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As economic uncertainty plagues our communities, strong and authentic leadership is essential. Effective leaders are needed at all levels of society to create a clear and inspiring vision, build trust, and display compassion.
Having built an award-winning company that employed over 100 people and built over 6,000 homes, I have given a lot of thought to leading and managing. The truth is that what it takes to lead in difficult times is no different to what it takes in “normal” times.
Regardless of the external environment, effective leadership requires three conditions.
Vision
Without a vision that inspires others, leadership simply does not exist. Early in my profession, I worked for a company whose slogan was “A New York Stock Exchange Company.” Not “We build quality homes” or “We create great communities”—just a reference to the NYSE. Where is the vision?
When I think of vision leadership, I think of Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech. In that speech, King painted a picture of a future that everybody listening would want to be a part of and help build. It’s a clear and inspiring vision.
That’s what I had in mind when I founded my company. Our vision was easy: “TW Lewis Company will be the best homebuilding organization in America, as measured by product quality, customer satisfaction, and profitability.” That vision has been the foundation of my leadership—a vision that embodies my dream, values, and personal journey—and has inspired all of our employees.
Credibility: Can I trust you?
Think of someone you truly admire and respect. I’d assume that person is trustworthy. They display trustworthiness through each their intentions and their competence. They do what they say they are going to do. The same is true for leadership. True leaders are trustworthy. They do what they say they are going to do.
One newer example of a “leader” who failed in this department is Adam Neumann, the ousted CEO of WeWork. From questions about the use of company funds to the inclusion of relations in the business, concerns were raised about Neumann’s credibility. He was ultimately ousted because his supporters didn’t trust him.
Do you care about your followers?
Leadership requires compassion – compassion for employees and compassion for customers. This means understanding and appreciating other people’s perspectives and demonstrating “compassion in action” – empathy, care and kindness for others.
While all the time critical, compassionate leadership is more essential than ever. Get into the details. Deal with individuals. Solve problems. Make exceptions to the rules and do what is right.
Four Basic Principles of Management
You also need to be a good manager. Throughout my long profession, I have seen each successful and unsuccessful managers. In my opinion, there are 4 basic elements of management: planning, organizing, motivating, and measuring. While leadership requires these traits, leadership alone is not enough to keep a business running.
1. Planning
Whether you’re in the C-Suite or a mid-level manager, you would like to plan before you go any further. That means starting with your vision and creating concrete steps to get there.
Another way to plan higher is to set goals. You won’t achieve your goals until you discover them and create a plan to achieve them. I’ve found that it’s best to set goals for different time frames: every day, monthly, yearly. Daily goals are essential because they emphasize the importance of today. Monthly and yearly goals are good because they enable you focus on what’s really essential, not urgent.
Once you know what your goals are, you may create a plan to achieve them. What do you would like to do? What does your team need to do? What role does each of your direct reports play?
2. Organizing
When I used to be running my company, I used to be consistently looking at our org chart and asking myself, is there a higher way to organize around our goals? Who reports to whom? Do we have enough people working on X? Do we have too many people focused on Y?
Good management means good organization of internal resources – each human and financial.
3. Motivation
Motivation is closely related to leadership vision. The best way to motivate your people is with an inspiring vision or a worthy ideal. If you are a manager, think of yourself as the leader of three, five, or fifteen of your direct reports. How are you able to articulate a vision that may motivate them to be the best they may be?
Show that you simply care. People respond to personal encouragement. They also want to know that you simply listen, value, and use their opinions.
4. Measurement
Without metrics as guardrails, you have no way of knowing whether your processes and systems are performing as planned. Regular measurement will show you when your goals have been met and when you may move on. If you haven’t met your metrics, you will discover out what’s not working and get things back on track.
At my company, we meticulously measured customer satisfaction in minute detail throughout the entire sales process. When we saw something that customers weren’t completely glad with, we focused on it and discovered how to improve it.
While our world is probably not normal in many ways, effective leadership and management have not modified. Now is the time to get back to basics and make sure you are doing every thing you would like to do to lead your team and organization into a latest future.