You can also connect with us on:
Leadership Solutions: Executive Coaching and Leadership Development specializing in Strategy Development and Implementation
  • Home
  • About
  • Coaching
    • The Benefits of Coaching
    • Effective Teams
    • Executive Coaching
    • Coaching and Mentoring: Developing Managers as Coaches & Mentors
    • Difficult Team Conversions
    • Choosing a Coach
    • Coaching Articles & Research
    • COMENSA Research Findings on Coaching in SA
  • Strategy
    • What is Strategy? >
      • What it takes to make a good Strategy
      • Diagnosing the internal environment
      • Figuring Out How to Reach the Promised Land
      • Strategy: External Analysis
      • The Competitive Environment
      • Defining the Challenge and Creating the Guiding Policy
      • WIGs, Scoreboards and Tracking Progress
    • Strategic Leadership >
      • Strategic Thinking
      • Strategic Thinking (cont.)
      • Strategic Acting
      • Strategic Acting (cont.)
      • Strategic Acting (cont.)
      • Strategic Influencing
      • Strategic Influencing (cont.)
      • Strategic Influencing (cont.)
      • Strategic Leadership Teams
      • Strategy as a Learnining Process
      • Summing Up Strategic Leadership
    • Strategic Thinking >
      • What is Strategic Thinking?
      • Strategic Thinking as a Discipline
      • Where to Play and How to Win
      • Bucking an Industry Norm
      • Replicating Pockets of Excellence
      • Questions about Strategic Thinking
  • Leadership
    • Developing Business Leaders
    • Personality and Business
    • Self-Leadership >
      • Selling when you are not a Sales Person
      • Meetings! Bloody Meetings! Be Mindful
      • Resilience. How Resilient are You?
      • Resilience: Build your Own
      • Build Your Team's Resilience
    • Leadership >
      • #UselessLosers
      • Leadership is Exercised One Conversation at a Time
      • Presenteeism - Doing more harm than good
      • 5 Steps to Develop your Leadership Skills
    • Culture Change
  • Clients
    • Current Projects
    • What Our Clients Say >
      • What a Massive Shift
      • Our small part in the fight against Corruption
  • Articles
    • Exploding Myths >
      • Myth 1: I am not like the other Guy
      • Myth 2: I'm not Micromanaging.......
      • Myth 3: The Survey is Wrong
      • Myth 4: I don't care if they're happy!
      • Myth 5: I don't have time to meet with my Team
      • Myth 6: People underperform when they are uncommitted
      • Myth 7: Fear is a great Motivater
    • An Axe to Grind >
      • Managers Joining the Pity Part
  • Contact

Leaders are Dealers: Influence

8/25/2015

0 Comments

 
Collaboration, agreement
In this third article in the series on how leaders can re-engage with the vision and regain their inspiration, we look at the role of influence and relationships.  If you've missed the previous articles, you can find them by following this link.

A leader is a dealer in influence. Her greatest challenge is to find ways to influence others. People first buy into the leader, and then they buy into the vision. The leader needs to win the support of all stakeholders. Firstly, she needs to win the support of her team for the vision. Then she needs to win the support of her upline – be this the board, the holding company or the shareholders – to the direction being pursued. This can be a challenge all of its own – especially when you know that your strategy is going to be 3 to 5 years in the making, and you are being pushed to deliver quarterly results. Influence at this level is often about what happens outside of board meetings or reviews. Leaders influence one conversation at a time – no matter how difficult this may be. Influence also means making sure that the expectations of the various stakeholders are managed, and making sure that key opinion-makers are on her side. This cannot be left to the formal meetings that we attend. It must happen behind the scenes in ongoing conversations in order to make sure that the right people are thinking and saying the right things about your team, your business and your leadership.

Who do you need to build a better relationship with? Who is the key to winning upline support for your strategy? How will you draw this person closer? How will you explore your ideas with this person outside of the boardroom so that you do not have to defend your strategy and tactics to them inside the boardroom? Who is key to winning the support of other opinion-makers? How could you win their support?

Do you have your team’s support for your vision? If not, why not? What concerns or reservations do they have? What fears do they have? How can you allay their fears and win their support? How can you make them an integral part of the vision and strategy?


0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Categories

    All
    Accountability & Responsibility
    Coaching
    CPD (Continuing Professional Development)
    Culture Change
    Diversity
    Ethics & Ethical Dilemmas
    Influence
    Leaders As Coaches
    Leadership
    Leadership Development
    Managers As Coaches
    Managers-as-coaches
    Motivation
    Personal Leadership
    Strategic Leadership
    The Discipline Of Leadership
    Trust & Trustworthiness
    Values
    Vision

    Archives

    October 2019
    September 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    February 2018
    April 2017
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    May 2015

    RSS Feed

Whats Next?

Leadership Development
Executive Coaching
Business Strategy

What my clients say

Articles
    Work We've Done
    Self-leadership
    Strategic Leadership
    Strategic Thinking
    Strategy

Call me! 082 5519504
Picture
Picture
Picture

    Ask me a Question

Submit