This is the second in our series of articles that looks at leadership capacity and its impact on organizational growth. The full series will be available for download as a white paper once it is completed.

In our last article, we discussed how leadership impacts your organizations ability to grow. Now let’s discuss some of the characteristics that leaders need to impact the growth of their organization.

There are certain core characteristics the majority of leaders possess. However, there are also an additional set of characteristics that define transformational leaders — leaders that have the ability to make an impact on organizational growth.

It is an organizations ability to develop this next level of leadership capabilities through training programs, mentoring, and skill development programs that put organizations in the enviable position to grow year over year without experiencing dips in performance.

Core leadership characteristics

There are certain leadership characteristics that, while important, do not inspire organizational change and growth that help companies develop into innovative, consistent industry leaders.

Examples of these core leadership characteristics include:

• Good judgment
• Communication skills
• Competence or knowledge
• Interpersonal skills
• Confidence

We hear about these leadership characteristics all the time and in many different contexts. While they are very important for leaders to have, there is another level of leadership characteristics that are “must haves” for transformational leaders. These are the leadership characteristics that make an impact and spur growth.

Transformational Leadership characteristics that impact organizational growth

In order to put your organization in a position to grow effectively and on a consistent basis, leaders with the following characteristics not only make them an effective leader — but also a transformational leader:

1. Internal motivation and self-management: Transformational leaders find motivation from within and use that as the driving force to effectively manage the direction of the company. The best natural form of motivation is to love what you do and ensure that your values are aligned with the organization you work with.
2. The ability to make difficult decisions: Difficult decisions are a part of being a leader. Transformational leaders do not back away or put off tough decisions. Difficult decisions are made easier when decisions align with clearly defined vision, values, goals, and objectives.
3. Check their ego: When placed in a position of power, it is easy to let your ego get the best of you. However, transformational leaders keep their ego in check and do not let it get in the way of doing what is best for business. The benefit of checking your ego ensures you put the company first over personal gain and encourages the best input from others within the organization — because when the company succeeds, you as a leader also succeed.
4. Willing to take the right risks: Anyone can take a risk. Transformational leaders take calculated risks that more often than not result in positive outcomes. Trusting your instinct, as well as your team to gather the necessary intelligence is important. Trusting your gut is easier when you have taken the time to research, evaluate and inform your decisions with input from those around you. Failure to take the appropriate risks and make these difficult decisions will inhibit change and your ability to grow.
5. Organizational consciousness: Transformational leaders share the collective conscious of their organization. They understand what actions to take to evoke change, spur innovation, and make decisions that will create growth. Since their own values are aligned with the organization they share a joint purpose with the organization and do not just view their position in the company as just a job.
6. Adaptability: Transformational leaders are willing to adapt and are always seeking new ways to respond to a constantly changing business environment. They know that the second they stand still is when they will be passed by their competitors; which means they are open-minded to change and lifelong learners.
7. Willing to listen and entertain new ideas: It is a rare individual who can build an empire. Transformational leaders understand that success is a team effort and growth is derived from the willingness to be open and listen to ideas from all levels of their organization. Transformational leaders create intentional ways to listen to their team and incorporate their insights.
8. Inspirational: People want to be inspired. Transformational leaders have the ability to make those around rise to the occasion. Inspiration comes not just from a formal motivational speech or simple recognition for a job well done, but by treating people as individuals and taking the time to understand what motivates and inspires their team.
9. Proactive: Transformational leaders are proactive decision makers. They do not wait around for others to make decisions and then react. They are willing to take risks, try new things and take an innovative approach to growing the organization. However, they also understand how to manage risk and make decisions that are backed by research, multiple insights and are well thought out.
10. Visionary: Being a visionary is about setting a realistic and concise company mission, vision, and values that fit the culture of your organization. Transformational leaders have the ability not only to effectively communicate the vision, but also get every person to buy in and work toward that vision by communicating with passion and clearly emphasizing the direction they want the company to pursue.

Transformational leaders constantly strive to have these characteristics. Developing these characteristics is what separates companies that are led by managers versus leaders.

The next article will build on these must have characteristics and examine how leaders can assess organizational leadership to improve their companies’ ability to grow.

When discussing leadership, we often hear words like teamwork and collaboration. People tend to shy away from words like conflict and disagreement. But are these bad?

Strong leaders encourage disagreement, because it ensures that everyone on the team is using their full potential to ensure decisions are bullet-proofed.

We are all trained from an early age to defer to authority. however, people who are closer to the issue or opportunity often have a different, more informed, perspective than more senior people.

My Perspective: If you are always getting agreement to your thoughts and ideas, then your people aren’t contributing their own valued ideas. As a leader you need to ensure that your team feels safe disagreeing and challenging your thinking. If your team automatically defers to the boss, then you and the team will miss out on critical input and thinking.

Make it easy for people to speak up with a dissenting opinion in a safe environment. Actively ask for their input — and then ask again to demonstrate you are serious about hearing their thoughts. Disagreeing with the boss requires courage, so recognize people when they voice a dissenting opinion and challenge your thinking with good ideas of their own.

When discussing projects, share your  comments as initial thoughts as opposed to formed ideas, then ask for input in developing the ideas further. This will encourage people to build on the thinking versus just agree.

Make sure that you don’t react negatively if someone disagrees, even if you think it is a bad idea. This will just shut people down in the future. It’s much better to allow the group to determine that the idea doesn’t make sense based on evaluation — and better ideas that come forward.

Lastly, never confuse dissent or disagreement with disrespect. Disrespect doesn’t belong in any discussion.

Today, more than ever, we need courageous leaders who empower others to reach heights they never thought possible. We need our leaders to expand their capabilities and move outside of the transactional space and into a transformational space that focuses on long term solutions rather than short term gains.

Transformational leadership – growing beyond transactional leadership

Developing your leadership capacity is moving beyond focusing on the day to day operations and expanding your decision making process to focus on long term strategies that are able to sustain business over time.

Leaders need to focus on developing a transformational leadership style that creates positive change and growth. This begins with the goals and vision that are set by leaders and their ability to clearly communicate them to their team in a way that inspires then to buy in.

7 must have transformational leadership qualities

In order to get your team to buy in and be part of your vision for the company, there are certain qualities you must possess to be a transformational leader:

1. A clear vision:
   Transformational leaders have a vision of what they want to achieve and the ability to clearly communicate this vision so that everyone in the organization understands what is needed to achieve this vision. Is your vision clear? Does it need to be refined?
2. Courage:
   An effective leader needs courage; a willingness to take on new challenges, take calculated risks, make tough decisions, and be willing to go out on a limb for something they believe in. Transformational leaders have the courage to create a vision and do what it takes to achieve their vision.
3. Self-motivation:
   Leaders need to fuel their passion from within. Transformational leaders have passion and motivation that people can sense and feed off of it. Are you passionate about your vision and willing to do what it takes to see your vision achieved?
4. Inspiration:
   Transformational leaders, based on their personal passion, have the ability to inspire others and get them to buy into their vision and execute it on all levels of the company. How do you inspire your employees to create change? Are you effective at motivating and inspiring your staff?
5. Know your people:
   Personal interaction is important. The impact of a simple “hello” in the hallway or conversation in the lobby goes a long way into getting employees to feel important and want to be part of the vision a leader has created for the company.  You have the ability to impact each of your team on a personal level. When was the last time you took the time to listen to your team and get to know them as individuals?
6. Set a company standard:
   Transformational leaders model a company standard they expect everyone to follow. They clearly communicate their vision, expectations, and how this standard is to be carried out throughout the organization. What is your company standard? What standard are you setting by example?
7. Follow through:
   While it is a bit cliché, actions do speak louder than words — and when leaders live according to the standard they set, employees take notice. Leaders often promise a lot, but it is the follow through that has a true impact on a leader’s ability to evoke change and get employees to buy in. How do you follow through and ensure your standards are met?

Tips for becoming a transformational leader

Leaders cannot just decide to become a transformational leader. However, they can work on developing transformational leadership by implementing these tips:

• Craft your vision and make it the focal point of the company
• Solicit input from senior management to ensure your vision can be spread throughout the company
• Have a process in place that allows your frontline workers to ask questions and get clarification
• Be clear and communicate the importance that each employees plays in the execution of your vision for the company
• Create actionable steps that align with your vision that can be executed by employees
• Understand what is needed to motivate and inspire your employees to buy in and become part of your vision

When leaders openly accept a transformational style they move beyond day to day functions and operate at a higher level that is focused on creating change in employees and culture that will lead to innovation and growth.

Recently I executed an employee engagement survey across a client organization. When I compared the senior executive team with the blended front-line results I discovered a very troubling outcome.

The senior executives were almost unanimous in the belief that they had done an excellent job of communicating the core values of the organization — yet results from the front-line indicated exactly the opposite.

Even worse, some of the comments indicated that the values the front-line were observing were inconsistent with the “advertised” values.

Too many organizations believe that the values are clear in their organization. However, all too often, the values that are communicated are coming via actions rather than words — or the actions speak louder than the words.

Here are few questions to ask yourself.

• Have you crystallized your values and written them down?
• Does everyone at the senior level of the organization agree and commit to live by these values?
• Did you involve your employees? Were they involved in establishing the organizational values? Do they feel ownership?
• Did you solicit buy-in across the organization and give them an opportunity to discuss them and what they mean in their daily lives?
• Do you regularly communicate the values? Do you explain your decisions in the context of your values so everyone understand how the values come to life?
• Do you live your values? Actions speak louder than words — are your values being demonstrated on a daily basis in your decision-making?

My Perspective: If you don’t have clearly defined core values, this is a missed opportunity to influence and engage employees. Too often organizations have a communications plan — but it doesn’t do a very good job of communicating internally.

Having a clear set of values also let’s people know what kind of organization is being built and they have an opportunity to decide whether they want to belong to that kind of organization. And in return, you have the evaluate people for a good fit with your team.

Clarity is key.

Are you finding that you are not hearing the fresh ideas and new thinking in your organization that you would like. Are you often faced with sitting through presentations that sound like the same ideas rehashed again and again.

Well maybe you are burying good ideas under a bad process.

Before you hear their ideas — are your teams spending time getting them “right”? Are they vetted, reviewed, revised and debated around in circles until all the edginess and excitement has been “fine-tuned” right out of existence.

Imagine if ideas for the iPhone had been fine-tuned to death before they were presented to the boss. Of if space travel had been fine-tuned before making the suggestion to president Kennedy?

My Perspective: As a leader it is your job to foster an environment where good ideas become great — not where good ideas get ground down into mundane ideas.

Instead of insisting that ideas are thoroughly vetted before your hear them, instead find ways to be part of idea generation sessions where you have the opportunity to hear raw, unfiltered ideas that need championing, not fine-tuning.

Skip the fancy presentations, remove the filters, roll up your sleeves and create idea incubation sessions where people present raw ideas and concepts that aren’t well thought out, but still hold the promise of greatness. Then embrace some of these ideas and help them grow with your support.

Just think, one of those ideas might turn into the next Google, Zappos or iPhone.

Just imagine