Posted on June 27, 2014
Harvard Business Review has an article with many questions to ask yourself in order to help you become a better leader. Read it below!
Start by asking yourself these questions about your organization:
1) Do members of my organization feel part of a community?
2) Does my organization have a shared purpose – one that binds us together and compels us all to do the hard work of innovation?
3) Does it live by rules of engagement supportive of a set of core values: bold ambition, responsibility to the community, collaboration, and learning?
4) Do we have the ability to generate ideas through candid discourse and debate?
5) Do we have the ability to test ideas through quick pursuit, reflection, and adaptation?
6) Do we have the ability to make integrative decisions, rather than compromising or letting some groups dominate?
Ask yourself some questions abut your own leadership mind-set and practices:
1) Do I think my primary job as a leader is to create a context in which my team can innovate?
2) Am I comfortable serving as the “stage setter” as opposed to the visionary leading from the front?
3) Do I have the courage and patience required to amplify differences, even when discussion becomes heated and when ambiguity and complexity loom?
If your answer to any of these questions is “no” or even “I don’t know,” it’s probably time to look again at your own leadership role and at the leadership potential that may be hiding in your organization. Many of the remarkable innovation leaders we studied had to encourage others to rethink their ideas about leadership and to recognize that operating in the ways we’ve described is far from easy – especially for those who may be passionate geniuses themselves.
