3 Drivers That Stimulate Exponential Leaders’ Love Of Leading People

Over the years through my practice I’ve come across and met several types of leaders. Most of them have been bold, charismatic and outright brilliant. However, there are very few that I’ve come across who actually, genuinely love leading people.

Early in your career you aspire to be a leader. The reality, however, is not many have the passion or the true love of leading people. Sure, there’s a desire to grow your business, to be successful and to be a creative force that the world recognizes and celebrates. Unfortunately, drowning under all that desire is the passion and love for leading people. Commonly, most leaders lead to be successful and not because they love leading people.

And so I ask these leaders, what’s missing as a driver that can fuel your passion and love for leading people? Most, would pause and think about it, yet not very many can pinpoint what’s missing. Here are 3 drivers that can stimulate their love for leading people.

1. Leadership from the Inside

Leaders who chase their dreams of being successful, of having illustrious careers in which they turned out the companies they represented and who love the status and fame that comes with leadership have little or no passion for people. They’re in it for themselves. Such leaders hardly are motivated to ‘serve’ the people that work with them. And they’ll always be commanding downwards to their ‘subordinates’, rather than working along with their ‘colleagues’.

A leader who really is passionate about leading people lets their leadership flow from within them. It’s about the enthusiastic approach they have to groom, coach and mentor people. For them, success is defined by the magnitude of what people working with them can achieve. It’s leadership that comes from the inside rather from all the external factors that would vaguely define their leadership brand – money, power and status.

2. Chasing a Purpose

Leaders who’ve asked themselves ‘why am I doing what I’m doing?’ have been able to identify many drivers for themselves. There could be multiple reasons why you do what you, why you’re in a leadership position and what you’re aiming to extract from your leadership. However, whatever your answers are, it all has to come down to a purpose. A purpose that’s bigger than your individual goal or mission. It could be focused on your company, community or an ideal, irrespective, however with a clearly defined purpose you’re aiming for something that’s much bigger than you alone. And a purpose that big can’t be achieved on your own. You need people to support you along the way.

Your purpose is what you align your talent to in order to motivate and drive their potential. It’s a mission, an ideology, a cause, a goal that’s only achievable through the sum of each individual’s collective contributions. Your purpose is what defines your leadership legacy. And leading people with a purpose is primarily what your leadership brand should spell out.

3. Leading with Passion

Let’s face it, without passion what good is it to go out there and do anything. Passion is what comes from the heart of a leader, not their head. It’s something you value, hold close to your chest, you protect (though you share it as well), and you nurture it for growth and wide adoption. What good’s a passion if you don’t love it or if you’re not willing to spread it across the people you lead and influence? Passion fuels creativity, innovation and stimulates exponential growth for companies. It’s what drives leaders to work harder, make personal and sometimes professional sacrifices, and achieve at any cost.

That same passion is what leaders need when leading people. It’s not just about having a huge number of people reporting to you. It’s about taking ownership of your responsibility, duty and serve to the people you lead. It’s about having the passion to grow and build capacity in your people. It’s about, simply put, leading people with passion – from the heart.

By revisiting your drivers of leadership and aligning it around your true passion of leading people you’ll be on track to build a leadership brand that’s much larger than you’d ever image. In fact, it’ll also help you achieve external goals such money, fame and status, though that’s not really why you became a leader. You’re here, as a leader, because you genuinely love and are passionate about leading people. It’s only about the people and everything else is just a bonus that you earn along the way.

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Paul Keijzer is the CEO and Founder of Engage Consulting and the co-Founder of The Talent Games, which aims to transform HR by digitising talent processes and creating more engaging and productive workplaces through gamification and mobile technology. As a global HR and Leadership Management expert, Paul knows how to combine business insights with people insights to transform organisations and put them on the path to growth.