The Essential Guide to Becoming a Great People Leader

What does it take to lead a team or organization?

If you’re reading this, we’ll assume you already have some idea of what great leadership includes. You may have a person in mind that inspires you – a former or current boss, a political figure, or the coach of your varsity team. But let’s take a step back and make sure we’re aligned on the basics.

First, note the difference between leadership and management – two very different animals.

As a manager, you primary responsibility is procedural oversight. If you will, you’re an “enforcer”. You implement your organization’s strategy and you do so by managing others. That includes handing out tasks, chasing people to complete their assignments and, importantly, reviewing and feedbacking their work. As a manager, you also have a certain level of decision-making authority, depending, of course, on your exact place in the pecking order.

Contrary to managers, leaders are not just about getting stuff done by making sure all ducks are in a row. Leadership is much more about the people you lead than about task completion. Your job as a leader is to nourish your organization’s culture and improve on those often intangible metrics that make up motivated, effective teams.

If that sounds elusive, it’s because the desired results of great leadership are unique to every team. And that’s exactly the point. If you want to develop your leadership skills, stop chasing (only) measurable goals and deadlines. That’s for managers. Instead, focus on developing effective leadership habits which, if applied well, will take you and your organization to a whole new level.

Below, we will walk you through the 6 things all great people leaders do every day.

1. Great Leaders Reflect on Their Strengths and Weaknesses

If you want to lead others, you have to make sure that your own house is in order. To this end, your first order of business is to recognize that beyond your undeniable strengths, you also have a few weak points.

Then, identify those strong and weak points, and either work to improve on your weaknesses; or work around your weaknesses, i.e., make sure to not let them interfere with your leadership potential. Let us give you a few examples to drive home this point.

Let us give you a few examples to drive home this point.

• Overwork – A curable desease. As (senior) managers, we often get so obsessed with hitting all our goals and collecting our trophys, that self-management is often neglected. As long as the team achieves its milestones, what does it matter that we, as managers, have so little time? Late nights at the office, and a resulting neglect of your physical and mental health are accepted as collateral damage of a great career. But there’s a dilemma. While exploiting yourself may be not conflict with being an effective enforcer – aka: manager – as a leader, you really have to be at the top of your game.
• Leading others is not a side gig and you have to mobilize enormous resources – time, concentration, emotions & inspiration – to be effective at it. But the good news is: “overwork” is a weakness that is absolutely curable. For starters, recognize what got you where you are in the first place. Managing others didn’t just happen, it happened because you have a talent to self-organize and the ability to look beyond your own to do’s to, well, manage others. Reapply this skill to your life and regain control of your schedule.
• You are what you are. Another example of necessary self-reflection is figuring out what leadership type you really are. Then, deal with it! You cannot change your personality so exploit your strong points, and avoid leadership methods that make you uncomfortable. Granted, even introverts can’t avoid holiday office parties, but it’s a common misconception that only a narrow combination of personality traits makes for great leaders. If you can’t stand meetings and the written word comes more natural to you, why not emphasizes on written instructions for your team. (Ever heard of Jeff Bezos’ silent meetings, you should try it!)
• Self-quantification. If the ideas in this chapter resonate with you, self-quantification in all its forms is a great place to start. Whether you track your blood sugar or use advanced automated time trackers (aka task mining tools), there’s a myriad of tools available. Check them out and you’re on your way to become the great people leader you are meant to be!

2. Great Leaders Defend Their Calendar – and Plan for Executive Time

We already spoke about every leader’s need for self-management, to free up that most precious resource we can bring to our team or organization: our time.

Now, to achieve that, it is vital that you are deliberate about how you spend your day. Most people’s calendars only show the calls and meetings they attend, with the time in between being more or less randomly assigned to whatever comes up.

If you’re a manager, that’s a perfectly valid strategy. After all, you are not really expected to be in full control of your time. Your main job is to get stuff done – to complete certain tasks or to drive a process forward. Continuing in this way in a leadership role, however, could easily run you into trouble.

Not only will co-workers continue to draw on your resources. As with any managerial role, whether you have an open door-policy that allows people to just walk in and consult with you on the fly, or the only thing that people can reach is your email inbox: your team’s natural need for guidance and feedback can quickly eat up whatever time you have left outside scheduled events in your calendar.

In addition, however, – and therein lies a difference to a purely managerial role –, great leaders recognize another, important part of their role that doesn’t involve scheduled or unscheduled managerial tasks. Call it “executive time”, “time to think” or “creative session” – whatever label suits your style, a leader must find times and places to nourish the very soil on which vision, strategy and inspiration grows.

How do you get there? Well, by deliberately and intelligently planning out your day. For inspiration, take Elon Musk, for example.

It’s both a cliché and the source of a common misconception: the idea that the self-declared “Business magnate and investor” plans his days in 5 minute-intervals. So, what does that even mean?

If you think that Elon the Great Funky goes around planning a material portion of his life in 5 minute-units, you got it all wrong. Rather, that story is really about two things:

First, let’s clear up what people get wrong about the “5 minute-intervals”. That concept does not, in fact, reflect the idea of a succession of 5 minute-meetings, 5 minute-calls and 5 minute-memo reviews. Rather, it’s about breaking away from default, pre-conceived notions of how long meetings, calls or other tasks should last. Look at your own calendar right now and you will find that most of the scheduled events default to multiples of 30 minutes (that’s 30, 60, 90, etc).

By contrast, great leaders who optimize for executive time, know that by converting just six 30 or 60 minute-calendar entries into more disciplined meetings of around 15, 20 or 40 minutes, they can gain a full hour or more to live up to their leadership role. And that’s what planning in 5 interval-interval really means.

Second, beyond the technicalities of event-scheduling, that story about Elon Musk should inspire leaders to be unconventional and challenge the norm on a broader level. You don’t have to get rid of your cell phone, but in order to maximize your leadership skills and become more productive, you should feel free to experiment around any work-related cultural norms. There’s no magic to this. Try it with a few parameters you encounter in your work life, the length, content, location, participants or form of your meetings, for example. Or the timing, form, audience and extent of communication within your team or organization. Once you’ve deliberately done this a few times, you will see the difference and optimizing for leadership time in this way will become second nature.

Related: 7 Productivity Hacks That No One Likes To Talk About at Parties

3. Leaders Develop Leaders

Pinterest said it best: the job of a leader is not to create more followers, but to create more leaders. That’s another way of saying: the race is over, you’ve won. Once you are in a leadership role, the goal is not to cement your position, to celebrate your position in the hierarchy and to think how you can outmaneuver your co-workers. If that ever was your game, it has to stop now.

Great leaders build great teams of people. Without a strong team, you can’t achieve great things. To do this, you have to have the right people in leadership roles, and then develop your leadership team so that they perform at their highest level. The best leaders invest in their people — they’re constantly asking, “How are we doing?” and “What more do you need to be successful?” They recognize that the path to personal and professional growth is different for everyone, so they provide a variety of mentoring opportunities.

As a great people leader, you should:

• Build and Develop the Leadership Team
• Have a Clear Vision for the Future
• Create Alignment with Your Team
• Focus on Individual Development
• Involve Your Team in Solving Problems and Making Decisions
• Be a Role Model for Your Team
• Recognize and Reward Success

Also, a great leader should always be developing and delegating responsibilities to the leadership team, allowing them to grow professionally and build their own teams. This is a symbiotic relationship. The leader gives the development opportunities, and the leadership team does the work to establish a strong team of their own.

The best leaders don’t just care about their own role; they care about the success of the entire leadership team. They realize that they will only be as good as the people they lead, and so they make it a priority to invest in their top talent and help others grow.

The most important part of being a leader is helping other people grow so that they can reach their true potential. Great leaders know this, and so they focus on developing their team members (and themselves) rather than just getting things done today or this week or this month.

4. Provide Positive Recognition and Reinforcement

Great leaders provide positive recognition and reinforcement every day. What does this mean? It means that when someone does something above and beyond, you bring it to their attention. It also means that when someone just “does their job,” and they do it well, you still bring it to their attention. In fact, when you’re trying to build a highly engaged team, you should be providing positive reinforcement for doing the right thing even more than pointing out problems with how things were done wrong.

Great people leaders are always looking for ways to recognize and reinforce positive behavior. That doesn’t necessarily mean giving out raises and bonuses, although those are certainly great ways to do it. Good leaders know that sometimes a simple “thanks” or “great job” can go a long way in making employees feel valued and engaged, especially if it’s done in front of their peers. This is also a great way to develop future leaders, because you’re teaching them how to give positive reinforcement, too.

A great leader makes a point of recognizing team members during the day. Even if it’s just a quick note saying thanks or a word of praise, it’s important to let people know they’re valued. If you’re not in the habit of doing this already, try to thank one employee every day for at least two weeks. You’ll see results almost immediately, and you’ll start to feel better about your leadership skills.

5. Manage Their Time and Attention Well

You need to be your most productive self! Your employees are counting on you, and they will be at their best when they see you at your best. For a people leader, as a good manager, time and attention are your two most precious resources. Both of them are in short supply. They are finite!

Time is our most valuable asset, yet we often waste it without even realizing it. We spend too much time on the wrong things, the unimportant and non-urgent tasks that don’t contribute to success. So whether it is managing emails, meetings or even focus time, managing your time well is so important. And what you spend your time on should be focused on the most important things that will help you achieve your goals. As a people leader, you need to become very good at managing your own time and attention well – prioritize what needs to get done and make sure that happens first!

You should focus on what matters most! If you want to be effective, you can’t get distracted by every little thing that comes your way. You need to have a clear vision for what you want to accomplish, and then make sure you put your time into things related to those goals.

6. Inspire, Listen, Empower

Great people leaders have a vision, and they work collaboratively with their team to achieve it. To do so, they inspire their team to meet expectations, and then some. They listen before they talk. And they empower their people to build trust, confidence, and loyalty within the organization.

The three steps to be a great people leader:

1. Inspire.
2. Listen
3. Empower

One of the most important things you can do as a leader is differentiate between being a boss and being a leader. But semantics aside, as far as leaders and bosses go, we can sum it up by saying that you need to be able to talk the talk, and walk the walk! There are many times when you need to be one or the other, but oftentimes as people leaders we get stuck in being just one of those things. If we focus on just telling people what to do (the boss mentality), we miss out on so much potential with our teams.

Conclusion

What is the difference between leader and boss? Sure, there is a huge difference between “leader” and “boss”! In fact, going on with the theme of “seven”, there are at least 7 differences between a leader and a boss:

• A leader makes people follow him, a boss makes people do as he says
• A leader applies his skills to meet goals, a boss just tells what to do
• A boss has power over people. A leader earns respect.
• A boss says, “Go!” A leader says, “Let’s go!”
• A boss fixes blame; a leader fixes problems
• A boss demands respect; a leader earns respect
• A boss inspires fear; a leader inspires enthusiasm

One of the most important things you can do as a leader is differentiate between being a boss and being a leader. But semantics aside, as far as leaders and bosses go, we can sum it up by saying that you need to be able to talk the talk, and walk the walk! There are many times when you need to be one or the other, but oftentimes as people leaders we get stuck in being just one of those things. If we focus on just telling people what to do (the boss mentality), we miss out on so much potential with our teams.

Are you a people leader? Be great at it by following this list of seven things that any great people leader should be doing on a daily basis. They may seem pretty simple, but they can make a huge difference in your business and in your team’s morale. So get to it—if you’re looking for a way to lead by example, start with these!

AllActivity helps you develop the “great people leader” in you! Whether you are an executive playing in a corporate arena, a manager managing direct reports in a small team, or startup entrepreneur trying to hit your SaaS nut—AllActivity’s guidance and wisdom can facilitate a successful business outcome. With AllActivity, managing people becomes not just easy but also fun! Check out Allactivity Academy.