Part of our understanding about stress and managing our response to it, is being aware of and using the strengths of our individual behaviour patterns. We all know that change and chaos are constants in our knowledge and technology driven world. John Maynard Keyes wrote, “The hardest thing is not to get people to accept new ideas; it is to get them to forget the old ones.” Yet, with all of this change and resulting chaos, both enlightened leaders and their organizations continue to thrive.
So what distinguishes enlightened leaders from those who are not? How do enlightened leaders overcome the reality of the Keyes’ quotation? A common denominator among successful enlightened leaders is they have discovered and use their emotional energy and behaviour strengths to propel themselves and their organizations to peak performance. Awareness of your emotional energy and an understanding of your behaviour strengths is key in your pursuit of becoming a more enlightened and transformational leader. As you build your awareness and understanding you naturally create and positively influence the relationships you have with other people.
Enlightened leaders know that placing emphasis on building their strengths can mitigate the impact of their weaknesses. Rather than try to compensate for their own level of performance in an area of weakness, enlightened leaders build highly functional teams and surround themselves with the right people to compensate for their own performance inadequacies. Enlightened leaders are so secure in who they are and what they believe that they aggressively seek out team members who balance their strengths and weaknesses.
One misconception about the playing to your strengths strategy is that it prevents a person from trying a new approach or imposes a limitation in the event of an organizational or market change. Another fear is that the successes gained from this strategy can be short term and may derail a person’s career because all he knows to do is to stick to what he does well. These beliefs may be true from the technical skills perspective, and we do recommend that leaders continue to learn and expand their technical skills. When we are talking about playing to behaviour strength however, this kind of thinking is misinformed.
The Positive Presence behaviour competencies recognize that when we play to our behaviour strength, it is much easier to maintain positive emotional energy and the higher-level brain function that is necessary for performance driven behaviour and a high performance team. Learning about your own behaviour strength and the behaviour strength of others equips you to easily control your emotional energy, as well as influencing the emotional energy of others.
Behaviour skill drives technical skill, and when leaders leverage their behaviour strength and rely on the behaviour strengths of others to support them, they can bring about improved technical performance, better interpersonal relationships, innovative solutions to problems, and consistent positive outcomes. How would you like to work for this kind of leader and their organization? We would too!
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.