August 19, 2015
By Tami Rubino, BioSpace Hiring and Branding Guru
I love words. I love their complexities and the various ways they can be used to communicate different ideas and perspectives. Quotient is one of my all-time favorite words. Most of us learned that particular term in third grade math class, but it has an alternate meaning that is much more ubiquitous and practical to our everyday lives.
According to Merriam Webster, quotient is the amount or degree that a specific quality or characteristic exists. So the leadership quotient must be referring to the amount of leadership qualities you possess, right? Let's look at this through a different lens—don’t focus internally but imagine your leadership quotient radiating outward like ripples through the water. Your leadership quotient is defined by the magnitude of your leadership reach and can be measured by one simple question—how many leaders are you building around you?
Perhaps we need to step back and talk about how you build other leaders. The recipe is pretty simple—teach and be intentionally honest.
First, teach future leaders everything you know—even if it doesn't appear to have anything to do with their job. This is called knowledge transfer. It doesn't matter if you oversee customer service, sales, or a group of engineers—teach them what to do and how to do it, but more importantly WHY they are doing it. The WHY is the critical piece that connects people to a grander vision and it’s the only way for them to think outside the boundaries of their own job description.
Good teachers, however, also listen. Be RECEPTIVE to what your employees have to say and be PERCEPTIVE to what they're not telling you. The issues that people are hesitant to talk about are usually the ones that need your urgent attention. Not only are you exchanging information more readily with your team, you’re modeling the most important aspect of leadership, which is open communication.
Honesty is probably the most difficult part about developing leaders and expanding your leadership quotient. Telling people the truth can be painful and awkward—both for the deliverer and the receiver. When you’re honest, you run the risk of hurting feelings, causing embarrassment, or perhaps they just won't agree with your perspective.
To illustrate, have you ever sat down with an employee for their annual performance review and they have self-evaluated as exceptional, yet you rated them as needing improvement? Where on earth did this gap come from? You've been telling them for months they have performance deficiencies. My guess is the feedback was laced with some serious sugar coating or excuses explaining away the real issue.
As leaders, we can be tempted to make excuses to soften the blow. For example, if you said, “Jane, you made several mistakes on your reports last week, but I understand the system is difficult to work with.” You’ve just given Jane a free pass to continue making errors. I recently heard Horst Schulze, founding president and former chief operating officer of the Ritz Carlton Group, break this down in its most basic form. Schulze said, “Leaders forfeit the right to make excuses." The most dangerous thing you can do for yourself, your team, and your business is to water down the truth.
Please hear me on this and notice I use the phrase “intentional honesty.” If your intentions are good, there is no reason to sugarcoat the truth. In other words, when you feel compelled to deliver tough feedback to a team member, ask yourself why you're doing it. If it’s going to help them improve and be more successful, deliver the message with honesty and grace. People are open to feedback when they truly believe you have their best interest at heart, and not your own.
As a young leader, I vividly remember the day a superior told me I was perceived by my staff as unfriendly and unapproachable. Me? Really? At first I was hurt, and then I was angry. Had he hired me to be the company cheerleader or grow the business? Sadly, it took me 10 years to realize he was absolutely right! I was so laser-focused on my work that I didn’t notice or connect with the people around me.
His message—albeit delivered poorly—was a blind spot that could have eventually thwarted my full leadership potential. Granted, there are a thousand ways he could have said it better—like this for example— “Can I share something with you? This might be hard for you to hear, but I am telling you because I care about you and I don't want anything to stand in your way of your success.” Regardless of how he delivered the message, I am forever grateful that he had the courage to be honest with me. It completely changed how I interact with people in all aspects of my life and made me a better leader.
So why is having a leadership quotient important? Organizations and communities are in desperate need of good leaders and your leadership quotient has an exponential effect—as you build more leaders, they go off and build more leaders, and the world is simply a better place.
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