February 17, 2025

TRENDING

Leadership Influence

Google+ Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr +

By CPA Sylvia Karaba

Leaders Must Learn to Embrace Their Followers as Equals 

In my leadership exploration journey, I came across a quote by John C Maxwell: “The true measure of leadership is influence—nothing more, nothing less.” This stirred my thoughts to explore this statement to understand how a leader can apply influencing skills for profound effect leadership, especially in our ever-changing business landscape.

It’s important to note that influence should not be confused with control or power. Influence shouldn’t be coerced through power or control. Neither should it be gotten by exploiting and manipulating others to get one’s way. Influence requires a leader to be intuitive and engage the employees to know what inspires and motivates employees’ commitment and use this knowledge to leverage performance and positive results. Influence is correlated to the level of trust between parties; as a matter of fact, influence increases proportionally to the amount of trust in a relationship. Leaders must look for ways to serve and value their followers to build trust and rapport. Actual influence is demonstrated when leaders lead as if they have no power.

To unmask what influence entails, let’s first explore what most leaders are missing out on in their roles as leaders. Most leaders view leadership as authority, forgetting that employees have a choice, and they resolve daily the amount of effort they will put into their job. Leadership only provides a partial source of power, and successful leaders know that they cannot rely exclusively on directive tactics to be effective. In instances where directive/coercive leadership is applied, innovation and creativity take a back seat and eventually die off. As we move into the 22nd-century leadership, leaders must learn to embrace their followers as equals and destroy the ivory towers to achieve an exceptionally positive influence on those they lead.

Most influential leaders in history and our time have one thing in common: they influence with character. Leaders looking to have influence must self-evaluate two critical components that speak to character, i.e. Credibility and authenticity, which I will expound on in this article. Though there are many skills that leaders can apply to have a positive influence, these two components will set them up for influence and inspire them towards a successful leadership trajectory.  With the emerging trends and global changes in the business environment, Credibility and authenticity will be a unique competitive advantage.

Regrettably, leadership today is characterized by oozing greed, moral decadency, diluted ethics, empty promises and blatant lies. In addition, despite leaders’ frequent attendance of business ethics/leadership seminars being at an all-time high, there needs to be a more tangible impact on the leadership of the day. This has created a thirst for impactful leadership in the world. To quench this scorching thirst, we need a breed of leadership willing to do what’s right no matter how difficult.

Authenticity is the core of successful leadership, and it is still rare. Most leaders are blinded by status and impeccable supremacy that comes with power. Authentic leaders embrace vulnerability, which is critical in fostering trust, relationship building, creating meaningful connections, transparency, and growth within themselves and their teams. Authentic leaders are at ease when sharing their mistakes, experiences, and failures; accountability and integrity are important and natural to them. In addition, they are respectful, empathetic and open to the opinions of others. They practice human-centred leadership, significantly impacting the organizations and the people they lead. Authentic leaders are natural influencers due to their vulnerability, which creates trust, accountability and Credibility. They influence those they relate with within and without the corridors of power.

Leaders are regarded as credible when their behaviour and actions align with their words. Therefore, the significance of Credibility must be considered while evaluating leadership influence. The leadership guru John C Maxwell once said, “Credibility is the leader’s currency. With it, he or she is solvent; without it, he or she is bankrupt.” We are living in times when Credibility is at an all-time low in leaders.

Interestingly, leaders have consciously or unconsciously embraced the phrase ‘Do as I say and not as I do’ and still expect to have a positive influence on those they lead. This has been brought by ‘power saturation’ in the leaders’ heads as they lean into the magnetic pole of power. However, leaders must learn to sustain their Credibility in the eyes of their followers in order to have the desired influence.

Unfortunately, most of these leaders don’t realize the absence or loss of influence in their leadership until they ‘lose the locker room’. These leaders are blinded by power and do not recognize as their followers detach from them. Followers become demotivated and disengaged, make no discretionary effort, do not initiate, and have a cynical attitude. In a nutshell, the followers routinely do just enough, are indifferent, and devoid of passion.

However, those who have ‘lost the locker room’ can redeem themselves and re-establish their influence by taking some steps that include;

• Embracing vulnerability, admitting own mistakes, and granting others credit when merited. Being a person of high integrity builds trust and belief in your leadership.

• Keeping your commitments; being a person of your word. “Talk right and then walk right” to build trust and walk with your followers. 

• Sharing the organization’s goals, vision, purpose and aspirations with people and letting them know how their mandates contribute to the organization’s good. If the leader gets this right, their influence will be positive.

• Investing in the personal and professional growth of the team. Leaders can apply different methods, including mentorship and coaching, training, helping team members build networks, giving fast and candid feedback and encouraging team members to stretch objectives. Assisting people to grow helps them acquire new skills that work better for the organization.

• Developing a winning team by implementing a winning strategy, building trust and open communication, encouraging diverse voices, promoting collaboration and teamwork, maintaining a positive culture, managing conflict and resolving issues proactively and measuring & elevating team performance.  Leveraging each team member’s unique strengths and talents and fostering an environment where everyone feels included and valued.

There is no doubt that influence can transform a team that is barely holding on by a shoestring existence, contented with being average, into a team of individuals who seek to be exceptional. Embracing authenticity and Credibility helps leaders embark on a fulfilling leadership expedition of inspiring others to reach their full potential.

For leaders to experience influence, they must have trust and Credibility. As such, leaders must seek input on decisions that impact the individuals or the team. They must know the simple truth: that trust begets trust, and generally, people tend to gravitate around those they trust the most. This will ensure leaders will increase influence and trust and connect people to work together in a healthy and productive manner, which is critical in the new paradigm shift of leadership in the VUCA (vulnerable, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) world of the 21st century. 

Influence should be and is reciprocal. One way to elevate your influence with others is to be open to influence yourself. Suffice it to say that you can demonstrate genuine openness by creating psychological safety, promoting and exercising open and transparent communication, seeking ideas and perspectives from the team, and using the talents, skills, knowledge, and expertise of others. By displaying openness, you begin to build respect and trust with others, and that will increase your influence.

An effective leader stimulates followers into action not with intimidation but by provoking their aspirations and motivations to align them to the vision and goals they have as leaders. A leader who is focused and intentional in exercising positive influence in a team builds trust and becomes an impetus for excellence.  The positive influence first impacts followers individually then permeates and aligns with group efforts, producing exponential successes. On the flip side, abused influence can result in disastrous outcomes.

Evidently, leaders have a choice to lead people to greatness or despair. Leadership has little to do with management acumen, authority, social status, wealth, residential place, being in charge or title held on an organogram. Leadership is influence: inspiring and awakening a sense of expectation inside those you lead. 

Influence isn’t just about getting our way. It’s earning our way into the hearts and minds of people to make things better. As leaders, let’s embrace and actualize the quote by John Quincy Adams, “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader”.

The author is a Seasoned Internal Auditor and Leadership Enthusiast.

snkaraba@yahoo.com

Share.

About Author

Leave A Reply