Larry Janesky's 4th HVA: Work on Your Leadership

Are you the leader others want to follow?

The fourth High Value Activity on Larry’s list is to Work on your Leadership skills. Although fourth, there’s no order these HVAs need to be in. Working on HVAs is not working on emergencies or immediate problems. None of these activities needs to be done immediately, but they will have the largest impact on your business. The order of importance stems from your goals as leader.

To build a great business requires a lot of great people. Your leadership will play the most important role in attracting and keeping great people.

People judge themselves based on their intentions. In contrast, people judge their leader by their actions. Knowing this contradiction will help the leader better understand how he or she is perceived by their employees.

Right or wrong, that’s how others judge you as the leader. From this judgement employees decide if they want to follow you or simply work for the paycheck until they find a better gig.

It is crucial that the leader understands how they appear to their employees.

How you communicate, what you communicate, and with what energy and intention all matter a lot.

Good people don’t work for bad bosses. They leave instead. Bad people don’t work for good bosses because the bosses hold them accountable. Bad people wind up leaving the good boss for one that tolerates them.

In the end, the good leaders retain all the good people and the bad leaders retain all the bad people. A big weakness in any area can sink your ability to keep the best people at your company.

Here are some areas that leaders need to score really well in to build, optimize and hold a great team:

• Trustworthiness – People want to know they can trust what you say. Can they trust you with the company they work for, as they know the leader can do anything they want or have the impulse to do.
• Fairness – People want to know you will be fair when things go right or wrong. If someone’s feelings get hurt or they feel unfairly treated, even one time, they may look for a new job.
• Credibility – People want to know that others who know you better or differently also trust you.
• Courage – People want to know you have the courage to confront and handle difficult situations that come up. They want to know you will protect the company and them.
• Likable – People want you to be happy and smile. It shows them they are accepted and that things are going well.
• Caring – Perhaps most of all, people want to know you care about them. They want to know you have their backs and will protect them from threats.

Big and little tests will come in the form of successes or challenges, and people are watching to see how you behave.

People are watching you all the time.

People are intrigued because you’re the leader. They watch how you run your personal life too. Mistakes can be made after hours, at parties, in bars, on the internet and on the weekends. Leadership doesn’t end at 5:00.

Have other high-quality people responded to you as a leader they will follow? What do you need to do to become better in this area?

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