Top 5 characteristics of effective leaders

There is no better time than now for business leaders to educate, inspire and uplift their employees. According to an award-winning executive, the ability to elevate – to exceed and outperform expectations – is directly related to your ability to build the competence of you and others.

Given today’s macroeconomic and microeconomic conditions, how can managers unlock peak performance and innovation by upskilling their teams? And what leadership traits have had the greatest impact on creating and nurturing a winning culture?

Robert Glazer is the founder and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Acceleration partner, the leading global partner marketing agency that has won over 30 awards for its world-class company culture. Glazer is passionate about helping individuals build their capacity to excel. Robert is the author of Friday Forward, an inspirational newsletter that reaches over 200,000 readers worldwide each week and #first The Wall Street Journal best-selling author of several booksinclude Advanced, Forward Friday, And How to Thrive in the Virtual Workplace.

Glazer shares her ideas and insights through forward friday, a popular weekly inspirational newsletter that reaches over 200,000 individuals and business leaders across more than 60 countries. He is the host Advanced Podcasts, where he engages CEOs, authors, and thinkers to discuss personal growth and help others live their best lives. Glazer’s Next Book Raise your teampublished in March, and it is a leadership handbook that helps leaders and managers help their employees grow at the same pace as their companies.

Glazer was interviewed by the bestselling author of the Wall Street Journal Karen Mangia to provide a behind-the-scenes look at the new leadership portrait and which leadership behaviors should stop, start, and continue now.

Q: Our growth plans often develop from observing others. Who is the leader who has influenced you the most, and how?

The leader who has influenced me the most is probably Herb Kelleher, the founder of Southwest Airlines. Kelleher sets an example of what it means to build a sustainable company that has the right culture differently, treats people well, and succeeds by defying conventional wisdom. The culture that Kelleher built — especially Southwest’s core values, and the way their team lives them on a daily basis — is what inspired me to establish our cultural principles at my own company, Acceleration Partners (AP). I used to believe that the company’s culture, core values, and mission statement were BS marketing, but Kelleher convinced me I was wrong.

How has your definition of leadership changed or evolved over time? What does it mean to be a leader now?

My definition of leadership has evolved over time; I have discovered that the key is not to imitate the qualities of effective leaders, but to become self-aware and to lead authentically. Early in my leadership career, my leadership approach was like a patchwork blanket — a collection of best practices from leaders I admire and the opposite of others. leaders that I don’t respect. It was only when I really began to dig into my core values ​​and purpose, and work toward alignment with those principles, that I found my footing.

Above all, being a leader is about helping people and organizations reach their full potential. Not coincidentally, that is my core life purpose.

Success often has as much to do with what we stop as with what we start. What is an inherited leadership behavior that you stopped because you discovered it was no longer valid or appropriate?

This is a tactic, but less so than corporate update meetings, in which the leader of an organization guides the team through a PowerPoint for an hour without dialogue or discussion. This is a prime example of a meeting that could be an email, but a lot of leaders think of leadership as standing in front of a group and giving the status quo. It cannot.

My advice to leaders who are stuck in the books and stereotypes of the past is to constantly learn and seek new perspectives. Intellectual competence is a core part of Raise your team, which means never assume you know it all and never stop pursuing new knowledge. Read books and listen to podcasts in your area of ​​focus. Attend seminars and conferences or join peer-to-peer communities (I’ve been a member of EO and YPO, as well as several others). Most importantly, surround yourself with people who challenge you to think differently.

Many of our readers can relate to the challenge of leading people for the first time. What advice would you give to new and emerging leaders?

While I want to talk about values ​​and self-awareness again, I have another tactic that has tripped up a lot of new leaders: delegation. I always tell our new managers to follow the 85 percent Rule: Effective delegation is when something is done 85 percent the way you would do it yourself without having to join. Although it is difficult at first, it is better for us to treat the 85% result as a win, then tackle the last 15% with better guidance and training in the future.

Based on your experience or research, what are the top five characteristics that today’s effective leaders exhibit?

I’ve always thought of great leadership as a more universal objective standard. We are better off when we can find fault in the leadership of those with whom we politically agree and recognize the capabilities of excellent leaders with whom we also disagree. There are certain qualities and behaviors that every great leader should exhibit, regardless of their ideology.

Over the years, I have read and saved numerous lists detailing the characteristics of great leaders in history from business, sports, politics, the military, and other fields. Looking back at all of these lists, these five leadership qualities keep popping up, in no particular order:

1. Integrity: People want leaders they can trust to act for the greater good and tell the truth. We want leaders to act on our stated principles, be honest with us, and keep our promises.
2. modest: We are attracted to leaders who are approachable and do not put themselves above others. When leaders show humility, empathy, and vulnerability, others instinctively want to follow.
3. Empowering others: Great leaders don’t do everything on their own — instead, they set clear visions and values, and guide others to work according to those guiding principles.
4. Great communication: Leaders must communicate well, both to motivate others to take action and to ensure their directives are understood. This includes sharing bad news clearly, honestly, and confidently.
5. Thinking forward: A great leader sets a compelling vision for the future, attracting and convincing others to want to join their movement.

Former UCLA Basketball Coach John Wooden said, “Make every day your masterpiece.” How do you present that quote?

This is connected to one of my favorite sayings: “We are what we repeat. So excellence is not an act, but a habit.” One area where I live here is preparing keynotes, which I do regularly for corporate events, conferences and corporate events.

When I go to an event, I carry a bag of adapters that can connect my laptop to almost any presentation system or projector, as well as my own slide upgrade kit. I always make sure my presentations are saved locally on my laptop and backed up in the cloud. I want to come in the afternoon before my speech to make sure I don’t miss it due to unexpected delays in the trip. After a good night’s sleep, I practice speaking fully twice — sometimes at the hotel gym early in the morning. I arrived at the venue early to meet the AV team and double-checked all the details needed for a great keynote. This full process builds on personal best practices, advice from top speakers, and lessons from my past mistakes. It’s a lot of work, but it’s worth it — and I do it before every speech, no matter how big or small the audience.

Also, this has saved me several times, including last year when the AV system was turned off during my speech for 10 minutes.

What legacy do you aspire to leave as a leader?

Above all, I want people to be able to say that their life is better knowing me. I want to be remembered as someone who helped people reach their full potential, told them what they needed to hear, not what they wanted to hear, and helped them leave a legacy of leadership.

Here are 15 leadership lessons from Glazer that resonated with us:

1. Emulate, then integrate leadership behaviors you admire.
2. Reconnect with your values ​​and your values.
3. Create your own core values.
4. Grow great people.
5. Delegate to the great people you develop.
6. Genuinely leading.
7. Looking for service.
8. Committed to collecting with a purpose.
9. The best meetings are chats.
10. Employee empowerment and engagement is the result of focused, holistic development in four key areas: mental, intellectual, physical, and emotional capabilities.
11. It can always be taught by applying a beginner’s mindset — curious and unbiased.
12. Learn to delegate — it’s about trusting and empowering others to thrive.
13. Champion is not born. The champion is made in reality.
14. Leave things and people better than when you found them.
15. Invest in yourself first, then help others win.

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This article was co-authored by Karen Mangia, Wall Street Journal bestselling author, podcast host Success From Anywhere, Executive Coach, and Hired Tech CEO. Her keynotes, seminars, thought leadership and coaching reach hundreds of thousands of leaders globally each year. Connect with Karen on Twitter @karenmangia and subscribe to her podcast on your favorite podcast platform.