Want to be Successful? Three Imperatives for Effective Leadership.
Sep 07, 2021
How do you become a better leader?
How do you develop stronger leadership abilities?
We focus on the leadership of our Chief Executive Officer but what about Board leadership? Of the Chair? Of Officers? Of Committee Chairs?
If leadership is primarily an act of social influence designed to people toward a common goal (any dispute there?), then leadership and management are a series of paradoxes.
- You are personally accountable yet rely on the work of others.
- You need talented colleagues, so you develop them, yet you also appraise them.
- You develop your team, yet your team comprises individuals, with unique needs and interests.
- You need to do well today, while focusing on tomorrow.
These paradoxes make the job that much more challenging and of course much more interesting!
Harvard researcher Linda Hill and executive Kent Lineback identify three “imperatives” for you to consider:
- Manage yourself.
An effective leader uses formal authority effectively yet rarely, preferring to focus on the responsibilities of the position more than the authority. Also, relationships, and building influence, should enable a focus on the purpose and goals of the team more than personal friendships.
- Manage Your Network.
Whom do you and your team (whether senior leadership or the Board) depend on? Are these people in your network? How do you build, maintain, and sustain a network while also supporting the needs of members of your network? How do you ensure that your network provides the resources you require? It is important that you build coalitions with network partners. Your network of course needs to trust your competence and character. This is critical to achieving sustainable resources to accomplish your mission.
- Manage Your Team.
Define and refine your team’s vision, again whether senior staff or the Board itself. Discuss your plans. Clarify roles, develop team culture, provide feedback, individually and collectively. Delegate and develop. Deal with performance issues quickly.
Fundamental to all of this is to consider how every problem can help you to build your team, make progress toward stated goals and strengthen your network.
It is becoming more and more important that the network is a critical ingredient in leadership and development. It is also a key element of succession management and overall success.
What are your main “pain points” dealing with building a strong team and network? What advice would be most helpful to you? And we always assume that you are asking for a friend!
Get in touch. We’ll address your questions and concerns in an upcoming blog post.
In this one-month course, you will move from feeling reticent and tentative to competent and confident, asking good questions and making great contributions.
The course complements and reinforces your on-site orientation and opens new channels of communication and discussion. Four weeks. Eight lessons.
Click here to learn more about The New Board Member 101.
For more insights, see our other blog posts.
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