Let’s do an exercise.
Close your eyes. Imagine yourself engaging your employees and motivating them to make extraordinary things happen. That’s you at your leadership best.
What makes a great business leader?
Managing a modern business is more global, digitally enabled and transparent than in times past. Nothing big gets done without some kind of complex metrics—even for small local businesses.
You can have your employees fill out 360-degree surveys based on narrow performance criteria to find out how you’re doing as a business owner, but it will give you false positives and making you think that you are more prepared than you really are.
Leadership is not about a set of skills and abilities, or a model that you must follow in order to be a great leader. It’s about personality.
Transparency is a must
Business owners can no longer get away with using a ‘game face’. Game faces are public personas that are inauthentic and false. Employees and customers want to know the real you. This demand for transparency stems from our new, instant connections on social media.
Today we find that the demand for authenticity has never been higher. Workplaces are become increasingly flattened and transparent, and Millennials are exercising their demands for transparency. Business owners need to improve as people in addition to improving as entrepreneurs.
The Social Age
Social media and globalization has had a great influence on modern businesses. Generational and cultural diversity have a high impact on employee communication, relationships and behaviors. Business owners must now learn how to deal with a combination of four generations in the workplace, as well as employees with roots from around the world.
Business success has always been affected by creating an engaging culture, but in the past entrepreneurs could afford to ignore or at least give it a lesser priority. Today, in the social age, it’s no longer an option. Now, it’s the only way a company can remain agile and responsive to the environment. Entrepreneurs simply must create a culture where people feel a sense of belonging and purpose if they want to work with a loyal and effective team.
