Leaders often face the challenge of choosing between success and likeability. Unfortunately, choosing corporate effectiveness over office culture can cause a dip in motivation for your subordinates. Learn to increase your likeability without sacrificing the leadership qualities that earned you the job by improving your emotional intelligence.
5 Ways to Connect with Subordinates
- Make connections. This isn’t simply an effective networking tip, but also a way to develop kinship with your team. By sacrificing an hour of your time at the next corporate event or team meeting, you’re presenting yourself as a human being who cares about the day-to-day of each employee, regardless of position or tenure.
- Stay steady. Want to build confidence with your employees? Practice steadiness during times of trouble. Whether you’re reacting to a workplace dispute or a quarterly failure, people respect leaders who can keep their head in a crisis.
- Invest in individuals. If an executive were to spend time encouraging every employee in the company, their own career would fail in no time flat. However, engaging with individual employees proves that a leader has a heart for the company and a team-player mentality. Invest in one or two promising leaders and ask each member of your team to do the same. Over time it will trickle down to entry-level employees as well as aspiring leaders.
- Practice integrity. Nothing undermines subordinates’ confidence in their leader faster than getting caught in a gray area. Demonstrate integrity in all aspects of business, whether that means taking responsibility for a failure, treating each team member equally, or praising another leader for proactive thinking.
- Keep it in perspective. Likeability helps leaders achieve greater success, but focusing too much on subordinates’ opinions will undermine executive effectiveness. Focus instead on building strong character and good work ethics. The rest will follow.
For assistance building your executive career, contact Colleen at Executive Resumes Atlanta.