Mastering The Leadership Role In Measurable Steps
I had many opportunities to be in a leadership position in the last period. Happily, the feedback received from my teams was good, and I am proud to say that I had the opportunity to receive it not only face-to-face but also anonymously. The official definition of leadership is "the ability of an individual or a group of people to influence and guide followers or members of an organization, society, or team." My question was always whether we really understand the meaning of this definition; because it is not just about saying but more about how to act and make the people around us believe in us and follow us.
How To Measure Leadership And Excel In Our Role
My latest feedback received about me as a leader was this:
- A trusted person (personally and professionally)
- A protective person
- Everything you want to obtain you can get for the team
- A person with a lot of initiatives
- A person that I want to be or look like in the future
- A person whom I can go and ask without being afraid
I believe that my passion for my job and for helping people helped me receive this feedback. And I truly believe that when we measure the leadership role, if we really are leaders, we should always:
- Make sure to lead by example. You’ve been in the field; your professional path included the field you are leading now. For example, if you are a learning manager now, in the past you must have been in a training role, in Instructional Design, a learning professional, etc.
- Turn back to the main definition.
- Think if you can be really there for your team to support them with knowledge, support them from others, and listen to them.
- Request anonymous feedback from your team.
- Try to compare the main definition with your feedback results.
1. Lead By Example
By having the proper experience in the field, you will be leading teams. This will provide both you and your team with a lot of benefits. Here is why I believe that:
- You will always be able to help your team with different kinds of cases/situations because you’ve been there at some point (you already have the experience).
- The chance to recruit your team qualitatively increases because you know what type of questions to ask in the interview and you will know what you are looking for.
- You can provide your feedback and support during the onboarding process of your team, even maybe be part of it, as you’ve been in these roles before.
- You will always understand the business and know what to request from your stakeholders and team.
Your team will trust you as a professional and will feel comfortable coming and asking you about the situations that may occur.
2. Read The Main Definition Of Leadership
Even if you practice your leadership role for many years, sometimes it is important to go back to the basics and recheck the main definition of it and how this role should be.
3. Support And Strive For Your Team
The leadership role is not only the name itself but more how you strive for your team, and how you help the team see that and trust you. The way others see us is because we demonstrate it. After all, we provide support, knowledge, understanding, feedback, and improvement opportunities.
4. Request Feedback
From time to time, it is important to also check if we do our job well because we are also humans, we make mistakes and improvement is always welcome. So, anonymous feedback can help you find out the truth and take action afterward.
5. Take Action
And now, it’s time to take action as well! You’re prepared and experienced in being the leader and have tried to do the best for yourself and your team, so in the end, you want to know how you are doing at this. Once you find this, it’s time to process the actions you need to take to improve yourself because it will also help your team in the future. I strongly believe that leaving things as they are and not taking action on the received feedback will only make you lose your time—it’s only a matter of time.
Conclusion
I do believe that a leadership role should start from the person, not from the role, and from you being in the same position as your team at some point to understand their needs. Because in the end, the team is following the person, not the role, and if you are there for the role then people will notice that.
