To Be a Good Leader, Think Like One

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We are constantly moving in the direction of our dominant thoughts. Buddha said it more succinctly: "What we think, we become." And so to be a good leader, you must think like one. Leadership in business involves having a clear vision of the direction you want your company to move in and then being able to communicate that vision to inspire others to make it happen. Getting derailed from this purpose or becoming bogged down in the day-to-day details of the business often leads to mediocre leadership. There are many different styles of leadership, but good leaders have in common certain ways of thinking.

Think big. Big picture, that is. Leave the day-to-day operations to your managers and supervisors. Focus instead on how everything fits together and interacts with the external environment in which you operate. To do this, it helps to spend some time with employees in all the different functional areas of the company, until you really understand what they do and how they feel about it.

Trust your intuition. Intuition is the rapid, unconscious processing of all your past experiences to reach a conclusion. If you are knowledgeable about your business, and well-prepared, this kind of thinking will serve you well. Data analysis and the advice of others are useful, but when these kinds of information point in confusing or multiple directions, in the end the leader must make a decision. This is where intuition is invaluable.

Think strategically. Strategic thinkers consider actions in terms of how they will help the company adapt and succeed over the long term. As just one example, rather than automatically buying services or materials from the lowest priced supplier, a strategic thinker will consider a variety of factors, such as each supplier's reliability, responsiveness, speed of delivery, willingness to do the little extras, and so forth.

Understand your impact as a role model. People look to leaders for direction, not only in concrete matters, but also in matters of judgment, character and style. Nothing has more impact on the culture of an organization than the behavior of its leaders. So be aware that telling an off-color joke or passing on malicious gossip, for instance, is like throwing a pebble in a pond – the ripple is felt in a much larger circle.

Think systemically. Systemic thinkers always consider how a change in one area of the organization will affect other areas. How would changing the quality of your product affect your balance sheet? How would changing a production process affect employee satisfaction? How would hiring from outside, as opposed to promoting from within, affect turnover?

Value learning. This is what Stephen Covey calls "sharpening the saw." A woodcutter would be foolish to work with a dull saw because he was too busy to sharpen it. Similarly, leaders must constantly be learning to stay abreast of change in their industry and in the larger environment. Time away from the business, if it is spent learning something useful, is time well spent. As an example, find out what the people you admire are reading and what conferences they are attending, and do the same.

Changing how you think doesn't just happen – you have to work at it. One way to do this is to spend 15 minutes at the start of each day thinking about your upcoming day. Consider how each of the above thinking styles could be applied to the activities you have in store for the day. If you do this regularly, you will begin to think more like a leader. And you know what thinking leads to.

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Tandem Partners is an organizational consulting firm specializing in people strategies that drive business results. We help businesses manage change, develop leaders and teams, improve productivity and maximize performance through people. For more information on leadership in business please contact Margaret Wilson at 443-589-1152 or via email: margaret@tandem-partners.com .

Copyright 2008 Tandem Partners

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