The 3 Core Traits Of Successful Leaders
Today I want to explore with you the three core traits I see as being critical if you want to be a successful leader.
Everyone has their own flavour and their own spin on what it takes to create a successful leader. The following three core traits are what I really see working right now for successful leaders and business owners in the engineering and construction industry.
The first trait is Strength.
At the moment in particular, but in general, being a strong leader is so so important. In order to lead others, in order to have others buy into your vision and your strategy and in order to build a really inspired, motivated and high performing team of people around you - you need to be strong.
You need to be firm with your non-negotiables and you need to be prepared to have hard conversations and stand up for what you believe in and what you believe is the right course of action to be taken.
You need to have a strength of character to be able to have hard conversations with people on your team who are not performing, you need to be able to have hard conversations with clients who are being difficult or unreasonable, and you also need to have that strength of character to inspire and to enroll people in your vision and your strategy for where you want to be taking things.
The second core trait is Curiosity.
You see it just doesn’t cut it any more to just accept and assume that the way that you’ve always done it, is the way that it that it will always be done into the future. You need to have a level of curiosity about all the things and all the tasks that you are undertaking in your team and your business in order to continue to grow, to continue to do better and to continue to evolve.
If you’re not curious and constantly reinventing things - you’ll get left behind.
Curiosity also really helps from a leadership point of view because you’re willing and able and ready to embrace new ideas from people in your team. Instead of having a closed mindset towards new ideas and new ways of doing things, you become curious about new, better and more efficient ways to carry out tasks that you’ve always done.
Curiosity is such an important trait of a leader.
The third core trait is Empathy.
Gone are the days of just bulldozing over the top of people to get stuff done and not caring about the thoughts, the feelings and emotions of your team, your clients and the people around you.
Empathetic leaders are absolutely required right now and this is what’s going to take you, your team and your business to that next level.
The reality is that everyone, including you, are human beings. We all have thoughts, we all have feelings and we all have emotions. We all have bad days and we all have a good days. And bringing a level of empathy and caring towards how your team are fairing, how they are performing, how they are travelling will ensure that not only your team feel supported and heard at all times, it also means that when the going gets tough they will go above and beyond for you, because they respect you.
You’ve taken the time to care about them and their world, so when it comes to crunch time on a particular project for a particular dead deadline, of course they will go above and beyond for you, because you’ve shown to them that you really care about them.
So, the above are the three core traits I see really working right now for leaders who are successful in the engineering and construction industry.
Question for you - which of the above traits do you do well at? And which of the above traits you need to work on?
Leadership and being a successful leader is a constant evolution. It’s a constant growth path and all successful people are constantly looking for ways to improve their leadership skills.
Josh ‘Leader’ Stone
PS: If you’re interested, here are 4 ways I can help you right now:
- Join the Leaders In Engineering community designed specifically for engineering leaders and business owners
It’s our new Facebook community where engineering leaders and business owners are learning the strategies and leadership skills to step up and thrive right now – Click Here to join
- Download our FREE PDF guide – “How To Build A High Performing & Highly Profitable Engineering Team”
Learn the skills to get the most out of the people around you. Build a high performing engineering team that generates incredible profits and allows you to have more fun and to spend more time with the people you love – Click Here
- Book in a 15min Check In Session
Let’s discuss how you can tackle a volatile marketplace, gain visibility on the issues, challenges and problems you are facing at the moment and then work on a plan together for how to break through the mountain in front of you in order to step up and thrive! – Click Here
- Have me work with you and your team privately
If you’re serious about getting real results and you’d like me to work directly with you and your team… just send me an email at [email protected] and put “Private” in the subject line...tell me a little about yourself, the challenges you are facing and what you’d like to work on together, and I’ll be in touch to discuss a plan!
