Despite the hundreds of books, programs and websites devoted to leadership, the truth is that leaders can't be trained.  Leaders need to be developed.  Hopefully this doesn't seem like a simple matter of semantics, because it isn't.

Let me illustrate this distinction.  Leadership is more about WHO you are than about what you do or what you know.  Two executives can do and say the same things but get very different results - even when they do and say those things to the very same person!  Although what you say and what you do are important, effective leadership is even more dependent on HOW you do or say those things.  This explains why the actions of those two executives can elicit such different responses.

You can train people about what to say.  You can train people about what to do.  You can even show someone how to do and say those things.  But getting them to change how they go about doing things and getting them to change how they go about saying things is a whole other story.

Leadership is about who we are, and it's this "how" of doing, saying, and being that defines who we are.  I think a good deal of "who we are" is captured within the competencies of Emotional Intelligence, developed and made popular by Daniel Goleman.  There are 12 EI competencies, with five of them being the one's that ultimately affect our effectiveness as leader.  These five competencies are:

1) Coaching and Mentoring - The ability to develop others

2) Inspirational Leadership - The ability to develop a compelling vision and to lead with it

3) Influence - The ability to utilize persuasion

4) Conflict Management - The ability to resolve disagreements

5) Teamwork and Collaboration - The ability to build and guide teams

Let's briefly examine each one of these competencies with respect to training vs. development as it pertains to leadership.

Coaching and Mentoring

As a professional coach, I know many professionally trained coaches.  They've gone through a curriculum of coach training from an accredited coaching school.  And yet, although they have the necessary skills and knowledge to be a good coach, a number of them are really rather poor at coaching.  Conversely, I've come across associates who are reasonably good at coaching, yet have never had any formal coach training.

How is this possible?  How is it that someone with great coaching skills is mediocre at coaching?  And how is it that someone without any formal training is very effective at coaching?

The answer of course, is in HOW they apply their coaching knowledge and skills.  In order to be effective as a coach, one must, at the very least, be aware of one's own emotions, have control of one's emotions, be empathetic, and have good judgment.  The reality is that each of those traits must either be developed or be natural to a person.  They just aren't things that can be "trained".

Inspirational Leadership

Leaders need to be inspiring.  They need to instill pride, they need to hold and communicate a vision, and they need to inspire an organization and its people to aspire to excellence.

Here's the challenge…  People aren't simply inspired by the right words.  The right words spoken by the "wrong" person will have only a minimal effect.  In order for a leader to move others to action, he or she needs to be someone who others admire and respect.

How does someone garner the respect of others?  It's obviously through our words and actions, but once again, "how" we say what we say and do what we do determine the impact those words and actions will have.  "Who we are" is something that can be shifted and developed, but it cannot be "trained".

Influence

Effective leaders are influential.  We influence people by our words and actions, but of course, it comes back to how we're viewed by others and how we do and say the things we do.  Honing and improving those abilities comes down to development and not training.

Conflict Management

Conflict and challenges are inevitable in business, and a good leader has the ability to diffuse and resolve situations as they arise.  In order to be effective in this effort, a leader needs to have the respect and trust of those involved.  How we conduct ourselves during these times is important, but even more critical is how we've conducted ourselves in the past.  Establishing "who we are" takes time and is not something that can be trained - only nurtured and refined.

Teamwork/Collaboration

In order for a leader to successfully foster an atmosphere of collaboration, he or she must be good at the previous competencies - coaching, inspiring, influencing, and resolving.  Clearly this ability once more rests on things best developed and not trained.

Now that we've made a case for leadership development and one against "leadership training", we need to address how this development occurs.  Here's what has to happen:

1. An objective assessment of one's competencies needs to take place.  Since "how" we do and say things is habitual, we're generally blind to our shortcomings.

2. No one needs to be excellent in every competency in order to be an effective leader.  Based on the objective assessment of our leadership skills, we need to focus on one or two areas to target for improvement.

3. Enlist the help of one or two trusted associates to help point out (in a loving fashion, of course!) when we fall back into old patterns.

By being mindful of your words and actions, and being persistent in your efforts to improve, you'll find that over time - there is no "quick fix" for what we're achieving - your effectiveness and impact as a leader will increase.  Not only should we strive to develop ourselves as leaders, but need to work to develop those around us.  Ultimately, a great leader is someone who develops other leaders.

 About the author:

Michael Beck is a Business Strategist and Executive Coach.  For more articles on leadership, personal effectiveness and personal productivity, please visit www.michaeljbeck.com. 

Mastering the Art of Asking Questions is essential if you want to succeed.  It's not simply a matter of getting in the habit of utilizing questions in your interactions with people.  It's really about learning how to ask the right questions at the right time.

Whether you're having sales conversations, coaching conversations, or working to develop others, learning how to ask good questions can be the difference between success and failure.  What does asking the right questions at the right time mean?  It means asking questions in such a way as to better understand the other person, their needs, and their motivations.

Since the questions asked and the flow of an effective conversation varies from person to person and from situation to situation, the best way to illustrate the Art of Asking Questions is by way of example.

Here is a sample sales conversation, conducted by someone not skilled at the Art of Asking Questions:

Hi Bob, I'm calling about the great widgets my company sells.  Do you have a few minutes to speak?

            "Sure."

Great!  Are you familiar with our brand?

            "No, not really."

We offer widgets that solve a number of problems and have some great features.  The new V210 - our mid-grade model - consumes 20% less energy than our competition and is 10% smaller.  It comes in three different colors - red, black and white.  Can I schedule a time with you to come by and show it to you?

            "What's the price?"

It normally sells for $199, but I can offer it to you at a 25% discount - only $149.

            "Do you have something you can send me?"

Sure... what address should I send it to?

            "123 Main St."

Great!  I'll give you a follow-up call in about a week.  OK?

            "Yes, that would be fine."

If you've been in sales, you already know the outcome of that conversation.  The likelihood of closing a sale is slim and the salesperson will no doubt continue to try to reach the prospect again until they get discouraged and give up.

The next example is the same conversation conducted by someone who is better skilled at the Art of Asking Questions, but is not quite there yet:

Hi Bob, my company helps companies like yours solve their widget problems.  Do you have a few minutes to talk?

            "Sure."

Do you currently use widgets in your business?

            "Yes, we do."

Have you been pleased with the ones you have?

            "Well, for the most part we are, but nothing's perfect."

The newer design of widgets have a number of improvements over older models.  Would you like to hear more about some of the improvements?

            "Sure."

Well, feature 1... , feature 2..., feature 3...  We have a number of different models available.  Do you have a budget in mind?

            "Well, we haven't been actively looking up until now.  Can you send me some information?"

I'd rather come by and show you first-hand so you can really see what I'm talking about.  Which would be better for you, Tuesday morning or Wednesday afternoon?

            "How about Tuesday morning."

Great!  I'll see you Tuesday morning then!

While it is possible that this salesperson may make a sale, it's far from a sure thing.  Even though the prospect set the appointment, the salesperson really doesn't know anything about the prospect or the prospect's motivations.

The conversation would unfold very differently if the salesperson was skilled in the Art of Asking Questions:

Hi Bob, my name is Paul and I help companies like yours solve any widget problems they have.  Do you have a few minutes to talk?

            "Sure."

Do you currently use widgets in your business?

            "Yes, we do."

How often do you use your widgets?

            "Pretty much every day."

To what extent?  How much?

            "About 3-4 hours every day."

It sounds like you rely on them pretty heavily.

            "Yes, absolutely."

What aspects of your widgets work best for you?

"Well, for one thing they've been really reliable.  We've had them for over 4 years.  Also, we need the automated feed feature and that's been a life-saver.  And the supplies are easy to find and affordable."

Sounds like they've served you well.  Have you had any problems with them?

            "Well, the only problem we've had is that they sometimes misfeed."

When you say they sometimes misfeed, specifically how often does that happen?

            "Only once or twice a day."

Are there any features or functions you wish they had?

            "It would be nice if they had a bigger bin so we didn't haveto re-stock them so often."

Anything else?  Would it help if they could automatically stack the finished product?

            "Can they do that?"

Ours can.  I think it would make sense for us to get together.  I can show you a widget I have that has a 99% reliability record, high-speed automatic feeding without jamming, a large bin, and automated stacking.  Do you have about 25 minutes on Tuesday morning or would something like Wednesday afternoon work better for you?

            "Let's do next Tuesday morning."

As you can see, the last sales conversation unfolded very differently than the prior two.  In the last conversation, the salesperson asked good questions - questions which uncovered what mattered to the other person, along with some motivations for making a change.  (We didn't have time in this article to uncover all the motivations.)

Having a conversation like this helps the prospect to clarify what features he needed and highlighted problems and desires.  Both parties knew exactly why they were getting together and the likelihood of closing a sale was extremely high.

When you master the Art of Asking Questions, you learn to ask questions which uncover motivations and you'll do a better job of selling, coaching, and developing others.

 About the author:

Michael Beck is a Business Strategist and Executive Coach.  For more articles on leadership, personal effectiveness and personal productivity, please visit www.michaeljbeck.com.  

*image courtesy of photostock/freedigitalphotos.net

Eliciting excellence in others is the essence of leadership, and one of the most effective means of eliciting excellence is to instill a sense of pride in those around us.

Instilling pride has a myriad of benefits - quality of work and workmanship improves, creativity and innovation increases, collaboration is facilitated more easily, and people are willing to "go the extra mile" to do their best. A team or department instilled with a sense of pride will excel simply to prove to others that things can be accomplished that are otherwise thought impossible.

Let me illustrate the power of professional pride with two remarkable leadership stories. The first story has to do with the achievement of casting the V-8 automobile engine as a single block. Everyone acknowledged that it couldn't be done. But Henry Ford was determined, had assembled a great team of engineers, and had instilled a sense of pride in his team. They worked for six full months with no success. Then they continued to work for another six months with no success. But Ford's determination and his team's sense of pride prevailed. Over the next months they devised a means of casting a V-8 engine as one block, an innovation that revolutionized the auto industry.

The second leadership story was reported in the magazine Fast Company in August, 2003. Mortgage lender Fannie Mae asked more than 550 employees to bring down, move, and start up more than 300 business applications. They had to unplug, wrap, and box 577 computer servers, lay more than 1.8 million feet of copper cable and 35 miles of fiber. Department employees were asked to do their "day jobs" all week and then throw themselves into this new task over 13 consecutive weekends, pulling all-nighters on Friday evenings -- without even the promise of extra pay.

They did it flawlessly, without a single interruption to the company's business. The leader of the initiative inspired them, fed them, and instilled a great sense of pride in them. She served about 1,600 pounds of chicken wings to her crews for midnight snacking, Friday-night themed dinners, ranging from New England clambakes to down-home southern cooking, and full-blown Saturday morning breakfasts with pancakes, eggs, bacon, and sausage.

The leader who spearheaded this task is one of those relatively rare inspirational leaders who is able to get people to do extraordinary things. She is a pride builder: a leader who instills self-esteem in workers and builds unflagging support for remarkably tough assignments through her leadership. Drawing the very best out of people is accomplished by making the emotional bond every bit as important as the monetary one.

So just how do we go about instilling pride in people? As always, I suggest using our own experiences as our best example. In thinking back over the things you've done in your life, what kinds of accomplishments caused you to feel proud?

Here is a sampling of the kinds of situations and accomplishments that may have caused you to feel proud:

* Being part of a winning team
* Accomplishing the unlikely
* Being better than the competition
* Doing something successfully for the first time
* Accomplishing something difficult

Having reflected on the kinds of situations and achievements that create a sense of pride in people, let's examine how our leadership can be used to create those opportunities within our organization. The two most impactful means lie with establishing an appropriate culture and effectively developing people.

Creating a strong, positive organizational culture will attract and retain the right people - people who will be loyal, who will take pride in their work, and who will put forth their best. This culture may be one of success, of excellence, of innovation, of service, or of achievement.

How does one go about establishing a culture? It starts with deciding which values you want the organization to be known for. Don't think of this so much as some written "Mission Statement", but rather a pervasive atmosphere that takes hold. It will define the organization. When someone is considered for employment, they "get" what the culture is. When decisions are made, the culture is used as a yardstick. When promotions are run, when work is evaluated, and when marketing collateral is created, they each reflect the culture. This culture will permeate the organization, and people will either identify with it or will move on to other opportunities. The consequence of identifying with this culture - this "thing" that sets them apart from everyone else - will instill a sense of pride and a sort of esprit de corps.

The result, of course, is that an organization filled with people proud of the work they do and the company they work for will put forth their best.

The other means of instilling pride and thereby eliciting excellence lies in how we go about developing people. By constructively helping people stretch beyond their current abilities, knowledge, and/or level of self-confidence, we help them become more valuable to the organization and to themselves. We create the opportunity to allow them to learn new skills they never had, to achieve things they never felt they could, and to feel a renewed sense of accomplishment. Not only does properly developing people achieve all that, but by our very belief and trust in them, it causes them to become more loyal, more responsive, and more willing to accept additional challenges. In short, our efforts cause a sense of pride to blossom in the individual, which in turn, translates into excellence of effort.

In conclusion, creating a sense of pride within the people in your organization and within the organization itself will ultimately elicit excellence. The ways in which this gets accomplished are through establishing a culture of excellence and through taking advantage of every opportunity to develop people. Incorporating these two strategies into your leadership style will yield excellent results and establish you as an effective leader.

 About the author:

Michael Beck is a Business Strategist and Executive Coach.  For more articles on leadership, personal effectiveness and personal productivity, please visit www.michaeljbeck.com.  

There is tremendous opportunity and satisfaction as a leader in developing others.  By effectively developing the people around us, we elicit excellence in a number of impactful and far-reaching ways.  Developing others is an important function of effective leadership.

The first benefit, obviously, is to the person being developed.  When we help someone expand their skill set and knowledge base, we make them more valuable and more versatile, which in turn, instills a sense of pride.  Instilling pride in work and workmanship is a cornerstone of the foundation for eliciting excellence.  In addition, we demonstrate our belief in them, their abilities, and their potential.  This in turn nurtures loyalty and responsiveness towards you.

The next way that developing people elicits excellence is the impact on our team.  When individual members of a team grow their abilities and stretch themselves, they in turn inspire others to do the same.  Even though you may not have personally worked with each member of your team (although hopefully you will at some point), the people you developed act as examples of what is possible, which if you have the right people on your team, will act to motivate others to take the initiative to improve themselves for the betterment of their future and the benefit of the organization.

The third manner in which developing others brings forth excellence lies within us.  By mastering the art of developing people, we become more skilled in our communication abilities, more effective in our leadership, and more leveraged in our efforts.  All of these benefits act to make us more productive, more creative and more confident, thereby eliciting excellence.

Given the impact and far-reaching implications of developing others, it is critical to master this important function.  At the heart of this effort lies the leadership style of "coaching".  Adopting a "coach-like" attitude and manner is the fastest and most effective means of developing others.

What does a coaching style of leadership look like?  Being "coach-like" embodies a number of competencies and strategies, all of which interlock and work in conjunction with one another.  The first concept to acknowledge is the power of asking rather than telling.  Many of us, in an effort to help someone "get it right" (and in the name of expediency), tell others what to do and how to do it.  And while this does get the work done, it does little to develop the other person, their skill set, and their confidence.

The alternative, "coach-like" approach, is to ask.  Instead of starting off by telling them what to do, ask them what they would do and how they would do it.  This strategy serves a number of very important functions.  Firstly, it demonstrates that you have an interest in what they have to say.  When you listen to what someone is telling you, it acts as a sign of respect.  It demonstrates that you value what they have to say.  The next benefit of asking is that their answers will give you a sense of how they think.  The answers will reveal their level of insight and judgment, and will illustrate their problem-solving abilities.  And lastly, listening to the answers to your questions will provide clues as to how best to help them develop.  It helps you understand which aspects of development they need help and guidance with.

When you choose to develop people this way, it creates the opportunity to mentor them, rather than to simply "train" them.  Training is good for technical matters and knowledge acquisition, but if you also want to develop someone's judgment, you need to share your insights, improve their thought processes, help them understand better ways to approach problem-solving, and basically give them the benefit of your experience.

In addition to adopting a coach-like approach with people, practicing effective delegation is essential.  Effective delegation consists of choosing the right tasks to delegate, choosing the right people to delegate to, delegating in such a way that the person grows from the experience, and making sure the work gets done accurately and in a timely manner.

In a nutshell, here is what all of that means...

"Choosing the right task to delegate" - Generally, any task which doesn't require judgment is a good task to delegate.  Also, if one of your goals is to develop a person's judgment, then choose a non-crucial task requiring some judgment.

"Choosing the right people" - The right person to delegate to is dependent upon their present skill set, their level of self-confidence, their openness to growth, and their level of ambition.  Clearly, choosing the right people is an art rather than a science.

"Helping the person grow from the experience" - The success of this is contingent upon using a coach-like approach when delegating.  Once you've clearly explained what needs to get done, ask questions to not only ascertain whether they understand what's required, but also to see their thinking process as it pertains to the task at hand.

"Ensuring an accurate and timely completion" - It is essential to let someone know when a task is to be completed and to hold them accountable for its completion.  The more important the task, the more critical it becomes to provide ongoing feedback with course corrections.  This, of course,  will ensure that the work is completed in a timely and accurate fashion, but also demonstrates your integrity by following through on the things you said were important to you.

By effectively developing others, you elevate everyone.  As people grow and stretch, their value and their sense of pride expand, which in turn, elicits excellence from them and the entire organization.

About the author:

 Michael Beck is a Business Strategist and Executive Coach.  For more articles on leadership, personal effectiveness and personal productivity, please visit www.michaeljbeck.com.