Participative Leadership

Participative leadership is unique because it solicits the input of team members as part of the decision making process.  Participative leaders actively seek out their team’s ideas and perspectives on issues ranging from improving processes to addressing front-line problems.

In order to be effective, participative leaders must be focused on others, great listeners, flexible, empathetic, and real.  They also need an inclusive mindset and a willingness to share their influence.  

Participative leadership is a tangible way for leaders to support their team members.  It shows team members that they have a stake in the team and the organization.  By creating an environment of respect and trust, participative leadership can give team members the confidence to risk sharing their ideas.  

Not surprisingly, research has shown that participative leadership tends to increase a team member’s engagement, performance, job satisfaction, and even their tenure at a company.  Under participative leadership, team members tend to be more helpful, open to change, and innovative.  

However, participative leadership is not ideal in every situation.  Some critical, urgent situations require leaders to step up and act before they have time to get everyone’s opinion.  (In cases like these, a leader can still get everyone’s input during a debrief after the situation).  Participative leadership also doesn’t work where “all the tasks are urgent” because there simply isn’t time to get everyone’s input on every task.

In participative leadership, there is always the likelihood of increased conflict when multiple people are giving their opinions.  Although not all conflict is bad, poorly managed conflict can spiral into bickering and personal disputes, creating divisions within the team.

Even though it doesn’t work in every circumstance, a participative leadership style works well in organizations that value team member growth and development.  It is an especially valuable tool for work that requires a variety of skill sets and knowledge.

Chew on This:

What is one decision you need to make that could benefit from the input of other people on your team?

Authentic Leadership

In the wake of the financial scandals and disasters of the early 2000’s, people were anxious and looking for trustworthy leaders.  This created a demand for an authentic leadership style.  Unsurprisingly, authentic leadership emphasizes trust, transparency, values, purposefulness, and responsiveness to team members' needs.  Genuine and principled, authentic leaders seek to develop and empower their employees.

Research has shown that authentic leadership has four important aspects.

1. Authentic leaders are self-aware.  They understand their strengths and weaknesses and the impact they have on others.

2. Authentic leaders do what is right and lead from their core values instead of being controlled by pressure from others.

3. Authentic leaders are fair and unbiased.  They can consider others’ opinions, even if they disagree.

4. Authentic leaders are appropriately transparent and real in their relationships.

Authentic leaders' genuineness can cultivate trust and create a positive work environment for their teams. As trust is built, team members often respond by increasing their engagement and contributions at work.  An authentic leader develops and empowers their team members, leading to higher engagement, job satisfaction, and commitment to their company.    

While authentic leadership can be used in many leadership situations, it will not be helpful if a leader is unscrupulous.  For example, some leaders believe that being authentic means that they are free to behave in hurtful or wrong ways, as long as they are being true to themselves.  By contrast, good authentic leaders seek to be real and genuine in a way that builds up their team and organization.  

Consider these principles that you can use to grow in authentic leadership:

1. Make a practice of evaluating your strengths, weaknesses, and values. 

2. Make sure you are clear about your own values and always follow company ethics.

3. Look at where your behavior aligns with or differs from your ideals, and think about how you can act in ways that are true to your values.

4. Think about past life experiences that shaped you and how you can apply the lessons you learned. 

Chew On This:

Where do your actions most line up with your values?  Where do you struggle to act in line with your values?

Shared Leadership

Shared leadership is an interactive, dynamic leadership method in which more than one team member shares leadership responsibilities.  Team members step up to lead in different areas at different times, depending on their capacity and expertise.

For example, if Julian has lots of experience gathering and analyzing data, he would probably lead his team when there is a project that is heavily data dependent.  On the other hand, Dasha has great marketing skills and would be the one to guide the team as they are developing a marketing campaign for a new product.       

For shared leadership to work, there must be high levels of humility and trust within the team.  Humble leaders will be able to learn from others effectively.  If they also have high emotional intelligence, they will be able to keep their self-regard intact while deferring to others’ leadership strengths.  Trust is foundational to cooperation and performance on any team, especially on teams with shared leadership.  When trust is present, there is an environment of mutual respect where team members can exchange ideas and perspectives, which helps generate innovative ideas.

Shared leadership has many benefits.  It can create a cooperative atmosphere and fosters positive relationships between team members by allowing everyone to have a significant impact in the area(s) where they are most effective.  Because no individual hogs the spotlight, teams using this leadership method tend to seek more feedback and generate more creative output.  Compared to teams without shared leadership, teams with shared leadership tend to have less conflict and more cohesion.

Although shared leadership has many benefits, there are also some downsides.  Implementing shared leadership requires time and resources and may also cause a temporary decline in a team’s productivity as members adjust to the new normal.  Sharing leadership also means that existing leaders must pass some of their influence and authority to others, which may be difficult for leaders who want to use a more authoritative leadership style.  Shared leadership also tends to exacerbate existing communication problems within the team.

Despite these drawbacks, there are several situations where shared leadership tends to work exceptionally well:

• Shared leadership tends to work well when used by generations who gravitate towards a collective leadership style, such as millennials.

• If several groups are competing for a leadership position, shared leadership can help reduce strife and make use of everyone’s talents. (Note: this is especially useful in family businesses with two or more viable candidates to succeed the founder).

• Shared leadership can be a great alternative for leadership positions that require more knowledge and capacity than one person will reasonably have.

Chew On This:

What projects can you see using shared leadership in?

Servant Leadership, Part 2

In our last blog post, we saw that servant leadership is an outward-focused leadership style and explained seven key aspects of servant leadership.  Today, we will look at some pros and cons of servant leadership.  First, let’s look at the benefits.

Servant leadership works best when employees understand the tasks being asked of them, feel comfortable making decisions, and are capable of moving things forward.

Servant leadership can help followers to be more engaged and in turn, more productive and creative at work. It’s been shown to reduce turnover by giving followers a voice with their leader.  Because servant leaders encourage and model serving, their followers are more likely to engage in acts of service, such as going the extra mile to help each other.

Servant leadership has some drawbacks, despite being an impactful and empowering leadership style.  

First, a servant leadership style does not work well in situations where tasks are unclear and nebulous or in critical situations where decisions must be made authoritatively and quickly.  Servant leaders give their team members significant empowerment to make decisions and determine how work gets done. However, if team members do not have enough information or confidence to take charge and move forward, then the results of servant leadership may be disappointing.

As a whole, servant leadership is a unique leadership style that is focused on growing and helping others.  Under the right circumstances, it can be incredibly beneficial to organizations and teams

Chew on This:

Where do you want to see yourself employing a servant leadership style?

Servant Leadership, Part 1

In 1970, a man named Robert Greenleaf coined a counterintuitive term: servant leadership.  While traditional leadership approaches focus on directing and motivating others for the benefit of the company, a servant leadership style emphasizes how a leader’s support can benefit their direct reports.  

The hallmark of a servant leader is their focus on others.  Servant leaders value their team members and work to ensure their needs are met.  They want to see their team members grow to reach their full potential, and their concern for others extends to their entire organization and community.

In practice, servant leadership can look very different from person to person.  However, research shows that there are 7 important aspects of servant leadership:

1. Servant leaders put their followers first. Servant leaders demonstrate that they care about their team member’s work needs via their words and actions, even if it means the leader must pause their own work to help.

2. Servant leaders empower their teams. These leaders encourage their team members to identify and solve problems proactively.  They give their team members the freedom to determine when and how tasks are completed.

3. Servant leaders develop and support their followers. They may do this by helping their team members identify and leverage their strengths, giving them opportunities to have an impact, and/or encouraging them to take risks so that they can grow.

4. Servant leaders help create emotional healing.  They are sensitive to other’s personal concerns.  They use empathy, active listening, and wisdom to help their team members heal from past negative experiences.

5. Servant leaders act ethically.  They are authentic, honest, and fair in everything they do.

6. Servant leaders create value for the community.  They seek to help others both inside and outside of their organization.  They give back to their community and encourage their team members to do the same.

7. Servant leaders have strong conceptual skills.  They are knowledgeable about their organization and understand what needs to be done.  Using this understanding, they can support their team.

If you’d like to learn more about servant leadership, check out part two of our blog series.

Chew On This:

Which of the seven characteristics stands out to you most? How would your team, organization and you benefit from that characteristic?

Transformational Leadership, Part 2

In our last post, we examined what transformational leadership is and how it works.  Today, we will look at the pros and cons of transformational leadership, plus some practical steps you can take to practice this leadership style.

There are many positives to transformational leadership.  Transformational leaders are excellent at getting everyone aligned and mobilized toward common goals.  They motivate others by casting a vision for their team and helping everyone see how they fit into that vision.  Research shows that transformational leadership promotes team performance and motivates team members to contribute to their team’s and/or organization’s success.

Transformational leadership can be highly effective, but it does have some drawbacks.  First, this style of leadership doesn’t work very well in teams where team members are highly individualistic or motivated by material rewards such as bonuses and vacation hours.  Second, if there is too much focus on the leader, it can cause transformational leadership to seem like a personality trait, where team members think the leader was just “born that way”.  In reality, transformational leadership is actually a skill that can be learned.

Overall, transformational leadership is a great leadership style for encouraging and motivating team members to be the best they can be. Here are some practical ways you can grow in transformational leadership:

1. If you haven’t already, take time to write down your top three values.  Think about how your values impact what you do each day. 

2. Take time to learn more about your team members and think about how you can help them fulfill their potential.

3. Involve your team members in problem solving by asking for their input.

Chew On This:

What would change if you started implementing a more transformational leadership style with your team?

Transformational Leadership, Part 1

Transformational leadership is a leadership style that is focused on inspiring others to accomplish great things.  Transformational leaders excel at helping their followers to reach their full potential.  They create a vision for the future, and then motivate their teams to accomplish it.

If you want to understand how transformational leadership works, it helps to compare it to the opposite leadership style, transactional leadership.

A leader with a transactional leadership style says, “If you do X, I’ll give you Y.”  (For example: “If you get these reports done by the weekend, I’ll give you a bonus.”) On the other hand, a transformational leader says, “If you do X, then we can accomplish Y.” (For example: “If you get these reports done by the weekend, we can wow our client with amazing customer service.”)

Great transformational leaders have high emotional intelligence (EQ) and use it to build trust and facilitate collaboration with their teams.  They have clear values and principles, are open to feedback, and can consider diverse perspectives.  Transformational leaders respect their team members by being mindful of each person’s feelings and needs, and they support each team member.  They aim to help their followers reach their full potential. In turn, team members who are collaborative and harmony-focused tend to thrive under transformational leadership.

Is transformational leadership right for your team?  In our next post, we will look at some of the pros and cons of transformational leadership.

Chew on This:

What can you do today to make your leadership less transactional and more transformational?

We're rebranding!

A big change is on the horizon: Ryan C Bailey & Associates is rebranding to LIROS Group! LIROS stands for Leadership, Interpersonal Relationships, and Organizational Systems. The name encapsulates our primary focal points when working with clients: health starts with leaders, thrives in high-performing teams, and creates a united organization where people love working and get a lot done.

We’re still the same coaches, and our vision is still to develop in-demand, high-performing teams. We’re now simply under a new name that we felt better captures the value we bring to our clients. We hope you love the new look as much as we do!

We apologize for the bit of construction you may see. Thank you for your patience as we complete this transition!

5 Gratitude Exercises For Your Team

Thanksgiving is less than a week away.  It has been a challenging time over the last year.  Lots of adjustments and anxieties - and there is still uncertainty over the future.  Yet in even the worst circumstances, there are always things we can be grateful for.  Here are some exercises you can do with your team that will draw you closer to one another and alter perspectives by being in a state of gratitude.

Exercise 1: Focus Only On The Areas Where You’ve Progressed

Go around the team and ask them to share an area where they’ve seen growth - whether individually, as a team, or even across the organization.  Encourage them to be as tangible as possible.  For bonus points, after each person shares, have them visually represent that growth on a whiteboard, flip chart, or poster board, and take a picture afterwards to capture everyone’s progress.

Exercise 2: Celebrate Those On The Team Who Helped Create Small Wins 

Big wins get shared easily across a team.  But often, we forget to share the small ones.  These base hits go a long way towards helping a team thrive.  Go around the room and have each team member share a small win and applaud those who contributed to the win.  

Exercise 3: Gratitude Roundabout

Have each team member share one specific and genuine way in which they were grateful for each person on the team.  The idea is to go for quality, not quantity.  Have the team load up each other’s inboxes with gratitude moments.

Exercise 4: What Good Could Come From...? 

If there was a hard circumstance that hit your team, then you can go around the room and ask: “What Good Could Come From [the Hard Circumstance]?”  It might be hard to think of even two.  So encourage the team to retell themselves a time when they were cracking up like crazy.  As each team member does this in their head, they often will start smiling, laughing, or feeling their moods lift.  Then after a minute or two, go back to the question and break it down into different parts of life. In other words, what good could come…

• Relationally?

• Emotionally?

• Rationally?

• Vocationally?

• Financially?

• Physically?

• For the team overall?

• Etc.

The idea is to generate a long list of the good that could come from even a bad circumstance until there is a sense of hope or encouragement.  Gratitude flows when we see how to turn a bad situation into one with potential for good

Exercise 5: Turn a Challenging Circumstance Into An Opportunity 

A modified version of Exercise 4 is to ask four questions of the challenging circumstance.  As we look back on the challenging circumstance, ask:

1. What can we learn from it?

2. What can we be thankful for looking back?

3. What strengths did we display then?

4. How are we better now because of it?

Chew On This:

• Which of the five exercises above do you think would best help your team get in that state of gratitude?

• What are good could come if your team is in a state of gratitude?

Ryan C. Bailey & Associates is an organizational effectiveness firm focused on equipping leaders to develop in-demand high-performing teams to increase the health and effectiveness of the greater organization.

*This blog is an amalgamation of a few different clients.  No client is being singled out.

Blog Bite: Attack the Problem, Not Each Other

When two people are about to start an argument, they have a choice.  They can either fight to be right, or they can fight to be one.

If they choose to fight to be right, they are going to focus on winning.  They will whip out facts to try to prove their case and be confused as to why the other sees the facts so differently.  They will try to impose their power on the other.  They won’t listen to understand, but instead listen to reply.  Frankly, as the argument intensifies, the lack of listening can get so bad that they actually don’t hear the other person at all and don’t answer what is being addressed.  Instead, at this point, two totally different arguments are happening.  The way one views the other speaking can seem really hurtful, dark, and condemning.  The typical result of this conflict is frustration, more distance, fear, and a huge wedge in the middle of the relationship. 

If they fight to be one, then they are going to attack the problem together by listening more, proving that they understand the other’s perspective, and focus more on their perceptions, rather than the facts.  They are not going to condemn, attack the person personally, or misuse power.  They are going to use higher emotional intelligence and leverage each other’s strengths to solve the problem.  The result is a strengthening of the relationship, confidence, growth, and everything in the middle of the relationship being cleared. 

Most arguments go south at the very beginning of the conflict.  It starts with the approach.  Do you want to be right, or do you want to be one?  Be clear in the beginning, and the conflict will go better - because if the other doesn’t join you in fighting to be one, you can always choose to not engage the argument until they do.

Chew On This:

• What type of relationship are we writing about in this blog?

Ryan C. Bailey & Associates is an organizational effectiveness firm focused on equipping leaders to develop in-demand high-performing teams to increase the health and effectiveness of the greater organization.

*This blog is an amalgamation of a few different clients.  No client is being singled out.