Leadership Howler 6 - Falling behind the times

What people expect now from their leaders, is not what was expected 30 years ago. The financial chaos since 2007; a truly global market; the frequency and reality of managing remote teams; the rise in the number of people working from home; the progress of social media and technology bringing widespread cultural change, have combined to transform our expectations of our leaders.

For example - do you remember your childhood school reports? 

If you're anything like me, phrases like 'must try harder', 'too much daydreaming', 'struggles with maths', were frequent comments. But if you look at the school reports of today, they're positive and where there are negatives, there is extreme care in how those negatives are stated, so that from the start to the end, the report is constructive.

The fact is that alongside many other issues in the workplace, now that we've got to 2014, our view of 'encouragement', both in terms of quality and quantity has changed and if leaders want to get the best out of the people they lead in 2014, they will need to keep up and adapt their leadership style where necessary. Staying with the example of encouragement:

• How frequent is your encouragement?

• How do you respond to under-performance? Is it a reactive or an intelligent response?

• How could you change your language patterns, behaviour and attitude, so that you inspire your team members to follow you and achieve more in their work? 

• When was the last time you reflected on your psychological model for leadership, and then assessed it's effectiveness? 

The role of an effective leader continues to evolve in line with social and cultural changes. Failure to stay on top of this evolution risks 'old-fashioned' leadership, where behaviour and process fall out of line with current thinking. The impact is:

• Disengagement from team members
• Lost opportunities 
• Underperformance

… all of which, severely impact the health of your team and organisation.

Is your leadership style really fit for 2014? Or is it stuck in a time warp along with Walkmans and Mullets?  

Thanks for reading

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