The Current Approach to Leadership

1. The Current Approach to Leadership

Important

Leadership influences people through emotions, since it fulfills a mobilizing function.

Sometimes when we refer to the leader we try to point out their ability to plan, foresee and have great ideas with an outstanding rigor in their knowledge, but the reality points to the fact that they are people who know how to manage the emotions of their teams and the different stakeholders with whom they interact.

The organizations have changed and evolved, going from being vertical to horizontal, matrix, helical, amoeba... more and more interconnected and where the role of the leader has the role of facilitator, optimizer… where the management of direct and indirect interpersonal relationships are at the center of their responsibility.

The leader develops an influential role on different levels:

• To the bosses (upwards)
• To the colleagues (sideways)
• To the collaborators (downwards)

This type of influence is produced by trying to influence someone who has a position of greater responsibility in the hierarchy chain.

The tools from which influence is managed in these three contexts are the same, what varies is the application of those tools. If you lead a team, it expects a number of things from you, your colleagues expect others, and your boss will expect different ones.

Interesting link

Before going deeper into the subject, we recommend that you read the following article: “Sin humildad, el éxito no llega”.

2. Leadership Diagnosis

In order to improve our influence management, it is advisable to analyze past situations in which we have tried to persuade someone to do something in favor of our objectives: How did we do it, did we achieve our goal? Etc.

To analyze a situation of past influence, it is necessary to elaborate a diagnosis, in which we will ask ourselves many questions about what has happened: what, how, why, what for.

As far as the "how" is concerned, we must reflect on the act of communication that has been carried out. In this sense, we must bear in mind that, normally, in the interaction of human beings to say obvious things, or things only of common sense does not usually work as a model of conviction.

Example

Imagine that you are a committed and hard-working person and your boss told you: ¨Here we have come to work.” Surely that phrase would generate the opposite effect in you, to the one intended. Of course you already know that we have come to work, you don't need them to remind you or clarify it.

Important

In order to manage our influence as effectively as possible, before doing or saying anything, we must think about how we are going to do it: who we are going to meet (detect their reality), with what objectives, at what time, etc.

In short, once the objectives of our actions have been established, it is necessary to make a diagnosis that will give us the necessary keys to guarantee its success. It is difficult to see things clearly if we analyze them from the inside. In this sense, it is fundamental to have an analysis of the situations that is as external as possible.

In addition, the human and social factor is important. Therefore, when developing our leadership we must also take into account the stakeholders and, of course, the management of oneself.

3. Leave Our Comfort Zone

There are many contexts in which we want to exert an influence over other people. For example, one of the most important moments in which we must use our capacity of influence is when we try to implement a change with respect to the current situation, which can mean taking the other person out of the comfort zone in which they find themselves. This presents a clear added complexity, because when faced with new situations, our brain tends to use the action framework it had previously established.

Therefore, breaking the status quo implies making a much greater effort to change the system. The less time we have to make that change happen, the more energy we will have to spend on it.

Staying too long in the comfort zone prevents us from progressing. Usually, when we try to leave that area, without knowing exactly why, we are first overcome by a certain uneasiness and then by a deeper fear.

When we manage to get out of it, even for a short time, after an initial restlessness our comfort zone shows a remarkable property: it widens and reaches us again. It grows with us. Once enlarged, it allows us to be comfortable in new and different situations, with which we did not dare before.

From a business and management point of view, the comfort zone does not help in the development of talent and motivation. Remaining in this area for long periods of time leads to mediocrity, stagnation, and lack of growth. That is why it is necessary to take risks and go into the learning zone.

Definition

The learning zone is the space between the comfort zone and the zone we consider to be dangerous. This is where the limits of existing skills and experiences are pushed, where learning is real and where growth takes place.

The learning zone is where the magic happens, where leadership and influence are developed, where success is built and goals are achieved. Also where greater self-motivation is achieved. Only by giving up the safe and familiar are opportunities created and new skills developed.

People who take risks and enter into their learning zone are those who achieve success. In this way they also expand their influence management capacity and are able to take on ever greater challenges.

Important

Motivation is the engine to get out of the comfort zone. Therefore, as leaders, we will strive to know the group and individual motivation, which mobilizes people to find an intention as the main factor of change in behavior towards the learning zone.

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