Authentic Leadership

Well, here it goes my first attempt at a blog.

Don’t get me wrong I love technology, I love the internet, l love my iPod, I even love my laptop even though it’s no Mac Air Book, I’m just not very good with it, let’s just say it doesn’t come naturally!

So forgive me if I’m no professional blogger but what I will do is share with you my experiences as a learning consultant, the things I notice, the different things I pick up and the things people say that make a ‘real’ difference.

So let me start by sharing with you what I’ve been up to over the last couple of weeks.

I have been working with a client on developing and delivering a leadership programme and have been co-delivering the first three of a four modular pilot programme that will be running over the next four to five months.

The framework that we chose to use is Kouzes and Posner, underpinned by five key leadership principles:

• Model the Way
• Inspire a Shared Vision
• Challenge the Process
• Encourage the Heart
• Enable others to Act

I have to admit before I started working with them on this piece of work, Kouzes and Posner were new to me. There are so many leadership frameworks out there, sometimes its difficult to know which one to use. In my humble opinion, in essence they all have the same simple key message: effective leadership is about the people rather than the process! Simple, huh?

Well yes and no;  the theory of Kouzes and Posner and most of these leadership models and theories is easy, it’s the effective application of them that makes them challenging. How do you effectively measure for example Model the Way?

Many of these frameworks give you the ‘what’ but not, and probably most importantly, the ‘how‘. The biggest challenge when delivering leadership development or training programmes, and ironically the thing that makes the biggest impact, is communicating the ‘how’ to your participants.

How often do people in leadership roles talk about the tasks and duties that they need to carry out to meet their performance targets? The things that I commonly hear are “I need to conduct this individuals’ performance or development review” or “find time to complete their one to one”. Often it is not because they want to do it but because they have to do it to tick a box to say it has been completed. Using Kouzes and Posner’s framework how can leaders possibly ‘Encourage the Heart’ when many businesses and organisations and we as facilitators and consultants, make leadership into a process?

If leadership is about the people and not about the process how can you get that important message across in a session or to the people that you lead on a daily basis?

The answer to that question is never going to be a process. Yes, there are some great leadership tools that you can add and develop over time, but building a great toolkit of knowledge will never make you a great leader.  It would be easy to just pick the perceived great leaders from history and say “just do as they did and you’ll be great” although I’m not sure that I agree. How relevant are the great leaders from history in our everyday lives in offices, schools, colleges and factories? If we are to base our leadership skills and abilities on the greatest leaders in history, we will often find ourselves coming up short and potentially lose the will to keep developing. In any case I’ll wager that history records their achievements far more vehemently than any failures or bad experiences they may have had, Winston Churchill anyone?

Great inspirational leaders are there in our everyday lives in all of the places that I’ve just mentioned. I always ask myself what is it that these people demonstrate that makes such a difference. My best friend Elizabeth has a great word for it, the word that she uses is ‘authentic’. Great leaders are authentic, what they say and do come from both the head and the heart. They are brave and often need to make difficult decisions that others may not like, but the driver behind those decisions is simple ‘do the right thing’ rather than ‘do the thing right’. So easy to say but so difficult to do, how often have you wanted or needed to give someone some feedback about a behaviour or action and felt something stopping you? I’ll be honest I fail that challenge almost every day in some way or another.

Ever been in restaurant where the service and food has been terrible and when the waitress asks you if everything is ok, you say “lovely thank you” and even leave a tip! Authentic leadership doesn’t mean being rude it just means being genuine, if someone asks you a question, be accurate in your response, otherwise how will they get the information they really need? Here is another example that we’ve been discussing over the last couple of weeks -  how often has a manager or leader asked you how you were and before even thinking about your response you’ve said ‘fine, thanks’ even though that is far from the truth. Worse still have you ever asked the same question of someone else and been relieved when they said ‘fine’ or felt uncomfortable if they are brave enough to tell you they are not fine? Worst of all have you ever asked that same question and carried on walking  before they’ve finished responding.

Let’s really think about the questions that we ask our people and why we are asking them and be ‘authentic’ when we do.

Ask your people about what they are working on, what is gong well and what isn’t and most importantly why? Ask them about what they’ve already tried and what they need from you? What and where do they need to develop further? Ask for feedback on you and how you lead them as an individual, what do you do that works for them and what doesn’t?

Being authentic isn’t a ‘what’, it’s about ‘how’ you are and choose to be. You can’t teach someone to be ‘authentic’, how could anyone else really know who the ‘authentic’ you is? Think about how much more we’d know about the people that we lead and what they need from you if they knew that you were truly interested, just remember the teacher who had the biggest positive impact on you, I’ll bet they demonstrated real interest in you. Just think of the impact to be had on the individuals you lead when they know that sitting opposite you in their weekly or monthly one to one wasn’t just a process but something that was all about them and their development.

If you don’t do this already, and please be authentic when you ask yourself that question, just try it and see what happens. It may take some time for people to truly open up and buy in because we all get used to and comfortable with the process, but in regards to Kouzes and Posner I’m certain that they would be great demonstrations of Encourage the Heart, Challenge the Process, Enable Others to act and Model the way. And maybe with a fair wind behind you and a bit of luck and determination “Inspire a Shared Vision” too.

Try it and let me know how you get on…

Martin