侧面领导力:非领导的领导术
真正的领导力并不仅仅是正式的权力那么简单。当人们通过以下方式承认领导者时,领导者才是领导者——认真听取他们的主意,重视并遵守他们的行动建议,以及向他们寻求建议。
实施领导的机会,并不局限于当你在某个团队和企业拥有正式权力的时候。当你站出来展示你的领导力,你会将你的价值奉献给项目或者企业——同时增强你的领导技能。
哈佛谈判专家罗杰·费舍尔(Roger Fisher)和合著者阿兰·夏普(Alan
Sharp)在他们的《侧面领导力:不是领导时把事做好》(Lateral Leadership: Getting Things Done When You're Not the
Boss)一书中阐述了一种有用的领导五步法,用于你还不是正式的领导者时。这些步骤几乎适用于你涉及的所有项目或者你所参加的团队或会议。
1. 建立目标
当人们有一系列明确的目标时,会取得最大的成绩。因此,所有群体的首要任务就是明确地写下它们希望取得什么样的成功。提出“我们能否从明确我们的目标开始?”这个问题,并且随后在讨论和起草那些目标过程中起引导作用的人,会自动地承担起领导角色,无论他或她处于何种职位。
2. 进行系统性思考
观察你的下一次会议:人们通常从手边的话题切入并开始争论该如何做。相比之下,卓有成效的领导者学会进行系统性的思考——也就是说,他们收集并摆出必需的数据,分析情况产生的原因,并且基于分析提出行动方案。在一个群体中,领导者们通过提出适当的问题来使参与者集中注意力。我们已经掌握了分析形势所需要的信息了吗?我们能否专注于找出我们所要解决问题的原因?
3. 边干边学
团队经常埋头于做项目,然后在项目结束时进行一次回顾总结,弄清他们学到了什么。但是,对于团队(或者是个人)而言,边干边学更有效。
推动团体做定期小回顾(minireview)并从中学习的任何人,正在扮演着事实领导者的角色。为什么这种进行中的过程要比事后回顾更有效?因为事件在每个人脑海中都还印象深刻,并且团队能够运用在小回顾中所学的东西对他们的工作流程或目标进行必要的调整。
4. 使人们参与
一个高绩效的团队会让所有成员进行努力,卓有成效的团队领导者 在成员利益和须完成的任务之间尽可能寻求最优适配。建议将杂事列成一个清单,分配给个人或小组完成这些任务。如果没人想要一个具体的任务,可以运用头脑 风**来使这项任务更有意思或更具挑战。帮助小组中的沉默寡言者多发表他们的意见,使每个人都觉得他们是整个项目的一部分。
5. 提供反馈
如果你不是上司,你能提供什么样的反馈呢?一个永远有价值的东西就是简单的赞赏——“我认为你在那方面做得很棒”。同样,有时你会通过教练式的指导帮助 别人提高表现。卓有成效的教练会问许多问题:“你觉得你在项目的这部分做得怎么样?”他们知道人们尽管很努力但有时也会失败:“是什么使你完成这部分任务 有难度?”他们提供体贴人的改进建议,小心地解释问题背后的关系和原由。
作者:克里斯蒂娜·别拉斯卡-迪韦奈(Christina Bielaszka-DuVernay)
翻译:薛力立
I’m not the Boss, How can I lead?
5 winning strategies for Lateral leadership
Has the above ever crossed your mind at your workplace? If yes, in this article you will learn five strategies which may help to overcome this limiting belief.
Although in organisations formal leadership roles are given to certain individuals, true leadership comes from individuals who are acknowledged by people, their suggestions and ideas are listened to and valued for. Opportunities to lead in a specific situation is never dictated by a formal role. It’s more about identifying the opportunities and stepping in then demonstrate leadership through adding value to the initiative you are in.
What is Lateral Leadership?
Let me clarify the meaning of “Lateral Leadership” – In my view, it is a “leadership without ‘title’ or position”. It is the natural inclination of an individual to get things done. The objective is to get things done and not the various ancilliary issues that come along with.A wonderful book that explores the concepts of Lateral Leadership by Roger Fisher (see below).
I present five strategies here which one could apply in any workplace situation.
1) Clarify the destination point
– What are the tangible goals of the initiative?
– How aligned are we in the understanding of the goals of the project?
– Can we start by clarifying the goals please.
– How does the end state look like
The individual who asks these powerful questions, automatically becomes the center-point and others start following the responses to these questions – almost like nod their heads to improve their understanding of the goals.
2) Strategic ‘BIG’ picture view
Typically you will find that people dive deep in the content and into solution mode. People start talking about solutions, argue about what will work and what not. In a team formation ‘Storming’ stage such behaviours are quite disruptive.– Do we understand the problem,
– What information do we require for better understanding.
– What are root-cause of the situations,
– have we done enough analysis of the problem,
– Who are our stakeholders,
– What key challenges must we focus on.
Addressing these areas will allow the teams to undertake a process where everyone learns about the problem, understand the root-cause better, what high level options are available.
It is very important for a leadership role to take a step back and look at things more strategically rather than dive into details and get into solution mode.
3) Associate with all
Successful initiatives happen when each and every member is engaged and connected. Often you will find your self helpless when one or two members seem to be disengaged from the rest.Leadership to bridge this gap is absolutely essential, the message must be – “if you are onboard the journey then you must play your part, meritocracy is not an option”. As an integrative leader one must make efforts to understand individual potentials, strengths and leverage them. If you find anyone disinterested, go to the root-cause.
Mostly people make genuine attempt to integrate and work towards common goal. But we are all different, different things motivate or switch us off, that is natural. What is important is to ensure everyone feels part of the journey and is not left out.
4) Acknowledgement and Feed-forward
Acknowledgement is biggest soother, as human beings we naturally want people to listen to our views. When you show such quality of keen listener and someone genuinely interested to hear views, you are already on the train of leadership.You may take this to the next level as well. In a meeting or forum before the chair person starts the agenda, if there is a win to celebrate and all are quiet about it, snatch the opportunity and say – “before we start today, may I take this opportunity to thank the entire team for …”
Marshall Goldsmith suggests that one must check their own progress and be future focussed – “How am I doing”, “What can I do better” – this is a leadership trait called feedforward. Unfortunately not many ‘so called’ leaders do this due to the feeling of insecurity.
…people will forget what you said … people will forget what you did … but people will never forget how you made them feel…
5) Continuous learning, challenging & connecting the dots
Often once the initiative gets going, everyone understands the goal, they all know what actions to undertake, there is a strong tendency to get into comfort zone of cruising in calm waters.Leadership quality of continuous learning and constant challenging the status quo is very useful at this stage.
The team must ensure to conduct mini reviews at every stage of the initiative and not at the end of the initiative. You must also be able to ‘connect the dots’ i.e. learning from one type of incident could work for another kind of incident.
Most teams would do a review at the end of the initiative – but think again!!! by the end we hardly have any opportunity to make any difference, “its all over”. Anyone who prompts evaluation of every steps throughout the initiative, challenges the status quo or even able to ‘connect the dots’ takes a leadership role.
http://www.positive-shift.co.uk/5-strategies-lateral-leadership/