When you think about leadership attributes, is your list heavy on technical elements but light on behaviour and relationship skills.? It is a fact, that behaviour and relationship skills bring out the technical competencies and enable the job to be done well. At higher levels of leadership (e.g., chief executives), technical skills are less important than behaviour competency and relationship-building acumen. The reason for that is the work of senior leaders is more strategic than operational.
Just look at the number of highly capable leaders in politics, business, and non-profit sectors who have failed. The root cause has not been their lack of talent, desire, ambition, enthusiasm, passion, agility, and the like… But, what sends these otherwise successful leaders hurtling toward the ground, is their poor behaviour. They become so insulated by their sense of self-worth and value that they lose sight of how they relate to others, and they get separated from those who can give them honest feedback.
Behavioural attributes (including interrelations ability), commonly and incorrectly referred to as “soft skills,” are really the “hard skills” that enable the leader to be influential—self-aware, collaborative, and connective. Employees’ low morale, refusal to engage in their work, mistrust of management, lack of motivation, and poor performance are linked to their leaders’ consistent display of negative behaviour. It is easier to overlook someone’s technical shortcomings than his poor interpersonal skills. This is why a leader’s behaviour is the most important predictor of organizational performance.
The bottom line is that accepting mediocrity in your leadership is the biggest impediment to your organization moving forward. It is often said that good is the enemy of great. If you want to create a great organization then you can never become comfortable, or “good” with the current results or success that your leadership is producing. When we accept that good is good enough, we have imposed a self-limiting factor of ever achieving anything better than what we currently have achieved. This isn’t simple semantics of calling everything great. When you accept an outcome that was the result of good enough leadership, or good enough leader behaviour, you have accepted mediocrity.
CORPORATE HARMONY is grateful to Dr. Michael E. Frisina for his contributions to this entry.
Catherine is the President and CEO of CORPORATE HARMONY, providing virtual solutions for leadership development and organizational culture change. Her leadership and coaching experience as a Project Manager in an ever-changing, fast moving technological organization with unrelenting demands drove her to the realization that a positive mindset and strength-building behaviors are essential for today’s complex and chaotic organizational systems. CORPORATE HARMONY’s virtual platform of programs, coaching and performance measurement, is an innovative online technology of tested proprietary content. The world-class content of CORPORATE HARMONY’s Positive Presence Program develops the skill of ‘Positive Presence’ and the necessary ‘Positive Presence Behaviour Competencies’ for maintaining a positive and energized mindset and increased performance in today’s complex work environment, and leading to a culture of collaboration and connection. Catherine’s vision for Corporate Harmony is to bring the skill of “Positive Presence” to the corporate world as it becomes more complex, ambiguous and chaotic. Catherine is uniquely positioned to impact organizations’ productivity and long term success, with her powerful vision of eliminating bad stress from every workplace around the globe, bringing purpose into the people equation to promote healthy, productive and meaningful work cultures and turn the tide on the neglect of mental health on a global scale. Catherine is author of the book: “CORPORATE HARMONY – The Performance Link for Today’s Modern Organization” Catherine can be reached at: Catherine.Osborne@corporateharmony.ca or go to ‘contact us’ on our website www.corporateharmony.ca. Catherine is available for consultation, and can be reached by 519-695-3407.