Want an extremely simple way to dramatically improve your effectiveness as a leader?
Start thinking in terms of what you can give the people you lead instead of what you can get out of them.
To go from being just a “manager” to being a leader, we should shift our mentality from being a taskmaster to being a mentor.
If we’re doing our job as a manager, it should be a given that we set clear expectations for our people and let them know that we’ll hold them accountable to meeting those expectations. But that definitely shouldn’t be where we focus our energy.
We should focus our energy on finding ways that we can help our people to be happier, both at work and away from work, and to continuously grow both personally and professionally.
We should know what goals and aspirations our people have, both at work and away from work, and do whatever we can to help our people reach those goals (provided they are positive of course).
What happens when we personally invest in the development and well-being of our people?
For one, by truly caring about our people and consistently demonstrating that we care, we build influence. People want to do great things not because of fear of reprisal if they don’t do them, but because they don’t want to let us down.
We also build a culture of trust and service that people want to be around. This is a simple way to gain one of the few competitive advantages that still remain in today’s business world – the ability to attract and retain top talent. One company that has been proving this for years is nextjump, which had a 0.2% hire rate last year (almost 18,000 applications for 35 positions) and has almost no turnover. Their stated reason for existing as a company, their “Why”, is “To do the little things that allow others to do the great things they are meant to do.”
Most important in the grand scheme of things it that we find we’re happier and enjoy going to work more. Being a mentor who helps people achieve greatness is much more rewarding and meaningful than being only a manager.
What are some ways you are helping your people to be happier and continuously grow?
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