If high-impact positive leadership was easy, there’d be more of it. Your workplace would be invigorating and supportive rather than defeating and cut-throat. The world would be a better place.
High impact is hard because,
1. Leaders with power attract people who want power. Relationships become smokescreens.
2. Leaders with resources have “friends.”
3. Inept leaders mold people into who they want them to be.
4. Expediency replaces honesty in many vertical relationships. Enemy-leaders tell you what you want to hear. They may seem truthful, but convenience (not honesty) drives them.
5. Selfishness is easy.
7 Principles of High-Impact Leadership
1. Focus on adding value rather than being influential. The path to influence is the value you add. The more value, the more influence.
2. Speak to progress. Fuel progress by focusing on progress. Avoid incessant corrections.
3. Maximize difficulties while expressing confidence. The bigger the challenges, the more useful encouragement can be. Never minimize the problems people face; embrace difficulties with confidence. Minimizing challenges makes people feel insignificant and disrespected.
4. Seek the highest good. The truest tests of leadership are noble intent and selfless motivation. Leaders ask: “What’s best for you? What’s best for the organization?” Enemies ask, “What’s best for me?”
5. Bring truth and compassion together. Some can be tough. Many, on the other hand, can be tender. Few bring tough and tender together. Toughness by itself points out failure from a distance. Compassion gets dirty.
6. Breathe wind into people’s sails. Leave people with more vitality than you found them. Ask yourself, “How do I make people feel?” Are you making life richer?
7. Persistently drive toward positive outcomes. Build up more than tear down.
Which high impact principle is most relevant to you?
What high impact principles can you add to the list?
