Why successful leaders fail
Successful leaders often appear decisive, proactive, and goal-focused. Often these groundbreakers believe they are successful because they have completed certain milestones or financial objectives in the company. He or she understands how to complete the functional aspects of their job without assistance from his/her supervisor. These trailblazers choose to be successful. Most often he/she achieve positive results until the day they don’t. When this day arrives the impact on the leader’s ego can be devastating. He/she may consider a small failure to be a significant adverse event in his/her career. Managers that are promoted before they are ready will often experience this self-image problem within the first six months after a promotion.
Raising to the next level
Often when these managers receive an elevation to the next level, he/she has difficulty managing the larger organization because they have not learned to listen to his/her stakeholders and adjust their behavior accordingly. Perhaps the leader is continuing to do the work themselves. He/she feels they do not have the time or even the desire to train their team to take on some of the work that they used to do. Until these high-potential employees accept the fact that he/she must choose to succeed and are merely at the exploration stage, they will fail. Real leadership requires a commitment to constructive behavior. When leaders become aware that they are not always right and believe that two or three minds are better than one, they become stronger heads and are less prone to end up in the role of an executor.
Buddha once said, “all that we are is the result of our daily thoughts.” When we change our thinking, our behavior will change. When we change our behavior, our habits will change, and when we change our habits our personality and/or character will change. When we turn our nature, our destiny will change.”
Practicing true leadership
The major challenge faced by leaders today is not understanding the true practice of leadership. Leaders know how to do the functional portions of their jobs. They just are not showing the next generation how to do their jobs. One has to wonder why this training does not occur when the millennial generation will be running our companies by 2025 and earning 46% of the available income.
Engaging stakeholders
Leaders that are truly successful will fully engage his/her stakeholders and ask them to participate in determining solutions to business problems. While the solutions may not be the final answer, allowing stakeholders to participate in problem-solving provides the manager with more ideas to consider. This exercise also gives stakeholders an opportunity to learn how to address issues in the future. If a leader is to be successful in this exercise, he or she needs to involve his or her stakeholders by asking their opinion, listening carefully to the stakeholder’s suggestions, and thanking them for participating. A stakeholder should never be criticized for offering an idea and should always be appreciated.
Golden Professional Coaching uses the Marshall Goldsmith Stakeholder-Centered Coaching mythology to enable successful leaders to lead and behave more effectively through positive behavior change that is sustained, recognized and acknowledged by others.
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