What are the three important parts of leadership that determine how effective a leader is?

As well as providing direction, inspiration, and guidance, good leaders exhibit courage, passion, confidence, commitment, and ambition. They nurture the strengths and talents of their people and build teams committed to achieving common goals. The most effective leaders have the following traits in common.

1. Share Their Vision

A leader with vision has a clear idea of where they want to go, how to get there and what success looks like. Be sure to articulate your vision clearly and passionately, ensuring your team understands how their individual efforts contribute to higher level goals. Personally working toward your vision with persistence, tenacity, and enthusiasm will inspire and encourage others to do the same.

2. Lead By Example

As a leader, the best way to build credibility and gain the respect of others is to set the right examples. Demonstrate the behavior that you want people to follow. If you demand a lot of your team, you should also be willing to set high standards for yourself. Aligning your words and actions will help to build trust and make your team more willing to follow your example.

3. Demonstrate Integrity

A leader with integrity draws on their values to guide their decisions, behavior, and dealings with others. They have clear convictions about what is right and wrong and are respected for being genuine, principled, ethical and consistent. They have a strong sense of character, keep their promises, and communicate openly, honestly and directly with others. Displaying integrity through your daily actions will see you rewarded with loyalty, confidence, and respect from your employees.

4. Communicate Effectively

The ability to communicate clearly, concisely and tactfully is a crucial leadership skill. Communication involves more than just listening attentively to others and responding appropriately. It also includes sharing valuable information, asking intelligent questions, soliciting input and new ideas, clarifying misunderstandings, and being clear about what you want. The best leaders also communicate to inspire and energize their staff.

5. Make Hard Decisions

To be an effective leader, the ability to make fast, difficult decisions with limited information is critical. When facing a tough decision, start by determining what you are trying to achieve. Consider the likely consequences of your decision and any available alternatives. Make your final decision with conviction, take responsibility for it and follow it through. Being a resolute and confident decision-maker will allow you to capitalize on opportunities and earn the respect of your team.

6. Recognize Success

Frequently and consistently recognizing achievement is one of the most powerful habits of inspiring leaders. For people to stretch themselves and contribute their best efforts, they need to know their work will be valued and appreciated. Find ways to celebrate the achievements of your people, even if it’s through a simple ‘well done.’ As well as boosting morale, it will also strengthen their motivation to continue giving their best.

7. Empower Others

Great leaders understand that for people to give their best, they must have a sense of ownership over their work and believe that what they’re doing is meaningful. Communicate clear goals and deadlines to your team, and then give them the autonomy and authority to decide how the work gets done. Challenge them with high expectations and encourage them to be creative and show innovation.

8. Motivate and Inspire

The best leaders drive their team forward with passion, enthusiasm, inspiration and motivation. Invest time in the people you lead to determine their strengths, needs, and priorities. As well as making them feel valuable, this will help you to understand the best way to motivate them. Continually reinforce how their efforts are making a difference, and encourage the development of their potential with meaningful goals and challenges.

For tips on how to teach others to be leaders in the workplace, find out here how to develop your future leaders.

Whether you’re an established CEO or just reaching for your first management position, it’s never a bad time to brush up on the basic elements of leadership. Just having the authority to tell people what to do is not the same as leadership. Without the right leadership skills, you won’t be able to motivate, engage and guide your team. If you want to be the best leader you can be, we suggest you take some time to assess yourself on the 5 fundamentals below so you can lead your team to greatness. After all, their success is your success!

1. Communication

Leadership starts with communication. Effective communication is clear, transparent and customized to the recipient. A good leader will take the time to find out which communication style and method (text, e-mail, phone or in-person) work best for each team member. By communicating with your team, you build trust, rapport and a culture of shared accountability. Communicate—often, clearly and honestly.

2. Knowing Your People

A good leader knows his or her team better than anyone else—their strengths, their weaknesses, what makes them tick and what motivates them. Take the time to get to know your team and you’ll know how to talk to them—and how to get things done.

3. Knowing Yourself

It’s not only important to know your team; it’s important to know yourself. Is this just a job to you, or do you truly want to be a leader?—Do you want to motivate, inspire and lead people? If you’re just in it for the money or the prestige, you’re not a true leader. Your team most likely won’t be happy or engaged, and neither will you.

4. Democracy

If you’re simply telling people what to do, you’re not going to have engaged workers, and your results will probably suffer, too. Sure, sometimes you have to make a tough call and push through an unpopular agenda item, but for the most part you should try to show your team that they do have choices. Listen to their needs, take suggestions and implement the democratic process when it comes to projects. Of course, every company, department and project are different, but, for the most part, giving people the autonomy they crave will result in a more engaged workforce and better results. Gently encouraging a collaborative, democratic work environment will be more effective than forcing roles and expectations on people.

5. Seeking Out Feedback

It’s hard to do an honest self-assessment so regularly ask for feedback—not only from your team, but other managers, mentors and other colleagues as well. Feedback helps you to understand what your strengths and weaknesses are and how to use them to your advantage. When you grow, your team grows!

How can you improve?

A title might make a manager, but it doesn’t make a leader. If you want to truly inspire and motivate and guide your team to greatness, putting these tips into practice can put you on your way to leadership status. Even the best leaders are constantly looking for ways to improve themselves. If you’d like some extra help improving your leadership skills, or even improving your entire leadership team, get in touch with our Human Resources Advisory team today! Our team of career experts offer a bevy of executive development and career coaching services that are proven to inspire and elevate leaders at every level of experience.

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