Being a horrible boss is easy, in fact, it’s glorified on TV. What you may not see every day is what a good boss looks like. How does a good boss lead? Being in charge is the ultimate journey of oneself you can partake in. It starts with the self, (after all that is the only thing we really can control), learning to inspire nonverbally, how to inspire verbally, and how to lead a team properly.
As a leader, it is important to establish credibility whenever you take on a new position of authority, so let’s start with why you should believe me. I come from a family of teachers and entrepreneurs. I have been working since I was eight years old fixing up properties for the family business and I was 16 when I got my first job away from home as a lifeguard. Over the course of four years, I climbed six ranks until I was the area supervisor. Leading over one-hundred lifeguards, operating nine facilities, and scheduling for all those guards. Since my first year of college I quickly became a peer mentor (mentoring over thirty students), an Honors Leader (in charge of over thirty students) the Marilyn Davies College of Business Senator for the Student Government Association, Vice-President of Alpha Lambda Delta (an internationally recognized first-year honors organization), and President of Golden Key (an internationally recognized second-year honors organization).
It is lonely at the top so the better relationship you have with yourself the better you will do. The higher up you climb the fewer coworkers you will have, so you must be able to handle being alone a lot more. Sometimes you must be your own best friend. We are social creatures designed to interact with one another, so it is very natural to want to spend time with your “subordinates”, but it is important to maintain a boundary for several reasons. Boundaries build trust. You want to avoid showing favoritism by spending more time with one employee, depending on your level of authority you may not even see your boss every day so you may find yourself having to make most decisions on your own.
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Another aspect of the self that is worth working on is confidence. A confident boss can inspire confidence in their employees. The same logic applies with insecurities, a leader who can’t deal with their own emotions will tend to project their emotions onto their employees. The better you are doing the better decisions you will make and the better your team will do. A change of mind is necessary to be an effective leader. Start looking for the bigger picture, set goals, and try to make decisions that are better for the team as a whole rather than the individual. Set a vision for your team to work towards.
When you think of great good leaders do you think of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, or Gandhi? There are many reasons for that. One of the main reasons may be because of one of the most important laws from “The 48 Laws of Power”, “Law four: Always say less than necessary”. What you don’t say can sometimes be more important than what you do say. By learning to speak less and focusing on what you are trying to say clearly and concisely you appear smarter and wiser. You will save more time and will be less likely to say something foolish. Body language is a must in terms of nonverbal messages. Talking with your hands expresses passion and urgency. The way you hold yourself conveys confidence and sets the tone for your leadership.
Appearance is extraordinarily important to be a good leader. It is important to appear like you work all the time to your employees. When I was working at the city pool, I had this manager who appeared to always be wet. It looked like he had always just finished working on a pool, the reality was that he had accidentally bleached his shirt up to his chest which created the illusion that he was always working. People are inspired by the leader who works alongside them; by creating this illusion he had gained respect from his employees. A hard worker that doesn’t look like they are working will get less respect than a slacker who looks busy.
Every leader inspires in a different way. My personal favorite way of inspiring people is through the help of idioms. “I know you are intimidated by this project that I am asking you to take on but think of it a real drop in the bucket” or “I understand you’re on the fence about the risk but a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”. Learning a few idioms is a good idea when you’re a leader for a few reasons. Firstly, if you can make someone laugh, they are more likely to agree with you and idioms are funny. Secondly, it feels more genuine and snaps people out of autopilot whenever they hear an idiom.
Lastly, they make it sound like you know what you’re talking about. At the same time, when you do speak it helps to reveal a certain amount of vulnerability to those working for you. It creates an environment of trust that allows the worker to feel comfortable asking for help. The last thing you want is to create an environment of uncertainty. An easy mistake early bosses will make, is not learning how to delegate properly. When you talk to your employees it is important that you differentiate between being bossy and being a leader. A bossy person cuts down others for making mistakes, orders their subordinates around like dogs, and blames their employees for why they aren’t doing well.
A leader inspires their team to improve themselves by working together, helps learn them from their mistakes, takes pride in their team, and owns up to their mistakes. By delegating your employees with more difficult tasks you are showing confidence in them as an individual and helping them grow. You will not only free up your time to handle more difficult tasks, but you will build up a team that likes working for you. You will know you are on the right track when you are able to come back from time off and the number of fires you must put out starts to decrease over time. Think of every mistake your team makes as an opportunity to help them learn and grow from.
Take pride in your team, I will never forget the first time my supervisor defended me against my general manager because we are a team. I worked harder than I ever had before after that. At the same time, when you make a mistake that affects your team, it is important to own up to it. Remember what I said about how when your team makes a mistake it is an opportunity to help them learn and grow? When you think of yourself as a team and you mess up then it is not only an opportunity for you to learn from your mistakes but also an opportunity for you teach the people you lead from your mistakes.
