In my Sappi days, like in many large corporations, leadership and management were mostly executed by different people. The CEO, Eugene van As, had a number of MDs report to him. This obviously presented its own challenges and Ian Forbes replaced Ian Heron overnight. The strategy to move up the Sappi corporate ladder was simple – make sure your name is Ian, or if you’re Afrikaans, Jan…

As an entrepreneur, however, you probably wear both hats, switching as and when required.

Management is about utilising people and machines to achieve a goal.
Leadership is about influencing people to think and act in a specific manner in order to contribute to success.

Many people regard leadership as intuitive, a natural ability, something you either have or you don’t.  The leadership guru John C Maxwell, makes the point that leadership is a skill that can be learnt.

There is so much that can be said on the subject. We will touch on only two aspects of leadership in this post.

1.  The three levels of leadership are public, private and personal leadership.

Public leadership is about the team. It involves providing a vision of the future, a mission to focus energy and effort, cohesion by way of values and determining the culture of the organisation. The aim is to achieve improved collective performance and involves positive peer pressure entrenched in a culture of productivity.

Private leadership involves dealing with individuals on a one-on-one level; essentially applying situational leadership skills. It is the leader’s responsibility to build and maintain relationships, to get to know the people and their aspirations and to align their personal purpose with that of the business.

Personal leadership is foundational to everything else, with the underlying principle that to lead is to serve.  The leader’s attitude should be to always learn, to grow, to build relationships. Technical and managerial ability must be developed to inspire the team to their best possible performance. Good communication and learning to listen is essential. Emotional intelligence, self-awareness and -mastery must be improved.  And the leader’s presence must be unquestionable. Command over your thoughts, feelings and actions must be practised. Learning to operate in the now, to be present and focused. Balancing peace of mind, energetic purpose and empathy for others in an authentic desire to improve interdependence.

To lead bravely, free of the fear of failure or criticism, is possible when self-identity is aligned to purpose.

2.  The people you lead expect you to envision a future and set a direction to get there. It is your job to Anticipate, Innovate and Activate.

To anticipate is to see the future. To keep your finger on the pulse of the business environment and not get caught short-handed.

  • Consider the macroeconomic forces; global and capital markets, trends in commodities and the state of the economic infrastructure.
  • Key trends in technology, societal, cultural and socioeconomic preferences must be tracked in an ever-changing landscape highly susceptible to fake news and misinformation.
  • Industry advancements kept tabs on, that is competition, substitution and disruptions in the value chain.
  • Market developments evaluated, including changes in the needs and demands of customers, changes in switching costs and revenue attractiveness.

The next step is to innovate, to solve problems creatively. This starts with a solid understanding of the internal machination of the organisation, the industry and the business environment.
Successful ideation should be focused on solving problems, not creating products. Consider all possibilities, and remember that a simple tweak in the way things is done could produce the desired effect. Your business revolves around the people, the processes and the technology employed, and this is where you should focus.

Activate cautiously – so often assumptions made are proven wrong in practice or are not validated by the market. First, test your innovation with the build-measure-learn feedback loop before implementing full roll-out.

Remember, leaders cannot anticipate, innovate and activate if they are constantly caught up in the day to day activities of the business.

So say the Bosses

There is no success in leadership, be it in life or business, without first learning to lead yourself.

The attitude of the leader determines the altitude of the organisation.

The Sologix solution

We have developed a series of courses aimed at helping entrepreneurs and their first-line supervisors become better leaders and managers of their businesses.  We incorporate teachings by, amongst others, John C Maxwell, both the Stephen Covey’s, Simon Sinek and Daniel Goleman in our material.

Join a Master Leader / Manager workgroup, or contact us for personal business coaching by sending us an email here.

Explore other online courses on offer and our Strategy 2021 sessions by following the links hereunder.