JumpStart Monday: Motivational Quotes for Powerful Leadership
”The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between the leader is a servant.” - Max Dupree
The above motivation quote illustrates the need for a leader to inspire their employees by appreciating them. The following leadership article shares seven leadership secrets to make you a better leader:
Leadership Techniques: Seven Leadership Secrets to Being the Outstanding Leader Everyone Wants to Follow
In this changing, challenging, and competitive workplace we can’t overestimate the importance of good management. Good managers will consistently motivate you to perform at higher levels of productivity. Bad managers will drive you crazy and eventually out of the organization. Managers with poor skills will frequently produce the following results:
- Decreased productivity
- Increased turnover
- Increased absences
- Increased human resources mediation situations
- Increased customer service complaints
The following are seven secrets to being the “perfect” leader everyone want to work for:
- Leadership means Creating a Vision – The best leaders not only assign tasks or monitor performance. They plan for the future and motivate others to see the same vision so they can all thrive to accomplish that vision.
Instead of dwelling on limited problems, the perfect leader looks at the big picture. They live the organization’s mission and implement, motivate, and dedicate all their efforts to accomplishing the mission.
During hundreds of team building and leadership workshops, I have asked the following simple question:
What is your organization’s mission statement?
If there are forty participants in the workshop, thirty-seven will look down at their desk, one participant will make a feeble attempt at reciting what he/she “thinks” is the mission statement, one participant will make a pretty good attempt and recite the first one or two sentences of the mission statement, and finally one student will volunteer to run to the office (or car) to grab a copy of the statement to bring back to the workshop. Out of the thousands of workshop participants I have asked this question, only three knew their mission statement word for word. The amazing part of this is that many of these workshop participants have been with their organization 5-10-20+ years and, they still didn’t know their mission statement. So my question is this:
How do you lead your employees to accomplish your organization’s mission if you (as a manager) don’t know what the mission is?
The perfect leaders live, eat, sleep, and shower with their mission statement. They know exactly what the mission is and understand its importance to the team they lead and to the organization. Most importantly, they communicate the mission statement to their employees at meetings, coachings, feedback sessions, and even corrective actions. Their actions are related to accomplishing the goals of the mission statement and can communicate the vision of the organization.
Action Step – Take the mission statement out of the dark corner in the office. Print the mission statement and its vision on the top of your meeting agenda and recite it at the beginning of the meeting. Then talk about how the employees are helping to realize the goals, values, and vision of the mission. (Read more at Perfect Leader)
