The world lacks great leaders, and staff at work are severely disengaged as a result. By watching this video you’ll learn 5 key leadership traits of successful leaders. Click here or the image to watch the video.
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I am a big fan of Simon Sinek who is a renowned leadership expert from the US, author of two books and presenter of two excellent Ted Talks. On his web site he leads with the quote “Imagine a world where people wake up inspired to go to work.” This would be a dramatic shift from the working world we are currently in, where according to a Gallup poll, 83% of workers feel disengaged.
Every day I receive a motivational quote from Simon, a lot about leadership and I wanted to share my top 5 with you and what they mean to me. Hopefully there is some learning for all of us and I’d suggest you check Simon out www.startwithwhy.com His Ted Talks are excellent.
- A poor leader will tell you how many people work for them. A great leader will tell you how many people they work for. This quote reinforces our strong belief that you need your people more than they need you. In retail we rely on people, we can’t do it on our own, so our role is to make them the best they are.
- Managers expect us to work hard out of obligation. Leaders inspire us to work hard with pride. What a difference, if we can get our teams to feel motivated it’s amazing what they will do for us.
- Weak leaders have the luxury of looking after themselves. Great leaders have the honour of looking after others. We should see it as a privilege if we have a team to lead, after all we are responsible for the performance of our store, state or company.
- Great leaders don’t try to be perfect. Great leaders try to be themselves. And that’s what makes them great. Letting your team know you are not perfect is ok, and as Simon says we just have to be ourselves and it’s ok to make mistakes.
- Bad leaders care about who is right. Good leaders care about what is right. As well as being themselves, I believe great leaders are in the role to coach their team to be amazing – it’s not about who is wrong or right, it’s about getting it right next time and helping the team to learn as they go.
I hope you find these quotes helpful and I’ll always challenge every leader to self-assess against these 5 points – there just may be some ways we could improve.
I’ll leave you with an excerpt from the excellent book “Good to Great” by Jim Collins – “Bad leaders look out the window to criticise and look in the mirror to praise. The great leaders do the opposite!!” Where are you currently looking for your praise and improvement?
Roger Simpson – CEO, The Retail Solution and Author of “The Retail Solution” With over 35 years’ industry experience, Roger Simpson is recognized as Australia’s #1 Authority on customer ROI in the retail industry and as a global expert on staff coaching, customer service and selling skills.
