Quote of the week

All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players:

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Eight Characters in Search of a Plot – the Capabilities that Underpin Great Leadership


Leadership. Setting challenging and worthwhile goals; inspiring others to follow and enabling them to realise your vision; making a long lasting and beneficial difference.
If you are reading this post the likelihood is that you are interested in those behaviours that underpin great leadership and are seeking to develop yourself and, perhaps, those around you. There is a wealth of material out there to help you and any number of training, coaching and advisory organisations who will come to your assistance (for a small consideration). But the commitment to develop leadership behaviours has to come from within the individual; yourself or those with whom you are working. So can you find a way to make sense of all of the available information and can you find a structured approach that will enable you to 'Keep It Simple Stupid' and focus on the elements that will work for you or your team? Yes you can. I did and it works for me – and may work for you. Welcome to the eight key leadership capabilities.
In a previous post I looked at what defines great leadership and settled on three criteria – setting challenging and worthwhile goals; inspiring others to attempt those goals; providing the capabilities need for those goals to be reached. After a bit of thought I have added a fourth – which is that the goal when reached must be sustained.
I have also argued that, while we cannot all become great leaders, we can all improve our leadership capabilities to the benefit of ourselves, our organisations and our communities. Great leadership is partly a function of who you are, part learned skills and knowledge and part context – being in the right place at the right time. Through effective coaching we can develop self awareness for ourselves and for members of our teams and use that self awareness to improve or mitigate the impact of those personal characteristics that make us who we are. We can train to learn new skills; we can acquire knowledge and, over time, experience. We can develop the habit of constantly challenging the status quo so that we may recognise the opportunities for change that others miss and be ready to take action; to live by the motto, 'Carpe Diem' – seize the day (two Latin phrases in one sentence – how erudite!)
This intent to develop our ability to act as great leaders and, by so doing, to make a difference is in itself a challenging and I hope worthy goal. So, in accordance with my own principles of great leadership, I have tried to articulate why it is worth making the effort (see my last post, 'Nature or Nurture') and also to consider how this task can be achieved. How can I help myself and others achieve this vision?
I started by thinking about my four definitions of great leadership and looking at what is needed to realise each of those aspects. As I did so I began to see a cast of characters evolving before my mind's eye. Each of these characters were to an extent one dimensional. Caricatures if you like of different aspects of the ideal leader but, like all good caricatures, I found them engaging and felt that they illustrated essential truths.
The first character to take shape cut a charismatic and inspiring figure. Keen eyed and highly intelligent, she saw things that others missed yet had the ability to draw others into her vision and make them want to help realise it on her behalf (in the interests of avoiding writing he/she a lot or trying to find increasingly complex, gender independent phrases to illustrate my points, the descriptions that follow have been equally and arbitrarily split across female and male protagonists – it has nothing whatsoever to do with any implied characteristics of the character). This was the Visionary/Motivator – the aspect of leadership that defines the challenge and inspires others to follow. Why had I joined these two characteristics together? Well, partly because it just happened that way. However, I have learned to listen to my inner voice and when it insisted that these two aspects were linked I decided to try and understand why. It seemed to me that vision and motivation are two sides of an inspirational coin. Without a compelling vision, no amount of charismatic presentation is going to compel people to follow. Without the ability to paint inspiring pictures, to capture imaginations and to tell stories that others want to be part of, the compelling vision will remain just that.
Close behind, shuffling onto the stage that had now formed in my imagination, came three further characters. Clearly together, they nevertheless formed an unusual group at first glance. Two seemed personable and outgoing and genuinely interested to see me as they looked out from the stage. The third figure continuously looked about him with an air of concern and seemed to be appraising the situation, furiously scribbling notes and muttering under his breath. This was the team charged with providing others with the capabilities needed to achieve the challenging goal set by the Visionary/Motivator. The first was the Team Builder. He understood that for success to be achieved the collective talents of those who had been inspired to participate would have to be welded together for the common good – the capability of the group would need to be more than the sum of the parts and his enthusiasm for the team, and for supporting those who form the team, knew no bounds.
The second of the three seemed equally enthusiastic and interested in those around him but focused more on individuals, wandering around the stage asking open questions of anyone who came near. "Who are you?" I approached and asked him. "That's an interesting question," he replied. "Who do you think I might be?" I waited during the ensuing silence then finally decided I'd better try and figure it out for myself. "I guess you'd be the Coach." I said, finally. And he was. His role, I now understood was to help the individual members of the team to give of their best.
Someone who seemed to be in need of a bit of coaching was the third member of the trio. It turned out though that all he needed was a bit of recognition and support. He was charged with helping to develop and maintain a supportive environment for the team. Not so much a worrier, just paying attention to detail and, it has to be said, feeling a little undervalued. "We all know that a supportive environment makes all the difference," he said, "but how often do we try to manage that environment?" As he spoke he removed his coat to reveal a sweatshirt on which was written the slogan, 'Creating an environment where success is inevitable'. So now I knew what the Context Manager was about.
At this point I felt someone tapping on my shoulder. Turning, I saw three women waiting to talk to me. They had an air of focus and an energy that positively crackled around them. "We have too much to do to waste time letting you figure out who we are," one said, "so we decided to introduce ourselves. This, is the Task Manager," she pointed to the clipboard wielding girl on her left. "She gets the job organised, ensures we have a plan and that we follow it. This," she turned to her right, "is the Risk Manager. She stops things getting in our way, or if they do, she makes sure that it doesn't matter." "I see," I responded, "and you are?" She turned on her heel, "I'm the Relationship Manager. It's my job to keep you and anyone else who matters on board. Lot's to do, must fly. I'll be back to see you, ...." , she consulted her diary, "... next week."
At that point I figured I had met the entire cast – the motivators, enablers and the doers. Then I noticed a man sitting quietly in the wings, watching the others with an air of amusement and with a wry smile on his face. As I approached he spoke in a voice that, though quiet was confident and authoritative. "Great bunch aren't they? Now they are on the case, they will deliver that vision – no doubt about it. What do you think will happen next?" I thought for a while. "Another vision, maybe?" He smiled. "Maybe. Although, unless someone worries about embedding and sustaining this vision it may look a lot like where we've just come from. That's where I come in." So this was the Change Manager. The person who understands that change is hard and cannot just be built, engineered or delivered. It has to be embedded and that is a process that takes time and effort and must be planned.
So now the cast was complete. We have:

  • The Visionary/Motivator – Setting the challenging goals and inspiring others to follow;


  • The Team Builder, The Coach and the Context Manager – building the capability to achieve the goal;


  • The Task, Risk and Relationship Managers – getting things done, knocking down barriers and delivering the goal;


  • The Change Leader – ensuring that the goal is embraced and sustained.

As I said, one dimensional, caricatures, yes – but the essential cast necessary to realise the drama that will be played out by us as we develop our leadership behaviours.
In my next post I will explain how this cast comes together to realise Great Leadership and we will take a closer look at the first among equals – the Visionary/Motivator.

2 comments:

  1. Mike, this is great. Somehow just writing it down makes everything a lot clearer.
    However in the real world and with finite resources available I can see that some of the roles identified are clearly complimentary and can be carried out by a single person, but what about the gaps? Especially when it is not possible to recruit. Those leadership qualities you refer to imply that we are all capable of learning new skills to help the business deliver
    but it could be the one additional task that completely overloads the individual, and 'burn-out' is something that we all must avoid.
    Still great food for thought (and self-improvement).

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  2. Good question.
    Well we cannot all do everything - we each have our strengths and our areas for development.
    One important attribute of strong leadership - perhaps the most important - is self awareness - the ability to know what we can do ourselves and where we need help.
    Second, if something eneds to be done to ensure success,then it needs to be done- if not by the leader then by someone else - usually by someone else, because leadership is not about doing, it is about creating an environment where the right things happen.
    Third, if the leader attempts to take on too much there is as you say the potential to burn out. Which is why the ability to focus is critical. What are the key things that need to be addressed right now? Who is best placed to address them? Which can be fully delegated and which will require my (the leader's) attention. These are all questions the leader must ask throughout the life of a project.
    At any one time there should be a lot of things done by the team where they work towards clear objectives and decide on the who, how, when, what etc.
    There will be fewer things where the team acts while the leader retains some control over ways and means. And there should be very few things where the leader acts. That is the nature of delegation and it is a management skill rather than a leadership skill. The ability to focus yourself and others in the right areas is a leadership skill I believe.
    And finally, if you have done all the above and do not have enough or the right skills and cannot recruit? Good question. I think that is the point where a true leader acts with humility and seeks help - drawing on the motivator/visionary skills to make a persuasive case why some outside intervention is needed.
    And we all need help sometime.

    Thanks for the comment by the way.

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