As I wrote in my last posting, there are many factors that can impact a leadership style and have a negative impact on the leader, the business itself, including partners and employees. Self-awareness is key to making changes for the better. To continue, here are three more examples that might resonate with you.
Some leaders are easily distracted. They may not have the patience to create a long-term strategy, and even if they have one, they find themselves not following what they planned. Distracted leaders tend to treat their business much the same way you might spoil a child – impulsively giving it what it seems to need at the moment, without quantifying performance and planning. This leader can also suffer from “shiny object syndrome.”
Next, there’s the micromanager, dominated by a fear of losing control. Micromanagers tend to create systems that are more a means of control rather than a way to support best practices. Further, this type of leader tends to allocate tasks without direction or authority, and when an employee has trouble succeeding, they tend to respond with frustration by taking away responsibilities rather than providing constructive criticism and better direction. Training others takes a back seat. Employees begin to believe they’ll never meet their leader’s standards and that the leader will probably end up doing it on their own anyway. This can result in low-performing and under-responsible employees, management conflict, and a lack of passion and personal engagement.
Then there’s the over-responsible business owner who tends to operate in complete overwhelm, taking a lot of pride in being the only one with all the answers and coming to the rescue whenever a crisis occurs. Over-responsibility comes from deeply caring, but it shows up as stress and extreme generosity at the leader’s own personal expense. This behavior ultimately takes away from the growth and responsibility of the team members. Many of these leaders can have money issues because of their tendency to sacrifice their own needs, often undercharging clients or delaying invoicing, because of a false belief that other people’s needs are more important than their own, and that everyone and everything depends on them.
Again, if any of the above sounds like you, let’s talk about how it might be easier than you think to begin modifying your approach.
Stephen
Recent Comments