Any organizational leader functions within the limits of three different leadership modes:
Task Leadership: making things happen.
Thought Leadership: creating clear paths for the organization.
People Leadership: help the team become their best self, to achieve organizational goals.
Most of the leadership issues arise because the leaders’ everyday activities do not match the current organizational needs. To remedy this mismatch, the first step is to become aware of the reality, which is most of the time different from the leader’s own perception.
A valuable tool for gaining this awareness is ‘the leadership radar’, and it is indeed very simple to use:
- For one week you keep a calendar for EVERY activity you are engaged in, writing down the title of the activity, its duration and a simple descriptor : Ta (Task), Th (thought) or P (people).
- At the end of the week, you calculate the % of time devoted to each one of the 3 ‘leadership modes’.
As a first step, let yourself be genuinely surprised by the result! You will most probably notice that your ‘investment’ behind (at least) one of the three leadership modes will be very weak.
Compare your findings with :
- Your own perception of the optimal split..
- The perception of your boss or of key stakeholders within the organization.
- The implicit directions coming from the company’s vision, values, goals, SWOT analysis and culture.
Ask yourself the true reason why this gap -between reality and the ‘optimal’- exists. Exclude ‘reasons’ such as ‘lack of time’ or ‘boss’s imposing schedule’ as the ‘standard excuses’ which your mind uses to hide the real issue: A personal weakness that you need to work on? A wrong perception of what leadership is? A need to look better in the eyes of others? Whatever the reason is, accept and make your decision if you want to continue like this, or make a change!
Following the above insights, decide your ‘target split’ between the three leadership modes and decide your immediate commitments to reflect this onto your everyday schedule.
For more questions or information about Leadership Coaching contact us here: t@q-mind.co.
