How to be a credible leader

I started to explore the role of credibility in leadership during the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. There was an immediate focus on leadership behaviour and leaders everywhere were being told they needed to be more empathetic, more human, and to show compassion. Everyone was being told to bring their 'whole self' to work and authenticity was something that was being talked about more and more.

For me, all of these attributes are open to interpretation in different parts of the world and they are too broad, which means we all have different expectations of what leaders should do and how they should behave. What do we really mean when we say leaders need to have more empathy? What does ‘being more human’ look like? Do we really want our leaders to be authentic?

I started to read and research more about empathy and being human at work. I explored where emotions and behaviours come from and more about how our brains work. I looked at different leadership attributes and how we build and maintain relationships with others. As a result, I remained uncomfortable with the focus of authenticity for leaders.

I’ve been questioning the focus of authenticity at work since the summer of 2019 and since the pandemic, I’ve been exploring more about what it is we really want from leaders, because I don’t believe it is authenticity and I also believe the pandemic has impacted the world of work forever.

What's wrong with authenticity? It’s easily weaponised. It’s very subjective. It’s gives people permission to behave badly. It’s not what we need to follow someone and that's what we are asking employees and teams to do when we lead.

I believe what we want, is a leader who is credible.

What does being credible really mean?

I asked my community here on LinkedIn to define credibility and these are a few of the definitions I got back:

• Credibility is whether you or your organisation is perceived by the audience you’re speaking to as having the capability to be effective in completing the objective set
• Someone who has a track record of doing what they say they’ll do, and whose actions demonstrate their good judgement and strong character
• Someone who walks their own talk

There were some great suggestions (around 20 in total) but I wanted to get a bit deeper – I wanted to understand why we follow some people and not others and why we believe some people and not others – all of that for me was part of being credible.

I explored different leadership types, personality types, the challenges of leading across cultures as well as academic papers from journals linked to the topic of leadership and credibility.

This led me to the creation of nine practices that I needed to test with leaders and followers. But I had an extra hypothesis to test. Did men and women feel differently about the practices?

Did they rank them differently in terms of importance and did they feel one practice was more important than all the others. In the research, I asked some open questions too. I asked leaders what stops them being credible, what are the blockers to achieving it and I asked followers why they followed some leaders and not others.

What did the research tell me?

• 99% of leaders said it is very important or important to be seen as credible
• Flexibility and empathy are ranked as more important by men
• The most important practice is integrity

Followers also said: It’s more important to me that my leader is credible than it is to my leader to be credible.

We also now know what gets in the way for leaders. There are eight key themes and I’ll share four of them here:

1. Navigating Change and Uncertainty: Dealing with uncertainty in the business environment, managing change, and overcoming resistance to change
2. Leadership Development: Developing as a leader, including mentoring the next generation of leaders, training opportunities, and gaining leadership skills
3. Communication: Effective communication, both within the organization and with external stakeholders
4. Remote Work and Hybrid Workplaces: Adapting to remote work, leading in a hybrid workplace, and maintaining team cohesion in a virtual setting

You can read more about the research report and purchase a copy here.

The research tested the nine practices and while some were correct, some weren’t. I adjusted the terms, removed and added a few, and now we have eight practices of credibility and The Credibility Wheel:

These eight practices are a blend of complementary behaviours and traits that combine to create a credible leader. In addition, there is a subset of words used to describe each trait and behaviour in more detail and these provide the depth and nuance needed to really get to grips with credible leadership.

The eight practices of credible leadership

These are the eight in a little more detail with an explanation of each to bring it to life a bit more:

1. Empathetic: You believe someone else’s lived experience regardless of your own.
2. Trustworthy: You’ve proven your competence and your words are acted upon
3. Visionary: You can clearly articulate where you want people to go with you.
4. Supportive: You create space for your team to learn and grow
5. Vulnerability: You’re open and real and able to admit when you’re wrong
6. Likeable: People like being around you, regardless of whether they like you
7. Integrity: You do what you say you will do, consistently
8. Capable: You take action and make decisions based on experience

What does all this mean for leaders today?

For the last 20 years, I've been helping teams solve their communication and culture problems. Over and over again, I am faced with the same problem, the same complaints. Leaders are struggling to get their employees to do what they need them to do.

The leader believes the problem is everyone else, but I have found that a breakdown in communication is often linked to the behaviour and approach of the leader. Leaders think they have a team or culture problem when, really, they have a credibility problem of their own.

We want to follow people we believe, and being credible is the only way to make sure people will genuinely want to follow you.

Credibility is what happens when effective communication meets true accountability. And that is what we need to follow a leader.

I've taken this reading and research and put it together in my new book; Nobody Believes You, Become A Leader People Will Follow which is out in October 2024. The book takes each practice in a chapter and I share stories from my work to bring each one to life. Each chapter includes practical skills and strategies to help you build each practice to improve your relationships with those in your team or organisation.

You can join the waitlist here so you're the first to know when the book is available.

How do you know which practice to work on first?

I am a firm believer in things being practical and taking action, so when I finished the research report I wanted to make sure there was something people could do quickly to help them move forwards. I developed The Credibility Gap Assessment which is a free, two-minute survey designed to help you see which practice needs some focussed attention. You'll get a free personalised PDF report emailed to you which will give you some guidance on what you can do to make some changes for those you lead.

If you want to explore more about the eight practices, season 5 of my podcast is out now and across the 10 episodes, I discuss each practice in more detail with advice to help you build and demonstrate the behaviours you need to be a credible leader.

And if you want to explore this with your leadership team, I am available later this year for any internal conferences or corporate events to host a session speaking about the research findings and the eight practices in more detail - just get in touch here.

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