Whether you’re a one-person practice, a small business owner leading a team, or driving the performance of a larger organisation, it’s up to you to make people feel amazing, to bring out the best in them.
As a leader you have the capacity to unleash the brilliance in others every single day. You have to inspire those around you to perform at their best and to achieve the results they want to achieve. You have to connect, influence, empower and equip others.
To unleash the brilliance in your teams, you have to create a safe space that you agitate just enough to unlock ideas and thinking, create possibility and potential and provide the motivation that drives momentum and change.
Your role as a leader is to:
- make a difference and mobilise change
- create a path for the future, inspiring others to engage with the work that is needed
- meet others where they’re at, empowering them to collectively move forward.
To magnify the brilliance in others, leaders need to:
- create a safe environment for people to try and fail, to question and ask, to explore and be curious without judgement
- create a space for personal growth where people are challenged and pushed, encouraged and nurtured as they work towards their own frontiers of competence
- respect the individual, acknowledging individual strengths, experience, skills, capabilities and achievements to date and encourage individuals to leverage their uniqueness for themselves and to help others
- care about the individual and be truly compassionate about where they’re at, their views, personal opinions and inner fears
- recognise growth and personal achievements and acknowledge when new learning has been adopted and personal limitations or barriers are pushed through.
Thinking about your company or team, which of the behaviours above are you strong at and which could you focus on to improve?
- what specific action you can take that will lift others higher?
- how you could open doors for others to try new things and practise new skills?
- when could you make invaluable introductions within your organisation to create that career progression opportunity?
- how can you share more about what you know: your knowledge, insight and advice?
Unleashing the brilliance in others is ultimately the intentional support of another: taking action, collaborating and sharing what you know and who you know to better someone else.