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Leadership for Growth

Written by: Harry Hayden

Article Overview: How many companies are letting their business stagnate through a proliferation of poor management practices and a lack of effective leadership at multiple levels? Possibly a sensitive and controversial question, however one that may still warrant some answers.

Leadership for Growth

So let’s try and remove the emotion and subjectivity and try and take an objective look at this. First we need to understand the motivations or sometimes lack of motivation behind poor management and how this differs from an effective leadership oriented environment.

Poor Management Practice.
The causes of poor management practice usually lie somewhere between two extremes - either too tight a hand on the rudder (micro management) or too loose a hand on the rudder (directionless). The results of both are very detrimental in the medium to long term.

Tight Hand:
Sometimes due to a mistrust of other people’s ability or commitment with a resultant disinclination to empower them. Perhaps the manager is surrounded by weak people (by choice, negligence or inheritance) or he / she feels they always have to know best.

Also sometimes a fear of being found out for one’s own inadequacy and thus a need to keep very tight control of people and information so as to look good (often at the expense of others). Such micro management stifles talent - especially if perceived as a personal threat.

Loose Hand:
Not really understanding where you need to take your team or perhaps how to take them there. The directionless manager often lets things run their course in the vain hope that they will come up smelling of roses or if not then at least survive any fallout.

We should be careful not to confuse an empowering leader with a poor manager as both could be judged to have a loose hand on the rudder – the former because he / she has surrounded themselves with strong empowered lieutenants and the latter due to management weakness.
 
Good Leadership Practice.
Effective leadership is at the other end of the spectrum. Sadly it is fairly rare and often feared by command & control type management who may even close ranks to eradicate it – e.g. in an acquisition where a control culture pulls together to oust a leadership culture.

Clear Goals:
Good business leadership will always ensure that the company vision and goals are clear, inspiring and well communicated throughout the organisation. But first, they must ensure that the vision is ambitious, but achievable and that the goals are well aligned with it.

Right People:
The other critical step is ensuring you have the right people in the right roles. If you are to build a high performance culture, the business must always be put first in the recruitment, retention and even removal of people. Good leaders don’t hide from tough decisions.

Conclusion.
So, any company wanting to enjoy rapid sustainable growth, must first look to building a high performance leadership oriented culture. Depending on where you are starting from, this may well mean considerable cultural change over a period of time.

The most vital steps you can take towards this relate to the people and the vision. Get the people and the vision right and you are well on the road. All it takes from there is to have something the market wants and is willing to pay a fair price for - the rest will tend to fall in place.

For further information and other free articles see Perform Coaching website

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Article Tags: business leadership, disinclination, effective leadership, fallout, good business, inadequacy, lack of motivation, leadership practice, lieutenants, loose hand, management practice, micro management, mistrust, objective look, poor management, rudder, subjectivity, tight control, tight hand, vain hope



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