Why blog posts on leadership can be the worst

Don’t get me wrong – leading for change and inspiring people to act in alignment with their goals AND the company purpose is the stuff dreams are made of. Effective transformational leadership is art. It’s poetry. It’s hard to do and good for everyone when it’s done well.

However, I don’t know about you but I’m suffering from a little bit of leadership best practices fatigue. There are so many articles, so much information, so many little things we can do to be better leaders.

What does that actually mean? What EXACTLY are we talking about when we’re talking about upping our transformational leadership game?

And how do you implement all of those tips that are constantly barraging your inbox and social media networks?

Allow me to introduce some academics to set the scene.

James MacGregor Burns published a pivotal book in 1978 called, well, Leadership. He introduced the concept of Transformational Leadership; in which leaders focus on the beliefs, needs, and values of their followers. For its time, this was breakout thinking.

In essence, Transformational Leadership focuses not on the traditional give and take relationship of leader and follower but shifts to one where the leader:

• Helps the follower understand the organization’s mission and culture
• Is an inspiring role model
• Encourages self awareness in the follower
• Provide opportunities to stretch and optimize the follower’s performance.

In simpler terms, a Transformational Leader must have a high level of self-awareness to claim role model status – inspiring the team is as important as inspiring individual team members.

The leader attends to each member’s needs, acts as a mentor or coach to members and listens to their concerns and needs.

It’s no longer a ducks in a row type situation.

A Transformational Leader gives space for communication, fostering member’s strengths and ideas, and promoting a shared vision.

Can I get a Hallelujah?!

It just makes sense these days; it’s hard to imagine it another way.

But, nowadays we have some new challenges. High stress, high demands, rocket-speed pace, diminished attention spans, and so many opportunities for talented staff. You could lose them at any minute if you’re not delicately leading, supporting, empowering and challenging.

How in the world can you practice transformational leadership and employee engagement, achieve optimum performance and results, and not completely burn out trying?

Enter Lumina Leader.

Step 1: Start where you are (and know, objectively, exactly where that is).

In my coaching practice, the first step is to help the leader understand the degree to which they are in fact transformational. Included in my toolbox, among other things, are Lumina Leader and the infamous (and amazingly effective) 360 review.

We dig deep and uncover in-depth insights into how each leader perceives their leadership strengths while uncovering blind spots. It’s also a check-in on how their team perceives the leader’s competencies (there’s actually no better barometer).

Within each competency are qualities such as:

• Strategic thinking
• Holds self and others accountable
• Inspires and energizes others
• Coaches and develops others

But it isn’t enough to expect a Transformational Leader to hold full responsibility for the high performance of their team.

Step 2: Have each leader and team member understand their own strengths and gaps.

This is like baking a pie where you handpick your ingredients. It’s about knowing what’s in season and where to find the best, freshest ingredients. You can thoughtfully put them together, having them bring out the best in each other.

You can cultivate and rely on the specific strengths of team members.

In this case, one of the tools I use is Lumina Spark.

It provides a psychometric assessment of each individual team member that reveals their strengths they currently use at work as well as underlying and/or underused strengths that could benefit the team.

For example, if most of the team shows up as introverted, outcome focused and detail oriented, there will be little energy aimed at abstract, big picture and innovative thinking. But maybe some of the team members have the needed skills – they just aren’t accessing them.

Using Lumina Spark, we reveal the gaps in the team, and where they can pull in member’s underlying strengths or qualities to fill those needs. The process of using Lumina Spark with the team is also a catalyst to gain clarity on both the vision and identity of the team.

For a leader to be authentically transformational, they must:

• Challenge assumptions, take risks and solicit team member’s ideas
• Articulate a vision that is appealing and inspiring to team members
• Be a role model for high ethical behavior, instilling pride while gaining respect and trust.

Transformational Leadership doesn’t just happen. It is cultivated and learned. Coaching and the Lumina Learning tools can take this leadership to the next level. In turn, the level of performance by a team can improve when all members are aware of the vision, identity and their own and each other’s strengths.

I know the last thing you need is another make-work project. You need the fastest route to improvement and optimal performance for you and your team.

Feel free to reach out to me and set up a complimentary session to see if/how Lumina Learning can provide insight to help you get your team to the next level (without reading another 100 leadership articles).