Lessons learnt about Leadership and Management

A few weeks ago I joined City University of London in order to gain a deeper knowledge about leadership and management.

Junior associates, managers, aspiring managers, and top-level leaders are all concerned with developing the competencies they need to become more effective leaders.

Below, I would like to share some interesting aspects learnt during this course:

1. Setting up objectives:

Peter Drucker (1954): "objectives should be smart: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timed. Key in all organizations: The vertical and horizontal configuration of departments, authority and jobs within a company”. “People, process, technology and structure should be aligned with the strategy and congruent with other one another (John Karren).

2. Team dynamics:

As John WoodIt said, if you want to arrive fast, you should walk alone if they objective is to arrive far, you should do it as a team.

3. Skills:

What qualities are shared by most of leaders?

• Influencing others, so a great leader is a master of social influence, and able to wield power effectively and fairly.

• Enthusiasm, we need to motivate.

• Integrity: we need to be trusted.

• Toughness: decisions will not always be popular.

• Fairness: we do not have favourites.

• Warmth: leadership involves the heart.

• Humbly: no egos here.

• Confidence: or people won´t follow you.

4. What leaders think - Research:

Dr Sunnie Giles, a professional executive coach and President of Quantum Leadership Group, completed a study were participants (holding a leadership position) were asked to choose the 15 most relevant leadership skills, below we show the results of this study:

Full article can be found on here.