Leading in the 21^st Century: A Primer

by Dr. Ed Slover

Walk into any Barnes & Noble or conduct a search on Amazon and you will find hundreds if not thousands of books on leadership. Most of the authors provide insights on becoming a better leader or ways to maximize leadership effectiveness. While the vast majority of the content is high quality, it largely moves the reader too far away from the foundation upon which leadership effectiveness is built.

Leading in 21^st century organizations requires a unique skill set in any business or industry. With an increasingly diversified workforce and advances in technology, effective leaders possess the ability to “flex” their style and adapt to different situations in order to make reasoned, ethically-based decisions. If you are thinking, “I do that,” consider the role of your followers. Do they believe you have their best interest in mind? Do they trust you? Do they feel that you make them better? What follows serves as a “primer” that gets you to get back to the basics in determining your own effectiveness as a leader.

“Flexing” Your Style

In goes without saying that the way in which we view the world determines how we behave in it. This worldview, or lens, guides us when making decisions about people and situations. It helps ground our thought processes and how we feel about any number of topics. It evolved over time and serves as a basis for what success looks like. It can also be our worst enemy when attempting to lead others.

It is commonly accepted that there are four generations in the workforce today. Each generation, from Baby Boomers to Gen Xers to Millennials to Gen Zers, have unique characteristics and qualities that differ dramatically from one another. Layer in the increased pluralism of gender, race, and ethnicity, the challenges to becoming an effective leader mount daily. While increased diversity is a good thing, it requires that 21^st century leaders “flex” their style to meet the unique needs of each follower individually. Said differently, if you, as a leader, apply your worldview generically and treat each follower the exact same way, your leadership effectiveness will plummet.

As a leader or future leader within your industry, ask yourself:

• Do I engage with new employees differently than longer tenured employees?
• Do I treat full-time employees differently than part-time employees?
• Do I provide frequent, developmental feedback to my employees that makes them better?
• Do I get out of their way and empower them to decide how best to complete their work?
• Do I apply incentive structures to all employees the same way?

Ultimately, your answer to each question determines how effectively you will lead. For instance, engaging with a new employee the same way you do a longer tenured employee is a mistake, as the new employee needs much more attention from you with regard to developmental feedback. Accordingly, longer tenured employees typically want to be empowered and require less developmental feedback. This is just one example of the need for you, as a leader, to “flex” your style and not impose your worldview the same way in every situation or to every person. When done well, this is incredibly difficult.

Belief, Trust, & Commitment

It has been said that leadership is born out of followership. No truer words have been written, as the prerequisite to be a “leader” is having at least one “willing follower.” Having positional authority, alone, does not make you a leader. It makes you an authority with legitimate power to get employees to perform job tasks. Without leadership, the employee will comply, but not commit. This rests in the fact that the employee does not believe you have his/her best interest in mind.

Inspiring someone to willingly follow requires belief. More specifically, it requires that followers believe that you have their best interest in mind. This begins by how you make them feel about themselves, about you, and about the job. By demonstrating faithful commitment to improving their lives through work, making them better at their job, and providing support during challenging times (i.e., customer complaints), they begin to trust you. Because they know you are in it for them, your employees recognize that they can have faith in your judgment. They trust that when faced with an ethically murky choice that you will make the right decision. They trust you because you have earned it by proving yourself to them. Once trust is established, commitment follows. It is here that your employees will give you maximum effort because they are committed to you and not their job or paycheck.

As a leader or future leader within your industry, ask yourself:

• Do my employees believe I have their best interest in mind?
• Do my employees trust my decision making and judgment?
• Do my employees commit to maximizing their performance and productivity?
• Do my employees go above and beyond the demands of their role without being asked?
• Do my employees feel that their contributions are valued?

In reflecting on each question, it is easy to think that engendering belief, building trust, and gaining commitment has little practical value since your employees are not developing “hard skills.” To underestimate the need to create willing followers by building positive, productive relationships is to overestimate the value of technical knowledge or skill. While the latter is important and can be quantified directly, the former is the recipe for creating a high-performing culture and sustained business success.

In conclusion, there is little doubt that the concept and practice of leadership extends far beyond this brief introduction and review. Each idea will serve you well as a leader or future leader in business and industry. Each idea is foundational to your ability to get business results with and through other people. Each idea allows both you and your followers to work together in the pursuit and achievement of shared goals. None of this is rocket science, but getting it right is more challenging than you may think. In fact, there really is no destination, so embrace the quest.