4 Leadership Principles to Grow Your Influence
Effective leadership creates a positive impact on teams and on a company’s bottom line. Impactful leaders motivate, inspire, and guide their teams while challenging them to take ownership of their own success.
While there are various leadership styles, most impactful leaders share the same core principles to model and create success.
Lead by Example
Leading by example means setting a standard of excellence through your behavior for others to follow. Your actions, especially during difficult and challenging times, are often far more impactful than the words you speak. Your employees watch what you do, how you act, and how you react.
By demonstrating the excellence you want to see in your employees, you’ll create an environment where people are inspired to do their best work. When you lead by example, you garner respect, trust, and inspire confidence in others. When people see how you show up, they will be motivated to deliver their best work too.
“When you lead by example and set that bar and expectations for yourself, others see that and rise with you.”
Communicate Vision and Purpose
Effective leadership requires clarity of purpose. Impactful leaders understand that clear communication is essential for team success. As a leader, it is crucial to articulate why your team exists and what its objectives are. This gives your team a sense of direction and focus.
If you want your team to achieve their goals and business objectives, you need to make sure they understand them. When people understand the meaning and purpose behind their work, they are more motivated to take action and solve problems.
Leaders who have the capacity to clearly articulate the vision and purpose of their team or organization are often rewarded with high performance and results. A leader's ability to communicate a compelling vision that can engage and energize their teams is essential.
“Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.”
Embrace Innovation, Curiosity, and Failure
Creating a space for new ideas and allowing experimentation to test those ideas can quickly propel a company forward. It’s crucial to create an open forum where employees can share their thoughts and experiences, while still maintaining a safe environment that fosters creativity and encourages risk-taking. It's essential to be flexible when trying out something new in order to discover possibilities that lead the company forward.
Impactful leadership also means not shying away from failure, but instead using it as an opportunity to learn and grow. It means not becoming discouraged when things don't work out the way we want them too; but rather looking at our mistakes with introspection and finding ways to improve. It also requires us to take risks in order to push the boundaries of innovation and creativity.
Leveraging failures as learning opportunities can help you identify what worked well, what could have been done better, and how they can apply that knowledge moving forward.
Impactful leadership creates an atmosphere of support and advocacy, welcoming diverse thoughts. By nurturing different perspectives, new ideas can emerge from all areas of the organization, leading to innovative solutions that would otherwise remain undiscovered.
“There’s no innovation and creativity without failure. Period.”
Continue Learning and Growing
Impactful leadership is done with intention. True changemakers know that effective leadership is a skill that should be refined and perfected. Cultivating impactful leadership behaviors requires practice and incorporating feedback.
Leaders who are committed to self-development understand the importance of knowledge and growth. They continually work to increase their understanding, hone their skills, and broaden their perspectives.
Leaders often turn to reading books and articles, listening to podcasts, attending networking events and workshops, and working with a mentor or leadership coach to continue developing their expertise.
“Commit yourself to lifelong learning. The most valuable asset you’ll ever have is your mind and what you put into it.”
Every leader wants to succeed, but it often feels like we have to figure out how on our own. But it doesn’t have to be this way. These four principles show how leaders can continually improve and grow their ability to motivate and inspire others.
