The 5 Levels of Leadership: Proven Steps to Maximize Your Potential (27 page)

A good Level 4 leader is always on the lookout for a person’s weaknesses and wrong thinking—not to exploit that person, but to strengthen and help him or her succeed.

If you’ve done your work on Level 2 to build a strong relationship with the people, and you’ve proven yourself on Level 3 by modeling success and productivity, there is a very good chance that they will buy into your leadership and accept a challenge from you to improve. To do that, ask the people you lead to do the following:

The idea is to challenge them in every area of their lives where you see that they need improvement. Just be sure to gain their permission to do it before starting the process.

Nobody gets ahead in life without the help and support of other people. One of the great privileges of leading on the People Development level is helping new leaders navigate through life’s difficulties. The primary way I do that is by allowing the people I mentor to request a meeting with me whenever they need it. On those occasions, they are to drive the agenda by asking specific, difficult questions. I answer them as best I can, and in return, the next time we meet, I ask that the person tell me how they applied what they learned.

It’s difficult for someone to make the most of their leadership potential when the rest of their life is a wreck. Good life skills help a person to create a strong foundation upon which to build a family, career, and spiritual life. I admit that I get the greatest joy from seeing people reach their leadership potential, but it is also very satisfying to know that I’ve helped someone to enjoy life and live it well.

President Theodore Roosevelt is often quoted as saying, “The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.” What he’s describing is empowerment. That’s helping people to see what they can do without your help, and releasing them to do it.

I have to admit that as a leader, it’s hard not to meddle. That’s especially true when you know the work you’re delegating very well but the person you’re giving it to is new to it. Yet releasing work to be done by others is an essential link to empowering and ultimately developing them as leaders.

As you release tasks to the leaders you’re developing, you need to trust them, believe in them, and hold them accountable. Trust creates a
bond between you and them. When I trust the people I will empower, I put a little piece of myself into their hands. When they respond in kind, the shared vulnerability creates a bond between you that deepens the relationship.

When you believe in people, you motivate them. Few things put wind in another person’s sails like your faith in them. And the belief must be genuine. Pretending you believe provides no passion for empowerment. Nor can you borrow the belief from someone else because it will have no power. You must draw upon the experiences you have with them and the growth that they have already exhibited. Besides helping them, it will also help you. If you don’t believe in them, you won’t be able to let go and release them to achieve.

When you hold people accountable, you increase their chances for positive results. Why? Because everyone finds focus in goals. They work better toward deadlines. And they usually rise to the level of a leader’s expectations. Without accountability, people drift. With it, they achieve results.

Many people look at winning sports teams, and they often tend to attribute the team’s success to how knowledgeable the coach is. But games aren’t won according to what the coach knows. Games are won according to what the coach’s players have learned. How can you measure that as a leader? By judging how independently your team members are able to function.

The Center for Organizational Effectiveness in Cincinnati, Ohio, suggests that there are different degrees of ability when it comes to empowerment, based on how independently a team member can work.
Here are the six they recognize, from least independent to most independent:

1. Look into it. Report. I’ll decide what to do.
   
2. Look into it. Report alternatives with pros and cons and your recommendation.
   
3. Look into it. Let me know what you intend to do, but don’t do it unless I say yes.
   
4. Look into it. Let me know what you intend to do and do it unless I say no.
   
5. Take action. Let me know what you did.
   
6. Take action. No further contact required.
   

As you work in People Development with team members, you can measure where they are in leadership development based on where they typically function according to those six benchmarks. Obviously, your goal is to help them become leaders who can take action without needing your input. When the leaders you develop reach that benchmark, then they—and you—are ready to lead them at the highest level of leadership, Level 5, which I’ll discuss in the final section of this book.

A
s you work to master the People Development level of leadership, please keep in mind how the following Laws of Leadership come into play.

No matter how much you want to be a good leader, it will take you time to improve your leadership. Leadership develops daily, not in a day. Likewise, developing people also takes time. You can’t make it happen using a “microwave” mind-set. You have to be willing to take it step by step. You have to put in many hours of mentoring and wait months, years, and sometimes decades for people to develop into good leaders. But it’s worth the effort. Just remember: mentoring is not a race. If you run fast and try to finish first, you’ll finish alone. Leaders who make it to Level 4 cross the finish line in the company of the people they’ve developed.

As a young leader I thought,
It will be great to have people follow me toward my vision and help me achieve it.
I could hardly wait for others to put me first in their lives. I was leading for all the wrong reasons. Good leaders put their people first, not themselves.

If you want to become a great leader, serve the people you lead. Make their success your success. Clear the way for them to achieve. Invest in them so that they succeed. Maintain the mind-set of a servant. Many people pursue success. Few pursue success for their people.

The highest levels of achievement in life cannot be accomplished by any person working alone. People need one another. If you are a leader with a big vision, you won’t be able to achieve it without a team of leaders—an inner circle. These people help you lead and achieve, and are almost like an extended family. If you desire to have a great inner circle, then start developing people. Only by raising up leaders and inviting them to pursue the vision with you will you achieve big things.

Niccolo Machiavelli said, “The first method of estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.” Look at the people closest to you. What is their caliber? What can be said about their integrity? A leader’s inner circle is the most accurate picture of his or
her life. If you don’t like what you see, then invest more of yourself into potential leaders and raise them up to succeed. They in turn will do the same for you.

I once heard Jack Welch say in an interview that when he was at GE, he noticed there were two types of leaders: those who would hide their key players and those who would promote them. He said the leaders who hid their best people had a selfish spirit. In contrast, those who promoted and empowered others had a generous spirit.

People don’t reach Level 4 unless they are willing to empower leaders, promote them, and release them to lead. That takes a strong sense of security and an abundance mind-set. If you want to succeed on the People Development level of leadership, work to address your insecurities so that you can become an empowerer of other leaders.

Leadership productivity and organizational impact begin to occur when a leader reaches Level 3. Those things multiply on Level 4. Every time you develop people and help them become leaders, you not only gain their ability and put their horsepower to use in the organization, but you also engage the abilities of everyone they lead. There is not a faster or more effective way to compound your time, effort, and resources than by developing leaders.

You may have noticed that this is the third time I’ve referenced the Law of Buy-In. Why? Because developing influence with others is a continuing process of earning their buy in.

Few things are more inspiring and energizing than leaders who seek to serve their people and see those people rise up to their potential and become leaders themselves. When leaders act worthy of their positions on Level 1, build good relationships on Level 2, model productivity on Level 3, and invest in their people by developing them on Level 4, people go beyond just knowing the vision. They feel the vision. Why? Because it comes to life in the leader. People find that inspiring and energizing. And they buy in.

I
f you have managed to move up to Level 4, you are leading at a very high level, higher than 90 percent of all other leaders. But there is still one level higher that may be within your reach. Fewer than 1 percent of all leaders achieve it. To prepare yourself to attempt that final climb and give yourself the best chance of making it to the top, you must first embrace the following beliefs:

Getting work done can be important and rewarding. And leading others and having them help you achieve a vision can be wonderful. But developing others is even more wonderful. And it should be your goal as a leader.

I believe I’ve already made a pretty good case for how leaders become more productive by focusing on leadership development. But I think it is worth saying that the improvement to individual leaders’ lives is the highest goal of leadership development. When you help other people become leaders, you change their lives. You change the way they see the world. You change their capacity. You increase their potential. You change the way they
interact with others. If they become good leaders, you help them improve not only their lives, but also the lives of everyone they touch. I believe that is how you change the world for the better.

How does a leader do this? By applying the Pareto Principle. I described in Level 3 how the 80/20 rule can be used to increase productivity. That same principle can be used when developing leaders. As a Level 4 leader, you should focus 80 percent of your attention on developing the best 20 percent of the leaders you have. That focus will bring you the highest return. A handful of leaders will give an organization a far greater return than hundreds of followers.

Focusing your development on the top 20 percent also sets you up for success on Level 5 because the leaders with the most potential and who give you the highest rate of return on your investment also have the greatest likelihood of turning around and raising up other leaders, which is the emphasis on Level 5.

Even if you place great emphasis on developing leaders and practice the 80/20 rule, you will not be able to move up to Level 5 unless you also create a leadership culture. Jim Blanchard did this at Synovus. In an interview with George Barna, Blanchard said, “I think the most important and difficult thing is to create a culture in the organization where leadership is really important. It’s important for people in the company to realize that this is a growth-oriented company, and the biggest thing we have to grow here is you, because it’s you who will make this company better by your own growth…. So I would think making a culture aware of the significance of developing leaders is valuable.” Blanchard went on to ask some critical questions that help leaders examine whether they are indeed working to create a leadership culture and putting the right emphasis on developing leaders. He asked,