There’s no one “right” approach to leadership, so consider approaching it from the perspective of a coach. Core coaching skills like empathy, curiosity, and listening go hand-in-hand with being a good leader. Below, 10 members of The Forbes Coaches Council explain how managers can lead like coaches.
- Train your own leaders: Teaching and coaching run parallel, but too many times, training comes from the outside. Tapping into your top leaders’ best practices through more formal teaching is hidden gold for most organizations.
- Stay Curious: Curiosity is key. A leader who is not curious is not reading between the lines and assessing morals. Become curious about what isn’t being said. Show interest in an employee’s life and how it affects their performance
- Ensure Emotional Safety: Managers who want to drive better results need to demonstrate openness, true listening and an allowance for imperfection. Be a human being with your team.
- Ask Questions That Encourage Employee Ownership: Managers are often tempted to tell employees what to do, but instead ask them to take ownership of their ideas and think through the outcomes.
- Actively Listen To Your People: Silence is gold — that’s where the gold is. As a manager, you can practice this skill by simply being quiet and letting your associate talk without agenda or interruption.
- Educate your team and Empower them: If you don’t understand your team’s strengths and weaknesses, you won’t have the power to strategically align them in a way that fills in the gaps.
- Model The Behavior You Expect: To lead others effectively, you must model the behavior you expect to see in others. People do what people see. In order to lead your team effectively, you must become an example.
- Succeed as a team: As a coach, it is my priority to ensure the success of each client, so I am constantly thinking about the best way to make that happen. My success is based on their success. Effective managers should take the same approach with each one of their employees.
- Daily Team Check-Ins: Hold daily five-minute check-ins with your team. Ask each team member to answer these questions in one sentence: What’s going on with you right now? What’s going well? What’s not going well? What are you learning about yourself? What’s next? Finally, what can I do to set you up for success?
- Hold Active Meetings: Some managers believe in a lot of “sit-down” or in-office meetings. Movement takes away agitation and creates a less tense environment, which allows a better flow of conversation
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