Attention all leaders - What is your job?
Attention all leaders - What is your job?
You are a leader. You manage a team and have influence within the organisation. You are ambitious for yourself, for your people and for your organisation. You work hard putting in extra hours to get projects done and to stay on top of the day to day work. You’re the kind of person who gets things done, and gets them done well.
And that’s your job.
Or is it? There is one piece missing from that description above. And that is the concept of “climate”. When you hold a position of authority within an organisation, you cast a shadow. Without even intending to, you create a feeling, a culture. You set the tone.
Think of the best place you ever worked – what made it so great? Was there a feeling in the place that made it a special place to be every day?
And what about the worst place you ever worked – what made it so bad? Was there a feeling in the place that made it an unpleasant place to be every day?
A great deal of what creates organisational climate (50%-70%) can be explained by differences in leadership style.
So, what’s going on in your team? What is the climate? And how are you contributing to that?
The most common problems I see are:
- Unclear or uninspiring company vision and team vision.
- Team members don’t all agree on where they are going and why this is important.
- Ineffective decision-making processes.
- Meetings are boring, ideas are rarely allowed to grow and develop, either a snap decision is made or it is unclear whether a decision has been made at all.
- Too much time “doing” and not enough time “thinking”.
- Dealing with problems today, fire-fighting and working through a list of “to do’s” and meetings take priority over planning ahead, anticipating challenges and discussing options and opportunities.
- Team members don’t feel valued and appreciated by the organisation or their team leader.
- Praise is meted out as if it is in short supply whilst criticism and blame are commonplace.
- No surprises there I expect. But as the leader it is your job to change it. How many of the activities you do every day actually reinforce the culture described above?
Here are some key questions to ask yourself in order to change the climate in your team or organisation:
1. How do I know when my people have done well?
2. How do I show my appreciation?
3. Are my criteria for “a success worthy of appreciation” too strict?
4. Am I specific in my appreciation or do I simply say a generic “Well done team”?
5. When do I think?
6. When do my people think?
7. How often do I suffocate thinking e.g. saying “OK, let’s move on” during discussions.
8. Do I reward thinking or just the successful results of thinking?
9. How do I handle failure? In others? In myself?
10. How do I assess risk – what is a risk worth taking and what is a risk not worth taking? Do my people have the same view of this as me?
11. What happens to good ideas? Where do they go?
12. What percentage of our time in meetings is actually productive?
13. Could information shared in meetings be shared in a more effective way, leaving meeting time for discussion, debate and decision-making?
14. Do we separate ideas-generation from decision-making thus allowing ideas to grow and develop before they are up for critique?
15. Do we know where we are heading?
16. Are people behind this vision? Could they tell me what it is and feel passionately about it?
17. Does the vision inspire me?
18. What message do I send out in my personal manner? What shadow do I cast?
19. Am I consistent? Can my people read me and learn to manage me well?
20. Do I walk the talk? Do I do what I say? Do I behave as I expect others to behave? Do I set higher standards for myself than I expect of others or lower standards for myself than I expect of others?
That is a lot of questions. But if one of those questions enables you to see how you are creating a climate that limits the success of your team, then one question is enough. You don’t need to address them all today!
