John Eades* says the current crisis is sorting out the truly great leaders from those who are finding they don’t have the stomach for it.
Do you remember how it felt the last time you were forced to let someone go?
Chances are, you felt terrible and didn’t sleep well for days.
While these feelings make you an empathetic leader with a good heart, they could unfortunately cause you to run away from leadership before you reach peak impact.
Take Jessica, an exceptional regional manager in a fast-growth company, for example.
For years she embraced her role and poured into the people she had the opportunity to lead.
While she was far from perfect, her growth and development as a leader were what any young leader would want to mimic.
Everything was going well until she and her new boss couldn’t find common ground and COVID-19 hit the business.
At first, Jessica hung in there.
She worked hard to build a stronger relationship with her new manager, and did all she could to shelter her team from the growing dissension, but COVID-19 added pressure she didn’t feel she could handle.
Reluctantly, she asked for a demotion; moving from her leadership position back to an individual contributor role.
While the move made logical sense, it was unfortunate for the people who grew so much under her leadership.
There is no denying that leadership is hard: The pressure of performance, making tough decisions, and guiding other people.
However, the hardest part of leadership is the requirement to take full responsibility for things you have little control over.
Most people avoid leadership, not because they can’t develop the skills to lead, but because it’s easier to stand outside the fire.
Those that do embrace leadership in their career or in their families, often fail.
The best leaders don’t give up because they know failure isn’t final; failure is feedback.
If you have chosen to be a leader, now isn’t the time to give up. Your people need you more than ever.
If you find yourself at a breaking point like Jessica, and you don’t want to give up, here’s what you can do.
Focus on your #1 job as leader
I know you think your job is to execute the tasks and devise a strategy for your team.
While you absolutely have to do those requirements, your primary role of being in a position of leadership is to elevate others.
I define leadership as “someone whose actions inspire, empower, and serve others to produce an improved state over an extended period of time”.
Simply knowing this definition isn’t enough — the real difference lies in living it out, because actions speak louder than words.
I have yet to encounter a strong leader who isn’t keenly aware of how important their actions are, as far as setting an example to the people they lead.
Many are borderline fanatical about the decisions they make, and the positions they put themselves in.
Lead right where you are
When leaders start to feel overwhelmed, it’s because he or she is doing too much.
They have loaded their schedule and responsibilities with so many things they can’t keep up with all of it.
Instead of trying to boil the ocean or solve every problem, make your leadership circle of influence smaller.
When a good leader is stuck inside an unhealthy culture they can’t fix the entire organisation as one person.
Instead, they start with changing the environment for their own team to make it the best it can be.
Reconnect yourself to the cause
It’s easy for leaders to get lost in the monotony of their everyday work, failing to consider how the work impacts people at a deeper level.
Having a deeper purpose and cause behind your work can be tough for some leaders.
If this is an area where you struggle, remember that leadership has a built-in cause; serving other people.
Speaker and author, Damon West told me on a recent episode of the Follow My Lead Podcast: “Every one of us has the ability to be a servant leader.”
Ponder the positives (regardless of how small)
While work absolutely should be a place that helps create positive energy for people, it is easy to lose sight of that during difficult times.
Choosing to be positive and looking for the good in things regardless of how small, is a competitive advantage and in your realm of control.
If you have been forced to let someone go, or your team has been negatively impacted by COVID-19, don’t give up. Your leadership is needed more than ever.
*John Eades is the Chief Executive of LearnLoft a leadership development company. He can be contacted at johneades.com.
This article first appeared on John’s LearnLoft blog.
