5 Keys to Leadership in Business – More Than Just Managing

Leading vs Managing

Whether you are the owner of your own business, the chief executive of a corporation, or a manager rising through the ranks, it is critical to develop your leadership skills. Great leadership brings great results. A great manager can get great results but the results reflect on a project or goal, not on the long term process of leading people. A manager can bring a project in on time or perhaps under budget, but a leader gets great results working with people, building relationships, and empowering all members which motivates even better results in the future.

Managers can be useful and successful at achieving project goals, but leaders are essential for long term growth, profitability, quality of work life, and positive results in major challenges from business crisis. You know, and possibly have worked with, or for, good managers. Perhaps you have been fortunate and worked with, or for, a great leader. The great leaders are not soon forgotten and are always appreciated. When an organization has great leaders in their management ranks, they suffer less from sabotage and turnover. These organizations are known for their leadership and find it easier to recruit the best and brightest personnel.

David Packard and Bill Hewlett were industry leaders that influenced many major business practices with their successes at Hewlett-Packard. Their leadership created an environment that took their products and then their company to the top. Their leadership style has been mimicked by many successful startups. Many technology engineers wanted to work for HP, driven by the leadership and respect driven work environment. These business principles have been studied and taught in business management programs with continued development for open minded executives and top striving organizations.

Another business leadership expert, Bill Bonnstetter, founder of TTI, has researched the most successful leaders and has defined the common qualities that these leaders possess. Though everyone has these skills to some degree, great leaders achieve mastery of these common skills.

Bill states that there are 5 essential leadership skills that great leaders have in common.
These include:

1. Influencing others – the ability to personally affect other’s actions, decisions, opinions or thinking.

2. Personal Accountability – the ability to answer for personal actions.

3. Self-management skills – the ability to prioritize and complete tasks in order to deliver within allotted time frames… the ability to control oneself under stress.

4. Goal Achievement – the overall ability to set, pursue and attain achievable personal, professional and team goals regardless of obstacles or circumstances.

5. Interpersonal skills – the ability to interact with others in a positive manner.

If you want to develop your leadership skills and become a successful and memorable business leader, you can get the coaching and training that lead to mastery in these key skills. Consider beginning by using a self-discovery process which uses assessments to discover where you are on the continuum comparing your skills and behaviors with the most successful leaders. By knowing your strengths and your challenges, you will be able to move forward. Find a mentor or an executive coach who will assist you in moving toward the highest levels of mastery of all of these skills. Very few of us are born to be leaders. Most of us require experience and sincere motivation to develop into top flight leaders.

The world needs great business leaders as positive role models.