Leadership Defined
You can easily get caught up in debate about what exactly is meant by “leadership.” One can spend countless hours contemplating the differences/similarities between being a leader and being a manager. CSI believes that anyone with a team of people reporting to them is in a position of leadership. Additionally, anyone in a leadership role needs to develop methods for leading those on their team.
An organization’s leadership must take an active role in defining the direction and strategies that will lead their business to successful outcomes. Companies define success by bottom line results in cost, quality, customer satisfaction, safety and productivity. While many organizations focus on outside competition and pressures, truly progressive companies also focus on how they will lead their people toward accomplishment of their mission. This can be achieved in one of two manners. Leaders can exert their wills and get personally involved in every menial task. Or, leaders can create an environment that proceeds with established, non-negotiable processes which raise employee engagement levels and results in collective accountability.
There is a choice. You can manage by personality or you can manage by process. Those opting for a process based leadership method will find greater, lasting success.
Managing by Process. The 3 C’s employees want.
With a focus on developing the proper leadership processes, organizations can provide employees with what they truly desire. Over several years and numerous studies, CSI concludes that employees crave the following.
- Clarity. The number one reason people get out of accountability today is they plead ignorance and this is directly tied to lack of clarity; clarity of purpose, clarity of direction, clarity of why. Successful leaders build a communication system that perpetuates clarity to the employees. This requires a systemic approach to information dissemination and discernment. Typically, what people don’t know they make up. Great leaders drive a culture of clarity, they teach the true meaning of communication. Without defined processes for communication, you’re left with no way to drive clarity, and you’ll be left with confusion and an inability to operate in accordance with expectations.
- Consistency. Managing by personality leads to inconsistency – Managing by process drives consistency. The most influential leaders are often characterized as consistent. They had a strategy, and they stayed the course. They were consistent in how they communicated, how they managed their employees and how they made decisions.
- Connectivity. The one sure thing that all your employees have in common is the business itself. In the absence of being connected to the success of the business, people revert to being connected to their individual wants and needs. This breeds and perpetuates an entitlement mentality. Today, leaders require a system that links people directly to the business results and provides them with direct knowledge of whether they are winning or losing. With a process to drive connectivity, your employees are held together with a common purpose.
Process Based, Performance Driven
With more and more being put on the plates of today’s leaders, organizations must consider the affect their leaders have on employees, and in turn, the end results. Great organizations are responding to their need for bottom line improvements by establishing cultures based on non-negotiable, minimum standard processes. Once an organization’s culture has employees commonly focused on performance that organization has found the most important and meaningful definition of leadership.
Getting Started
Contact us now for information on how other organizations have improved performance, raised accountability and kept all their employees focused on accomplishing their mission.
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Process Based Leadership Training
