The defining characteristics that separate the best from the rest
With demand stagnating across most of the developed economies and faltering across many of the developing countries, identifying and steadfastly pursuing a path to prosperity is complex and demanding for the one at the helm, the company’s chief executive. Great companies are energised by their leaders. Great leaders motivate and inspire their people, driving them to achieve unparalleled levels of success. But not every leader is a great leader. With expert insight from our board of global advisors including Bernard Atalli, Ed Hanway, Manfred Maus, Gordon Peeling and Brand Pretorius, we review the defining leadership characteristics that serve to distinguish the best from the rest.
The leadership skillset
Good leaders do much more than manage those around them. More importantly, they inspire them to deliver the company’s overall mission.
Good leaders are...
architects: designing the organization and its infrastructure to meet the needs of the business strategy.
agenda setters: defining the company’s priorities in order to realise the goals of the strategy and business plan.
diplomats: willing and able to negotiate with customers, shareholders, and regulators. Leaders are comfortable in this external world, because they recognize the importance of achieving alignment between the strategy and plan, despite the sometimes competing agendas of outside stakeholders.
role models: inspiring the organisation by example and keeping communication transparent. Leaders are able to ‘show the way’ by articulating the vision of the future in a way that the people within the organisation can both see and understand their personal stake in the outcome.
excellent simplifiers: while the leader has to juggle complex internal and external factors, simplicity is critical to ensure that all parties move forward and make progress.
innovators and encourage their people to be creative: given that today’s business world is so competitive and ever-changing, leaders need to focus on new horizons, fresh approaches and mid-course corrections.
cognisant of the value and need for external support and coaching: leaders are almost always the product of considerable mentoring and coaching on their way up. In fact, most have eagerly sought out specialist expertise or executive coaches along the way.
capable of evaluating talent in their teams and welcome high potential newcomers: they appreciate their vision and plans all depend on the ability of their management team and the organization to execute, and are always on the lookout for new talent that will strengthen the team.
mindful of what excellence means for each function: they develop an understanding of what top performance entails in each function and hold managers responsible for superior performance. Since the success of the leader is dependent on the performance of the team, it is critical for the leader to always be mindful of this.
Successful undertakings demand from the leadership a clear definition of the vision, the passion to drive forward in pursuit of this vision and, perhaps most importantly, the commitment and discipline to ensure the successful execution of this vision.
