How to Be the Best Leader You Can Be

Maybe being a leader for you means having the right to call the shots. It's very satisfying having authority over people. You can be a better leader by being less authoritative and more engaging. Interested? Read on!

To be an engaging leader, stop trying to be the authority and, instead, draw solutions out of team members, colleagues and partners. This website will show you how to be more engaging and explain the benefits.

How to be an engaging leader

  • Actively seek input from others
  • Stop asking only analytical questions
  • Ask what others think and want
  • Value the input of others
  • Be facilitative, not the answer-giver

Why be an engaging leader

  • Engagement fuels motivation
  • Shared ownership & commitment
  • Better decisions
  • Greater trust and openness
  • Fuller empowerment
  • More creative thinking
  • More bottom-up initiative
  • Stronger team spirit

Partially engaging leaders propose their own solutions and then ask what others think of their ideas. Not many people will question their boss so this is often just a rubber stamp exercise. Saying "I have an open door policy" is another half-way measure.

The concept of engaging leadership upgrades traditional participative leadership by placing more emphasis on being proactively engaging.

Here, you will learn how to be a fully participative leader by asking engaging questions. The two most engaging questions are: "What do you think?" and "What do you want?" Each of these questions has several variations. The fully participative leader knows the difference between engaging and analytical questions. Asking only the latter is for those who want to make the decisions themselves.

See Engaging Leadership A good place to start. See also Directive Leadership for comparison. Next, have a look at how Engaging Questions work.

Other topics include how to celebrate success and conduct more engaging performance appraisals. In addition, there is some material on how to build your confidence, how to feel more positive and feel more fortunate.

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