10 Ways To Unleash The Power Of Leadership For Entrepreneurs

Being a successful entrepreneur doesn’t guarantee you’ll also be a great manager and inspiring leader.

Here are 10 easy-to-follow tips that can transform your chances of success in business...

Your mindset towards your team is critical. Just because you pay them doesn’t mean they should be grateful to you. Show respect and be interested in them.

Always think of them as talented volunteers rather than employees.

?Thank them, respect them and put them first.

Of course, your team will always appreciate thoughtful staff benefits: Free Lunch Thursdays, an early finish on a Friday, a birthday cake on their special day…but these are secondary in importance to you noticing their efforts and emphasising the difference that their contribution makes.

Steven Jackson , a recruitment agency co-founder, says:

"I completely agree - viewing team members as talented volunteers fosters mutual respect and appreciation, and something that I think we do very well in our business. It builds respect both ways and sparks innovation."

Are you clear and unambiguous about your aims and the company’s objectives?

Be vocal, be consistent and challenge the team around you to strive to achieve those aims every day. Many would-be leaders believe it’s enough to tell their teams once, at the start, about the importance of the company’s goals and expect them to remember.

They won’t. So it’s your job to keep it front of mind for everyone, by using every opportunity to tell them how they are individually and collectively contributing to the progress the enterprise is making. And also leading from the front by showing them, through your actions, how you contribute too.

Conor McNicholas , the leading creative and strategic consultant, comments: “I’d say this is the most valuable piece of strategy advice for any leader. You simply cannot expect those on the team around you to perform successfully if you haven’t first made it absolutely clear what success looks like.”

Think about the environment you create in your business: are new ideas greeted with scepticism, or are they embraced, acknowledged and built upon with enthusiasm?

You don’t need to have all the answers. (Or all the ideas).

In fact it’s often better for the business if you only have the questions.

Develop the habit of asking open questions (those that begin “who”, “what”, “why”) and think about how you can frame questions that elicit new and unconventional responses.

Ask your team what they think. Encourage them to come up with ideas and suggestions for improving the business. Nurture their creativity. Reward them for innovation.

Multiple brains are always better than one.

Showroom Manager Julie James adds: “A great team helps built on your initial ideas and by allowing them an input can truly transform a good idea to a fantastic one.”

How accountable are you to your team?

Reporting goes both ways if you are to foster the mutual respect that drives high performance ventures.

Be as accountable to your team, as they are to you.

Tell your team what you are doing today and this week and what you expect of them today and this week.

And those times when you don’t do what you said you would (happens to everyone, right?) don’t try and hide away from it, or ignore it, or worst of all pretend you never committed to it. Own up, pledge to do better, and your people will respect you more.

Your example will create a culture of grown-up accountability and you’ll spend less time managing individual underperformance and more time maximising your team’s efforts.

Do your people know what you really want? Sometimes even the best leaders struggle to make their directions ring with clarity.

Delegate often and clearly. Follow up a verbal instruction with a written one.

When giving instructions, make them:

-???Timed (what do you want to do and by what deadline)

-???Grounded (what is the context? why do you want the task done? What will it do to further the short and long term aims of the business? How will it tie in to what other people on the team are doing?)

-???Textured (explain how you want something done. Ideally show them. Allow them to propose different ways, try both.)

-???Clarified (make sure that they understand the instruction by getting them to repeat it back to you. Correct the bits they get wrong and praise them for what they do right)

Investing time in giving direction always pays back in the speed and quality of the results.

Often how you do something is as important as what you do.

There are incredible digital tools out there to schedule, transcribe, analyse and keep track of projects and people. AI technology will doubtless result in an absolute explosion of new tracking solutions too.

But I have an old school suggestion for you. It’s a counterintuitive proposal in a digital world. It makes tasks tangible, physical and, in many ways, more satisfying when achieved.

Keep daily lists in a physical notebook. Cross them off as you go.

Be ruthless about prioritising the activities that are a/ high value to your business and b/ can only be performed by you.

Anything that doesn’t match both of those criteria should be delegated immediately to someone else.

Be honest with yourself about what’s really important rather than doing the things which you personally prefer doing.

TJ Edwards, an entrepreneur, says: “I've used both Eisenhower planning and a page per day diary for several years now. Both invaluable tools for planning.”

If you don’t set the tone inside your business, who will?

Every day, deliberately calibrate your mood to its optimum level – regardless of the day you’re really having.

Radiate positivity, even on days you don’t feel optimistic.

Of course, your team, your customers and your suppliers want you to be authentic and I’m not suggesting you pretend to be someone you aren’t.

But we all face a decision every day to be the best version of ourselves that we can be. And that means setting a level of energy and enthusiasm to be matched by your team.

It’s amazing how unconsciously powerful you can be as a founder in setting the norms. Years ago, running a start-up, I started to notice how much people were swearing in the office. Then it dawned on me I was hardly setting the best example with my colourful use of language. So I consciously stopped. And within a week so did everybody else, I suspect without even realising.

Bad language in a business is infectious, but so is enthusiasm, laughter and good energy. It’s all there for you to harness.

Colin Campbell , a Project Management expert says: “Over the years I have tried to start every working day with positivity, and started the habit of saying ‘Good morning all you lucky people!’ when entering the office in the morning. That greeting has been met with many responses, thankfully most of them good-natured! It invariably sets a positive tone for the day though ??”

I like Colin's take.

Leadership isn’t just about being a cheerleader. Often your most valuable interventions are those in which you take someone to task for underperformance.

When you give feedback, make it specific: Praise, Criticise, Praise.

Nobody likes to be criticised. And often leaders shy away from confronting poor performance because they don’t like to dish out criticism, or are averse to confrontation.

But you can build a culture within any organisation in which constructive criticism is given without stress and adopted without anxiety. There are two pillars to this:

1.??Give specific feedback to your people on their performance, every day. Frequency is key. They will quickly understand that you are invested in their success and their work, and that any criticism is a reflection of their importance to you and the organisation.

2.???Give feedback in this order: Praise, Criticise, Praise. Tell them why you liked the way they did something, ask them to improve in another area, and praise them again for something that they’ve done recently that was constructive.

Central to any feedback you give is that it’s about *output* not *input*. Criticising input can be taken personally – it can sound like you’re saying someone doesn’t work hard enough, or care enough – but output is a more objective measure and less open to debate.

Output is what someone has achieved (or not). Focus on that.

Are you confident enough to admit you got it wrong?

We all make mistakes, we are all human. Don’t cover up your flaws and errors.

As an entrepreneur, you will definitely make mistakes. In fact if you don’t you’re probably not trying hard enough.

The important thing is your reaction to those mistakes. How you respond will send a signal to everyone in your team.

Saying “I got it wrong” is a sign of strength, not weakness. Confess and pledge to do better next time, let your team hold you to account.

Don’t mitigate with excuses, otherwise you’ll encourage the same behaviour in others. Mistakes are never terminal for a business, but covering them often can be.

Be frank with your team about your blind spots and encourage them to do the same. Candour will nurture an environment in which people will support each other and in which everyone can use their strengths to the collective advantage.

Mica Apuan , a copywriter & social media?expert, nails it: “Only leaders have the courage to admit their mistakes. The ones who don't are not leaders, they're bosses.”

Delaying action is almost always guaranteed to make a problem worse.

Always eat the frog first.

During World War II, Winston Churchill had a file of correspondence on his desk marked “Action Today”.

You should have one too. And on the top of your list should be the task that you dread most: the difficult supplier call, the tough conversation with a close colleague, the analysis of the cash crunch ahead of you…

Every entrepreneur, every leader, wakes up with a task they dread every day. Don’t put it off. Do it first and the rest of the day will be easier.

Be Churchill. Act Today. Have frogs for breakfast.

Sophie Morris ?International Learning & Development Manager says: "I've always followed and shared this advice! Really does make you more productive and improves your focus once you've got the dreaded task out of the way! (Which is often not as bad as you were expecting!)"

Thanks again for reading through. Leadership is about practice and the desire to see others do better, individually and collectively. What do you think? Let me know.