Leaders Grow Leaders
"If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader." – John Quincy Adams
Those very powerful words from John Quincy Adams bring home a global truth: In leadership, who we are, how we speak, and how we treat people, are the most important factors in who we are as leaders. It isn’t accolades from our peers or how cool we are that inspires our team to be all that they can be. It is who we are when we are doing what we do, the choices we make, and how well we walk the talk! All of this should lead one to wonder: What does my team see when they see me doing what I do? How am I leading? Who am I inspiring? What am I teaching? Where am I leaving people?
CREATING LEADERS VS. FOLLOWERS
When our responsibilities have us moving forward quickly we all too often fail to teach as we go along. Instead we are the person with all of the answers and the chief cook and bottle washer. We expect our teams to do what we tell them to do when we tell them to do it; we create in our team managers of our stuff. Our team members learn very well how to take on whatever they are told and manage it over a timeline; we create phenomenal followers. So, how well is the “following” mentality serving you? Remember: You are a leader within your organization. It is a huge responsibility. So if you are now in a place of leading your team through a more trying time AND still telling your team members every move to make, you can see where you have a problem. Creating a team made up of followers vs. leaders is absolutely detrimental to the long-term success of any organization. It creates a very uninspiring atmosphere for the team, and you as the leader will suffer personally because of the demands on your time. So what do you do about it? How do you grow your team into leaders?
Growing your team members into the leaders they are capable of being is as much about who you are being — what you believe, what you say, what you do, what you are committed to, where you leave people, and the example you set — as it is about them!
THE MAKEUP OF A GREAT LEADER
In a nutshell, leadership is about having a clear vision and being able to articulate that vision in a written plan. Providing direction, having an undauntable level of commitment, being a master of change, being a master communicator, and teaching what you know! These are the basic principles that should guide who you are as a leader, and the truth is, you wouldn’t have gotten to where you are if you didn’t possess these characteristics.
The question then is, how do you teach commitment, the ability to handle change, visionary thinking, being responsible, and communication skills? We teach leadership characteristics by being them; we lead by example. (What a concept!) If you want to grow your team into leaders, rather than followers, you have to be leadership and teach what you know. The way you teach is important to growing your team into leaders too. Without question, we all learn the easiest things we understand, think through, and then do ourselves. So when a team member comes to you with a question, you need to be the question, instead of the answer! Ask your team members what they think; ask what they would do if you weren’t there. This provides your team with:
The benefit of thinking through issues and developing their problem-solving skills!
The benefit of learning how to think on their own, which boosts your team member’s confidence in their ability to do their job and lead without you looking over their shoulder!
The confidence to step out on their own, to lead, and not just follow directions!
Being the question and not the answer also provides you, the leader, with the opportunity to see what your team knows and what they don’t know, who has natural abilities in what domain, and who’s growing and who isn’t. Eventually, their freedom provides you with the freedom to be the visionary and big-picture leader that you need to be to get your business (and your life for that matter) to where you say you want it to be!
CREATING LEADERS AROUND YOU
Leadership training is an ongoing process. No matter how great we are, each one of us can grow in our leadership abilities, and as I’ve pointed out several times already, creating leaders around you is as much about who you are as a leader as the abilities of those around you. So, as you go forward growing your team, you need to remember that old habits are hard to break. The old feeling of, “I can get this done faster if I do it myself just this one time.” will creep back into your head, and if you allow your old leadership habits back into your business one of two things will happen:
You’ll convert your followers into ineffective pseudo-leaders.
You’ll drive away those on your team with ability, motivation, and drive if you continually get in the way of what you start.
To create effective leaders around you and not stymie your or anyone else’s growth, you have to:
Stay out of the way! You have to give up being a control monster because when you “hover” over your team it sends the message that “It’s my way or the highway.” and that you don’t trust them! Both of which are opposite of what you want growing leaders to learn!
Stop being the answer and start being the question.
Be the visionary you are paid to be, and allow your team to contribute to the team and you. You’ve got to trust the training and instincts that you are building in your team.
Listen to what your team members have to say and be open to learning and doing things in a new (and possibly even better) way. Once you give your growing leaders a voice, you need to treat them with respect.
Be your word. This one speaks for itself. If you want to build a team with integrity, you’ve got to be integrity. It is that simple!
Allow your team members to learn from their mistakes.
When we walk the leadership talk, when we are consistently the question instead of the answer, and when we create opportunities for growth in our team and ourselves, we go from creating followers to growing leaders. We create a team of people around us who are capable of not only bringing our vision to life but of contributing what they know and the solutions to what they see to the table. Your organization becomes a place where “we” get the job done, instead of “me”. Your organization becomes a source of great pride and investment for you AND your team. Your growing leaders start growing leaders around them, and eventually, your team is riding high as they, on every single level, create their sense of ownership in what they do and the results they produce. In other words, everyone wins on every level and it all starts with who you are being as their leader.
So, I ask you: As a leader within your organization who are you being? What are you teaching? Who are you growing? Where are you leaving people?