How can I become a better leader? Part 1 – Self-Awareness
February 13, 2012 by simonteague
Filed under Learning
You have within you the skills to become an accomplished leader. It is not true that leaders are just born and not made. Take a moment to think about who in your life has influenced you greatly? Who do you admire? Who would you follow? That person is a leader. My guess is that they had to work hard all their life to earn that position.
The difference between managers and leaders is that managers have employees; leaders have followers. Managers often get given the role; leaders have to earn it. Moreover, there is no fixed formula for great leadership, but there are many paths to excellence.
Over the course of 2012 I want to share with you how you can become a highly respected, successful and accomplished leader. My thoughts are based on 26 years of experience, but these insights will not just come from me. I will be pooling many great minds and asking many renowned authors and authorities on leadership to share their thoughts with you to. Together we want to build a community of great leaders who live fulfilling and enjoyable lives, learn how to build winning teams of people and build within their organisations a sustainable high value, high performance culture. This programme of learning will be entirely free. Why? Because so many companies have stopped investing in the development of their people, I thought I would give them and you a helping hand. So if you would like to join us, all you need to do is subscribe and get as many people in your team to join in too.
The plan:
Every week, for the next 20 weeks I will post:
- Tried and tested methods of leadership philosophy
- Fresh insights into how you can lead your teams differently and make a difference
- We will hear what some of the world’s greatest leaders have to say. Sometimes indirectly, others directly.
- I will provide you with practical, highly effective leadership tools to do your job better and begin a journey of lifelong learning and self-improvement.
- For all intents and purposes I will be your on-line coach.
To be sure not to miss all 20 articles in the series, you can do these four things:
- Subscribe and bookmark this site
- Make a diary note to spend up to an hour a week here over the next 12 weeks
- Like us on Facebook and Twitter to receive notifications of when the material is released.
- Tell me what you think by leaving a comment – what else would you like to see in this series?
Are you ready to start your journey. Well here we go…
Leadership qualities
Before you can start acting like a leader, you need to understand what leadership traits you need to develop, in order to become like a great leader. I will repeat this because its important. You can develop the skills you need to become a successful leader, no matter what field you are in.
In the table below I have listed two groups of leadership traits and I want you to give each one a score between 1 and 20. But you can only use each number once. I.E. no trait must have the same number (basically you are placing them in an order of what you feel your strongest verses your weakest traits are. I am happy for you to cut and paste the table onto a word document – you might want to keep a track of your scores over time.
Although I have separated the boxes with the left hand box representing more junior leadership qualities and the right hand box representative of a strong and accomplished leader it is important that you score both boxes. This is called self-assessment. It only works if you are truly honest with yourself. Especially the more senior you are in the organisation – as Fred Goodwin, ex Chief Executive of RBS will testify. ‘The higher you get, the further you have to fall’. Understanding your current skill set, by being honest with yourself, will enable you to gain a real insight into your own personal strengths and weaknesses. Before you go ahead and self-assess, I would like to share with you a really powerful poem written in 1934 by Dale Wimbrow:
The Guy In The Glass
When you get what you want in your struggle for pelf,
And the world makes you King for a day,
Then go to the mirror and look at yourself,
And see what that guy has to say.
For it isn’t your Father or Mother or Wife,
Who judgement upon you must pass.
The feller whose verdict counts most in your life
Is the guy staring back from the glass.
He’s the feller to please, never mind all the rest,
For he’s with you clear up to the end,
And you’ve passed your most dangerous, difficult test
If the guy in the glass is your friend.
You may be like Jack Horner and “chisel” a plum,
And think you’re a wonderful guy,
But the man in the glass says you’re only a bum
If you can’t look him straight in the eye.
You can fool the whole world down the pathway of years,
And get pats on the back as you pass,
But your final reward will be heartaches and tears
If you’ve cheated the guy in the glass.
Ok lets score:
| Junior Leader Traits |
Score |
Senior Leader traits |
Score |
| Self-awareness | Energy | ||
| Enthusiasm | Passion | ||
| Goal orientated | Tough minded | ||
| Good listener | Confidence and self-belief | ||
| Creative | Competitive | ||
| Attention to detail | Visionary | ||
| Influence | Inspirational | ||
| People developer | Strategic thinker | ||
| Collaborative | Emotionally and culturally intelligent. | ||
| Solution orientated | Change catalyst |
(This list is not exhaustive, but it’s a great start)
Interesting? I would encourage you to share this table to your team and get them to score you anonymously – you may get a whole new perspective.
Now, I am going to introduce you to two tried and tested leadership development models which will help you to re-evaluate by taking a good long hard look in the mirror.
The first is called a SWOT analysis. You may have heard of it being used by companies to develop their business strategy, but it can be equally powerful as a tool for individuals to identify their Strengths; Weaknesses; Opportunities and Threats (S.W.O.T.).
Originated by Albert Humphrey in the 1960’s SWOT remains a powerful and relevant tool for you to use in today’s increasingly competitive world to give you an edge over your competition. It helps you to define your current situation (your strengths and weaknesses) and plan for self-improvement to give you a better future (your opportunities and potential threats). I recommend you spend at least half an hour alone writing out (in bullet points) everything you can possibly think of that might fit into any one of the four boxes below. I have given you some pointers to get you started. A good SWOT will have at least 10 areas identified in each box – so dig deep…
 |
|
| Strengths | Weaknesses |
| What are your dominant personality traits and emotions that help you to get on in life?What do you do well?What resources do you have at your disposal?What do other people see as your strengths? | What are your limiting paradigms/beliefs?What areas of your life do you struggle with most?Where do you have fewer resources than others?What are others likely to see as a weakness in you? |
|
|
|
| Opportunities | Threats |
| What opportunities are open to you?What trends could you take advantage of?How can you turn your strengths into opportunities? | What threats could harm you?Where does your competition have the edge?What threats do your weaknesses expose you to? |
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|
|
The SWOT analysis then becomes an excellent planning and goal setting tool (more to come on goal setting in article no. 3) in order to keep you one step ahead of the competition.
Here’s a great thought provoking Japanese proverb: ‘When you are thirsty, it’s too late to start digging a well.’
Useful? See what the guys at MindTools™ have to say about SWOT. Have a look at their video and check again – have you covered everything in your own personal SWOT analysis?
OK, so what next I hear you say? I want you to focus on your strengths and opportunities. Far too many companies nowadays keep getting people to draw up Personal Development Plans based on addressing their weaknesses. I don’t agree with this strategy. Nor does Susan Tardanico from Forbes Magazine who reports:
“Business culture has long focused on weakness prevention, with managers and leaders spending untold time and energy trying to address deficits in themselves and their employees. It becomes a quest to fill the gaps where one doesn’t have natural capability. Taken to the extreme, it attempts to make people someone they’re not.
While we’re busy trying to fix ourselves and others, we often minimize or completely overlook our most powerful asset–our strengths. Strengths are a person’s innate talents, things they do well naturally. Every person has them, and when identified, nurtured and channeled appropriately, they can have a dramatic effect on job satisfaction and bottom-line performance.
Indeed, research suggests that the most successful people start with a dominant talent and then add skills, knowledge and practice into the mix. In other words, we stand a greater chance of success if we build on our authentic selves–who we already are–beginning with our innate strengths. Perhaps even more significantly for employers, a powerful connection exists between employees’ levels of engagement and the extent to which they maximize their strengths on the job.”
So, develop a plan which focuses on honing your strengths and realising your opportunities. For now I want you to let the weaknesses take care of themselves. By the end of this 20 week programme, I will be asking you to re-write your SWOT – you will be amazed at how far you have come and how many weaknesses simply won’t exist or matter anymore.
Now think about combining what you have learnt about yourself so far with the next model.
The Johari Window:
The Johari Window was originally developed by two American psychologists called Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham. They named the model by combining their first names, Joe and Harry. (Johari). The Johari Window model is used by leaders seeking to become more self-aware. It represents information – feelings, experience, views, attitudes, skills, motivation, etc – within or about a person in relation to their group/team, from four perspectives.
The diagram shows how others can see into our ‘window’. It is their perception of who you are. The public arena changes the more you communicate about yourself, e.g. ‘what I know about me and what you know about me = larger window’.
Johari Window
|
|
Known by Self |
Unknown by self |
|
Known by others |
Open/ free area
|
Blind area |
|
Unknown by others |
Hidden area
|
Unknown area |
A great deal of information has been published about the Johari Window on the Businessballs website. Click here for more information.
| Open/Free Area | Blind Area
|
|
| Hidden Area
|
Unknown Area | |
The essence of the Johari model is that the size of each area changes to reflect what you know about yourself and what other know and are saying about you. This is very important for leaders as the more you know about your own strengths and limitations, the more you are able to play to your strengths. You may decide to address your limitations or build a team of people around you who have the expertise you may lack. The late Steve Jobs was a master at recognising peoples talents and bringing them into his team to plug gaps in his or the teams knowledge. The late great Andrew Carnegie who despite being regarded as the second most richest man in history (1835-1919), had words to this effect on his tombstone “Here lies a man who knew how to get around him, people who were cleverer than he“.
Leaders who consciously display a larger open/free area have strong self belief and make it their purpose in life to communicate with the people around them, sharing both their personal vision and aspirations and those of the business. They can relate to their team, engage in banter, socialising (to a degree) and open discussion. Their door is always open, but their mind is also open to new ideas. They are considered approachable and they know what motivates their team. Such leaders practice self-reflection and have their own agenda of continuous personal improvement through self discovery. As such they demand high standards of their people, but they set and live by those standards themselves. Consequently they can be challenging and difficult to work for, but inspirational at the same time. You will find the more you can share with your team and lead by example, the more they will learn about your values and what makes you tick; the larger the top left window. Often this larger window leads to a greater degree of respect for the leader as the risks of the other windows recede – backbiting and undermining in the blind area; assumptions and avoidance in the hidden area; lack of trust and respect in the unknown area.
Leaders can also increase the size of the open/free area through a process of disclosure and 360 degree feedback from the people they interact with. Getting people to share (anonymously) what they really think about your style and what you could do to improve and get the best out of your team can be enormously enlightening.
Here’s a useful exercise. If you were to describe yourself to your team/boss and could only do it in the form of a picture, what would you draw?
What does your window look like?
What picture do you want people to see when they look inside?
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The exercises I have shared with you are designed to open up neurological pathways in your brain and tap into your emotional intelligence (much more to come on EI in article 19). Ultimately the most accomplished leaders, who create resonance within their organisation, have been shown to have very high levels of emotional intelligence. Developing strong emotional intelligence begins with developing self-awareness. Daniel Goleman writes in The New Leaders (a MUST have in your portfolio):
“Self-awareness means having a deep understanding of one’s emotions, as well as one’s strengths and limitations and one’s values and motives. People with strong self-awareness are realistic – neither overly self-critical nor naively hopeful. Rather, they are honest with themselves about themselves. And they are honest about themselves with others, even to the point of being able to laugh at their own foibles.
Self-aware leaders also understand their values, goals and dreams. They know where they’re headed and why. They’re attuned to what “feels right” to them. .. Because the decision of self-aware people mesh with their values, they more often find their work energising”
Perhaps the most telling (although least visible) sign of self-awareness is a propensity for self-reflection and thoughtfulness. Self-aware people typically find time to reflect quietly, often by themselves, which allows them to think things over rather than react impulsively.
Summary
I hope you have found this first article of great help at the start of your journey. As Lao-tzu (tao te Ching 6th Century BC) once said “He who knows others is learned. He who knows himself is wise”
I encourage you to spend the next 7 days really analysing yourself.
What do you want out of life? How ambitious are you? What motivates you? What is your dominant strength and primary motivator? What do you want to be remembered most for? Is your Johari an open or closed window?
If you can answer all these burning questions, you will be well on the road to becoming an authentic leader. Next week we will look at one of the core leadership traits – that of Enthusiasm. Here’s what Henry Ford had to say about that:
“Enthusiasm is the yeast that makes your hopes rise to the stars. Enthusiasm is the sparkle in your eye; it is the swing in your gait; the grip of your hand; the irresistible surge of your will and your energy to execute your ideas. Enthusiasts are fighters. They have fortitude. They have staying qualities. Enthusiasm is at the bottom of all progress – with it there is accomplishment, without it there are only alibis.”
If you enjoyed this article don’t forget to follow these four steps:
- Subscribe and bookmark this site
- Make a diary note to spend up to an hour a week here over the next 12 weeks
- Like us on Facebook and Twitter to receive notifications of when the material is released.
- Tell me what you think by leaving a comment – what else would you like to see in this series?
Be a winner in 2012.
January 16, 2012 by simonteague
Filed under Feature, Learning
110 metres hurdles at Beijing Olympics
People often ask me “what does it take to be a leader in today’s complex world?” Granted, we are seeing unprecedented change in the business world in which we all operate. We are traversing choppy waters and it will take more skills than ever before for leaders to navigate their teams, organisations and themselves through these difficult times.
This is such a massive issue that everyone that’s anyone is either writing about or seeking information about leadership. The voices of those people immersed in leadership and management positions, and those who aspire to become successful and accomplished leaders, are asking the same questions… How do I become a successful leader? How do I inspire my team? How do I build a winning team?
There are hundreds of tools at your disposal and over the course of 2012 I will share with you some amazing techniques you can employ to stand out from the crowd and become a respected, winning leader in your chosen field. But, just like an Olympic Athlete, you will need to train hard. Focus. Subscribe to Leadership-Expert™ (its free!) and visit this site every week to pick up, learn and apply the latest tips and techniques which are guaranteed to give you a winning edge.
Becoming a winner doesn’t happen overnight. You have to train regularly. It takes commitment and dedication. We often can’t do it on our own. We are so much more powerful with these three things:
- A system we can use.
- A coach by our side.
- A group of people cheering us on.
I am so passionate about helping people to develop leadership capability. Hopefully you can see that by how much free or very low cost material is available to you on this site.
So lets start with you. First I want you to shake off the erroneous notion that leaders are born and not made.
Come on me with this journey. I will be your coach and guide. My journey began 20 years ago with my first junior management promotion in the corporate world. Since then I have enjoyed an incredible career reaching the dizzy heights of executive directorship and in recent years an entrepreneur, building and developing my own business and my own winning team of dedicated, inspired individuals. I have become the Leadership-Expert through passion, dedication and connecting with many great leaders and leadership authorities around the world. They helped me publish The Ultimate Leadership Guide – Secrets to Success at Work and In Business (which only Leadership-Expert readers can REDEEM with a 25% Discount using code LE001).
So, I hope you can see I have had to work hard at learning how to become a strong leader in both the corporate environment and in business. I was not born a leader. I became one, through reading, learning, training, having my own coach and through application of some tried and tested principles, which I will share with you now. I have the credentials to enable you to be just as successful. Leadership success starts with you.
You need to do three things:
- Allocate specific time for self-development
- Use trusted sources and systems and people to help you
- Apply what you learn, reflect and then revise your approach where appropriate
There are two ways of doing this:
- The free way
- The low cost way
The free way – action plan:
- Save this website to your bookmark and subscribe to get all our free information and top tips to enable you to become an accomplished leader.
- Like us on Facebook to keep up to date that way, or follow updates on Twitter.
- Allocate up to 1 hour per week (your quietest time) to read the latest articles posted, make notes and apply the principles contained within.
- Write specific goals for your work each week. What does a good week look like? Who do you need to inspire and motivate this week? What’s the best approach?
- Apply these goals.
- Take time to reflect on the success (or otherwise) of your actions. What did you learn? What do you need to do to continually improve?
- Following this process relentlessly every week you will start to feel and see a difference in your performance and that of your team.
The low cost way – action plan:
Every great leader invests both time and money in self-improvement, training and learning. They follow a system that prompts thinking; action and results. Here is a system I would strongly recommend to anyone looking to become the best in their field. It is a proven system that I use to create the results I want. Although it’s not my system, I have used it for over 10 years and it fascinates me how my progress has always exceeded my expectations. It is based on 5 principles of personal transformation:
- First, take time out to appreciate your success to date.
- Learn your lessons (what winning ingredients do you already use?)
- Shift your limiting beliefs – you can be whatever you want to be.
- Live your values – what are your personal values?
- Set and focus on your top 10 goals
I invite you to join me and a growing community of people world-wide who use this system to reach their full potential (and give them a winning edge). To learn more click here.
In summary, becoming an accomplished and respected leader starts with self-development. This leads to increased self-awareness about the impact you have on people around you. Leaders set the tone. Learning new techniques and applying them will give you greater confidence in how you manage and lead your team. With a greater repertoire of leadership tools at your disposal you will be amazed at the response. The most exciting thing of all is that you will realise you have the power to change. Change yourself and change the people around you, so that everyone starts to realise their full potential.
I have described above the process some of the world’s greatest athletes are currently going through as they prepare for the Olympic Games of 2012. To be a winner as a leader, you too must adopt the same techniques and you will be amazed at what you can achieve. As Mo Farah recently said “Don’t dream of winning…. Train for it.”
Click here if you want 2012 to be your Best Year Yet.
Unlocking The Leader in You in 2012
December 31, 2011 by simonteague
Filed under Learning
With the onset of an Olympic Year in 2012, I have spent the ‘quiet’ days over Christmas contemplating how I can best serve you throughout 2012. From comments, feedback and discussions with many aspiring leaders who visit Leadership Expert™, it is clear that you all want me to ensure I retain the ethics of researching, testing and reporting on leadership tips, techniques and tools that actually work in the workplace, business environment, schools and across communities as a whole.
I am committed to offering you independent, meaningful and useful information for you to be able to understand and apply whichever environment you work in and whatever position you hold. Within our leadership community we have top CEO’s, entrepreneurs, senior managers, middle management, junior managers, team leaders and many ambitious people who are seeking their first management position.
I am committed to serving you all. In many cases your companies have stopped investing in leadership and management training and development. Its my goal to access that training and legitimately provide you with the content for you to be able to build into your own personal development plan.
Over the course of 2012, I am therefore planning to research and distill programmes in:
- Self-awareness – looking at models such as the Johari window
- Self-management techniques – how top performing people profess to the application of certain ‘habits’ that make them successful
- Planning – strategic thinking and how to plan and increase your chances of success as a leader
- The art of communication. Influencing techniques, particularly the one I stumbled across recently which makes people say yes, when otherwise they would have said no!
- Leadership traits, leadership styles and leadership skills to make you into an authentic and accomplished leader in 2012.
- How the best leaders are also highly effective coaches and how they make use of coaches themselves.
- How to use certain programmes and techniques to motivate and inspire your teams.
- Skills to enable you to create and build winning teams.
- Problem solving techniques – enabling you to think laterally and literally and be one step ahead of the game.
Within all these topics will be a plethora of material you can use to help you have the winning edge and for 2012 to be your best year ever.
Its my mission in 2012 for you to reach your hopes, dreams and aspirations. To help me do this I also propose to seek your views by way of a questionnaire early in the new year, so I can be sure I am fully meeting your needs. So, if you dont already, then feel free to subscribe – I promise I won’t be bombarding you with ‘useless’ marketing information.
If there are any areas you specifically want us to focus on in 2012, please feel free to comment below. Wishing you an amazing 2012.
Simon Teague, Leadership-Expert
If you LIKE this article click here to subscribe to our community for free.
Leadership Tip Of The Day
December 22, 2011 by simonteague
Filed under Learning
Leadership practitioner Dr. William Cummings brings tips to Eyewitness News USA every Monday and Wednesday. This Wednesday, he shared a personal experience to illustrate why it’s not only okay to be a “yes man”; it’s an essential ingredient of good leadership.
Here are Dr. C.’s comments:
“When I was fifteen years old, I delivered groceries on my bicycle for Whipple Grocery Store in Chicago. One morning, when I walked up the steps to my first customer of the day, she asked me to go back to the store and get her some milk. I said, ‘No, I can’t do that; I’ve got five more deliveries.’
“When I finished the day’s deliveries and returned to the store, the owner fired me. He said: ‘You never say no to a customer; you always say yes, and then you figure out how you’re going to do it.’ That’s what leaders do.
“If I want to be a leader, I need to develop a yes attitude. E-mails, phone calls, one-on-ones, staff meetings: every communication needs to be full of yeses. Saying yes means saying yes to my life as it exists today; saying yes to people who surround me; saying yes to all the challenges and surprises that come my way each day.
“I have to say no to drugs, no to evil, and no to taking revenge. But in a very real sense, those no’s are really yes to my value system.
“Every leader I have ever known was a yes person. You can be a leader too, if you want to.”
How to Make Your Commute Fly By
August 2, 2011 by Simon Oates (Admin)
Filed under Learning
I’ve recently moved house so have been investigating the new ways available to get to work. My preferred method remains my trusty bicycle, but thankfully for days when this isn’t an option there are alternatives, although being London the car generally isn’t one of them. The daily commute is often a pretty horrid experience however, especially in the summer months. It always amazes me how people manage to get so smelly first thing in the morning, but suffice to say the summer heat only exacerbates the situation, especially when you are armpit height like me.
I’ve used my time commuting around London to come up with a few strategies to make the experience a little bit more enjoyable.
5 ways to make your commute more fun
- Make it productive time – With my job I tend to read (a lot), but with technology being what it is, finding the quiet time and place to really immerse yourself is tough. Riding the bus or train to work fits the bill. If reading isn’t your thing, listen to some educational things on your MP3 player. There are loads of good free ones available on iTunes, with this offering from Stanford a favorite of mine – http://ecorner.stanford.edu/.
- Be sociable – London commutes are legendary in the isolation with which each commuter tends to travel. Eye contact is rarely made and it’s amazingly common to travel with the same faces every morning for months/years without ever saying a word to them. Reclaim your humanity by making eye contact with your fellow travelers, and don’t be afraid to strike up a conversation. After all, it’s much better to talk to your neighbour than someone on your phone (major annoyance to fellow travelers)
- Get some exercise – Cycling in London isn’t for the feint-hearted but with Boris Bikes scattered about the place it has never been easier, and I can certainly recommend it. You get some relatively fresh air, the exercise gets your blood pumping and you save a bit of money. A super way of getting your day off to the right start.
- Don’t go hungry – There’s little worse than being stuck on a hot train so make sure you have some water and something to nibble on. My personal favorite is a small pot of mixed nuts as they offer a healthy source of energy that’s easy to pick at.
- Let your mind wander – Life is increasingly hectic, and those moments of contemplation increasingly valuable. Inspiration often strikes when we least expect it, so use your commute to let your mind wander. Make sure you have some means of recording your thoughts should a Eureka moment occur. A notebook or something digital does the trick for me.
How do you make your commute enjoyable?
Adi Gaskell is the editor of The Management Blog for the Chartered Management Institute, a professional body for managers and leaders in the UK
How Can You Be A Social Media Leader?
June 21, 2011 by Simon Oates (Admin)
Filed under Learning
Have you ever wanted to know how you could become the next social media leader on Twitter? If you want to become an online brand or entrepreneur then social media is extremely important. So how can you try to become an authority in the world of social media? Here are four great tips:
Passion
Whatever industry your part of, it’s essential that you show passion. If you don’t enjoy writing or sharing information about your favoured topic then why would your followers or readers enjoy following you? Be positive, passionate and enthusiastic and you should reap the benefits.
Engagement is Key
You have to be responsive to the community who follow you, do this by welcoming questions and answering other peoples. Also, do something to help one of your followers that a normal user wouldn’t do, show that level of commitment and engagement that is critical to success.
Originality is extremely important
When looking at Twitter or other social media platforms, people want to read new and original articles, it’s this type of content that will get you noticed. Anybody can re-tweet an article that they like, but it’s the unique articles that you have produced that will gain you followers.
For example, if you are a personal finance blogger then you may like to re-tweet articles about savings, but if you write your own savings content and you express your own views then people will be more likely to read and respond to voice their own opinions.
Use a metric: Klout or the Times Social List
If you want to check how well you are performing on the social media scale, there are many metrics you can use. The two most popular metrics are Klout and the Times Social List.
Klout
Klout is said to be the measurement of your overall online influence and it takes into account 35 variables through Facebook and Twitter to measure your:
“Reach” – True Reach is the size of your engaged audience
“Amplification Probability” – The likelihood that your content will be acted upon. How often do your messages generate re-tweets or spark a conversation?
“Network Influence” – This measures the actual engagement of your audience, by measuring actions such as re-tweets, messages, follows, comments, likes etc. Every time someone performs one of these actions the authority of your content rises.
Times Social List
The Sunday Times Social List is a great way to measure your social power and you can choose one or more social networks to calculate your social worth, either, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Foursquare. You will then be ranked based on their social algorithm.
The algorithm works in a similar way to the Klout score, as it tracks the way a user interacts with their “wider network”. This means that there is an increased value placed on re-tweets, “likes”, and responses.
So are you a social leader? Or do you aspire to be one?
How Good is Your Handshake?
May 17, 2011 by Simon Oates (Admin)
Filed under Learning
The handshake of a leader has almost mythical status. Just last year there were reports of job seekers losing out on positions due to a weak handshake. To firm, to limp. The perfect handshake is something executives the world over are striving for, with some companies even providing handshake training to help budding leaders make that great first impression.
New research looks into what verifiable personality traits can be derived from ones handshake. Frank Bernieria and Kristen Petty screened the personality of some 300 students before selecting 10 with contrasting personality profiles.
These 10 people were then asked to introduce themselves to around 100 people, with either a handshake or a less formal greeting. The 100 people were then each asked to rank them in order of whether they were extraverted, neurotic, open, conscientious and agreeable.
So do handshakes reveal our personalities?
To begin with it’s worth pointing out that generally speaking our ability to perceive someone’s personality in such a short space of time is pretty rubbish, with the honourable exception being when someone is extraverted.
That said, when men got to shake hands with other men, their ability to gauge the personality of each other was considerably improved. Bernieri and Petty believe that a good handshake is a skill in the same way that riding a bicycle or learning a musical instrument is, and therefore that a good handshake requires a conscientious personality. They believed that conscientious men were better at handshaking, and this was reflected in the results of the study.
Also of interest was the finding that this is mainly a male issue. The handshake isn’t as important for women and therefore the link between handshake and personality was not found when women shook hands with each other. The researchers did however suggest that amongst business women the link may exist as they shake hands more frequently than most.
So whilst the handshake is not a cast iron glance into ones soul, it is nevertheless an opportunity to portray yourself in a positive light to the recipient, and therefore should not be one that is overlooked.
About the Author:
Adi Gaskell is the editor of The Management Blog for the Chartered Management Institute, a professional body for managers and leaders in the UK
Leadership Style Mistakes Made By New Leaders
March 28, 2011 by Simon Oates (Admin)
Filed under Learning
The subject of effective leadership styles is often debated by the press, academia and scores of management as well as leadership blogs & books. Most of these articles or essay focus on the following:
(1) Leadership styles adopted by successful businessmen and women in the past.
(2) Leadership styles required for the future in a business environment of accelerating organisational change.
(3) A slightly new leadership style based on the author’s experiences.
I believe that all these angles on leadership styles have their place in your ‘library’ of leadership knowledge. But if you’re a new or aspiring leader, you may not have developed many of talent exhibited by these ‘already honed’ leadership celebrities.
I’m talking about skills such as Charisma, Time Management, Initiative, Courage and other important leadership characteristics. These improve over time with focus and commitment toward personal development. In other words, you don’t jump out of a box as a pre-made leader!
The truth is that leadership is often thrust upon us for the first time when we do not expect it. Be it through sports, local communities, or trusting bosses giving us a hand up.
Therefore for your first leadership experiences, you won’t have many of the memories and lessons learnt from previous events and situations, and such, you may feel vulnerable and nervous.
Common Behavioural Mistakes
Let us take a look at the different options for leadership styles you could choose to take when taking the reigns for the first time. Naturally, the issue of Autocratic versus Democratic versus Bureaucratic versus Laissez Faire will rage on. However this topic has been sufficiently covered online already, so rather than run through what these styles are, I will only detail the behavioural elements that apply to new leaders:
A New Autocratic Leader
Autocratic leaders make executive decisions and pass orders down to their subordinates to be executed. The issue with being autocratic as a junior leader is concerned with your credibility.
An autocratic leader typically has detailed, technical experience in the business area, and as such, can be trusted by their followers to make effective decisions. Following these decisions is therefore a simple matter of course.
A classic risk for new autocratic leaders is to fail to gain such credibility in the eyes of followers. Without credibility, a leader will not see loyal, passionate action taken beneath them. How is one to fix this situation?
Some attempt to make up for this shortfall by making cosmetic changes to their behaviour. Examples include making decisions quickly to assert decisiveness, and even talking louder to appear more confident in their ability. Naturally one thing can lead to another, and the new starter can quickly find themselves constantly playing catchup with regards to their knowledge:
“I must look up that term used by the banker as soon as possible, I don’t quite know what I’ve agreed to, but I couldn’t risk coming across as ‘thin’ on my finance knowledge.”
It’s clear that an autocratic leader has three possible scenarios. One is that they successfully ‘fake it until they make it’, and sufficiently bluff their way through the first couple of years without making any tell-tale blunders. The second is that their cosmetic changes wear thin, and the leader faces an even greater credibility crisis than when they began. The third is that they’re frank about shortcomings in their experience, and use their experts to catch up as quickly as possible. Only one of these options is good for the business, but I’ll leave you to decide which route you want to take!
A New Democratic Leader
Democratic or participative leadership involves seeking and respecting feedback received from ‘below’. A common mistake of new democratic leaders is to interpret the leadership style too literally. A new democratic leader is at risk of appearing ‘weak’ involving those beneath them too much in the decision making process. While the title suggests it, a democratic leader does not simply use a vote from a sample of their workforce every time they wish to make a decision.
As a subordinate, when a manager comes to you and asks “What do you think I should do in this situation?”, this could have two effects. If this is the first time the occasion has happened, you will undoubtedly feel valued and empowered to get involved in ‘higher’ decisions. However if this was the 10th time this month a new leader had called to ask your advise – you may start wondering whether it should be you who collects the manager’s pay cheque! Keep in mind that empowerment and employee involvement has it’s limits.
A New Bureaucratic Leader
Bureaucratic leaders ‘lead through a system’. They setup processes and procedures in place that typically centralise decision making, maintain accountability and quality of work. Bureaucratic systems are good for negating risks to the business and also ensuring consistency across a large organisation. Employees that rise through the bureaucrat hierarchy will almost certainly experience the many pitfalls of such a system, be it slow processing times, wasteful activities and an inability to deal with extraordinary situations. A common mistake of newly empowered bureaucratic leaders is to then ‘revolutionise’ the way things work in an attempt to solve all their personal gripes.
While it has many enemies, the bureaucratic system has a neat purpose and achieves many of its objectives, even with all the infuriating problems and waste. If it is employed in local government, central government or extremely large organisations – a bureaucratic system has evolved for a reason. It’s now large, it’s complex. and guess what – many previous leaders have been in the exact same position you have. Has it been solved to date? No.
The fact is that bureacratic systems are a necessary framework for several types of important processes. If you turn the whole system upside down, and shake out all your niggles, then after several years of firefighting and implementation, you will likely find that your new system is almost as complex as the last, and cost £’000s, if not £’000’000s to implement. The habit of attempting to revolutionise bureacratic systems comes more from a desire to change things, than a rational evaluation of the business case for such a change. I would suggest that you weigh up all your options first, including incremental changes to existing systems, before sprinting towards the drawing board.
I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this article. It of course contains only a small selection of the types of mistakes new leaders can make, but hey! Mistakes are of course, all part of the process. But do try and make sure you take most of your lessons from others’ mistakes!
The Finest Leadership Videos on the Planet
August 18, 2010 by Simon Oates (Admin)
Filed under Learning
I have been in talks with MeetTheBoss.TV (I am sure you may have heard of the site).
And they have agreed to supply our group members with free lifetime access to their premium video content for free as a partner. You lucky things! Take advantage of this opportunity by signing up for free here:
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Some of the videos I recommend you watch first are exclusive interviews from the leaders of global brands such as;
- CEO of Adidas- talking about competition and innovation
- CEO Lego- talks about how he rescued Lego
- CEO Rolls Royce- gives an insight to their sales tactics
- CEO FedEx- has a ‘Secret Weapon’
(they are 20 minutes long and provide useful insights)
The site is a valuable resource and allows you to learn from such visionaries, directly in HD quality!
I highly recommend that you Register Today for FREE using the below unique link given to our group and start exploring!
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This is not just a ‘free trial’. Your membership will be free forever as per the promotional agreement we have with MeetTheBoss.tv.
Register in just 30 seconds (or faster) here:
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Here’s the secret: You can actually share this benefit with other collegues, students or friends by sharing the link above, or simply ensuring they enter the promotional code ‘LEEX01′ on their registration form. (This will be automatically filled in if you use the above link).
I would really like to know your feedback on the videos so please get back to me with your thoughts.
Chartered Management Institute (CMI) National Conference 2010
July 19, 2010 by Simon Oates (Admin)
Filed under Learning
The conference takes the form of a daytime session running from 9:30 to 5:50. The day is filled with inspiration speakers, spaced adequately with coffee breaks and a gormet buffet lunch. This is followed by an exquisite black tie ‘Gold Medal Dinner’ in the evening with a keynote speaker. A thoroughly enjoyable and inspirational day to be had.
Not only will the Conference give you a unique opportunity to take inspiration from our exciting speakers but with the chance to debate the key issues of the day as well as maintain and expand your network, this one day conference will enable you to take away an invaluable insight on the latest management and leadership issues.
1. Bring away strategies, ideas and insight from leaders at the top of their field.
2. ‘Once-a-year’ networking opportunities
3. Be inspired by motivational speakers
4. Enjoy the finest in hospitality from a landmark hotel.
5. Meet top CMI executives and staff.
| 8:00 to 9:30 |  |
Registration, Coffee & Exhibition. |
| 9:30 to 10:20 |  |
Terry Morgan CBE (President of CMI) and Ruth Spellman OBE (Chief Executive CMI) will discuss the key attributes that leaders of tomorrow need to equip themselves with. |
| 10:20 to 11:05 |  |
Mike Southon, Political & business columnist, Financial Times. Hear why political leadership really makes a difference; what lessons businesses can learn from politics; and how political leadership helps shape economies. |
| 11.35 to 12.15 |  |
Rob Law, CEO, Magmatic Design. After suffering Theo Paphitis breaking the strap of his ‘Trunki’ ride-on child’s suitcase on Dragon’s Den, Rob Law could have thrown in the towel. Rob explains what drove him on to success and how he made the Dragons regret their decision. |
| 12.15 to 12.30 |  |
Lord Eatwell, Director, Centre for Financial Analysis & Policy will offer a whistle-stop tour of the fourth of our research papers examining managers’ views on the economy, looking for evidence that employee and customer engagement has contributed positively to the overall economic outlook. |
| 12.30 to 13.30 | |
Lunch & exhibition |
| 13.30 to 14.10 |  |
Stephen Howard, CEO Business in the Community. There has never been a more important time to create a new era of responsible business leadership. Stephen Howard discusses how this can be done through the balancing of short-term needs, longterm- value creation and the continuing demands of a fast changing society and business environment. |
| 14.10 to 14.50 |  |
Karren Brady, Vice Chairman, West Ham United FC and judge of ‘The Apprentice. Whether you are running a company, a department, a section or a football club, leaders and managers make decisions every day. Every decision made has an effect on others. This session looks at the importance of engagement and teamwork when making decisions, whether they are world changing or just procedural. |
| 14.50 to 15.20 | |
Coffee & exhibition. |
| 15.20 to 16.20 |  |
Jo Salter, UK’s first female fighter pilot. This session looks at the drivers behind leadership. What shapes individuals into the ‘type’ of people they are, how to nurture your belief systems and how to see all challenges as surmountable. |
| 16.20 to 17.05 |  |
Chris Moon MBE, Former army officer and motivational speaker. He’s survived kidnap, threatened execution, being blown up, losing his limbs and most of his blood. He ran a marathon less than a year after leaving hospital, and proved that the impossible is more usually the improbable. Chris will share his vision and inspire delegates to take back a new attitude to their everyday work. |
| 17.50 to 17.30. |  |
Daytime Conference concludes |
| 19.00 to 19.30 | |
President’s drinks reception |
| 19.30 to 23.30 |  |
National Management & Leadership Awards Ceremony. Celebrating the best and brightest in management and leadership with the highest accolades awarded in our field. Enjoy a lavish meal in an exquisite environment for an unforgettable evening. |
 |
Last year’s national conference set a very high standard for this year’s organisers to compete with! The iconic calendar date was set in the London Hilton Metropole – a fabulous venue for a fabulous event. The speakers kept their slots to a 40 minute average, which kept the information concise and easy on the listeners.
The New CMI Brand
The 2009 conference was also the stage for the unveiling of the new CMI Brand, which transformed the organisation from ‘The Chartered Management Institute’ to the shorter and catchier ‘CMI’ acronym. This move is part of a wider effort to increase the CMI’s presence on a national level, and facilitate the growth of awareness surrounding it’s Chartered Manager qualification.
The standard and quality of the speakers was impressive in 2009, as you can see from the video below which shows the motivational session with René Carayol we experience at last years conference.
The CMI left nothing to spare with its handouts. Upon arriving, delegates received several insight reports and note-taking materials bound within a professional portfolio case. Reports included ‘Age Isn’t An Issue‘, ‘Leadership for a Low-Carbon Future’, and an exclusive economic report prepared by Lord Eatwell (Director, Centre for Financial Analysis & Policy). These definitely left me with plenty to read and ponder over after the event had concluded!
With media attention already being drawn to this years event, the pressure is certainly on to create another rich and rewarding experience, bringing together the engaged members of a 86,000 member strong organisation, which contains over 560 Chairman and CEOs.
In conclusion, The National Conference 2010 promises to be bigger and better than any before. I’m looking forward to being inspired by the speakers on offer, and can’t wait to enjoy the annual Management and Leadership awards ceremony, an event not to be missed.
If you wish to purchase tickets for the CMI’s National Conference 2010, 14/10/10. Please contact us, detailing your request, and we will attempt to negotiate preferential rates with the CMI on your behalf.
| Standard Pricing & Options (Starting from just £250) | Member (£) | Non member (£) |
| Full delegate | 325.00 | 550.00 |
| Conference day only | 250.00 | 500.00 |
| Gold Medal Dinner only | 85.00 | 125.00 |
| Gold Medal Dinner table for 10 (20% discount for non members) | 850.00 | 1000.00 |
- Adrian Kingswell ~ Superintendent, National Policing Improvement Agency.
