LEADERSHIP CONNECT TOOLKIT
Connect the Dots Consulting, we are committed to providing practical and timely leadership coaching and development. At a time when leaders are stretched to the limit, we want to share a Toolkit for effectively leading and connecting with your teams.
ToolKit: Today’s Leadership Success Profile
These skills and associated behaviors have surfaced as critical to leading yourself and your team in the evolving normal.
It’s clear that our current work environment is not temporary. Each of you have adjusted, “pivoted,” and exercised leadership muscles that you didn’t know you had.
It’s time to take stock and assess yourself and your team against the new Leadership Success Profile.
These are not new skills, but they rise to the top in terms of priority and urgency as leaders respond to the demands of today’s workplace.
Skill: Decisiveness
What’s new? Leaders are being asked to make significant decisions with limited information, and a lack of decisiveness or slow decision-making are simply not an option. Effective leaders have leveraged the pandemic to break down cultural barriers, creating an environment that can quickly move amidst uncertainty and that fosters a sense of confidence, which allows their teams to brace for both the positive and negative impacts of each critical decision.
Skill: Agility
What’s new? Today’s environment has both taken away former ways of working and presented new opportunities. Leaders and team members who have recognized these opportunities and then acted very quickly have demonstrated agility. Those who have not recognized or acted on the new reality have put teams and organizations more in a “victim mode” response to the new environment, which limits creative problem-solving and encourages a survive vs. thrive mentality.
Skill: Collaboration
What’s new? Prior to the pandemic, collaboration was largely a “nice to have.” It is now imperative that leaders and teams find new ways to partner and leverage each others’ strengths and knowledge. Leaders are “reaching across” to functions, business units, and even to competitors, seeking opportunities, creative process improvements, and strategies to attract new business.
Skill: Innovation
What’s new? While innovation is a skill that most organizations desire of their leaders and teams, innovative thinking and problem-solving are now required in almost every aspect of a leader’s world, including engaging and motivating teams, customer acquisition, retention, satisfaction, marketing, and process-improvement. There have been countless examples of inspirational and surprising innovations created in response to the challenges of 2020.
Skill: Empathy
What’s new? Leaders have more opportunities to lead with empathy than ever before. Many have gotten more comfortable with being overtly vulnerable, thereby creating a more open environment that acknowledges personal feelings, dynamics, differences, and challenges. Team members have an expectation—and need—for their leaders to lead with empathy as they continue to navigate uncertainty both personally and professionally.
Leadership Success Profile Assessment:
How skilled are you and your team at demonstrating these skills? Use this simple assessment to surface your current state and outline a plan for leveraging your strengths and addressing your gaps.
Skill | Current state | Actions to take |
Decisiveness | ⃝ Skilled | Leverage this skill by: |
⃝ Developing | Actively develop this skill by: | |
⃝ Gap | If a gap exists, plan to address by: | |
Agility | ⃝ Skilled | Leverage this skill by: |
⃝ Developing | Actively work on by: | |
⃝ Gap | Create a plan to address by: | |
Collaboration | ⃝ Skilled | Leverage this skill by: |
⃝ Developing | Actively work on by: | |
⃝ Gap | Create a plan to address by: | |
Innovation | ⃝ Skilled | Leverage this skill by: |
⃝ Developing | Actively work on by: | |
⃝ Gap | Create a plan to address by: | |
Empathy | ⃝ Skilled | Leverage this skill by: |
⃝ Developing | Actively work on by: | |
⃝ Gap | Create a plan to address by: |
We would appreciate hearing from you about which strategies are working or not working in our evolving workplaces. Please drop us a note, follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter, or check out our website.
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