Many seek to lead, but few do it well. Leadership comes with relentless challenges. To navigate those challenges while running your own team, you must have principles to guide you and help you stay focused on your team’s short-term and long-term goals.
The trickiest part is that some leadership principles that were vital to success in the 80s or 90s may not help businesses keep pace with an evolving landscape today. In their place are other values and disciplines that better reflect the modern world. Poised has listed some of the most crucial leadership principles to pursue as a leader in 2022.
What Are Essential Leadership Principles?
No startup can set and establish goals without skillful, effective leadership in place. There are specific leadership metrics that every leader should embody if they want to bring out the best in their employees.
Some individuals are natural leaders, but most people in a leadership position must work hard to acquire the abilities and skills necessary to take their followers in a bold direction.
Essentially, leadership principles are the guiding beliefs, values, or actions that leaders from which operate to propel their teams to success. A company or organization simply cannot perform well unless its leaders can motivate, inspire, and guide their team members.
There are as many leadership principles as there are leadership styles. The principles below can help any leader succeed in their role, but your specific leadership style and personality will determine which disciplines to emphasize the most.
Let’s dive into some leadership principles that will take your career to the next level.
Get Input From Diverse Perspectives
Diversity provides a range of strengths and real-world experience for business teams.
The best leaders welcome diversity and learn to lean on the input from team members to come from all types of backgrounds and experiences. They give everyone a seat at the table.
The last thing you want is for your team to make decisions with limited viewpoints. Diversity cultivates innovation. It allows your team to operate from fresh perspectives and strategize differently than your competitors.
In other words, a diverse workforce will help your team and organization as a whole succeed. Develop a team that embraces diversity and watch your growth reach new heights!
Learn and Be Curious
Employees expect their leaders to know more than them, but they don’t expect them to know everything. The best way to encourage innovation and inspire your team to learn new things is to demonstrate a hunger for growth yourself.
Embrace curiosity, and think big. Let your employees see you researching new leadership skills and methods and learning from mentors. Live by the “student for life” mentality. Invest in training metrics like courses or AI to help boost communication.
Additionally, look for opportunities to learn from your followers. Humility can go a long way in building rapport with others.
Create a Positive Company Culture
Company culture is more critical than ever. Developing and nurturing a positive work environment among a remote team can be especially challenging. You may not see short-term results for your hard work, either — shifting your company culture takes time.
Nonetheless, you must prioritize company culture if you hope for team members to collaborate and attract exceptional talent down the road. In every decision, prioritize diversity, inclusion, open-mindedness, and respect. It can also help to conduct regular team meetings and set up in-person events now and then.
Grow Your Communication Skills
Team communication is another crucial aspect of successful business teams. Great team communication begins with great leaders who dive deep to learn new ways to improve.
Maintain an open line of communication among your team members. Ensure all your employees and managers feel comfortable sharing ideas and concerns (even when you disagree), and establish clear expectations for when everyone is to be available for contact.
As a leader, you probably have your fair share of meetings and presentations to lead. Constantly seek to improve your verbal and nonverbal communication skills. You don’t have to be Martin Luther King Jr. or Ruth Bader Ginsburg to communicate or lead effectively. Just learn how to engage an audience and deliver your message with impact.
Hold Your Entire Company to the Highest Standards
A company cannot become a customer obsession without standards. If you really want to set your team up for success, you must establish high standards for everyone involved.
Yes, you want to cultivate a welcoming and encouraging culture, but you also need to keep every employee and manager accountable. Oh, and let’s not forget — you have to hold yourself to the standards you set!
Prioritize Meeting Customer Needs
Customers are the lifeblood of your business, and your team must consider that at every turn.
Your job as team leader is to ensure all your team members go out of their way to learn about and address customer needs. You’ll need to stay customer-centric when specific problems make their way up the pipeline to you. Foster customer trust, and you’ll be halfway to establishing a stellar reputation in the industry.
Get Involved in the Hiring Process
If you’re like most other business leaders, you already have more on your plate than you can manage (without sacrificing some sleep). So, you might be tempted to pass off the recruiting and hiring processes to your managers. But make sure you know what’s going on and who your company is hiring.
You’re ultimately responsible for your team's success. As such, you’ll want to ensure each hire fits your company culture and can help move the organization forward. Get involved in choosing interview questions, use your good instincts, meet every candidate possible, and help your recruiters think past the status quo.
Don’t Be Afraid of Risk-Taking
Finally, embrace risk. Innovation and leadership are impossible without risks. So move through your fear, conduct research throughout the decision-making processes, and take calculated risks that can propel your business to your goals and beyond.
Become an Effective Leader With Help From Poised
Understanding and implementing crucial leadership principles will enable you to accomplish more than you ever dreamed of as a leader. Embodying the values and disciplines above will help you get off to a strong start, but keep learning how to take your leadership to the next level.
And don’t forget how critical communication is to your impact as a leader. Use Poised for real-time feedback and tips on how you can deliver your message more clearly, empathetically, and confidently.
Sources:
Communication Skills for Workplace Success | The Balance
5 Wildly Successful Entrepreneurs Reveal How Risk Taking Propelled Their Careers | Inc.com
Leadership Styles and Frameworks You Should Know | Verywell Mind
