The Leadership Challenge summary

Have you ever known people who constantly change their opinion depending on who’s around? Chances are you don’t feel comfortable placing a whole lot of trust in them.

As a leader, it’s critical to be clear about your opinions. Doing so inspires trust and increases good work performance in teams.

If your boss always comes to the office in shorts and a T-shirt but demands you wear a suit, you might be reluctant to follow his orders. Conversely, you’d probably feel out of place wearing a T-shirt and shorts when your boss dresses formally to make a better impression on clients.

If you’re gonna talk the talk, you gotta walk the walk. That means leaders need to make sure that they themselves act according to their team’s values.

It’s always easier to work toward a future goal if you can picture it clearly. So if you want to lead successfully, you have to be able to think ahead about future possibilities.

Albert Einstein himself said that intelligence is less important than having a vivid imagination.

Leaders need to motivate and inspire their team with common ideals that everyone will support, like the pursuit of happiness, freedom, world peace or even just more confidence and self-respect.

Certain ideals make us feel like we’re doing something meaningful. When we recognize that our actions matter, we feel proud of our work. Good leaders inspire these ideals and pride in their team members.

While it’s only natural to want to stay within our comfort zone, sometimes we have to venture out into the unknown if we want to be a successful leader.

All the best leaders step forward to seize new opportunities and challenges. Frequently, things lag just because nobody thinks about the possibility of change. Someone needs to take the initiative to bring about positive change.

Part of being a good leader is taking chances and keeping your team behind you when you take them.

But you can spend a long time taking big risks in pursuit of big achievements before you get concrete results, so it’s important for leaders to emphasize small wins. When tasks feel achievable, we feel more certain and motivated when completing them.

Sure, we all know that Rome wasn’t built in a day. But it wasn’t built by one person, either. So teams and leaders need to work together in order to achieve great things. And one essential factor for good teamwork is trust between team members and their leaders.

Research on trust and organizational performance agrees: in organizations where employees trust their leaders and organizations, profitability and performance are higher and people are more innovative.

Imagine you had a colleague or boss who was always taking credit for your good work. You’d probably feel less motivated to continue striving for good results because it’d make you feel weak and insignificant.

Leaders should instill in their team members a sense of ownership of their own work.

As we have seen, giving staff the freedom to make their own choices is very important. But, as a leader, you should also make it your duty to acknowledge when your team members have done a good job.

Leaders can bring out the best in their team members and will motivate them more by communicating that they expect everyone to perform exceptionally. They should explain what their idea of an exceptional performance is and openly praise very good work, while staying positive and giving employees everything they need to complete their tasks.

People love celebrating. So why shouldn’t leaders take advantage of that in the workplace? Company celebrations unite people around goals and values, and create a sense of community that leaders can foster.

Communities are important for us humans. Extensive research shows that when people have many active social connections, they’re happier and wealthier, more trusting, and share more information.