What I Learned from Our Best Leaders

For the past six years, our company has recognized up to 10 of our best people leaders with an annual award honoring their achievements and capabilities. Everyone from first-line managers to vice presidents are eligible for nomination by their teams, peers or anyone in the company, and we have recognized leaders from all those levels. These awards are not just an HR exercise. Developing great leaders is key to the success of our business because, in our experience, leaders play a central role in earning the engagement of our employees. And engaged employees are far more likely to deliver great service and earn the loyalty of new and existing clients than those who are disengaged. One of the favorite parts of my job is sitting down with each year’s honorees. I never fail to be bowled over by their achievements, enthusiasm and, to a person, their deep commitment to the people who work for them. Our 10 honorees this year were no exception. Their passion was infectious, and it quickly became clear that the secret to their success is not rocket science or some rare genetic disposition to leadership, but their dedication to a handful of simple, but powerful operating principles. Here’s what I learned from them:

A positive attitude is a must. To a person, our best leaders at Charles Schwab are some of our most positive ones – in personality and outlook. This matters for a couple of reasons. The people who work for us spend a huge amount of their lives at work. In what kind of environment are they going to do their best work? In a positive one? Or in one that’s dominated by skepticism, doubt and negative emotions? By example, positive leaders encourage those around them to reach for new highs, and to rally together in the face of adversity, because they focus on people’s strengths, and attack problems from a position of hope and optimism. Too often, leaders think being positive means being a Pollyanna or unrealistic about challenges. But positivity isn’t “spin.” It doesn’t have to come at the expense of being direct and honest, or prevent you from holding people accountable for results. Demanding leaders with high standards can also be positive people who are resilient rather than pessimistic in the face of challenges. Those are the kind of leaders people want to follow.

Caring matters. What’s clear from our best leaders at Schwab is that they really care about people, and their love of people, and doing right by others, informs their leadership choices – not the position or the supposed power that comes with it. Caring doesn’t necessarily equal comfort, however. Our best leaders coach and cajole those around them out of their comfort zones in pursuit of excellence. They are direct when things don’t go well. But they never forget that we are all just people -- with lives outside of work, and with our own strengths and weaknesses. Most importantly, when employees know you care about them as people, the clients they serve are more likely to feel it, too.

They’re authentic. Being true to ourselves is one of the hardest things we’ll ever do as leaders, and yet, it’s one of the most important things we can do to be a successful leader. Without authenticity, there’s no predictability. People will struggle to know what they can count on you for, and they will have less confidence in your decisions.

They love what they do. Underlying all of these attributes of successful leaders is a love for the job of leading others, an embrace of the responsibility that comes with that role, and honesty about what it takes to do it well.

If you only do one thing toward your own development as a leader this year, do this: grab breakfast or lunch with a leader or group of leaders that you and others admire, and learn about their approach to leadership. I think you’ll find it not only enlightening, but infectious.