Succeeding in an upended world requires stepping up in extraordinary ways.
by Vince Molinaro for Industry Week
photo: © Fizkes | Dreamstime.com
As organizations continue to pivot in the face of the global pandemic, a few new realities are becoming increasingly apparent.
The first is that how we work will continue to be virtual and most likely give way to further workplace transformations.
The second is that employees everywhere have been rethinking what they want from their work, their leaders and their organizations. This will create both opportunities and risks for companies in the future.
Finally, to succeed in a world that has been upended will require leadership, but not just any kind—we will need truly accountable leaders at every level.
We need our leaders to continue to step up in extraordinary ways to help drive strategy execution, inspire employees and manage the uncertainty and ambiguity that organizations face.
But at a time when we need stronger-than-ever leaders, many are not. Research that I share in my new book, Accountable Leaders, reveals that 51% of leaders are mediocre and unaccountable. This was based on a global survey of close to 3,000 senior leaders across a number of sectors. They were asked to rate their organizations on a number of variables related to leadership accountability.
As a leadership advisor, I have found that accountability is what ultimately differentiates great leaders from mediocre ones. Furthermore, five behaviors set truly accountable leaders apart from the rest.
1. Hold others accountable for high standards of performance.
Accountable leaders make expectations clear by consistently reinforcing what is essential, and what employees should prioritize in their roles. Unfortunately, far too many leaders go about their work on autopilot, going from meeting to meeting, deadline to deadline, without any thought about setting high standards. Maybe they are overloaded or even burnt out and have lost passion for their work. Whatever the reason, when a leader fails to set and live up to high standards, everyone suffers.
