The Leader Everyone Wants to Work For

It takes courage to step up to lead. Talented employees want leaders who can open their worlds and make them better. So what kinds of leaders draw and develop the best talent? Generally, they possess many of these qualities:

1) Service Mentality:

Focus on serving your employees. Your job is to level obstacles, streamline processes, find resources, and keep the political nonsense at bay.

2) Juice:

Confront issues, no matter how unpopular it makes you. Stand up for what’s best for customers, employees, and society.

3) Experience:

Take time to help your employees understand the business. Expose them to every part of the operation and plug them into your network. Help them find new connections and mentors.

4) Openness:

Be ready to learn, ask questions and never be satisfied. The fastest way to lose credibility is to lose touch with what’s happening.

5) Space:

Give your people ownership and space to figure out how to solve issues themselves. That’s how people learn.

6) Excellence:

A leader is always asking, “Is this the best we can do?” They set goals to maintain focus, pushes continuous learning and demands results, regardless of precedents, politics, and predicaments.

7) Bring Out the Best:

A leader doesn’t focus on what an employee can’t do or what others say about them. They look at what the individual can do – and what they could do. Often, there are capabilities they didn’t realise they had.

8) Fairness:

Leaders hold themselves responsible to the same rules as those they lead. They don’t lead from on high or from behind – they lead by example, and they view their people as equals.

9) Consistency:

good leaders are reliable and responsive. They don’t point fingers; they gather facts and take action. They understand that everyone takes their cues from them and they act in the same way they want their people to react.

10) Recruiting:

The ability to attract the best people is one way leaders measure themselves. Great leaders need to foster a culture where talent is developed and valued. Word gets out – and when you get results and help people get where they want to go, talent goes on the look-out for you.

What are you doing to ensure that people WANT to work for YOU?

Adapted from an article by Jeff Schmitt, Forbes Magazine