Successful/Effective vs. Ineffective Leadership

There are successful leaders who are effective, and then there are successful leaders who are ineffective. Find out what separates the two and why it’s important that you’re the former, not the latter.

For when the One Great Scorer comes to mark against your name, He writes – not that you won or lost – but how you played the Game.  Alumnus Football by Grantland Rice (One of the greatest sports poems of all time)

This is a wonderful poem and sentiment that works well in the amateur arena. But don’t try to sell the idea in the professional ranks, particularly to the leadership of corporations and professional organizations.

Winning isn’t everything – but it comes close. Click To Tweet

What Makes a Leader Relevant?

To be relevant as a leader in executive or management ranks you must first and foremost achieve results consistently. Daily. Yes, there are other contributors to your success: job satisfaction, high morale in your group, and many other things, but if you’re not the kind of leader “who makes things happen” and produces consistent results you’ll soon be looking at another venue to practice your brand of success.

Getting Results

You have a choice as to how you achieve the results you need.

1. You can employ your “personal power”, using your communicating and relating skills to develop collegial relationships, and work collaboratively with people.
2. You can employ your “position power”. Think of this as the mantle of authority the organization has invested in you, which gives you the ability to require people to do your bidding. And in return, you are supported in your initiatives to do things to or for other people.
3. You can employ both (if you have “personal power” and “position power”). Yes, sometimes both must be used.

Effective vs. Ineffective

Over the years, I’ve asked countless professionals and corporate leaders what words they’d use to describe successful leaders who achieved their results in an effective vs. ineffective manner. They’re listed in the image above.

To be effective is to achieve your results with, not at the expense of, the relationship. Click To Tweet

This involves a two way, cooperative, participative, mutual interaction. The goal is to achieve both short and long term results.

To be ineffective is to be autocratic, taking a “my way or the highway” approach. Click To Tweet

Although this may be somewhat faster (one-way vs. two-way) than the effective approach, it creates resentment and only achieves short-term results at the expense of long-term relationships.

What do Successful/Effective Leaders Look Like?

They are leaders who consistently achieve results by gaining the respect, trust and loyalty of those they lead and those they follow. How do they do this? They are transparent and they employ a leadership approach that successfully achieves results, while building collegial relationships. Their approach does not dismiss the views of others, but rather embraces them. They view problems as challenges and challenges as opportunities.

Successful/Effective leaders view problems as challenges and challenges as opportunities. Click To Tweet

So what’s their advantage?

They have a clear, concise and focused communication and relating strategy that maximizes a minimum amount of time to achieve successful results and develop effective relationships.

Are Relationships Really Important?

When it comes to your success, how important are your relationships with the people you lead? The relationships with your colleagues? Your associates? All of these relationships serve as the engine of a leader’s success. Without the support of those you lead – if people resent your dictatorial, autocratic, “my way or the highway” approach – you will survive short-term with your position power, but your success and relevance will soon wane and before long you will be on the outside looking in.

Resentment has a long memory and a strong desire to get even. Building strong, lasting, mutual relationships while successfully achieving your results is very important. It should be a leader’s first option. If results cannot be achieved effectively, you always have your position power. And, yes, there are times when this is necessary. But these times should be the exception rather than the norm

Why do Leaders Choose the Ineffective Approach as their First Choice?

There are a few reasons.

1. Because they don’t have the communication and relating skills to employ the effective approach successfully and “when all you have is a hammer  (position power), all challenges are viewed as nails”.
2. Because the ineffective approach is successful for a period of time, particularly if the organization rewards results over all else, including the morale and goodwill of its employees.
3. Because busy leaders just don’t have the time to engage in long two-way conversations. They don’t have to.

Today, business and professional interactions are more like bullet point executive summaries that present information with very few details, unless specifically requested. They are controlled and disciplined interactions with a purpose – not exactly spoken as headlines, but close. It’s an approach that holds people’s attention and leaves them wanting more.

What Does it Take to be Effective Today?

Today, you need a communication and relating strategy to get from point A to point B concisely and quickly in a way that successfully achieves results, but that also builds reciprocal relationships. You need an approach that values, includes, supports, listens to and gives fair-minded consideration to the views of others.

The higher up the organizational leadership chart you go, the more you must have both a successful and effective approach. John Kenneth Galbraith put it this way, “The modern business executive is well-spoken, tolerant of disagreement, disposed always to negotiate and otherwise given to persuasion rather than command”.

Building Your Approach

This takes organization and preparation. How do I start? Get a favorable buy-in? Share essential information? Indicate a preferred solution? Reduce my thoughts to four concise sentences that I can say in one minute or less?

Is it possible to achieve successful results and effective relationships that quickly?

Stay tuned.

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If these thoughts strike a chord with you, share this blog with others who you want to support in their effort to improve their leadership results, relationships and career development.

In the next blog, I will introduce you to The System, a sequential, developmental, four-stage communication process that successful/effective leaders employ when they relate to others, particularly in challenging situations (the high risk ones). The System is repeatable, reliable, will stand up under pressure and provides both control and predictability. It represents the leadership key to successful results and effective relationships.

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Dr. Don MacRae is the author and passionate leader of Situational Communication^® and the CEO of Lachlan Enterprises Incorporated (The Lachlan Group).

Do you know the primary reason leaders and potential leaders fail today? It’s not because of what they do but rather how they do it – in other words, their people skills. Find out “How To” improve both your success and communication effectiveness by taking advantage of the FREE version of the Situational Communication^® website/webinar.