.

Business and the world becomes over-complex and hyperconnected, leadership effectiveness and qualities needs to be assessed within the context of the organization, not as a stand-alone program. Day by day should be assessed via mind shift - how do they think; positive influence - how do they lead, competence - how do they cultivate capabilities, performance - how do they make continuous delivery, potential - how do they learn & grow, business results - how do they contribute to their business's long term success, and cultural evolution - how do they walk the talk - be the change agent themselves and ultimate digital masters.

Leadership must be anchored to a full professionalism: Also made of personal qualities such as, independent judgment, critical thinking, professionalism and sense of responsibility and balance through which it becomes possible to earn the role of trust and guiding the organization in which they work, the respect and trust of others. and become a value constructor: These are the qualities essential to improve the quality of people's lives and the future of organizations.

Leadership must embrace the multi-dimensional intelligence or ultimate wisdom: One of the biggest challenges in this complex, multi-polar world is the fact that we need different perspectives, different knowledge and different ways to solve a problem. Sometimes there is not "one" answer: there are some, or many: that is why what is first of all needed is to think as a team. The high quality leadership has very characteristics such as multi-dimensional intelligence and wisdom.

The principle of developing as a leader is a continuous process: Improvement of oneself does not only happen in just one day. Every Day you will learn new things and new styles. Becoming a leader is about being a better person, being committed, to yourself, others, growth, and finding that passion to improve every day. Self-fulfillment, well-being, and satisfaction become the goals of genuine positive leadership; that on these coordinates must measure itself in terms of quality -efficiency and effectiveness; agility and maturity. To the leader is given the responsibility and the privilege to be real, true pioneers, which mind all sorts of gaps. But to be so, they have to think and develop an innovative model of productive governance, train their followers as new leaders, listen to their customers as genuine buyers of their work.

Summing up the high-quality leader -Being great in Attitude, Aptitude, and Altitude -a winning mixture composed of character, intelligence, and competence in a humble frame of self-esteem which makes aware of his/her quality without needing to show them. Among the primary tasks of a leader, there is certainly also that to promote the renewal, the generational change. Be aware of the role of the change agent as a leader, proactively cultivate the qualities:

-Self-awareness and a desire for constant self-improvement

-A clear vision,

-Being a creative communicator.

-Having first rate emotional intelligence

-Make an effective decision, no procrastination

The leadership of the future must become aware of its own resources, being open to new ideas and input from others is a key skill for any leaders to achieve behavioral strategies effectively and have a path of personal and professional improvement. A great preparation, vision, intuition, perseverance and the ability to work hard. But, above all, don't be afraid to take risks and make mistakes, but fail forward to learn with agility.

Digitalization is like a flywheel, and Digital Masters are the one riding above it. Surf more Information about Digital Master:

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The Best indicator of Business Readiness to be more Agile

So the move to agile needs to be agile itself.

Each organization is different, there are various characteristics make or break agile adoption at an organization, but those that successfully transition to being agiler probably share similar characteristics. What are the best indicator of business readiness to be agiler?

C-level support affects many aspects. Awareness of agile (or lack of it) at the top does matter a lot. No matter what happens or desire at other levels, without C-level blessings, any attempt at aligning the projects with agile values turns out to be a waste of time and resources. Being Agile can't happen in isolation of other corporate processes (funding & financial, HR hiring, talent and & performance management; etc.). And it's likely the legacy processes don't support doing work differently and have to be addressed. Changes to the legacy processes need C-level support, otherwise, teams feel like they're running into bureaucratic obstacles and get discouraged because being Agile appears too difficult. And, the recognition C-level executives give for great results related to being Agile really fuel the teams and organizations! The ability for upper management/executives to clearly state what they believe agile will do for an organization and deciding how they will measure its success. Unfortunately, much upper management doesn't even have a proper understanding of what an "agile" environment means to them other than getting things done faster!

Communication is at the heart of building a better, more trusting relationship. Without it, it's hard to see how teams could be successful. If management doesn't trust the people they hired to come up with solutions and do the job right, then management shouldn't have hired them. If management does trust its employees, then let them do their jobs. There shouldn't be much need to "manage" people.  The main goal of Agile is to manage changes, and the best way to do that is to improve the communication. All others points of Agile are great improvements, but this is the principle. Managers and executives have to serve and lead, and the traditional management paradigm needs to shift 180 degrees; leadership teams have to trust and support teams and remove organizational impediments. They need to empower teams and individuals that are closest to the 'problem' to make the right decisions, and ensure that those decision makers have everything they need to implement. The truly trusting relationship can overcome the fears:

-Fear of making an estimate and having it turned into a commitment.

-Fear of pursuing a solution and finding out it doesn’t work.

-Fear of starting something without having all the facts.

-Fear that mistakes are punished.

-Fear that discoveries will be treated as failures to foresee events.

-Fear that all the work will not get done if you don’t force it into the current release.

Clearly a strong IT / business relationship matters. So, if the IT teams are really interested in being Agile, then the grassroots desire is the most important attribute to drive Agile acceptance. As IT works on projects, it can start to implement Agile practices: getting more frequent communication with the business during discovery and development, daily standups, frequent releases of high-value features, etc. As the business realizes they are getting valuable features from IT at a faster pace, and those features are exactly what they wanted (since they are more touchpoints during development), they will come to see the value of Agile and support it more.

The crisis is a catalyst for change. Complacency with the status quo and statements like 'it's not broken so don't try to fix," it'll signal roadblocks ahead for trying to implement new ways of working. If it is acknowledged at board level that the existing delivery mechanism is considered to be fundamentally broken or there has been a major delivery disaster (or more often - no delivery at all), then the organization may be ready to consider a major change. Without this 'crisis' there is often not the urgency or commitment for change. However, a crisis can imply an expectation of a quick fix to alleviate the crisis rather than a careful evaluation of why existing processes don't support growth. Implementing Agile in a "crisis mode" is probably a formula for failure. Instead, consider positioning agile as a way of helping the business meet its objectives. Every business wants to increase sales, revenue, etc. Show how implementing Agile will help meet those long-term business goals by providing valuable features faster than current processes.

So the move to agile needs to be agile itself. Simply because every organization is different, it has different challenges and has a different ability to absorb learning and change and different resistors. The organization needs to be willing to invest in learning from failure, as at times things will progress. The ability to clearly state what you believe agile will do for your organization and deciding how you will measure its success. Moving to Agile should be business driven. It is organizational change and organizational change has low success rate and needs a strategy and close inspection and adaptation.

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How to Enforce Performance Accountability

Accountability goes hand in hand with the delegation of authority or power.

Digital transformation is all about shaping highly performing and highly innovative organizations (Digital Master)  to improve efficiency & effectiveness; agility and maturity. In detail, how do you drive workforce performance, whilst generating accountability for that performance?

Accountability goes hand in hand with the delegation of authority or power. Accountability is part of personal integrity. If you ensure the individuals have the autonomy within their tasks or projects, you will be able to address performance on equal partnership bases. It seems simple, but it has many different additional advantages encouraging knowledge transfer within the team, engagement and so on.  It’s easier at least to recognize and award it wherever put in place effectively to generate some good results. One must take the long view and may require a core DNA transplant. Designing a performance management system that makes sense for your company depends on many factors, including the nature of your business, your company culture, and your mission.

At its core, performance management is about creating a work environment that helps your company meet its business goals. It's more than just a collection of tools and processes, although there are many that can help you meet your goals. It's a philosophy that informs everything you do. When everyone has the same vision when everyone is treated as a "partner" when communication flows top to bottom and bottom to top when people no longer say I have a job but a purpose, when management is agile and leadership is about people, and when individuals/teams/ departments are taught to solve daily operational problems, when people can "become brilliant on the basics" and when everyone understands how the business operates - then you will see a workplace with respect, genuine engagement, mutual understanding, trust, optimism, and absolutely the best customer experience management - that is the digital competency.

A processing mechanism could be put in place to understand what flaws are in place, impeding a good performance and its improvement. Then identifying for each and any of these main key impediments a pragmatic solution. Identified a list of them from organizational, process/ procedure, people, leadership sides. Just as an example from people side: lack of workforce flexibility (both attitude or know-how); interpersonal relationship drift/ issues; aging of know-how, experience, position-talent match; engagement trends. Set clear expectations, provide thorough training, track errors, (and retraining when necessary), and reward success.

Performance rises on many fronts based on managers and leaders being on the same page: Of course, both of these groups need to buy into the high-performance culture as well and doing several things consistently. there is no single initiative or program or "theme for the year" that will suffice to raise the performance of a company or business unit. For example, you cannot command innovation and adaptation but you can enable, encourage, inspire and even lead. Also, you can't command someone to be creative or adaptive. People must have other intangible performance drivers that get them out of bed each morning and motivate them with ambition and creativity.

Behaving in a trustworthy manner is crucial as well: Using the forces of respect for every employee, versus fear and punishment. Belief in the high value of both TEAM and EACH PERSON, and profits and performance. This is the long view and takes some courage and faith to develop...but it ultimately releases the highest potential of each employee. Allowing for personal traits that will vary both among the person who delegates and the person delegated to, there are some structural issues with accountability. If one is to hold another accountable (peer or subordinate) for achieving some result,  there is a set of conditions that must be fulfilled in advance on the "receiver" side. Among them - that person must a) be reasonably known to possess the skill/talent needed, b) be provided with the tools and resources necessary to succeed, c) have "during the duration" access to responsive up/down communication, and more. Holding someone accountable is not the same as someone taking responsibility.

Rewards systems are put in place and rewards that are tailored to the individual instead of one-size-fits-all. You can't "drive" performance without mutually accepted goals and expectations. It's almost impossible to measure performance objectively but goals and expectations help. It’s important to tie individual performance in the company to company profits and also company rewards and at the same time had individual performance incentives that were measured against personal goals. This kept all employees working together while at the same time pushed the individual to exceed their personal goals. It was a win-win. One of the "obstacles" is not having the same rules for accountability apply everywhere. Recognizing your performers and keeping them motivated along with keeping the average and bottom box performers on toes are two leadership styles you will have to maintain simultaneously.

Digital organizations are flatter, with an “every individual as a stakeholder” culture, through cross-functional collaboration, open door listening, transparency ("we have a problem to solve together") and mutual sharing in successes, the performance accountability can be harnessed via motivating your employees to achieve high than expected result.

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Five Key Elements in Digital Leadership

Digital Leadership is Profound, Positive and Innovative.

With many organizations and the society as a whole reach the inflection point of digital transformation, as always, the spirit comes from the top, leadership is a key success factor for any organization's success. Due to the complexity, uncertainty, ambiguity and volatility of digital age, the leadership in any organization must have the ability to guide, inspire and motivate a group of people toward accomplishing shared visions and goals; what are the most critical elements in digital leadership though?

Vision: Leadership is the foresight to see the future needs of an organization, the commitment to provide whatever effort is necessary to move the organization in the right direction and the grace to do so because it is best for the organization. It is more crucial for leadership today due to the rapid changes and VUCA nature of digital age.

Creativity: Creativity emerges as one of the most critical factors of digital leadership; which is often motivated by curiosity, be curious to discover the new way to do things. Creative leadership avoids unnecessary process and hierarchy. Good leadership sees how bureaucracy can stiffen innovation, strangle understanding, process and action.

Empathy: Listening, challenging and concluding positively in terms that the individual / audience understood, at any level of the organization; knowing his/her team upon strengths, weaknesses, goals and objectives. Ability to see and treat people as people, not as objects. Many of people unknowingly work and live within their own boxes and often times fail to see co-workers, bosses, and subordinates as people but objects, and in doing so fail to see and hear their viewpoints which cloud the judgment of leaders. In a broader scope, today’s global leaders must understand multiple cultures, multiple points of views, moving leadership from apathy to sympathy to empathy.

Collaboration: Collaboration is imperative. Leaders need to inspire others to want to work together to deliver on the goals. Leadership is about collaboration, fostering an environment where creating success together has greater rewards than individual performance. Leadership is getting other people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it. A leader is able to inspire best-ever individual and team performance in support of the organizational mission while ensuring that each member of the community has the support, resources, and guidance to succeed. Leadership is the capacity to manage volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous situations in order to create commons to address challenges.

Wisdom: Only wisdom can transcend leadership from good to great. The significant tasks of leaders are making decisions, wisdom has to do with the soundness of judgment.  Wisdom mainly consists of having experience and yet knowing when to discard that experience, when you come to new knowledge - new frontiers to existing knowledge. Wisdom is a full set of learning, unlearning and relearning. Plus an open mind -wisdom is a function of knowing what you don't know and keeps curiosity to know more.

Sometimes leadership is at the front, sometimes it is from behind - depends on what is required by the circumstance. Surely digital leadership is profound with such five key elements, and beyond, integrity, consistency, perseverance, character, forthrightness, enthusiasm, attitude, knowledge, industriousness, etc, for all values. We all respect things which reflect the highest standards of values and want more of them and disrespect things which reflect their opposites, leadership is a journey, and digital leaders are the forerunner of digital transformation.

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Digital Transformation - Where Do you Start?

The "Problem Framer" begins with an end in mind.

Today’s business is dynamic and complex, many organizations are on the way for radical digital transformation. What’s the setting point, where will you start with, and how to manage change and transformation in the more radical way in order to become a Digital Master ultimately?

Vision -"Begin with an End in Mind": Transformation requires first shifting mindset, starts with the realization that where you currently no longer can deliver the business objective and vision of success for your company and your shareholders. Determining what the future needs to look like (what the transformation must look like), and then, intrapersonal transformation and interpersonal transformation is needed to achieve organizational transformation.

The transformational leadership: A leader would have difficulty transforming an organization until she/he had her/his own transformational experience. Sharing experience seems to be better received than just, "Here's how we do it." Having the most senior champion is critical - someone who will not only communicate what the transformation looks like and where people will fit in the new vision but also be observed as the leader who is "marching towards" that transformational vision.

The Golden Circle: As every successful change program, the business transformation should follow the 'Golden Circle' starting with the WHY? (vision & motivation), then addressing the HOW? (process) and the WHAT? (results) in the end. Do not turn it around if you want to set up for success. With a focus on the arrival point, success will be contingent upon culture, the state of the business, leadership (senior and positional influencers within the business), communication, team membership (internal and external) and the overall commitment to the goal. Celebrate successes often and don't lose sight of the "pulse" of the organization.

The "Problem Framer": A solution is nothing if the problem is not perceived, therefore, creating the awareness of the problem is the first step to making a solution be understood and accepted. The realization only comes when the problem is perceived. Easy to say that you start with the process and/or capability that is most critical (customer impacting) with the largest potential impact on the success of your firm. How to identify where? - through internal (SWOT) and external assessments (benchmarks/consultations/ customer feedback) of your baseline position and a joint position as to where you want to arrive (interim state/end state). Audacious goals are absolutely important, but "boil the ocean" approaches seldom deliver expected results.

Minding the Gap. First clarify change vs. transformation -- "change" can be a somewhat mechanical implementation of new or different ways to doing something, while transformation is more likely to be a sweeping approach to altering a culture, or parts of it, possibly even to parts of its value system, to embrace such as change and help it become self-perpetuating. When the need for significant change is identified, it's generally naive to think it will succeed without transformation as well. So it is important in helping leaders discover, then consciously manage the communication gap between self-perception and the perception of others. Transforming, generating, ascending and core-shifting individuals, teams, even whole the organization! That's the starting point.

The process management: The business transformation is enabled by the internal business process management. One concept always is present in any process designed to successfully produce positive change. This is why it is critical that a solid maturity model should help to define ambition along with the as-is. (1) Involve, (2) Engage, (3) Emerge & Evolve (4) Evaluate and (5) Embrace the change. The vision and Idea of transformation should come from the highest chair with a timeline. Each department should have defined & definite goals. It is not a one-time activity. It should be an ongoing process. The process, change assessment, etc. are all tactics to get the organization there.

Still, back to the three fundamental elements of business: people, process, and technology. A good transformation initiative will well orchestrate them seamlessly. in addition to the set point changing, then building new skills, reinforcing and embedding new practices/reflexes, and finally measure the right thing and measure them right.

Digitalization is like a flywheel, and Digital Masters are the one riding above it. Surf more Information about Digital Master:

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Digital Leadership Manifesto

Digital leadership transcends from the mind set to MIND FLOW!

Digital leadership is the capability and capacity to manage volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous digital dynamic in order to create commons to address challenges during digital transformation.  

Digital leadership goes Deeper over louder;  Global over local; 

from Apathy to Sympathy to Empathy;  
from Diversity to Inclusiveness to "Inclusiversity;"

Digital leadership requires multi-dimensional vision and creative communication:

        Positive influence over status quo;

        Continuous delivery over static credential;

        Problems Solving over bureaucracy;

         Creativity over Hierarchy;

Digital leadership achieves high maturity in pursuit of mastery:

              Character over Charisma;

              Authenticity over Perfection;

          Collaboration over Command & Control;

               Wisdom over single dimensional smartness.

Digital leadership makes the world round - as it is always to be.

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What are the Critical Barriers to Performance Excellence (PE)

The emphasis needs to shift from number crunches in corporate towers to the people delivering performance.

Success stories are more often the same, but the causes of failure vary: Most of the organizations have issues with effectiveness of execution or achievement of set goals. Some blame it to external market environment (lack of demand) and others blame it to internal barriers (lack of resources, lack of strategic clarity, lack of capable committed people, lack of effective leadership to name a few). General speaking, what are the most critical barriers which, if addressed properly, usually have an amplifying impact on performance?

Culture of change inertia: It is important to develop the organizational culture continuously to reduce the risks associated with the firm's goal achievement. The human aspects of performance barriers and effectiveness of execution may be addressed with the creation of associate buy-in. Maintaining awareness in the people of an organization keeps them connected to the ongoing challenges that must be met for achievement of the firm's goals. Extracting feedback from the associate workforce may increase effectiveness as this workforce is the organization's pool of subject matter experts. Developing organizational culture may require little resources. However, this type of activity can produce great returns.

Lack of organizational alignment: Organizational alignment is what is key to fully achieve corporate performance goals. Culture is fantastic, however, that makes little difference if the goals and direction of the company are not properly and continually communicated throughout the rest of the organization. It is like planning a trip. You can't plan a trip if you don't know where you're going, meaning the goals of an organization. The strategic/tactical plans lay out the map of how you're going to get to your destination/goals. Communication is how you make sure everyone on the trip is aware of where you're going, when, etc., particularly to the navigator to help keep you on the right track. Lastly, you need infrastructure to support the trip; gas, food, lodging, and keeping your vehicle in good working order. The trip cannot happen efficiently without all parts working together, that is organizational alignment.

Lack of employee engagement and reward structure, etc. Performance; good, bad; fantastic or indifferent is only ever delivered by people - the task as managers, leaders, performance managers; coaches, mentors etc is to monitor that performance and create an environment where people understand the opportunity; the reasons for the opportunity and want themselves to "pull" high performance and personal achievement in from within themselves and their colleagues. The structural barriers to performance excellence include: 
a. Unclear goal / too many variables attached to it to make it more confusing. 
b.Mismatch in requirement from a role and expertise of the candidate 
c. Lack of effective reward structure to encourage innovation/low or no motivation for mediocre. 
d. Non – involvement of ground team during target setting – If you want to achieve is x% of growth. How is it going to achieve. 
e. Management ignoring the external environment or business ecosystem affecting the business.
f. And the lack of support from immediate manager or management – it can be in terms of proper guidance, providing adequate resources which would help employee focus on the job etc.

Culture, organizational alignment and communication, employee involvement and buy-in in the process are all critical element in leading performance excellence- from performance management perspective, perhaps the emphasis needs to shift from number crunchers in corporate towers to the people delivering performance. And performance excellence is not only measure through efficiency and effectiveness, but also drive agility and maturity.

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Data Savvy Mind: How Does it Influence Business Culture and Performance

Mind shift is the very foundation to transform from doing analytics projects to running an intelligent organization.
Digital is the age of Big Data. from doing data analytics project to shaping a data-savvy mind is a leapfrogging transformation, because it will fundamentally change the business culture and leadership style, also change the way to serve customers and engage employees.

A data-savvy mind can lead more persuasive and evidence-based communication.  How to make effective communication much depends on the individual, the enterprise, and the corporate culture. That said, the keys to communicating data to the board aren't that different than the keys to any strong communication. It's critical to listen to what stakeholders need from data - that makes it far more likely that they'll be truly engaged, and eager in what data can deliver. Also, it's important to use data to tell a story. That can be a different way to look at the process of data. But it's not "just the facts" - it's the business impact of those facts that ensures engagement.

A data-savvy mind doesn’t ignore the experiences or intuition. It's critical for leaders to communicate the real value of data in clear, actionable business terms. But, of course, that's a big part of what data has to do - be transformed into actionable insight. Also, a strong point for promoting a savvy mindset, especially among c-level executives, is stressing the fact that being data-driven does not mean experience and intuition are obsolete. Data is a simple way to supplement reason when making decisions and can even help reduce risk. Another common challenge to executives seems to be that it's too complex to practically implement. To the very least, executives should at least explore their options and possibilities, since being data savvy is becoming a norm in most companies today.

A data-savvy mind can drive data driven behaviors which vary from functional level to a large-scale organizational level. One common example, companies can  improve customer experience or make marketing campaigns based on all kinds of data. This would likely involve business intelligence software to analyze your existing customers to come up with a customer profile of the age, gender, lifestyle, etc. of the people who are likely to buy from you. Then, you can even get more specific. The data may show you that you have multiple audiences that are likely to buy your products. You can analyze the data even more to find out which audiences are likely to buy certain products and which audiences are not likely to purchase other products, so that you can maximize your marketing dollars by targeting people who are more likely to purchase.

Both corporate executives and front line customer representatives need to equip with such data savvy mindset. For business leaders, such thinking drives good habits to always make effective decisions well mixing the data and intuition at strategic level; and for the front line employees, they can also make data driven decision at transnational level to either delight customers or improving business processes.Mind shift is the very foundation to transform from doing analytics projects to running an intelligent organization.

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