One of my favourite leadership quotes comes from John Quincy Adams who defined a leader as someone whose “actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more.”
When we first step into leadership we develop a certain skillset that helps others grow at an individual level. As we ourselves rise in the ranks, we soon learn that leading at an advanced level requires a new set of skills.
Leading leaders means we must coach others to be, instead of to do. This finer skillset is more subjective, it requires more flexibility and openness, and for most of us it requires a major shift in our leadership mindset.
Build strong relationships
The first thing to understand in leading leaders is that the most important thing is the relationship between the two of you. Leaders will follow you because they trust you, and trust comes from developing the relationship.
Build the relationship by taking a personal interest in them and in their success. These people will work long and hard as they go the extra mile. When you know something about them personally, especially their interests and goals in life, they feel as though you care about them. And as the saying goes, people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.
Strengthen communication skills
Listen first and listen often. People want to be heard and understood, even if you don’t agree with them. The British statesman Philip Stanhope said, “Many a man would rather you heard his story than grant his request.” People don’t always expect to get their own way, but they always expect that you’ll at least hear them out. Hearing them out means not just paying lip service with your ears, but truly seeking first to understand, as Dr. Stephen Covey's book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People would admonish us to do.
Get them involved
There’s more than one way to dig for gold, and often the people on your team will have different ideas on how to do things. You must be willing to listen to their ways, and support them in their plans, if what they want to do is feasible. Where possible, involve your leaders in generating options. If you can’t involve them at the strategic level, then certainly include them at the tactical level. You might set the destination, but let them define the path.
Be flexible when you lead leaders. Be willing to listen to others and be open to adjusting your plans based on the collective wisdom of the group. But know what’s negotiable and what’s not.
Coach leadership skills
To be a leader means to take responsibility and accountability for your actions and for your results. Depending on the types of leaders your team has had in the past, they may be waiting for someone to tell them what to do and how to do it. If they’ve been treated in the past as though their titles are just that, a title on a business card, then they may not have truly learned to be leaders… just higher-paid followers.
Be sure you know how to delegate effectively. Don’t assume that because they have the titles means they can do the job. Ask more questions rather than give more advice. If they are new leaders, perhaps you give more coaching on how to coach others from a performance perspective. If they’ve been around for a while, maybe they need some assurance from you that they in fact can make a decision and won’t have you veto it at the next staff meeting. When leaders feel as though others are stepping into their territory, it can have an adverse effect.
Lead by example
Be a good leadership example, because they are learning their skills and behaviours and norms from you. When people take on a new role where they have little or no experience, and they aren’t given formal learning opportunities, they will pick up their new skills based on what they see going on around them. If there is a behaviour that you want to see your leaders practice, be sure that you are doing the same.
This also means you must respect their position as a leader. Regardless of the level of skill, they are a member of the leadership team. Treating them with respect is critical if you want them to respect others, including you.
Generate critical buy-in
When leading leaders, it’s important to realize that your leaders will have their own vision and want to leave their own mark on their corner of the world. So getting them to do the things you want them to do (because, after all, you also need to set a high-level vision) means to illustrate and communicate ways that your vision helps them achieve their goals.
Link the things that you want to the things that they want. Leaders (usually) will have a vision of the things they want to accomplish and the way they want them accomplished. It may not be fully baked into something formal, but everyone wants to accomplish something.
Sometimes this is easy… when the visions are the same. But lets say that as the Department Head you want to improve operational efficiency in your department by 3%. One of the leaders in your team wants to improve the employee engagement score in her team by 5%. These two objectives might seem at odds with each other if you think of them as work harder vs. be happier, especially if there is no budget to increase compensation. This is where you need to find another link between the two.
One potential link could be: if the team can find ways to improve processes by shortening cycle times, their employees can work less overtime and take less work home, creating better work-life balance, and ultimately increasing employee engagement.
Manage conflict effectively
A challenging part of your role will be to resolve conflict. When conflict arises among a group of leaders, don’t allow yourself to get sucked in to choosing sides. Remain calm. Keep the lines of communication open. Ask lots of questions. In times of conflict, people want to be heard and feel understood. Understanding is not the same as agreeing, and the best strategy to help people resolve issues is to have them clearly articulate the other person’s position. Only when people fully understand each other are they capable of moving to the most effective resolution.
Tom Peters, author of In Search of Excellence, says that the job of leaders is not to create followers, but to create more leaders.
When we transition to the level of leadership where we ourselves are leading, developing and growing leaders, we need to shift our mindset. What shift do you need to make in your mindset to help other leaders dream more, learn more, do more, and become more?
