Successful businesses need good leaders. Leaders set goals, encourage their team, inspire creativity and aid motivation. Good leaders are easy to spot because their team is often excited about their work and motivated to get it done. Under qualified leaders are even easier to notice because their employees are often stressed out, over worked, disenchanted with their job and doubt their relevance to the company. Over the years I’ve seen too many businesses suffering due to poor leadership. If you’re a leader who feels it’s time to re-evaluate your attitude and skills, read on to find out how you can improve.
Be The Boss (Respectfully) – It’s good to be the boss, but bossiness isn’t cool. Just because you’ve been put in charge doesn’t mean you are the king and everyone is there to serve you. There is a fine line between being the boss and being bossy. A great way to shake off your bossy pants is to meet with each member of your team to see what they are working on. If they are on overload, this means you need be considerate and stop throwing stuff their way for the time being.
Optimism Is Key – Always pointing out the negative in every situation will impact the whole team. Leaders should constantly be recognizing the positive and using it to encourage their employees. If you tend to be pessimistic, try writing down what you believe is negative and share only the positive with your team. After you’ve encouraged them with positive feedback, it is then appropriate to address the negative. Just make sure you aren’t focusing on it and always find a way to end with encouragement!
Communicate. Communicate. Communicate. – Not involving your team in decisions and a lack of proper communication can be detrimental to becoming a good leader. If you find that your employees are completely out of the loop about important occurrences and information, that could be a sign that you need to step up your game as a leader by including them in important conversations and making sure you always communicate.
Keep A Clear Vision – Good leaders have a clear vision of how their team is going to reach success while poor leaders are vague in their vision and are opposed to collaborating with others. If you find that you are unsure of where your team is headed, take a step back and figure that out before you confuse everyone who is looking to you for guidance. It could be that you need to meet with your leader to re-evaluate you team’s goals.
Be Willing to Compromise – Yes, you are the leader and have the last say when it comes to making decisions. This does not mean that you shouldn’t listen to your team’s ideas and recommendations. That’s what they are there for! If you know that you are often unwilling to compromise try simply listening to others with an open mind and treating them with respect. This will go a long way.
By consciously making an effort to break these bad traits and habits, people will be more likely to follow your lead. Consider meeting with a mentor who will hold you accountable for how you are influencing and leading your team each day.
Have you recognized any other traits of bad leaders and have advice on how to improve? Leave us a comment below.
