When individuals decide to grow in their careers, one of the first things they research on is which leadership skills can support them in leading people effectively.
And that makes sense. After all, People Leadership is one of the 4 Success Pillars in Global leadership, and people want to make sure they get it right.
In this article, we will go over the foundation skills of people leadership, and what exactly you need to learn in each one of them, and how each will help you as a leader.
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Let’s start by outlining and understanding one by one of the skills, and how they can help you in leadership. Read our blog post on what people leadership is and how to develop it, if you want to start from the beginning.
1 - Global Leadership & Decision-Making Styles:
During your career, you will meet different people from different places. Every single person is unique and has different approaches to situations.
Our minds, however, can’t compute an infinite number of situations and quickly make a conclusion on how to best react. That’s why humans create models. Models help humans approximate situations to a pattern so that they can make the best course of action or response to a situation.
That’s why leaders have to learn how to identify and “read” styles quickly. This can help address and cater to specific needs and interests, building trust and bonds faster.
Different types of people and decision-making styles value different things; therefore, they think, behave, act and give attention differently.
When you identify these values and preferences for each style, you can lead a more robust and straightforward conversation. Leading actions and driving initiatives become easier.
Again, it’s not about boxing or labeling people because, as I said, everyone is unique. There are no 2 people that are alike, even within homozygote twins. But each individual on this planet leans towards certain styles more than others. It’s about zoning in to what people value, as closest as possible. And if you understand this, you can quickly create rapport, build trust, and share the same goal.
2 - Communication & Trust:
When we search the word “communication” in Google, there are more than 6 billion results. And it’s not difficult to understand why. Humankind is a species that rely on communication to thrive and survive. We are a social species, after all.
However, we think we know the basics of communication, but we don’t. We often know how to talk and how to listen. But to communicate is an art that requires far more than that.
Communication has a lot more nuance than one thinks. For one, non-verbal aspects of communication have more impact in a conversation than anything else. We can plan arguments, and we can plan a full narrative.
In the end, that counts less than the subtle messages that we are (literally) communicating. Learning deep communication and the non-verbal aspects of communication and its cultural elements is critical in our globalized world. And we have to make sure all these nuances are aligned with the main message, otherwise, our communication attempt will fall flat.
On top of that, we have to focus on building trust and our reputation in every interaction we have with the people around us. Every interaction counts on trust building. Read our 1o1 Trust Building Guide here.
3 - Influencing Skills:
Here is the official descriptor for influencing skills: it is the capacity individuals have to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behavior, opinions, etc., of others.
In other words, it is the ability to guide people to come to certain conclusions without coercing (or forcing) them.
There is often controversy between influencing and manipulating. Influence is not manipulation. Actually, comparing these 2 words does not even make any sense. What makes more sense is comparing the act of persuasion with the act of manipulation. Both of them make use of influencing skills. The difference is in intent. Manipulation has a bad intent in the sense that it is for personal gain only.
Influencing skills is not good or bad. It can be used for good or bad. All leaders must learn to be influential because no leader makes decisions alone anymore. And when using influential skills with a productive, constructive, and win-win mindset, influencing skills can have a real positive impact in the world without manipulation.
4 - Impressions Management:
Have you ever heard the saying, “there is not a second chance to make a first good impression”?
I bet you have. And I bet you – like many others out there – think that once you made an impression, it’s done.
There’s a good piece of news for those who have ever made a bad impression and regret it: impressions can be managed. And changed, by the way.
Impressions management is about you learning how to make sure people have (and perceive) the right impression about you. It sounds like influencing people to think good things about you, but it’s not exactly that.
It’s about helping people get you right.
Again, it’s not about manipulating, although it could be, and it is for many people. For ethical and good leaders, though, it’s not. It’s about helping people perceive your authentic self.
I learned in my career that the best thing we can do is be authentic. Sometimes, people get us wrong even when we are 100% authentic.
So impressions management is about helping people get us right. Leaders who learn impressions management have shown to make quicker progress in their careers than those who don’t.
5 - Managing Expectations:
If you are a leader or not a leader, managing expectations is a key skill to master. This skill should actually be taught in schools for everyone. Really.
Managing expectations is our ability to communicate what we expect to happen while learning from others what they are expecting in return.
It sounds simple enough, and it is. But quite often, people don’t know how to do it or even don’t care to learn this skill.
Do you know what managing expectations actually is? It’s managing data. Yep, that’s right. Your expectations and other people’s expectations are data. Data about what they want, what they prefer and so on.
Tell me, when you went buy a present for a person you cared for, was it easier to make the decision when you knew what they wanted or when you didn’t?
When you know what people expect, you can take the right action to create the right expected result. Why? Because you have data. You have information. And remember, information is power, right?
So the more you know about how to manage expectations (and the more you do it right), the better results in life you’ll see.
6 - Manager Coaching Skills:
A decade into the new millennium, the company I was working for introduced a series of training for all directors and above to develop manager coaching skills.
In the beginning, I thought it would be a waste of time, to be quite frank. And that’s because I thought I knew manager coaching skills at the time. I am pretty embarrassed to say today that I did not. I got it all wrong at the time.
Manager coaching skills are the ability to guide and coach your team on things that make them feel stuck or frustrated. Through this skill, you will help them sort out the issue, find their own solution, plan a course of action, set goals for the execution, and track the results. Manager coaching skills are a crucial skill to help employees develop critical thinking. Most managers think it’s the same as mentoring, and it’s not.
Like influencing skills, it’s not about manipulation. It’s about helping individuals set their mindsets correctly for what they want to accomplish, find the solution that best suit them and get the results.
With the awareness and knowledge that I have today, I’d dare say that manager coaching skills should be taught to every single leader that has any leadership role in an organization, regardless of title and power. Not just directors and above.
From my experience, when I started coaching my team members instead of mentoring them (which I wrongly thought was coaching), I saw a HUGE increase in performance. But what was more surprising was that I saw a fascinating bond of trust form between us.
When done right, manager coaching skills improve performance and create a bond that goes beyond work relations because when employees feel guided and cared for, it becomes personal on an unconscious level.
7 - Creating Collaborative & Motivated Teams:
Here is the fact: people collaborate for different purposes. And people are motivated by different things. And these go hand in hand.
Leaders have to learn how to form collaborative teams to get optimal performance from talents and harness the collective brainpower.
I like to say that each individual talent, when summed, will never be as good enough as when all talents come together. And this is the power of collective brainpower.
Focusing on creating collaborative teams is part of wanting to create a more inclusive workplace. People want to belong. So leaders must do this the right way. They need to:
- Hire the right people
- Learn what drives people in their team to collaborate
- Create engagement rules or norms
- Drive team performance from storming to performing
- Address motivational drivers correctly.
Focusing on creating collaborative teams is part of wanting to create a more inclusive workplace.
8 - Using Motivation Drivers The Right Way
In the same way we have different decision-making styles and personality types, we have different motivational drivers for everyone.
As leaders, we have to understand the main categories of motivational drivers, how to use and apply each, and then match them as close as possible with each employee in our teams.
In other words, you will have to have a different motivational strategy for each of your employees. For that, you not only will have to learn about motivational drivers, but you will also have to understand your employees, peers and stakeholders, and what motivates each one of them.
Now that you know exactly which skills are the foundation of people leadership, you can build up a career plan to develop these people leadership skills. Learning a new skill takes time, especially if you want to become proficient. Take your time to create the right strategy for you and prioritize which one you want to focus on first.
If you are interested in improving your people leadership skills and want to learn step-by-step how to build them, check out our Global Executive Leadership Program. We go over all 4 success pillars of global leadership during 9 online modules, including 2 modules entirely dedicated to people leadership.
In case you have a specific people leadership skill in mind to develop or a situation in which you feel stuck, you can purchase one of our executive coaching packages. We can help you sort the issue or topic out during your program and find the best course of action to make things better for you and your team. Executive coaching can be a powerful tool in people leadership.
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