Overview
It takes leadership and talent to grow a successful company. One of the best descriptions of a leader is that leaders focus on vision and strategy, guiding and removing obstacles for their teams.
Real leadership means providing a compelling vision and clear direction while giving creatives the right space to focus on what they do best… creating magic.
What was expected of employees 50 or 100 years ago simply doesn’t apply in today’s climate anymore.
And that’s why the management needs to adapt too.
TOPIC
Are You Managing Or Leading?
EPISODE
006
WHAT WE DISCUSS
Having a human-first approach and treating your team as you’d like to be treated yourself.
Are you managing or leading?
There’s a common assumption that today’s employees, especially those of the millennial era and younger are entitled, lazy, disloyal, unmotivated or even selfish.
But the truth is – they’re none of those things. They’re just not built for yesteryears’ ways of working. Admittedly, I come from an era where working eight hours a day in an office, aspiring to become a manager, a director working my way up the chain was the north star of being employed.
But today’s workforce isn’t interested in titles. They’re much more resourceful, innovative and entrepreneurial. They just want to be part of something that has a purpose. The eight-hour workday comes from the early 1900s, on the factory floor, the Industrial Revolution era to be more specific, but that traditional workplace is totally out of sync of what the needs are of today.
Today’s workforce – they want to be invested emotionally. They don’t want to be doing time-sheeting. It’s so de-humanising. To continue growing the culture of our business – I put three key conditions upon myself to help me be a better leader:
- The first thing is, I put a 100% trust in them. From the moment they walk through those doors. I provide my team with areas of responsibilities. They have goals, they have deadlines, but I assume that they’re here for the right reason.
- The second thing is, I provide them with space. WeAgile is a remote-first business so they can work from wherever they feel most comfortable. But I give them provisions for them to be able to communicate with the entire team as and when needed. I don’t track what time they come online or when they clock off work as long as work is getting done to a high degree of quality. That’s all I can ask for.
- And lastly, I believe in culture. I believe that people want to show up to a workplace that doesn’t feel like a workplace that feels more like a community where they can be among friends where they can bring their whole selves to work.
A great quote that I recently heard was “organisations that are growing need to be managed, but employees need to be trusted”. Don’t let the workplaces of yesteryear and tradition hold you back. Bad employees lead to bad managers and if you want to build a strong organisation, you need to trust your team and you need to give them an environment where they can flourish.
It’s a tradition that keeps you managing and not leading and it’s a surefire way to fail.
