Over the years, I’ve talked with so many people who seek new jobs because of their bosses. These are what I would call bad leaders.
Bad leaders exert their power in self-serving ways: for instance, firing someone as a way to retain or grow their power, or to diminish their staff. Many bosses focus on themselves and the perception of their career well-being: they are apt to take the credit for group accomplishments and use that situation to advance themselves.
This type of boss may also denigrate or ostracize successful people. Their self-interest takes precedence over the group’s best interest. They define their own position and visibility as more important than the way in which it was achieved. These bosses may be hugely successful and deliver “wins” to the company, but that success usually occurs at great expense to others.
I heard about the converse – good leadership – much more rarely. It was often articulated as what clients wanted, and sometimes as the kind of boss they are.
I’ve come to understand that, for my clients, good leaders focus on both the work and the well-being of individuals, while amplifying the positive aspects of themselves and others. They are confident in their own abilities, comfortable with the power they possess, and compassionate with others and their lives. They are aware of the power inherent in their role, and wield it responsibly instead of destructively.
Good leaders encourage people to tap into and develop their own personal power. They know it is important to inclusively acknowledge other people’s contributions so that all can share in the pride and positive experience of a job well done.
In short, good leaders will showcase the accomplishments of those individuals whom they lead, and take credit in the form of the entire team taking credit, and credit the entire team. They understand and respect the responsibility and of furthering employee’s careers in ways that benefit the employee. Last, good leaders are often invisible in the process and will say ‘thank you’ at the end.
What does good leadership look like in practice? Robert Reid, the Chief Executive at Intacct, noted in an interview for the New York Times’ Corner Office column that:
“Almost everyone goes to work to do a good job. And if they’re not doing a good job, most organizations step back and say, “I’m not sure they’re going to make it here.” We think the opposite — that we’ve done something to let them down. We either haven’t taken them through the right process, or trained them appropriately. If somebody is not doing something the way you expect or you have a different viewpoint, you need to seek to understand what’s going on and help them.”
While people have achieved their own wins working for bad bosses, I’ve heard the stories of emotional strain, frustration and pain that accompanied these gains. Some women joke about their “Devil Wears Prada” experiences. Sure, they learned a lot, but at what price?
Tony Schwartz in his June 26, 2015 Life@Work column wondered “...how much more these men could have enhanced thousands of people’s lives – and perhaps made them even more successful — if they had invested as much in taking care of them as they did in conceiving great products.”
The work world is not a sterile environment where people can simply turn off their personhood and check all life experience at the door: on the way in or out. And in the long run, companies who expect this type of environment will pay the price whether it be rapid turnover, unhappy, stressed-out, burned-out employees, or a general toxic atmosphere. No one is inspired when they feel devalued.
Unfortunately, we didn’t see a lot of emotionally intelligent or compassionate leaders in these stories. Perhaps this is because of a general society-wide misperception about what leadership really is. Perhaps it is because the people who are most prone to misinterpret leadership are also those who seek out leadership positions. Perhaps it is because of our current culture of work, which rewards getting things done at the expense of people and relationships and too often puts profit before people, whether it be individual profit (including power) or company profit. Perhaps it is a combination of all of those things.
In non-profits, I’ve witnessed and heard tales of very bad leadership. It’s turned a lot of people off working in the sector because they expected good leadership from a sector devoted to improving the world. Unfortunately, “running it like a business” has come to mean adopting some of the worst characteristics of for-profit businesses – jettisoning kindness and niceness in favor of hard-nosed bottom-line behavior.
Daniel Goleman, the “father” of emotional intelligence, writes extensively about the link between excellent leadership and emotional intelligence. This article, “4 Keys to Being an Inspirational Leader,” underscores some of the points I make above based on my clients’ actual experience. And studies (e.g. this) have shown better bottom line outcomes from good leadership practices.
Do you want to be a good or a bad leader? The reason people stay at your organization or the people people flee?
