Notes from the Field - Develop Influence

You and I both know leadership isn't really easy. It's not about titles. It's not about our position on an org chart. I had to learn that long ago, the hard way. Leadership, if we boil it down, is really about the influence we have on another person. How do we create that influence? And there's a ton of ways to do that. But I'm going to give you just three simple things that I've learned throughout my leadership career. And I'm going to use the first three letters of influence. Number one, it's about having integrity with the person. Now that doesn't mean not to lie. It does mean that, but. Right. We already know those things. Think about integrity from this perspective. If as a leader you're talking about quality, quality. Quality is the most important thing yet. The thing that you reward your team on is quantity. Are you truly in integrity with that individual? Integrity is key. Number two is our ability to help somebody navigate creates influence. Meaning when somebody comes to us, we don't solve their problem. We help them through to create their own solution to the problem. When we create an environment where we're solving everything for everybody else, we're not creating the type of influence in a positive way. Where the person is answering these three questions they have in their mind. Does the individual care about me? Can the individual help me and can I trust them? Those are the things that build influence. And the third and the hardest one that I have found in order to build influence others is the letter F. Faith in other people. As leaders, this is tough. Having faith in somebody and letting them do something, letting them achieve or try something before they've proven they can do it. If you're anything like me, I was always. Once they prove themselves, I'll give them more. Building influence with your team means having faith in them because they feel it, they understand it. Leadership is about building influence. You can start with those three things.