Essential skills for successful leaders

“Leadership is hard to define and good leadership even harder. But if you can get people to follow you to the ends of the earth, you are a great leader.” - Indra Nooyi, Former Chairman, and CEO, PepsiCo

Let’s look at the 10 essential skills for successful people leaders. These characteristics have been drawn from anecdotal evidence gathered by the Project Management Institute. They fit perfectly with the requirements of Legal Leaders as legal matters are a type of project-based work.

There are so many tools and techniques that you can use to support the development of these characteristics. I’ve drawn on my experience to highlight the ones that I know are effective and easy to apply.

Leadership

Leadership –

? Involves inspiring and focusing the team on the achievement of the objectives of the legal matter.

? It is the ability to get things done through others and involves the development of rapport, trust, and respect.

? Different techniques need to be applied to obtain the best performance at an individual team member level and the team level.

The primary tools that support leadership are –

1. Adaptive leadership model for managing individuals
2. Adaptive leadership model for managing teams
3. Adaptive leadership model for managing crises
4. Emotional and Social Intelligence

Team Building

Team building –

? Includes processes to encourage teamwork by assisting individuals to come together to achieve common objectives.

? Legal Matters can face unique challenges in this area as teams are often temporary and the introduction of different team members can dramatically alter the team dynamic.

? Just as working with different clients has a major impact on how the team will interact with each client according to the preferences and expectations of the client.

? Client expectations can have a major influence on the way the work is organised and executed.

The primary tools that support team building are –

1. Tuckman’s ladder of team development
2. Individual Rapport Building
3. Team Building Exercises – Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
4. Strengths-based Leadership

Motivation

Motivation –

? The overall success of a legal matter is greatly affected by the level of commitment of the team.

? This in turn is dependent on the levels of motivation for each individual team member.

? A highly effective people manager makes an effort to understand the motivating forces for each team member and adapts their leadership style, as well as the work allocation in order to accommodate these.

The primary tools that support motivation are –

1. Adaptive leadership model for managing individuals
2. Adaptive leadership model for managing teams
3. Balanced Supervision Model

Communication

Communication –

? Has the greatest impact on the success or perceived failure of legal matters and also on the satisfaction of the client, project sponsor, and matter team.

? Poor communication has been identified as one of the major frustration factors for clients and legal teams.

? Highly developed and flexible communication skills are required to lead the legal project team and to manage stakeholder expectations.

The primary tools that support communication are –

1. Effective Communication

2. Stakeholder Analysis

3. Communication Preferences – Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

4. Emotional Intelligence

Influencing

Influencing –

• Is the ability to use interpersonal skills to encourage people to align behind the achievement of specified objectives, as well as the ability to form groups of individuals into highly effective teams.?
• For some reason many lawyers seem to think that influencing skills are somehow negative and often restate these in terms of manipulation and coercion.
• These are not positive skills and can lead to de-motivation of the team. It is possible to guide individual and team behaviours in a more positive manner.

The primary tools that support influencing are –

1. Effective Communication

2. Stakeholder Analysis

3. Emotional Intelligence

4. Lead by example

5. Clarify how decisions will be made

6. Adjust your interpersonal style for the audience

Decision Making

Decision making –

• Is the ability of the legal project manager to make effective decisions within the context of the matter which ensures the achievement of the matter objectives.
• It is also the ability to assist key stakeholders in decision-making processes that are outside of the authority of the legal project manager.
• It can be challenging as some stakeholders may not wish to be associated with a potentially incorrect decision. Also, legal managers will often need to make decisions on the basis of incomplete information or assumptions.

The primary tools that support decision making are –

1. Minto’s Pyramid Principle
2. Rational Models
3. Normative Models
4. Critical Thinking

Negotiation

Negotiation –

? Negotiation skills are employed to facilitate agreement where there are differing points of view between team members and stakeholders.

? They often require application-related skills including influencing, conflict resolution, and decision making.

? Many lawyers see any disagreement as negative and assume an argumentative demeanor to coerce others to align.

? It is better to remain open and non-judgmental so that potential positive outcomes can be obtained such as a win-win result, or adjustments to your current position.

The primary tools that support negotiation are –

1. Negotiation Frameworks
2. Conflict Resolution Frameworks
3. Conversations not Arguments
4. Emotional Intelligence

Trust Building

Trust building –

? These skills are critical to effective team leadership.

? Relationships deteriorate when trust is compromised, and all legal matters require effective relationship management amongst team members and stakeholders.

? When trust breaks down or has not been built up, people disengage making leadership and collaboration difficult.

The primary tools that support trust-building are –

1. Rapport Building Skills
2. Emotional Intelligence
3. Conversations not arguments
4. Deliver on Commitments
5. Open and Transparent

Conflict Management

Conflict Management –

? Conflict inevitably occurs whenever more than one person is involved in an activity.?

? Most conflict occurs early in the formation of any legal team or the commencement of a new legal matter.

? Some level of conflict is useful in that it can lead to the clarification of understanding and refine the overall objectives.

? Differing viewpoints may indicate a better way of approaching a situation, it is worthwhile exploring them rather than shutting them down.

The primary tools that support conflict management building are –

1. Effective Communication
2. Emotional Intelligence
3. Conversations not arguments
4. Conflict Resolution Frameworks
5. Conflict Response Models
6. Code of Conduct

Coaching

Coaching –

? Has the greatest impact on the success or perceived failure of legal matters and also on the satisfaction of the client, project sponsor, and matter team.

? Poor communication has been identified as one of the major frustration factors for clients and legal teams.

? Highly developed and flexible communication skills are required to lead the legal project team and to manage stakeholder expectations.

The primary tools that support coaching building are –

1. Effective Communication
2. Emotional Intelligence
3. Adaptive leadership model - individuals
4. Adaptive leadership model - teams
5. GROW and TIPS Model
6. Motivational Interviewing

Find out more

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