Leadership Language: The Fine Art of Listening
Today, everyone is bombarded by millions of messages every day, with tweets, texts, YouTube videos, and countless other media competing for attention. Amid all that noise, leaders must work harder than ever to build the connections that matter most. And the most effective strategy they have for achieving that is to leverage the three ways of listening.
The first way is listening to affirm. These listeners look for the relationships between what they already know and what they are hearing. Sometimes they are focused on self-validation ("I'll wait until she says something that confirms what I already know, so I can feel good about myself, my education level, my experience, etc.").
Coaching from Afar
Coaching tops the list of skills that many executives look for in their frontline managers, and for good reason: effective coaching can dramatically increase employee engagement and intrinsic motivation. Considering that only about one-third of U.S. workers are engaged and managers have a huge influence on employee engagement (they "account for at least 70 percent of the variance" in those metrics!), it's clear that managers need to ramp up their coaching skills.
Four Ways Leaders Can Temper an Overly Critical Approach
Spending an enormous amount of time out of the office over the past several months has given many people the opportunity to do some thinking. For some leaders, that reflection may result in excessive analysis of their team members or assignments to the point of focusing on the negative.
These days "nagging" employees about their work probably says more about a leader's need for more control during these unpredictable times than it says about the actual work itself. Leaders are feeling a lack of control, which manifests as overly critical feedback. They may also be feeling insecure about adding value and turning out the highest level of deliverables. Right now, many leaders are in the same boat, each trying to navigate this uncertain time period.
How Does Leadership Influence Organizational Culture?
The strong correlation that exists between effective leadership and great organizational cultures comes as no surprise. After all, by virtue of their roles, leaders have tremendous influence that can (depending on leadership style and execution of strategy) be either positive or negative. Because their positions enable them to reinforce values while simultaneously holding people accountable, leaders need to be deliberate in their efforts to create cultures in which employees can thrive.
How HR Can Support Companies in Times of Crisis
When economic downturns, natural disasters, company reorganizations, and other challenges arise, companies depend on HR leaders to set policies, initiate support, and assist employees. During the COVID-19 pandemic, HR departments have been actively involved in their companies' decisions (such as slowing businesses, canceling conferences, and implementing new work arrangements) to slow the spread of the disease and to adjust to statewide and local social-distancing directives. By maintaining several key focus points, HR staff can more effectively lead their companies through this crisis.
