The Top 5 Percent Leader

I recently embarked upon an effort to review in depth the work I have done over my 20+ years of coaching and consulting with leaders from numerous industries across all levels of organizations.?

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My goal was to find what the most important ingredients were for those leaders who were the true superstars.? I’m not talking about the leaders who could be considered “competent” but otherwise unremarkable.

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Rather, I wanted to explore in depth the truly special leader who was remembered long after people stopped working for them.? The leaders who not only were competent managers but who also strove for a deeper, more lasting impact on those they led and the organizations in which they served.

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In short, the leaders who were the answers people gave to the question often posed in leadership development courses, “Who was the best leader you ever worked for?”

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The leader that I ended up modeling was what I came to call, “The Top 5 Percent Leader,” using the label “Top 5 Percent” to denote the relative rarity of these types of leaders.

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And I narrowed all that they did down to three essential elements to describe their effectiveness:

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First, they UNDERSTOOD:?

--Themselves, including their strengths, weaknesses, and how to best leverage their talents

--Their people – how to bring out the best in them and know where they needed help

--Their teams – how to build high performing teams is a critical skill of all Top 5 Percent Leaders

--How to best serve the mission of the organization – Seeing and executing upon the opportunities in front of them to contribute to organizational success

--How to get results in their organization – Not as common as one would think but knowing how to navigate complex, matrixed organizations and having the relationships needed to succeed are higher level skills

--Their customers – Whoever their function served, they knew how to lead their team to effectively fulfill their customers’ needs

A leader who comes to mind who demonstrated the practice of deeply Understanding was Bob Iger during his first go-around as CEO of Disney. In his business-focused memoir, The Ride of a Lifetime, he lays out several "lessons to live by," many of which describe his approach to Understanding, including "ask questions you need to ask, admit without apology what you don't understand, and do the work to learn what you need to learn as quickly as you can."

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They CARED:?

Of course, about their people and their well-being.? But they also cared as much about themselves so as not to neglect their needs to maintain their health and well-being. ?AND they deeply cared about the work through such means as communicating clear expectations and holding people accountable to them.?

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To successfully balance caring for self and others AND caring for the work is a critical element that set them apart from other, less exceptional leaders.? Too often, leaders bias to one end or the other; to know how to integrate the two into a cohesive approach is where you see mature, effective leaders stand out from their less impactful peers.

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Herb Kelleher, the renowned founder of Southwest Airlines, was perhaps the epitome of a leader who deeply cared about the people who worked for him as well as the work of the organization. He instilled a culture based on fun that attracted much loyalty and dedication, and Southwest was hailed as the most successful airline ever. Fortune magazine called him perhaps the "best CEO in America," and, as Forbes magazine put it, "Herb and the people of Southwest Airlines showed us that it is possible to love people (employees and customers alike), have fun, and make money simultaneously." Now, that's a leader to emulate!

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And they INSPIRED:

This is another area of distinction.? Truly inspiring others requires being inspired yourself.? Top 5 Percent Leaders tuned into a deeper purpose, connected that to their work, and were able to communicate in a way that motivated others to get on board and feel a deeper sense of purpose as well.

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Elon Musk might be a controversial figure today, and he is not an example of a leader who particularly cares for his people (the stories demonstrating this are legendary), but one thing he does exceptionally well (and I would argue a key reason behind his success) is inspire others to reach heights that most wouldn't dare dream of. His partner during his PayPal days, Max Levchin, summarized Musk's world class ability to inspire this way: "One of Elon’s greatest talents is his ability to pass off his vision as a mandate from heaven." And people who are attracted to Musk's vision obviously are inspired by it enough to work tirelessly to help bring his dreams to reality.

The Results

But can these leaders truly deliver results for their organizations? The Gallup organization has done numerous studies on what describes an effective leader. One such effort involved their studying around 10,000 followers around the world to assess leadership in a wide variety of organizations to learn the most important leader elements according to those who follow them. COMPASSION (similar to CARE) was one of the 4 key ingredients for the best leaders. The other 3 were HOPE (= INSPIRE), STABILITY, and TRUST. Their findings also showed that impactful leaders Understood their followers needs. The impact seen on employee well-being and engagement were striking:

• When employees strongly agree that they trust the leadership of their organization, they are?4x as likely?to be engaged. I would argue that Trust is successfully developed as a result of a leader's focus on Understanding and Caring for themselves, others, and the work.
• Employees who strongly agree that leaders help them see how changes made today will affect their organization in the future are?7.5x as likely?to feel connected to their company culture. In order to truly Inspire others, they must see the linkage between what they are doing today and how that will contribute to the desired success of tomorrow.
• 69%?of employees who strongly agree that their leaders make them "feel enthusiastic about the future" (i.e., Inspired) are engaged. Only?1%?of those who disagree with the statement are engaged.

While there are many ways to describe what effective leaders do and how they achieve results, I believe this framework offers a simple, yet meaningful way to orient one's efforts in order to become a better, much more impactful leader over time.

Also, I encourage the reader to consider who the Top 5 Percent Leaders have been in their own lives as those examples can be so important to our understanding of the impact these people can have in our world and how to go about doing so.

Finally, this road is not necessarily an easy one to travel down as it takes courage and fortitude, great qualities that all Top 5 Percent Leaders possess, and it very much helps to have the assistance of an experienced coach, a supportive mentor, and others in one's life to do so successfully.

But, for those inspired to do so, the rewards are plentiful, not only for the individual leader, but especially for those they lead, the organizations they serve, and in fact the world overall.

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