Leadership Wisdom from Experience

Many senior leaders and leadership experts talk about a “lack of leadership”. For instance, Shivshankar Menon, a visiting professor on international studies and the 4th National Security Adviser of India, said only last month: ‘The world needs leadership today and that’s what’s in short supply’.

I had the delightful opportunity to speak with Peter Tyler who is a very experienced business leader. He has been combining the busy role of Group Managing Director of a high technology group with a Non-Executive Director/Chair role of Darcy group which provides products and services to prevent environmental pollution. ?It's a very busy combination of roles but it was clear he takes time to mentor junior leaders as he feels at such a critical part or being a senior leader.

I asked him about leadership in business and how he would define the concept of leadership intelligence.

I found the conversation very interesting and he highlighted four key points:

1)?????EQ is mandatory as a leader (IQ less important).

Peter described how in his experience, classic “IQ” intelligence is not so important as a leader, He has found that EQ is even more important in the C-suite as it is the enabler for building relationships and building trust.

2)?????Learn from the leaders you have had (good and bad).

Peter said that throughout his career he has learnt from leaders that he admired and looked at what they do well. He has then added that to his own abilities.

Critically he has also looked at what they've done badly as well, and learnt he emphasized that the crucial part of the growth of any leader is to actually learn both from the good and the bad, and not to try and reinvent the wheel.

3)?????Grow the leaders you have (via both your skills and external resources).

Wherever Peter has gone in as the leader he’s always looked at the team that exists. If it was called a ‘management team’, then he has changed the emphasis from management to leading, and then he’s always looked to grow the leaders. He even started master classes in leadership at his organisation and worked on developing people's emotional intelligence.

He has applied a toolkit of things that to do this including mentoring (and he usually ends up mentoring in pretty much every organization he has worked at) as well as external coaching as sometimes the person’s manager is not the best person to actually try and develop certain aspects of a person's skill set

4)?????Care for your staff (keep actively listening).

I found it interesting because Peter didn't use the word but I got the strong impression that he cares for his staff and I too believe that's critical. Often team members may behave poorly but have good intention and it is important to treat them in a respectful way.

We talked about the importance of actively listening, so the person on the other side of the table feels engaged and not brushed aside. Without effective listening the leader themselves actually missed the opportunities to help that person and develop that person as well at the same time. It is also the demonstration of care.

Peter also described how he talks to his managers about a form of situational leadership. He divides them into level, one, two and three tiers of leadership. With the level ones being the day to day situational leaders who are effectively supervising the operation. Their style of leadership as a situational leader needs to be different from the level threes which is the leadership team for the business. The key is that situational leaders have to have different sets of skills for different tiers.

Overall, I found it a fascinating conversation and Peter has recently set up Blackdog Leadership Advisory and Consulting. I am confident that he will be including many worthwhile tips and bits of information so it will be worthwhile following on LinkedIn.

Also if you're looking for remote board support then I would not hesitate to recommend contacting Peter through LinkedIn.