Impact Partner Content: Absa | by Tina Playne, Managing Executive: Sectors and Segments, Private & Business Banking, Absa Retail and Business Bank
Our brave new world demands brave new leadership - leaders who understand their purpose in life and in business, and who are able to inspire and motivate others. But how do you make the shift, find your purpose, and successfully transition from manager to leader. Tina Playne shares her insights on what makes great leaders who can move business forward.
“Good leaders organize and align people around what the team needs to do. Great leaders motivate and inspire people with why they’re doing it. That’s purpose. And that’s the key to achieving something truly transformational.”
Our world today is often referred as VUCA – Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous - a combination of qualities that, taken together, characterize the nature of some difficult conditions and situations. This means that for leaders, we face new challenges in how we lead, how we influence those around us and how we effect change.
So what is leadership in this VUCA world? Let me start by discussing what leadership is NOT:
Leadership has nothing to do with seniority or a position in the hierarchy of a business. A business’ leadership is not the senior people with the big pay cheques. Equally, leadership has nothing to do with titles; a fancy title doesn’t make you a “leader” and you don’t need a title to lead. Leadership also has nothing to do with personal attributes. Say the word “leader” and most people think of a domineering, take-charge charismatic individual, but leadership is not an adjective. Finally, leadership is not management - they are not the same thing. Managers plan, measure, monitor, coordinate, solve, hire and fire. Managers manage things, but leaders lead people. Being a good manager does not make you a leader and running a business, effectively managing every detail, and making money at it, does not make you a leader.
You see, only leading makes you a leader.
Good management is essential for the stability of every kind of business, but management does just that. It keeps things as they are whereas leadership is about growth and change; it is about influencing others to make sure all efforts are working towards the same goal.
The VUCA world brings some dramatic shifts and we need to shift as leaders. Volatility is driven as we see economic power shift from West to the East; uncertainty grows as technological innovation disrupts old industries and creates new ones; We see changing dynamics every day as social media speaks to millions of customers instantly; and we need to deal with far more ambiguity as the world globalizes and becomes more interconnected.
With all these changes, our brave new world demands brave new leadership. Leaders evolve all the time, depending on what the times demand, thus leadership skills are not timeless. In today’s fast-paced, complex business environment, with a tech-savvy workforce, a new approach is essential. As leaders, we need to listen, engage, motivate, inspire, challenge and connect every day.
SO how do we shift? At the heart of great leadership is a strong sense of PURPOSE. Purpose is what separates leaders from managers.
Steve Jobs said, “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me. Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful, that’s what matters to me.” And Albert Einstein said, “Nothing truly valuable arises from ambition or from a mere sense of duty; it stems rather from love and devotion towards men and towards objective things.”
Purpose is the UNIQUE impact we are called to make for the benefit for others. A purpose statement says where you want to go, what you do and how you do will do it. So how do you define your personal and work purpose?
Find Your Inner Voice. Purpose comes from the heart, from intuition, from our emotions. Start a leadership practice of writing down experiences that energize you at work or in your life. Look for the common themes in these experiences. What are you doing? Who are you being? What strengths are you exercising? What do people seek you out for? What are the deepest challenges you’ve experienced and developed the inner resources to overcome? Who are you drawn to help?
As I look back at some of my best experiences throughout my career, I realize that some of the times that I experienced the greatest sense of being alive was when I was bringing in new, creative thinking to change how things were done for a better outcome, and energizing people around me to follow the journey.Define Your Leadership Legacy. What is the lasting impact you would like to leave in this role? In your career? In your life? What would the ideal world look like if you were in charge? How would you like your contributions to be remembered?
I always thought that my biggest impact in business was the number new and exciting clients and assignments I brought in. I was surprised that that is not what people remember – they remember the work I did to make things easier for our teams to collaborate, to deliver better quality and fulfill their career aspirations sooner. A transactional leader is not remembered. A transformational leader is revered.Articulate Your Personal Brand. Your personal brand is your unique essence and impact in the world. Articulating your personal brand helps you to be more inspired and accountable in your leadership impact, and link it with the mission and role you play in our organization.
So, for all women who are leading teams, think clearly about what makes you tick, what legacy you want to leave behind and how you’re going to do it in your own personal way. Be bold and move from managing to leading. Define your purpose and inspire those around you to follow your goals.
