A small group of dedicated people

I spend a lot of time tracking leadership conversations through blogs, books, speakers and seminars and I notice a heavy emphasis on Personal Leadership in the ‘zeitgeist'*. The current conversation is less about dogma 6.0 or strategy 17 (made up terms) and more about the individual leader.

Just this week I came across the following ideas (none new, just current)...

• The Leaders Character
• Collaborative Leadership
• Authentic Leaders
• Care Factor Leaders
• etc etc

Each of these ‘leadership trends' are a lens. Experts are using these lenses to look at the issue of Personal or Self Leadership. These lenses ask the question ‘What difference do you make as a leader?' A friend of mine and brilliant Thought Leader, Suzanne Mercier often says, ‘the hardest person you will ever lead is yourself'. She is an expert in Authentic Leadership and talks about the impostor syndrome.

I love it all.

Leadership is personal. It's about the difference one person can make on the whole. It's about Inspired Leadership. Margaret Mead, the famous anthropologist said ‘never underestimate the power of a small group of dedicated people to change the world. Indeed it's the only thing that ever has.'

When I talk or think on this topic I see there is a need to explain the changing role of a leader around what has stayed the same and what needs to change in the 21st century. Here is an incomplete list of some ideas I think are important for the 21st century leader. These may have always been important but in my mind they are the new leadership essential skills.

1. Unlock: Nurturing talent in yourself and others
2. Open: Entertain differences of opinion
3. Elevate: Lift the game, create higher purpose
4. Adapt : Grow behavioral flexibility and change your approach
5. Share : Facilitate collaboration between clever people
6. Know : Create clarity and share perspective
7. Speak : Present and receive ideas. Yours and others
8. Spark: Energise others to move into better futures
9. Create: Deliver results and make things happen

Sitting around all of these are the 3 key roles of a leader to replace fear with confidence, confusion with clarity and to mobilise people in pursuit of a better future. In short, to be an Inspired Leader.

M@
Matt Church

P.S. *"Zeitgeist" refers to the ethos of an identified group of people, that expresses a particular world-view which is prevalent at a particular period of socio-cultural progression. My friend Anders Sorman-Nilsson delivers a fabulous presentation about this exact thing.