Leadership - are you a motivator?

So we have seen in the last week the election of three new leaders and how different they are in their style and personality.  The Pope appeared to be quite a quiet reverend man with a sense of humour, Xi Jinping now the leader of China is quite hard to read and Uhuru Kenyatta  who is now in charge of Kenya appears to be quite controversial.

So what does this tell us about leaders in the 21st Century? I believe that it tells us there is no one standard mould and this is something that we need to reflect on when we look around our organisations at who will be the next leader at whatever level. What we must not do is stereotype, but consider the appropriate competences that are required for leaders in our business.

Fundamentally leadership is not about structure and process but it is about your ability as a person to motivate and inspire your team, especially in this climate.  The people who work for you are looking to you for guidance and support. The motivation that you give to other people is not: 'you should be grateful that you have a job' type of motivation but you should be motivating your team with recognition, support and inspirational moments.

Recognition is one of the fundamental tools in your toolkit as a leader...it does not mean reward, it does not mean saying 'well done' every five minutes,  it means you recognising what contribution people are making to your business and the team and thanking them for it; it is remembering about them as an individual and what they have done and something about them personally.

So often I meet team members who repeatedly say, the only time they hear from their boss is when they have done something wrong! That is just plain bad management!

Why do managers & leaders do this?  Why do you only criticise your people? Why do you always concentrate on the 5% of my job that I am not doing well instead of recognising that 95% of my job I am doing well!!  If this is you, and be honest with yourself.....get out of the habit!!!

Think of it like this:

"People often say that motivation doesn't last.  Well neither does bathing - that's why we recommend it daily!!" Zig Ziglar

Thanks for your time, Suzanne Unsworth

www.rubusassociates.co.uk

The dog ate my homework!!

Well it is one excuse for not getting your work in on time! As you know I deliver accredited programmes for both the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM) and the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (CIEH) and in order for the delegates to gain the qualification they have to complete assignments or homework.

I recently sent a chivvying email to a number of these delegates to encourage them to complete the assignments. The variety of responses can compare with all the excuses that teacher friends of mine get on a daily basis. It is also interesting how many people just ignore my email in the hope that I might go away!!

It is just such a shame that many people do not complete the work as they lose out on the qualification. I wouldn't mind but in most cases their companies have paid for them to attend and the government have part funded the programme to encourage the development of managers. I appreciate that people have pressures both personal & professional but there is also a responsibility of the delegates manager to encourage this development.

Part of the role of a line manager is to develop the people in your team, in fact you should be trying to develop your successor. You also have budget responsibility which is wasted on people who do not complete the qualification and this is not a great demonstration of leadership!   So how are you being measured? How are you measuring your people.  If all you measure is 'yes' they have attended the course that does not mean that the learning has happened it just means that the person attended the course. What you should be doing is ensuring that whatever has been learnt has met the originally identified training need.

If you complete the circle like this I will be a lot busier marking work that your people have completed!

Thanks for your time, Suzanne Unsworth

www.rubusassociates.co.uk