As we close out June 2008, I think it’s important to take a look back at what was happening with leadership as we ended 2007. After all, the saying goes, you can’t know where you’re going unless you know where you’ve been.
In the financial services industry, in 2007, what we saw was that there was such a dearth of leaders.
So, what happened in 2007 with leadership was we were finding we had less and less people saying, Yeah, I want to be a sales manager, which means that I am getting groomed to the next and highest levels of leadership. Again, how do we make it more appealing for people to become a leader in the financial services industry?
The other thing is, when you are leading in the financial services industry you’ve got to remember that you’re dealing with basically a volunteer work force. So, it is much different leadership style. You have to be a leader that people want to follow and you have to be a leader that people believe so they can say, “If I am in that environment, if I am the space of that leader then I will be able to evolve to my best. That I will be able to bring my A game by virtue of being in the presence of this leader who brings out my best, who has an extraordinary way of seeing my gift and inviting me ‘out to play’ on a regular basis.”
As far as universally outside the financial services industry – and I will say that this applies within the financial services industry as well – it is about accountability. Leadership is about not only the leader being accountable, but how does the leader create an environment were people hold themselves accountable.
The truth of the matter about leadership is that we are all leaders. It just comes down to how many of us will own up to that and take responsibility for how we are leading our lives, how are we leading ourselves during the work day and were we actually going.
It is so easy to look at leaders and say, Hey, you didn’t do everything right, therefore I am not doing my best or we are not succeeding, but I think that personal accountability, especially in a commission only environment, is the only way if you are going to be successful.
We see accountability missing everywhere. It is just not in peoples personal life which you can see everyday on a reality TV show, but it’s in business and social situations.
The more a leader can figure out ways to hold themselves accountable and evoke accountability from people on their teams, it will spur on exceptional performance.
