# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
School counselors are uniquely equipped to bridge the gaps between administration, teachers, parents, and students. As the demands placed on everyone in a school community increase, it's vital that we view and include school counselors as part of our leadership teams. Let's make sure we recognize all they do and put their strengths to work for our students! Here are 11 ways school counselors serve as leaders in your building.

1. School counselors recognize and showcase diversity.

In many buildings, school counselors are considered the "heart" of the school. They help create an inclusive environment that is respectful, welcoming, kind, and open to all.

2. School counselors develop community partnerships.

Counseling staff work collaboratively with universities, community colleges, technical schools, local unions, military reps, and apprentice programs to provide a variety of opportunities for students. They are especially vital in ensuring underserved and first-generation students have access to and the tools to reach all possible post-high school options.

3. School counselors help during difficult situations.

Strengths such as listening, reflecting, and high emotional intelligence make school counselors valuable allies when trying to get buy-in from staff or the greater community on difficult issues. Counselors foster a culture of change via strong lines of communication and valuing input from all parties involved.

4. School counselors maintain strong home-school connections.

Counselors tend to be the liaison for parents when it comes to communicating with the school. This leadership role is especially important when assisting families who are not familiar with the school setting or have issues trusting staff.

5. School counselors maximize educational success.

School counselors can help to maximize the educational attainment of all students by providing students with mental health services (school or community-based) and developmental guidance that takes a proactive approach in helping students set and reach academic goals.

6. School counselors lead staff trainings.

Administrators who use their counseling staff (rather than outside contractors) to lead building-wide trainings can save a lot of money and gain quicker buy-in from staff. School counselors are experts on topics such as student engagement, positive discipline, suicide/self-harm, students-as-leaders, peer mentoring programs, and academic/social interventions for low-performing students.

7. School counselors protect and advocate for disadvantaged students.

Counselors identify and amend policies and practices that negatively impact disadvantaged students and advocate for equitable services for all students.

8. School counselors use expertise to bring data to life.

Like administrators, counselors are trained in data collection and analysis. They are skilled at using this information to drive decisions about placement, intervention, and overall student health and wellbeing.

9. School counselors mediate difficult situations between parents/students and staff.

Counselors are consistently looking for ways to support the relationship between school staff and parents. Acting as a mediator when one or both parties are upset about a situation is a critical way in which school counselors serve as leaders.

10. School counselors organize and lead crisis response.

Counselors are on the front lines after a tragedy has happened in a school or community. Staff, students, parents, and community members look to the counselors for guidance and support immediately following an event. Because of their training in emotional/mental, the counseling staff is critical in advocating for and teaching self-care to staff, parents, and students during a crisis.

11. School counselors empower and inspire.

School counselors inherently believe in people and work tirelessly to communicate that. By being visible and accessible at all times, their calming, caring, and encouraging presence helps support and empower staff in the building.

School counselors serve as leaders in many ways and we need to value their perspectives and strengths. They are vital to building positive learning environments in which students thrive.
Join our Facebook group Principal Life for more conversation about and insights into the challenges of school leadership.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
11 Ways Your School Counselors Serve as Leaders - WeAreTeachers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
School counselors are uniquely equipped to bridge the gaps between administration, teachers, parents, and students. As the demands placed on everyone in a school community increase, it's vital that we view and include school counselors as part of our leadership teams. Let's make sure we recognize all they do and put their strengths to work for our students!

# data[].attributes.headline
Leadership Traits Every Counselor Should Have

# data[].attributes.subject
Leadership Traits Every Counselor Should Have

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Far from simply setting up student schedules and administering placement and academic evaluation tests, school counselors are leaders who can have a huge impact on the acceleration and the enhancement of learning. They must possess the ability to negotiate, persuade others their ideas are worthwhile, and collaborate with principals and other school officials.

School counselors have many responsibilities, including counseling students, working with teachers and parents, referring students to outside agencies, participating in student welfare and learning support communities, and evaluating and improving their own school counseling program.

Listening

First and foremost, a school counselor needs to be a good listener. Often, they have several students they work with and may get very few chances to converse with them in a one on one setting. "The most basic of all human needs is the need to understand and be understood," said Ralph G. Nichols. "The best way to understand people is to listen to them."

To listen effectively, counselors must be fully in the moment, not thinking of their "to do" list but rather giving their full attention to the issue at hand. Reflecting back to the person, your perception of what they said helps show understanding, and lets them make corrections. The counselor must also keep an open mind, being careful not to make any judgments until they have heard the entire story. ¹

Being Empathetic

Often a part of listening, putting themselves in the shoes of the person speaking, whether that is a student or another school official, helps counselors truly understand the underlying issues.

"Without the ability to understand what the student is experiencing, a counselor cannot truly do an effective job," says Helen A. Hatridge, past president of the Missouri School Counselor Association. "Empathy leads to good listening and a better ability to help the client come up with solutions. It also helps the student feel more comfortable and willing to open up to a counselor." ²

To be more empathetic, it is essential for a counselor to put aside their viewpoint. At the same time, they need to validate the student's viewpoint, which does not always mean agreement. Instead it means acknowledging their right to have an opinion, and that they have valid reasons for it. Asking how that person thinks a situation should be handled or what they would do opens up an even deeper understanding. ³

Building Relationship

It takes time for a counselor to build a relationship with any student or even their peers. However, through listening and being empathetic, that process can be accelerated.

To feel free to talk to a counselor, a student must often "break the ice," and needs to feel trust, comfort, and acceptance. Students need to accept that the counselor is a professional caregiver, and someone they can turn to without fear of judgement.

A counselor who develops this trusting relationship with students can get a lot more done, An understanding of the kid culture and what they care about can go a long way toward providing that environment of trust and understanding.

Performing Assessments

Assessment skills are essential for any school counselor in a number of areas. From academic and skills assessment to personality testing and career advisement, the ability to discern the intersection of talent and desire is essential to offering good counsel.

Assessment also includes determining if a student has special needs and interpreting test and non-test data to decide where the student should be placed, and what programs will most benefit them.

Regardless of the reason for assessment, the steps often include, but are not limited to the following:

Choosing what tests should be administered and when.

Scheduling, preparing, and administering tests.

Scoring tests or sending them out to be scored.

Advising students, teachers, parents, and other staff on test score interpretation.

Evaluating the testing process, results, and subsequent recommendations.⁴

Assessments involve some testing but must also be combined with listening, empathy, and the relationship that has been built to determine how testing outcomes relate to personality, desires, and the goals of the student.

Coordinating Efforts and Activities

Efforts and activities can fall into a couple of different categories. A counselor will have to coordinate Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) for students, and other student specific plans as well. Along with coordinating individual student plans and interacting with teachers and other school officials, the school counselor often coordinates other activities and projects as well.

In many cases, the school counselor is in charge of parent newsletters, school announcements, managing social media accounts, and other community outreach and event planning efforts.

The ability to coordinate and manage these efforts and activities requires strong leadership and organizational skills. Teaching these skills to students by allowing them to take responsibility for their own educational goals and other efforts enables a counselor to show leadership by example.

Exercising Authority

In order to be able to implement programs, direct student activities and coordinate tasks, a counselor must exercise a certain amount of authority.

This means first of all that the counselor must be granted the authority to handle certain tasks by other school officials such as principals and administrators. The more their authority is validated by their actions, the more the counselor will be perceived as a leader by parents and students alike.

Secondly, the school counselor must be willing to wield the authority they have been granted, taking charge of tasks and situations, setting expectations, and holding those responsible to deadlines.

The counselor must also know in any given situation when to cross the line from friend to professional. If a student is being abusive or abused, a more professional response is ethically and legally mandated. It is the counselor's obligation to take charge and follow through, ensuring that student safety comes first.

Being Flexible

If one thing is certain in the field of education, it is that things will change. Interruptions, schedule changes, new programs, and new responsibilities all interrupt a counselor's daily routine.

Student needs and the needs of the school overall often take priority over scheduled meetings. Parent phone calls, staff concerns, talks in classrooms, and unexpected counseling needs can all be disruptive.

A successful counselor should:

Leave gaps in their day for unscheduled needs.

Use good time management techniques.

Set reasonable boundaries. Know what is worthy of an interruption, and what can wait.

Communicate clearly. Inform students, parents, and faculty of schedules and boundaries.

By remaining flexible, a counselor can better manage the stress inherent in the job and be more responsive when needs arise unexpectedly.

Having a Sense of Humor

Being able to see things from the side of humor has a number of advantages. It lets students see that the counselor is human and can not only laugh at situations but laugh at themselves as well.

This is frequently one of the biggest assets in building student trust and developing a relationship with them. It is often how those students relate to adults, whether through jokes or humorous anecdotes that illustrate a point the counselor is trying to get across.

Humor is also a stress reliever. Being able to see the humorous side of interruptions and other daily situations allows a counselor to relax and keep anxiety from taking over many scenarios.

It takes a combination of many leadership traits to make a school counselor effective. They must use listening skills and offer empathy in order to build relationships. A counselor must also perform assessments and coordinate activities and educational efforts. These duties mean they must remain flexible and exercise authority when appropriate.

Not one of these traits alone is enough, and no one is equally adept in all of them. They are taught and can be learned in a Master of Arts in Counseling with an emphasis in school counseling like the one offered by Wake Forest University. This graduate degree will prepare you for a career as a school counselor in almost any setting.
Sources: 1 2 3 ⁴ American Counseling Association, Assessment Skills for School Counselors Mind Tools, Empathy at Work Education World, School Counselors Reflective On What Makes Them Effective Fast Company, 5 Ways To Improve Your Listening Skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Leadership Traits Every Counselor Should Have

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Far from simply setting up student schedules and administering placement and academic evaluation tests, school counselors are leaders who can have a huge impact on the acceleration and the enhancement of learning. They must possess the ability to negotiate, persuade others their ideas are worthwhile, and collaborate with principals and other school officials.

# data[].attributes.headline
The Counselor in the Principal’s Leadership Circle

# data[].attributes.subject
The Counselor in the Principal’s Leadership Circle

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Mod 9 Video 1: The Counselor in the Principal’s Leadership Circle

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
by Jan Burgess and Donna Bates

In mid-August, the much anticipated "Welcome Back, Teachers" letter arrived from the new principal at Oregon's Lake Oswego Junior High School. This year's letter was different. It read like a teacher's to-do list:

Dear Faculty and Staff,

Welcome back! For our upcoming inservice day together, please

Bring two colored markers.

Bring three note cards, each one with a n idea you have always wanted to investigate or try in your classroom.

Wear tennis shoes.

Bring a bottle of water. (We're going to be working hard!)

Leave your cell phone, doubts, I can'ts, and it won't works at home.

See you at 8 a.m. on August 31 in the school cafeteria. Breakfast and lunch will be provided.

Can't wait for us to get started,

Your principal

This was definitely not business as usual!

A Culture of Interdependence

Consider rafting a river with a group of friends. There is a guide, there are charts and maps of the river, and there is a sense of adventure as the group descends into the water. There are challenges ahead-perhaps boulders under the water that could sink the raft. Whitewater rapids and currents of varying strength are downstream. The guide instructs the group to listen to his commands, asks that each person be alert to potential hazards, and trains the group to work together. Throughout the journey, the group's trust in their leader grows, as does their sense of exhilaration in doing something successful together.

Shared leadership in schools is a similar journey. Through collaboration, collegiality, community, cooperation, and communication, interdependence emerges and is nourished. Interdependence is quality of connection built on trust and respect. For schools, the vehicle for building interdependence is not a raft but groups of teachers organized into teams-grade-level groups, departments, and small professional learning communities, each headed by a leader who facilitates the group's work and guides it toward a common end. As a faculty develops a shared, organization-wide understanding of who they are and what they are about, they are increasingly able to engage in ongoing, meaningful conversation that, if wisely and carefully conducted, becomes action on behalf of students and marks progress toward identified goals.

Historically, schools have operated on a hierarchical model. There is a leader at the top, who is charged with overseeing groups of teachers, who are charged with overseeing groups of students. Although teachers and others on staff work side by side, eat together, laugh, and share stories together, for most of the day they work alone, in their own individual classrooms with the doors closed. The faculty might meet monthly to hear updates about upcoming events, budget issues, schoolwide behavioral concerns, and district messages. Faculty meetings seldom involve robust discussions on issues or tackle curricular or instructional undertakings. When decisions are made, everyone knows it's the principal who says what's what. It's the principal who manages the operation.

Over the past several decades, a new model of interdependence has emerged. Margaret Wheatley (2000) describes this approach as one in which "people organize together to accomplish more, not less" (p. 340). She goes on to note, "Behind every organizing impulse is the realization that by joining with others we can accomplish something important we could not accomplish alone."

Schools, as living systems, have a great capacity to organize and to bring energy and passion to the work they undertake. When the system works as an integrated whole, with everyone in the organization connected around a central purpose, a synergy happens that can propel a school forward. We see this happen, for example, when faculty members commit to fully implementing new, cross-grade instructional strategies for reading, and then reading scores go up. We see it when a school faculty faithfully conducts data reviews and provides an array of instructional supports designed to help students meet grade-level reading and math standards, and then increasing numbers of students meet these standards and go on to graduate.

The Challenge of Leadership

Leadership in learning institutions means everyone understands and embraces the school's vision for student success, and everyone on staff participates in the journey toward that end. As Charlotte Roberts writes in The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook, "An interdependent vision can be realized only through collaborative action, so relationships at work become central" (Senge, Kleiner, Roberts, Ross, & Smith, 1994, p. 231). To re-energize, redefine, or re-establish the school's direction so that it provides opportunities for all students to succeed, there must be a collective responsibility for strengthening relationships and for improving academic achievement. This is the challenge administrators and teacher leaders share.

Fortunately, there are strong models for us to follow. Numerous major longitudinal research studies of effective schools attribute gains in student achievement to the work of small learning communities, team structures, and collaborative decision making (Jackson, Davis, Aheel, & Bordonaro, 2000; Lipsitz & Felner, 1997; Marzano, 2003; National Association of Secondary School Principals, 2000; National Middle School Association, 2003, 2005). Similarly, in The Fifth Discipline (1990) Peter Senge references teams, decision making, and a task orientation as crucial for any learning organization. Robert J. Marzano (2003) provides additional insight when he identifies three components that are necessary for establishing an interdependent work environment: broadening the range of participants in conversation, sharing power, and enhancing interpersonal relationships. Correspondingly, literature on high school reform points to "twin pillars ... (1) instructional improvement and (2) structural changes that personalize learning" (Quint, 2008, p. 68).

However, structural changes do not automatically result in substantive conversations or strengthened relationships among the adults who populate the school. Fostering a culture of interdependence relies on more than the structural apparatus usually in place in schools, which includes the building's schedules, how space is used, which rooms are allocated to which programs, and how adults spend their time. For example, team teaching can be an effective structure, but teaching side by side should not presume the two teachers will have conversations about students' challenges with curricular concepts or about the instructional strategies in use. The building's schedule might allow a group of teachers to share a common planning time but that, too, does not guarantee the teachers will meet together to assess student work or solve problems related to curriculum alignment.

The truth is, the critical work of schools is done through relationships among people. These relationships must be nurtured and attended to so that conversations move beyond collegiality to collaboration and a commitment to improving one's practice. In fact, recent research reviews done by the National Staff Development Council (2008) identified working in teams as the model for strengthening teaching practices. Also important, according to Jacqueline Ancess, coordinator of the National Center for Restructuring Education, Schools and Teaching, is that teacher relationships be "caring [and] characterized by interdependency, trust, respect and a sense of collective responsibility for students and school outcomes" (2008, p. 50). As William D. Greenfield (2005) writes, "The challenge for a school leader is to spark and sustain such a dialogue and to work with and through teachers to develop a shared commitment to implementing the desired practices effectively" (p. 249).

Moving toward this vision of strong relationships and a focus on student success begins by renewing an understanding of the purpose of the collective work in a school. Like the river rafters setting out on their journey, a faculty needs to know where they are all going and what each individual must do to help the school reach that destination.

To successfully navigate a river, ongoing conversation is a must. In school environments, those who lead must be willing to reexamine existing structures and processes and consider how else the school might organize itself to achieve the desired ends. New structures to consider are those that strengthen collegial relationship and provide a forum for many parties to share their voices and contribute to the conversation about how to support learning. These structures go by many names: professional learning communities (PLCs), Critical Friends Groups, interdisciplinary teams, and departments.

QUESTIONS to Consider

What is your vision for your school?

What current leadership model exists in your school?

How are decisions made in your school?

The Various "Looks" of Interdependence

Interdependence does look different depending on the school, the environment, and other variables. Let's consider a couple of examples.

At Fir Grove Elementary School in Beaverton, Oregon, a Title I school of about 500 students, all teachers are members of a grade-level team. In 2007, the principal assessed relationships in the grade-level teams, agreed with the teams' purpose, and challenged staff to focus more specifically on using their team time to become a professional learning community. Now, each week, one of the grade-level teams meets for the entire day as a PLC to discuss best practices, share effective lessons, and talk about ways to meet student needs. Making time for this embedded staff development has energized the Fir Grove faculty. They have been able to make their vision of ongoing teacher-led professional development a reality by leveraging a very traditional structure (grade-level teams) that was already in place.

Then there is Lake Oswego Junior High School, where teachers are organized into four core academic teams for instruction and also divided into curriculum departments. Both groups-teams and departments-meet regularly, often during weekly early-release time, to engage in professional growth activities and build relationships between and among colleagues. These complementary structures provide two avenues for adults to get to know one another better, to work together, to support each other, and to share student-related concerns and successes. Additionally, having two organizational structures increases the number of teacher leaders who have a significant voice in the workings of the school.

As Gordon Donaldson (2006) puts it, "Leadership is about how I can help cultivate relationships among talented and well-intentioned educators and parents so that we all can assure that every child learns" (p. 3). Changing the culture from one in which the principal is the only leader to one in which there is collective ownership of the work of schools and many voices are heard is a powerful practice and, in some schools, requires a shift in perspective. With this model, we're no longer talking about a single raft guided by a single expert but an arrangement in which the river guide must depend on multiple leaders in multiple rafts to be alert to the challenges and obstacles of the journey and to move together in some systematic fashion for the success of the outing.

Sharing Leadership

A shared leadership model of governance means principals seek out others in their school to build partnerships, tap others' strengths, and jointly move the vision forward. Principals who believe and act in ways that are invitational and support a common purpose understand that strong relationships with their faculty, developed through both formal and informal interactions, is fundamental to motivating everyone to move in the same direction. Think of how multiple boats on a rafting trip reach their final destination. Some rafts will run the rapids; others will portage around the rapids to reach calmer waters. Each raft takes the route that's best suited to the skills of the group onboard. What really matters is that all rafts travel to and reach the same destination; for schools, that destination is improved student learning.

Remember the "Welcome Back, Teachers" letter at Lake Oswego Junior High? The new principal who wrote it was making the point that business as usual was changing. On that late August morning, the 46-member faculty met and moved directly into an all-school teambuilding activity. Each person relied on the next to complete the activity. Debriefing afterward over a picnic lunch, the faculty identified the strength of the activity as the opportunity to work together and talk with one another. The general mood was that they were all in it together, sink or swim, and they were glad to have partners to help them succeed. After lunch, the entire faculty engaged in a lengthy discussion about the focus for the upcoming year and brainstormed ways to keep positive team spirit alive. Everyone was invited to participate in the creation of the school's action plan and focus for the year. The day ended with department teams aligning their goals to the school's common emphasis. In this simple way, one school moved toward a new model of shared leadership.

RUBEN'S DILEMMA

Ruben is a 7th grade science teacher in a very crowded K-8 school. The district's second K-8 school has seen its enrollment drop dramatically and has classrooms to spare. In response, the school board announced a change to the current configuration: The two schools will have one year to examine middle-level best practices and create a new 7th-8th grade school, with a 6th grade to be added after the first year of operation. The district has provided funding for six teachers to meet for four days over the summer, at which time they will outline a plan and draft a calendar of meetings for the upcoming year. Ruben is one of three teachers identified to lead this configuration study, and the plan is for him to stay on as the 7th grade team leader when the new school opens.

Relationship building is much on Ruben's mind. He'll be in charge of uniting two groups of adults hailing from two schools used to seeing the other as a rival. How will he go about this? What kind of support will he get from the new principal? And what will the new principal expect from him?

CONSIDER THESE KEY IDEAS AS YOU THINK ABOUT RUBEN'S DILEMMA:
Relationships

With any change in leadership, the culture changes. It's important to be proactive-to embrace collaboration and reach out with support and enthusiasm.

When forging working relationships, it helps to be clear about what you believe, be flexible, and give things time.

A change in leadership is an opportunity to define a new vision, look critically at what's working and what needs improving, and set a new course, factoring in the perspectives of all parties.

Teaching and Learning

Teaching and learning should always be at the center of what is done at school and in teams.

A significant portion of team time should be devoted to professional learning conversations.

OUR RESPONSE TO RUBEN: MAKE A CHANGE TO SHARED LEADERSHIP

Strengthening relationships within a group of adults who will be working together is important for any group's success, but it's especially critical in times of change. Planning activities that will help group members learn more about each other as people and as professionals is a great start. Ruben could model his intent to emphasize collaboration by asking a teacher from the other school to partner with him in planning over the summer and addressing relationship building early on. The plan and calendar they draft together might alternate meeting sites and divide tasks, thus honoring both faculties. It might stipulate that both faculties will be called on to react to and shape the subsequent action plan.

Ruben would also be wise to acknowledge the fears, concerns, and anxieties that this large change will cause to both faculties. A discussion of the unknowns they're facing-and how the faculties might work through them together-can set a positive model for the team's subsequent functioning.

Similarly, Ruben should ask to meet for a one-on-one conversation with his new principal. During this conversation, Ruben might ask her about her vision for the school, her support for teams working together, the ways she wants to work collaboratively with her teacher leaders, and what she sees as teacher leaders' function in the school. Ruben could help shape the principal's thinking on these topics by being supportive of her vision and by urging her to involve the teacher leaders as the new school takes shape. This melding of faculties will be stressful to all, so ongoing, open conversations will be critical, as will sharing information and planning and working together.

Envisioning a High-Performing and Equitable School

According to the U.S. Department of Education Office of Educational Research and Improvement's (2001) High Performing Learning Community Project, high-performing and equitable schools embrace five core principles:

A shared vision

Challenging curriculum and engaged student learning

Learning community

Supportive organizational structures

Proactive community relations

Interdependence is the organizing principle that links the five critical core characteristics into a cohesive whole and ensures their ongoing functionality.

Ask yourself: How developed are these five core principles in your school? What are the connections among the five? Is your school moving toward a common vision? What is your school's primary focus? Do you have supportive organizational structures to help all students succeed? What are the common beliefs at your school about how students learn? What connections are there with parents and the community? Are these connections working?

Highly effective schools don't just choose one or two of the core principles as a focus; they understand the interdependence of the five. Their approach is holistic, built around a common vision. As a starting point to begin forging this interdependence of principles, engaging the faculty in this visioning activity signals a receptivity to change. Unless you know where you are going, you will meander along and perhaps miss your desired destination.

Making Shared Leadership the Norm

School leaders engaging staff in professional conversations should strive for a set of operating norms that will help ensure interdependence is in play. An example of these norms might read as follows:

All voices are heard.

We operate by listening and asking probing questions.

All faculty members are engaged in decision making, as appropriate.

All faculty members know the goals we're working to achieve.

When operating norms like these are set in motion, the commitment to carry out the school's mission becomes a collective one, and the shared responsibility for student learning forms the foundation for shared leadership.

To encourage interdependence and shared leadership, it's essential to embrace collaboration and invite multiple voices to join the conversation. Consider the following examples of what shared leadership looks like in schools, and note how they support various core characteristics of high-performing schools and invite collaboration and multiple voices.

Two teachers have an idea that they bring to the principal and faculty. The teachers are passionate about the idea and convinced it will have a very positive effect on teaching and learning. The principal and faculty members listen attentively to the teachers' pitch and ask them to develop the idea more fully, consider time and resources and the overall school improvement plan, and then bring an action plan to the group for consideration.

The principal asks for staff volunteers to work with the district's math curriculum coordinator to analyze recent math test scores and bring a detailed analysis of strengths and weaknesses back to the math department. The math analysis team will recommend the kinds of support or resources they believe will strengthen students' math prowess.

The science department has adopted a new textbook. The principal asks the department chair to bring the rest of the faculty up to speed on the new curriculum by sharing the major learning strands and soliciting comments. By engaging the entire faculty in looking at the key science topics, the principal provides support to the department chair as she guides the faculty in identifying concepts that cross curricular boundaries. These initial conversations will assist academic teams as they connect learning across departments.

Literacy is a districtwide focus for the year. A group of teachers from different disciplines meets over the summer with the objective of pinpointing the reading comprehension strategies each will teach and monitor throughout the school year. Group members will design model lessons and assessments. The group will let the principal know how much time they'll need during the August inservice to share their materials with the rest of the faculty.

A cross-grade group of elementary teachers decides to study student math-placement practices with the goal of suggesting modification to current grouping guidelines. They form a learning team and plan to devote a semester to researching the topic. At the semester's end, they plan to bring their research-based conclusions and best-practices recommendations to the school's leadership team for consideration. They agree to keep the principal abreast of their activities and share relevant materials and studies through regular updates.

Three teachers, all new to the profession, are joining the faculty. The principal reviews the rookies' assignments with the rest of the teaching staff and asks who might have the interest, expertise, and time to work as a first-semester mentor. The assignment will entail two half-day, administration-led training sessions for both the mentor and new teacher prior to the start of the school year and then monthly afterschool meetings with the group of other new teachers and their mentors throughout the first semester. Beyond this, mentor teachers will spend time with their charges as needed.

In each of these examples, notice how principals multiply their effectiveness by creating the conditions and vehicles for shared leadership. Inviting a teacher or teachers to take on the responsibilities of leading a group leverages shared commitment to the collective goals. The necessary condition is that these teacher leaders have the knowledge, skills, and disposition for building strong interpersonal relationships necessary to support effective teamwork. They must be adept at creating a community of peers that can function as a resource for one another. Teachers and teacher leaders, then, are at the heart of this interdependent model's five core characteristics of effective schools. Little (2000) puts it this way: "The target of teacher leadership is the stuff of teaching and learning" (p. 396).

In this model of interdependence and shared leadership, all staff members have a twin focus: (1) how we work together-relationships; and (2) what we work on -teaching and learning.

Teacher Leadership Structures

The building principal's responsibility is to intentionally build capacity and broaden the role of leader so the complex work of schools can be done in an organized and systematic fashion.

Regardless of the organizational structure in which teachers find themselves, the keys to success are developing "a collective sense of what is important, and why" (Senge et al., 1994, p. 299). Strong relationships are built and sustained when a team of teachers work together to ensure that instruction is tailored to improve student learning. Through collaboration, they find a common voice and can go on to set a plan with clear, common priorities. Left to their own devices, though, such groups may flounder. This is why the role of teacher leaders is so important.

Figure 1.1 lays out the three most common organizational structures found in schools today. Each structure is based on adults working together for a common purpose. Whether ongoing professional training for teachers is a critical component of the structure depends on the nature of the group and the role it plays. The PLC framework is an important tool to focus the work of a group of peers on teaching and student learning. Some schools operate with both a traditional organizational structure and PLC groups sharing the leadership voice. Others combine their functions. As you peruse this figure, note areas of similarity and overlap among the three.

Figure 1.1. School Organizational Structures

Traditional

Meet in collegial teams to facilitate curriculum coordination.

Organize time and students for maximum efficiency of school hours and requirements.

Work with the principal as communication conduit.

Create small communities for learning so every student is well known by at least one adult.

Use common planning time to improve the quality and quantity of interactions between students and teachers.

Use a common vision to guide decision making as part of an expanded leadership structure.

Teach a core academic program with engaging, relevant, and integrative curriculum.

Empower teachers to make decisions.

Professional Learning Community

Ensure that students learn.

Build a culture of collaboration.

Focus on results.

Remove barriers to success.

Work hard.

Can a high school science department also be a PLC? Can a blended 5th and 6th grade group of teachers be a PLC? Can teachers belong to a traditional department or interdisciplinary team and also be members of a cross-discipline PLC team? The answer is a resounding yes! Teams of teachers who gather with a common purpose to look at improving teaching and learning in their classrooms over time become a community of learners. As author and researcher Rick DuFour (2004) points out, "To create a professional learning community, focus on learning rather than teaching, work collaboratively, and hold yourself accountable for results" (p. 11).

Think of the car you drive, whether it's a Ford minivan or a Honda Civic. The standard car model has four wheels propelled by a motor. The four wheels could be the departments or grade levels or interdisciplinary teams. The motor that drives them all is the principal. When all are in synch and working as expected, the wheels move in the same direction-say, toward the school's vision. In the newer, hybrid car model, those wheels are part of two interconnected, interdependent systems-one combustion, one electric-working in tandem. The combination of the systems makes the overall machine more efficient. Now, think of teacher leaders and their smaller teams of teachers as the hybrid's electric power system and the school's overall, principal-led organization as the hybrid's gasoline system. They are different, but both are propulsive and capable of moving "the whole" forward. Together both have specific roles and functions that are linked for efficiency and meet the energy demands for the 21st century. A newer, more responsive model is the result.

QUESTIONS to Consider

In your school, what are the expectations for professional collaboration and relationship building?

What structures are in place to focus on student learning and professional development?

A good example of this newer model can be found at Sandy High School in the Oregon Trail School District at the base of Mount Hood. This comprehensive high school of about 1,500 students has a six-period day and is organized in departments. Departments manage and coordinate the curriculum and focus on student learning and support needs. A few years ago, several new faculty members at Sandy High agreed that something was missing. This small group went on to create a Critical Friends Group, using a set of guided conversation protocols to look more analytically at their own teaching practices and learning needs. Participation in the group eventually expanded to include a teacher leader.

Eventually, one small cohort within Sandy High's Critical Friends Group, troubled by the school's high dropout rate, decided to investigate the possibility of forming 9th grade "houses," or academies. The idea was to divide students at this grade level into smaller learning teams and link two or three subjects in a block schedule arrangement. The rationale? Developing a stronger sense of community among and between students and teachers would help to boost student achievement, which, in turn, would reduce dropout rates. As the cohort at Sandy High conducted its investigations, they sought out others for critical conversations with regard to math placement, as math scheduling and the personnel available to teach math would be affected if smaller teams were created.

This small, voluntary professional learning community at Sandy High School grew to 8 teachers, then to 20, and is now 41 members strong. The faculty also meets in smaller groups, across departments, to look at teaching and learning from different vantage points. Two engines-the school's Critical Friends PLC and the school's traditional curricular departments-are driving Sandy High School in the same direction: toward meeting students' learning and relational needs.

ELISE'S DILEMMA

Elise is a veteran teacher leader who is now working with her fifth principal in 12 years. This principal, hired from within, is new to the position. He was formerly the school's athletic and activities vice principal. Elise wonders what his leadership style will be and whether she will be called on to perform quasi-administrative tasks as he finds his rhythm. She knows new principals often bring their own agendas. What else will she have to add to her already overloaded plate? She's concerned.

CONSIDER THESE KEY IDEAS AS YOU THINK ABOUT ELISE'S DILEMMA:
Relationships

Shared leadership takes many forms, and teacher leaders can influence the direction it takes.

Teacher leaders should be ready to extend their working relationship to the principal and be part of schoolwide teams as well as smaller, more focused ones.

A change in leadership is an opportunity to define a new vision, look critically at what's working and what needs improving, and set a new course, factoring in the perspectives of all parties.

Teaching and Learning

Consistent "it's all about learning" messages are one way to highlight a team's core values. Having this motto visible in halls and classrooms demonstrates your commitment and alerts the administration (and students and parents, as well) to what drives your work.

Professional learning should be defined as the center of what is done at school and in teams.

OUR RESPONSE TO ELISE: REACH OUT TO THE NEW LEADER

We would advise Elise to work on building a relationship with the new principal. She should begin by making an appointment to meet with him, and during the meeting, she should ask three questions:

1. What's your vision for the school?

2. How can we work together to support teachers and their work with students?

3. What do you see as my role as a teacher leader, and is that open for discussion?

Any change in personnel and leadership affects the whole organization. At those times, teacher leaders have a critical opportunity to influence the vision and work of the school by building support for what they believe is key to its success. So, Elise should share her dreams for the school and ask what the new principal's are. She should look for common ground and begin building there. She might consider helping her principal get started by volunteering to take on a few additional tasks, like organizing textbook checkout, setting up faculty inservice group tasks, or coordinating materials for the staff handbook revisions. This also might mean asking members of her department to give the new leader a chance and be patient with him as he gets a clearer picture of what works and what needs to change.
Shared Leadership as Conduit for Communication

As teams become the structure for teacher expression, decision making, and the consideration of best practices, the teacher leader focuses on keeping team conversations on track and ensuring active communication throughout the school community. Additionally, the teacher leader is responsible for seeing that teams' findings are circulated among all the organizational structures and that these findings make their way from team recommendation to classroom application.

Bringing a group of educators together around a common vision, where shared leadership is the norm, small learning teams are the structure, and relationships among the faculty are collaborative, provides support for the school's core function: student achievement. In this model, where teacher leadership plays an integral part, giving teachers a legitimate voice and role assumes a readiness on the part of the administration and the teachers to raft down the same river. When teachers and administrators navigate the rapids successfully, there is a sense of satisfaction, pride, and possibly exuberance in having embarked on this journey together.

Great Resources on Shared Leadership

Leadership profile instruments can be useful and illuminating. Many are available online. Check out the Dimensions of Leadership Profile and Understanding Personal Learning Approaches (available through Inscape Publishing/Carlson Learning at www.hughesconsultinggrp.com) and McREL's Balanced Leadership Profile, which is designed with principals and aspiring principals in mind (available atwww.mcrel.org).

The National School Reform Faculty Harmony Education Center (www.nsrfharmony.org) provides information and protocols to facilitate Critical Friends Groups. These can be useful to all kinds of teams.

The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook (Senge et al., 1994) is a classic look at systems thinking. This book has a plethora of resources, exercises, and context for creating a shared vision and developing the components necessary for a healthy organization built on teams.

Cultivating Leadership in Schools: Connecting, People, Purpose, and Practice (Donaldson, 2006) has useful information and tools, particularly in the section "Teacher Leaders as Partners in the Leadership Relationship" (pp. 80-86), in Figure 9.1: "Skills for the Leadership of Renewal" (p. 155), and in "Chapter 18: Critical Role of Leadership."

What Works in Schools: Translating Research into Action (Marzano, 2003) is an absolute must-buy for its focus on research-based best practices to support student achievement. Especially pertinent are Chapter 18's look at the "Critical Role of Leadership" and the appendix titled "Snapshot Survey of School Effectiveness Facts," particularly the category "Collegiality and Professionalism" (p. 181).

"What Is a 'Professional Learning Community'?" (DuFour, 2004), an article in the May 2004 issue of Educational Leadership (Volume 61, Issue 8), defines four big ideas that are the core principles of PLCs and provides compelling examples of each principle.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
by Jan Burgess and Donna Bates In mid-August, the much anticipated "Welcome Back, Teachers" letter arrived from the new principal at Oregon's Lake Oswego Junior High School. This year's letter was different. It read like a teacher's to-do list: Dear Faculty and Staff, Welcome back!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Instead of looking to the principal alone for instructional leadership, we need to develop leadership capacity among all members of the school community.

The days of the principal as the lone instructional leader are over. We no longer believe that one administrator can serve as the instructional leader for an entire school without the substantial participation of other educators (Elmore, 2000; Lambert, 1998; Lambert et al., 1995; Lambert, Collay, Dietz, Kent, &amp; Richert, 1997; Olson, 2000; Poplin, 1994; Spillane, Halverson, &amp; Diamond, 2001).

The old model of formal, one-person leadership leaves the substantial talents of teachers largely untapped. Improvements achieved under this model are not easily sustainable; when the principal leaves, promising programs often lose momentum and fade away. As a result of these and other weaknesses, the old model has not met the fundamental challenge of providing quality learning for all students.

Our lesson is clear: Instructional leadership must be a shared, community undertaking. Leadership is the professional work of everyone in the school.

For decades, educators have understood that we are all responsible for student learning. More recently, educators have come to realize that we are responsible for our own learning as well. But we usually do not move our eyes around the room-across the table-and say to ourselves, "I am also responsible for the learning of my colleagues."

Some students seem to understand that the classroom and school communities are in the business of learning together. For instance, when our 9-year-old grandson, Dylan, completes his own work, he observes how other students are progressing. He voluntarily goes to the desks of other students and assists them. Shannon, our 10-year-old granddaughter, serves as a peer mediator at her school in Colorado, helping other students work out solutions to their conflicts.

Everyone has the right, responsibility, and ability to be a leader.

How we define leadership influences how people will participate.

Educators yearn to be more fully who they are-purposeful, professional human beings. Leadership is an essential aspect of an educator's professional life.

A New Framework for School Improvement

Educators and policymakers alike seek a framework for instructional leadership that will produce sustainable school improvement. The development of leadership capacity can provide such a framework. I define "leadership capacity" as broad-based, skillful participation in the work of leadership. In schools with high leadership capacity, learning and instructional leadership become fused into professional practice. Such schools have some important features in common.

These features-skillful participation, vision, inquiry, collaboration, reflection, and student achievement-interact to create the new tasks of shared instructional leadership. An abundance of research into school improvement suggests that these features are vital to the school improvement process (for example, see Barth, 1999; DuFour &amp; Eaker, 1998; Lambert, 1998; Newmann &amp; Wehlage, 1995; Schmoker, 1996; Spillane, Halverson, &amp; Diamond, 2001).

Leadership Capacity in Action

A growing number of schools have undertaken the work of building leadership capacity to bring about sustainable school improvement. Schools are inventing and experimenting with many forms of participation. The following examples come from former principal students of mine or from educators whom I have come to know in my development work, in the United States, Canada, England, and Australia.

Study Groups

Study groups read articles or books together and discuss the implications of the texts' ideas. Educators in Edmonton, Wild Rose, and Calgary in Alberta, Canada; Columbus, Ohio; Kansas City, Kansas; and San Leandro, California, regularly use study groups as a means to challenge and integrate their thinking and move to new and collective levels of understanding. These conversations give rise to new and better instructional practices.

Chief Justice Milvain School in Calgary, Canada, an ethnically diverse elementary school serving 460 students, developed an inquiry-based improvement plan with the broad participation of teachers, parents, and administrators. Study groups emerged from the school's professional development process, focusing on four areas: Building a Learning Community; Teaching for Understanding; Representing, Assessing, and Responding; and Access and Management of Resources. The study groups examined student achievement data and engaged in dialogue that challenged participants' assumptions about student learning. An integrated improvement plan emerged from this process.

Action Research Teams

Action research teams identify a compelling question of practice and conduct research to discover information that will shed new light on the question and lead to new actions.

In the Seven Oaks School System in Winnepeg, Canada, a system with a culture of inquiry, Superintendent Edie Brock describes how educators responded to pressure for student retention. Staff and community members embarked on a study to find out what happened to individuals later in life who had been retained in school. The result was a district-published book entitled Faces of Failure, which examined the long-range impact of retention. Seven Oaks no longer retains students; instead, the district finds alternative interventions to ensure student progress.

Vertical Learning Communities

In the vertical learning communities model, multiple grades are linked together in a common community in which teacher leaders have the authority to work closely with students in instruction, curriculum design, discipline, and family relations. Teachers know all the students well, so students feel cared about. During an advisement period, teachers mentor students in small groups. The curriculum is carefully articulated and focused on student needs, and discretionary time and resources allow teachers to do intensive collaborative planning. Teachers are assigned to students for multiple years; this "looping" structure creates strong, long-term relationships.

Wyandotte High School in Kansas City, Kansas, is organized into eight vertical learning communities. Looping at the high school level provides an opportunity for students to have the same teacher in many disciplines for the entire four years.

Leadership Teams

At Hawthorne School in Kansas City, Kansas, the Vision Team joins principal Jayson Strickland to analyze data and to plan, advocate, monitor, and implement the school improvement plan. The team is composed of representatives from various school departments (grade level and special education teachers and reading specialists) who are nominated and selected by the staff. All meetings are open to anyone who wants to attend. The team keeps the plan alive and ensures that its components are systematically implemented.

The Dreamkeepers at Garfield School in San Leandro, California, describe their team asa volunteer group of staff who consciously keep equity at the forefront of their minds and in all of their personal and professional actions, while remaining committed to ensuring that it is not forgotten in the minds of others.

Principal Jan Huls notes that this group is fluid, with open membership. Frequent retreats and regular meetings enable this team of teachers to design curriculum units and instructional practices, share ideas and research literature on equity, and serve as advocates for equitable practices among their colleagues.

Curriculum teams were formed in the Rhineland School System in Manitoba, Canada, when the province issued a mandated standards-based curriculum (initially K-8, then 9-12). This top-down initiative had the potential to make educators feel disempowered, but Assistant Superintendent Dorothy Braun worked to avoid this outcome by establishing strong implementation teams armed with authority, resources, support, and time. Teams became energized, teacher leadership grew, and implementation led to inquiry and innovation. When teachers compared the current and mandated curriculum content, they identified gaps in their own knowledge. These perceived gaps in knowledge led to investigation and experimentation. Teachers raised their own questions and supported one another in finding answers or approaches.

An Integrated School Improvement Process

Participation is most powerful when combined into a thoughtful and integrated school improvement process. For example, Principal Rosalinda Canlas of Eden Gardens School in Hayward, California, describes that school's involvement with the Bay Area School Reform Collaborative, an Annenberg-Hewlett initiative in the San Francisco Bay area:Our staff and the school learning community take the business of educating our students very seriously. Our primary goal focuses our energy into addressing the needs of all of our students, especially those falling below grade level; we are bridging the gap between students who are currently achieving and those who fall in the bottom quartile.How can we do this? What teaching practices should teachers use to help students achieve? Eden Gardens staff live and breathe these big questions. Wednesday collaboration days are rotated among the cycle of inquiry, action research, grade-level meetings, new teacher support meetings, and parent/community involvement. During these collaborations, multiple assessment data help us find patterns that guide our instruction. Teacher leaders and the entire staff take responsibility for inquiring about the problem; researching possible solutions, answers, and inventions; and implementing recommendations. During the dialogues and reflections, peers support each other to become more effective teachers.

The Changing Role of the Principal

The work of developing leadership capacity brings clarity to the changing role of the principal as instructional leader. A principal who goes it alone or who dominates will find that the school becomes overly dependent on his or her leadership. As former Clayton, Missouri, principal Barbara Kohm explains: "The more adept I became at solving problems, the weaker the school became" (2002, p. 32).

Today's effective principal constructs a shared vision with members of the school community, convenes the conversations, insists on a student learning focus, evokes and supports leadership in others, models and participates in collaborative practices, helps pose the questions, and facilitates dialogue that addresses the confounding issues of practice. This work requires skill and new understanding; it is much easier to tell or to manage than it is to perform as a collaborative instructional leader.

What the Future Holds

Today, shared instructional leadership among professional staff is state-of-the-art practice. And we are developing students like Dylan and Shannon as future instructional leaders by creating opportunities for mutual learning in the classroom, on the playground, and in the community. Parents are also emerging as important instructional leaders as they share in setting goals, examining student data, conferring with teachers, tutoring students at home and in the classroom, helping monitor and assess school programs, and forging links with community resources. Such collaboration is building a sense of collective responsibility among students and parents for the accomplishments of all students. Tomorrow, we may view all participants in the education arena, including community members and policymakers, as instructional co-leaders.

Our mistake has been in looking to the principal alone for instructional leadership, when instructional leadership is everyone's work. We need to develop the leadership capacity of the whole school community. Out of that changed culture will arise a new vision of professional practice linking leading and learning.

ASCD is a community dedicated to educators' professional growth and well-being.

Let us help you put your vision into action.

We empower educators to reimagine and redesign learning through impactful pedagogy and meaningful technology use. We achieve this by offering transformative professional learning, fostering vibrant communities, and ensuring that digital tools and experiences are accessible and effective.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Instead of looking to the principal alone for instructional leadership, we need to develop leadership capacity among all members of the school community.

# data[].attributes.headline
Strategies for Community Engagement in School Turnaround

# data[].attributes.subject
Strategies for Community Engagement in School Turnaround

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Get a daily email featuring the latest talk, plus a quick mix of trending content.

By subscribing, you understand and agree that we will store, process and manage your personal information according to our Privacy Policy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
We have all changed someone's life -- usually without even realizing it. In this funny talk, Drew Dudley calls on all of us to celebrate leadership as the everyday act of improving each other's lives.

# data[].attributes.headline
A Closer Look at the Four Pillars of Heroic Leadership

# data[].attributes.subject
A Closer Look at the Four Pillars of Heroic Leadership

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Lowney, C., 2003, A Closer Look at the Four Pillars of Heroic Leadership

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Everybody defines leadership differently but I really like the way John C Maxwell defines leadership, " A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way." Irrespective of how you define a leader, he or she can prove to be a difference maker between success and failure. A good leader has a futuristic vision and knows how to turn his ideas into real-world success stories. In this article, we take an in-depth look at some of the important leadership qualities that separate good leaders from a bad one.

15 Leadership Qualities That Make Good Leaders

Want to become a great leader? Here are fifteen leadership qualities that can make you a good leader.

1. Honesty and Integrity

The 34th President of United States, Dwight.D.Eisenhower once said, " The supreme quality of leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible, no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in an army, or in an office." Honesty and integrity are two important ingredients which make a good leader. How can you expect your followers to be honest when you lack these qualities yourself? Leaders succeed when they stick to their values and core beliefs and without ethics, this will not be possible.

2. Confidence

To be an effective leader, you should be confident enough to ensure that other follow your commands. If you are unsure about your own decisions and qualities, then your subordinates will never follow you. As a leader, you have to be oozing with confidence, show some swagger and assertiveness to gain the respect of your subordinates. This does not mean that you should be overconfident, but you should at least reflect the degree of confidence required to ensure that your followers trust you as a leader.

3. Inspire Others

Probably the most difficult job for a leader is to persuade others to follow. It can only be possible if you inspire your followers by setting a good example. When the going gets tough, they look up to you and see how you react to the situation. If you handle it well, they will follow you. As a leader, should think positive and this positive approach should be visible through your actions. Stay calm under pressure and keep the motivation level up. As John Quincy Adams puts it, " If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader." If you are successful in inspiring your subordinates, you can easily overcome any current and future challenge easily.

4. Commitment and Passion

Your teams look up to you and if you want them to give them their all, you will have to be passionate about it too. When your teammates see you getting your hands dirty, they will also give their best shot. It will also help you to gain the respect of your subordinates and infuse new energy in your team members, which helps them to perform better. If they feel that you are not fully committed or lacks passion, then it would be an uphill task for the leader to motivate your followers to achieve the goal.

5. Good Communicator

Until you clearly communicate your vision to your team and tell them the strategy to achieve the goal, it will be very difficult for you to get the results you want. Simply put, if you are unable to communicate your message effectively to your team, you can never be a good leader. A good communicator can be a good leader. Words have the power to motivate people and make them do the unthinkable. If you use them effectively, you can also achieve better results.

6. Decision-Making Capabilities

Apart from having a futuristic vision, a leader should have the ability to take the right decision at the right time. Decisions taken by leaders have a profound impact on masses. A leader should think long and hard before taking a decision but once the decision is taken, stand by it. Although, most leaders take decisions on their own, but it is highly recommended that you consult key stakeholders before taking a decision. After all, they are the ones who will benefit or suffer from your decisions.

7. Accountability

When it comes to accountability, you need to follow the approach highlighted by Arnold H Glasow when he said, " A good leader takes little more than his share of the blame and little less than his share of the credit." Make sure that every one of your subordinates is accountable for what they are doing. If they do well, give them a pat on the back but if they struggle, make them realize their mistakes and work together to improve. Holding them accountable for their actions will create a sense of responsibility among your subordinates and they will go about the business more seriously.

8. Delegation and Empowerment

You cannot do everything, right. It is important for a leader to focus on key responsibilities while leaving the rest to others. By that, I mean empowering your followers and delegating tasks to them. If you continue to micromanage your subordinates, it will develop a lack of trust and more importantly, you will not be able to focus on important matters, as you should be. Delegate tasks to your subordinates and see how they perform. Provide them with all the resources and support they need to achieve the objective and give them a chance to bear the responsibility.

9. Creativity and Innovation

What separates a leader from a follower? Steve Jobs, the greatest visionary of our time answers this question this way, " Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower." In order to get ahead in today's fast-paced world, a leader must be creative and innovative at the same time. Creative thinking and constant innovation is what makes you and your team stand out from the crowd. Think out of the box to come up with unique ideas and turn those ideas and goals into reality.

10. Empathy

Last but certainly not the least, is empathy. Leaders should develop empathy with their followers. Unfortunately, most leaders follow a dictatorial style and neglect empathy altogether. Due to this, they fail to make a closer connection with their followers. Understanding the problems of your followers and feeling their pain is the first step to become an effective leader. Even that is not enough until you work hard and provide your followers with the suitable solution to their problems.

When the going gets tough, the tough gets going. You might have heard this adage many times, but did you know that great leaders also follow this rule. They are resilient and have a positive attitude. Irrespective of how difficult the circumstances might be, you will find them rallying their followers. While most people are busy in complaining about the problems, great leaders always focus on solutions, not the problems.

Good leaders always have higher influence but how do they increase their influence on the point where people accept what they say. They do this by connecting with people emotionally. That is where emotional intelligence comes into play.

Here are some of the reasons why a leader should be emotionally intelligent.

Manage emotions effectively

Better social awareness

Seamless communications

Conflict Resolution

With emotional intelligence, leaders can control their emotions, which prevents negative emotions from influencing their decision-making skills. As a result, they are less likely to make hasty decisions. Moreover, emotionally intelligent leaders are great at understanding the emotions and care about the feelings of others. That is not all, leaders who have this leadership quality not only handles conflict in a better way but also play an important role in conflict resolution.

" Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real."-Thomas Merton

How would you feel when you are promoted to leadership status? You will feel proud. A good leader is always selfless and always think about his or her followers. That is why the leadership styles most great leaders adopt put lots of emphasis on problem-solving and team dynamics instead of focusing on self-promotion.

One of the best ways to win the trust of your followers is by being transparent. Instead of hiding information, you should openly share it with them. By giving visibility to your followers, they will buy into your vision and support you with conviction in achieving the goal. More importantly, it gives your followers clarity, autonomy and make them feel more empowered while keeping them engaged.

" Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion. "-Jack Welch

Good leaders always have a vision and purpose. They not only visualize the future themselves but also share their vision with their followers. When their followers were able to see the big picture, they can see where they are heading. A great leader goes above and beyond and explain why they are moving in the direction they are moving and shares the strategy and action plan to achieve that goal.

Conclusion

To join the elite club of good leaders, you must have all these qualities but if you lack some of these qualities, then you might struggle to make the mark in the world of leadership. You will have to set a good example for others to follow. That is where your commitment, passion, empathy, honesty and integrity come into play. Good communication skills and decision-making capabilities also play a vital role in success and failure of a leader. Lastly, innovation and creative thinking, as well as the futuristic vision, are a couple of leadership qualities that make up good leaders.

Sarmad is a Digital Content Producer at TaskQue. He is passionate about writing and loves writing blogs and reading magazines. In his leisure time, he likes to watch the news and current affairs program.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Top 15 Leadership Qualities That Make Good Leaders

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Want to know what characteristics are important to make great leaders. In this article, we discuss 15 characteristics of a good leaders.

# data[].attributes.headline
17 Emotional Intelligence Tests and Assessments

# data[].attributes.subject
17 Emotional Intelligence Tests and Assessments

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Perhaps you may have heard that what is even more important than a person's 'IQ' is their 'EQ', or emotional intelligence, and are interested in learning more. Emotional Intelligence involves, broadly speaking, the capacity to understand and manage emotion. Can this be measured?

IQ tests are well-known assessments of cognitive capacity, however, the picture when it comes to emotional intelligence is more complicated. There are many free quizzes readily available to test EQ, but as is explained shortly, such self-report measures are not always accurate.

Ability tests of EQ fare better. In the following article, the 'ins and outs' of emotional intelligence testing are explored in some detail. Along with a rich assortment of information, this article will also provide links to some free EQ assessments and samples of questions so that you can really get a feel for EQ tests.

I hope it sparks your interest!

Should you want to learn how to professionally teach, coach, and increase emotional intelligence, be sure to check out the Emotional Intelligence Masterclass©.

What is an Emotional Intelligence Test?

So, just what is a test of emotional intelligence?

Well, put simply, as opposed to a self-report scale of EI, an EI test is developed differently. You see, EI tests are based on the premise that EI consists of a group of skills that are employed in order to solve emotional problems.

Therefore, as explained by pioneers in the research area of EI, Mayer, Caruso, Salovey & Sitarenios (2003), because it is developed from a skill-base, that EI is, therefore, a distinct ability that can be measured objectively.

What is an EQ appraisal?

Another way of looking at the assessment of EI is an EQ appraisal. One example of an EQ appraisal is the Emotional Intelligence Appraisal that features in the best-selling work ' Emotional Intelligence 2.0' (Bradberry & Su, 2006). The appraisal was created in 2001 by Dr. Travis Bradberry and Dr. Jean Greaves and it may be administered in either online form or in a booklet. You can find more emotional intelligence books here.

The EQ appraisal is a skill-based assessment based on Daniel Goleman's four-factor taxonomy (Bradberry & Su, 2006). According to Goleman, EI consists of four components:

self-awareness,

self-management,

social awareness and

relationship management.

The EQ appraisal consists of 28 items and is performance based - it is designed to assess the behavior linked to EI skills. The assessment gives an overall EQ score, and a score for each of the four EI factors (Bradberry & Su, 2006).

Research with The Emotional Intelligence Appraisal has found Cronbach alpha reliability ratings between .85 and .91 however, interestingly, a non-significant positive correlation was found between the appraisal and the popular EI test, the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test.

In the following sections of this article, you can certainly read more about the MSCEIT. Briefly, however, for the purpose of an introduction to this discussion, the MSCEIT is an ability model of EI.

Researchers have suggested that there is a distinction between the constructs that are measured by the MSCEIT and EI Appraisal (Bradberry & Su, 2006). It was reasoned that this difference in models from which the assessments were developed - the MSCEIT is an ability-based assessment, whereas the EI Appraisal was based on Daniel Goleman's 'mixed' model of EI.

It has been claimed that scores on the Emotional Intelligence Appraisal predicted job performance more than the MSCEIT, and what's more, it also takes one-fifth of the length of time to administer.

The Emotional Intelligence 2.0 Test

In this section of the article, I will be focusing on the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test, Version 2.0 (MSCEIT, V 2.0). The MSCEIT is a 141 scale that measures the four branches of EI, each branch reflecting specific skills - perceiving emotions, using emotions to facilitate thought, understanding emotions and managing emotions (Mayer, Caruso, Salovey & Sitarenios, 2003).

Each of these four 'branches' is measured in the MSCEIT using two tasks, as described below:

Branch one - perceiving emotions: faces and pictures tasks

Branch two - facilitating thought: sensations and facilitation tasks

Branch three - understanding emotions: blends and changes tasks

Branch four - managing emotions: emotion management and emotional relationships tasks.

Each of these 8 tasks is measured either by a discrete, single item or a group of individual items that make up an 'item parcel' (Mayer et al., 2003). Item parcels are collections of related items - so, for example, the 'faces task' consists of four item parcels, each containing five responses. Some items only require one response per stimulus so are distinct and free-standing (Mayer et al., 2003).

Across the 8 tasks, the responses required take different forms. The test was designed this way so that the results across the response methods can be generalized, and also minimize the associated error in measurement (Mayer et al., 2003). So, some tasks use a 5-point rating scale, whereas others require a multiple-choice response.

Let's look at this test a little closer...

The 'faces' task is made up of 4 item parcels, each with 5 responses (Mayer et al., 2003). In this task, participants are presented with a group of faces, and they are required to respond with the specific emotion they can identify as portrayed in the face (Mayer et al., 2003).

The 'pictures' task consists of six parcels each with 5 responses. It is similar to the 'faces' task, except that the target stimuli are abstract designs and landscapes, and to respond, participants select from cartoon faces that show specific emotions (Mayer et al., 2003).

The 'sensations' task consists of five parcels, each with three responses. Participants match sensations to the emotions they generate - e.g. describing how 'hot' or 'cold' a feeling of envy is (Mayer et al., 2003).

The 'facilitation' task is made up of 5 item parcels, each with three responses. This task requires a decision about the moods that are most closely associated with specific behaviors and cognitive tasks, in terms of accompanying them or assisting them. The example given by Mayer, Caruso, Salovey, and Sitanerios (2003) is " whether joy may assist planning a party " (p. 99).

The 'blends' task consists of 12 free-standing items. Responders choose which emotions could be combined to produce another emotion - for example, that malice could be formed by combining envy and aggression (Mayer et al., 2003).

The 'changes' task is made up of 20 free-standing items in which individuals choose the emotion that emerges due to another emotion intensifying - e.g. that depression is most likely to result from intensification of sadness and fatigue (Mayer et al., 2003).

The 'emotion management' task consists of 5 parcels, each with 4 responses. In this task, responders are required to form a judgment about the best actions that can be taken by an individual in a story in order to result in the specified emotional outcome (Mayer et al., 2003). So, for example, the participant might read a story about a character and need to identify what this character can do to reduce their anger or prolong joy (Mayer et al., 2003).

Finally, the ' emotional relationship ' task. This task is made up of 3 item parcels, each with 3 responses. This task requires test-takers to decide what are the most effective actions an individual can take in order to manage another person's feelings (Mayer et al., 2003).

Putting this all together, it can be seen that the MSCEIT 2.0 is a comprehensive test of EI. In fact, it requires a total of 705 responses - 141 items are included, each with 5 responses (Mayer et al., 2003).

Can EI Really be Measured With a Quiz?

According to Matthews, Roberts, and Zeidner (2004), there are a number of problems and serious omissions in the area of EI as measured by a simple self-report assessment.

In actual fact, this issue is what led Mayer, Caruso, and Salovey to argue that performance-based measures are needed for EI to be understood as an actual cognitive ability (Matthews, Roberts & Zeidner, 2004).

Their argument then resulted in the development of the Multi-Factor Emotional Intelligence Scale (the MEIS) and, more recently, the MSCEIT.

To consider EI as a scientific construct, it is necessary to determine whether EI is a measurable phenomenon (Matthews et al., 2004). Self-report measures of EI have shown satisfactory internal consistency reliably across a variety of cultures, as well as more than adequate levels of test-retest reliability over 1 - and 4-month periods (Matthews et al., 2004).

On the other hand, performance-based measures of EI have been shown to present a number of problems in terms of reliability (Matthews et al., 2004). All these issues seem to suggest that EI may not be able to be measured.

Indeed. Whether or not EI tests actually measure a theoretical construct or trait is termed 'construct validity', and, in actual fact, Matthews and colleagues (2004) concluded that neither performance-based or self-report measures of EI meet the criteria for what is deemed 'construct validity'.

However, past research has found a relatively modest association between self-report measures of EI and actual ability measures (Matthews et al., 2004). What a complicated picture EI presents! What are we to make of these claims?

Well, further research into the measurement of EI is certainly warranted - particularly into validation studies of self-report measures of EI. According to Matthews et al (2004), " there are major conceptual, psychometric, and applied problems and issues to be overcome before EI can be considered a genuine, scientifically validated construct with real-life practical significance " (p. 192).

Other research, however, argues against what Matthews and colleagues presented in the 2004 paper titled ' Seven myths about emotional intelligence '. It does in actual fact support the notion that EI can be readily measured using tests, particularity self-report tests.

However, just because something is easily measured this does not mean that such measures are accurate.

The fact that EI is made up of a range of skills does mean that self-report is not the most accurate way to measure EI (Matthews et al., 2004). This also means, however, that even though self-report measures are not effective measures of EI, that because EI consists of a range of skills and abilities, in a similar vein to the measurement of other skills, these skills can be measured!

In other words, yes, EI ability tests are legitimate measures of EI.

What's in an Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire?

To show what to expect from an EI questionnaire, I will now provide an example of an EI-quiz (Mind Tools, 2019). In this quiz, 15 statements are presented and responders are asked to answer as to how they really are, rather than how they think they should be:

1. I can recognize my emotions as I experience them

2. I lose my temper when I feel frustrated

3. People have told me that I'm a good listener

4. I know how to calm myself down when I feel anxious or upset

5. I enjoy organizing groups

6. I find it hard to focus on something over the long term

7. I find it difficult to move on when I feel frustrated or unhappy

8. I know my strengths and weaknesses

9. I avoid conflict and negotiations

10. I feel that I don't enjoy my work

11. I ask people for feedback on what I do well, and how I can improve

12. I set long-term goals and review my progress regularly

13. I find it difficult to read other people's emotions

14. I struggle to build rapport with others

15. I use active listening skills when people speak to me

For each of these statements, the responders would rate themselves from not at all, rarely, sometimes, often and very often (Mind Tools, 2019).

How is EI Measured?

Generally speaking, EI is measured in three different ways:

A variety of scales, quizzes and questionnaires have been developed for each of these methods of measuring EI. There are four general types of EI tests, which are described in more detail soon!

Abilities based tests (including the MSCEIT)

Trait-based tests (such as the Bar-On EQi)

Competency-based tests - (including the ESCI)

Behavior-based tests - (for example, the Genos)

Whilst all provide measures of EI, for situations where an accurate, objective assessment of EI is wanted (such as recruitment) the consensus from the research is to use the MSCEIT (Bradberry, 2014).

The Emotional Intelligence Scale

Schutte and colleagues (1998) developed a measure of emotional intelligence based on the model that was published by Salovey and Mayer in 1990. Sixty-two items were found to be reflective of the dimensions of Salovey and Mayer's model (Schutte, Malouff, Hall, Haggerty, Cooper, Golden, & Dornheim, 1998).

Then, a factor analysis of results from a study of 346 participants lead to the development of this 33-item scale:

1. I know when to speak about my personal problems to others

2. When I am faced with obstacles, I remember times I faced similar obstacles and overcame them

3. I expect that I will do well on most things I try

4. Other people find it easy to confide in me

5. I find it hard to understand the non-verbal messages of other people*

6. Some of the major events of my life have led me to re-evaluate what is important and not important

7. When my mood changes, I see new possibilities

8. Emotions are one of the things that make my life worth living

9. I am aware of my emotions as I experience them

10. I expect good things to happen

11. I like to share my emotions with others

12. When I experience a positive emotion, I know how to make it last

13. I arrange events others enjoy

14. I seek out activities that make me happy

15. I am aware of the non-verbal messages I send to others

16. I present myself in a way that makes a good impression on others

17. When I am in a positive mood, solving problems is easy for me

18. By looking at their facial expressions, I recognize the emotions people are experiencing

19. I know why my emotions change

20. When I am in a positive mood, I am able to come up with new ideas

21. I have control over my emotions

22. I easily recognize my emotions as I experience them

23. I motivate myself by imagining a good outcome to tasks I take on

24. I compliment others when they have done something well

25. I am aware of the non-verbal messages other people send

26. When another person tells me about an important event in his or her life, I almost feel as though I have experienced this event myself

27. When I feel a change in emotions, I tend to come up with new ideas

28. When I am faced with a challenge, I give up because I believe I will fail*

29. I know what other people are feeling just by looking at them

30. I help other people feel better when they are down

31. I use good moods to help myself keep trying in the face of obstacles

32. I can tell how people are feeling by listening to the tone of their voice

33. It is difficult for me to understand why people feel the way they do*

Further studies of this 33 - item measure found it to have good internal consistency and test-retest reliability.

4 Example Emotional Intelligence Tests and Questions

Are you now curious about EI tests? Perhaps the following description of four examples of EI tests can capture your interest!

1. The Emotional Quotient Inventory 2.0 (EQ-i-2.0)

This test was the first scientifically validated, and now the most extensively used, EI assessment worldwide (Australian Council for Educational Research, 2016).

It was developed from 20 years of global research. The EQ-i is a self-report measure for individuals aged 16 years and older and can be delivered online. It takes approximately 30 minutes, and participants are required to respond to questions designed to assess key aspects of emotional skills related to life and workplace performance.

Such skills have been shown to affect performance in complex areas such as conflict resolution and planning (ACER, 2016).

The results from the EQ-i can provide respondents with information about emotional skills they can improve as well as those areas that they excel in - which can then lead to individuals having the capacity to utilize their strengths to maximize performance in daily tasks (ACER, 2016).

The EQ-i 2.0 is administered from an online portal that achieves simple and efficient administration, scoring and reporting.

Once an individual completes the test, a report is produced that takes the form of an inventory. The inventory includes 15 competencies that center around 5 composite areas of EI - self-perception, self-expression, interpersonal, decision-making and stress management (ACER, 2016).

Although taking the test is free, in order to administer the test a practitioner must meet the requirements of the EQ-i qualification level.

The EQ-i is based on Bar-On's model of emotional-social intelligence, and it is accompanied by the EQ-360 (Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence in Organizations - CREIO, 2018).

The EQ-360 provides a more comprehensive analysis of EQ because it also includes information provided by others. Observer ratings are then considered in conjunction with the results of an EQ-i-2.0 self-report to give a more detailed profile (CREIO, 2018).

2. Profile of Emotional Competence (PEC)

This test was developed by Brasseur & Mikolajczak and provides separate measures of intra-personal EI and inter-personal EI (CREIO, 2018). It looks at 5 core emotional competencies - identification, understanding, expression, regulation, and use of emotions - in the self and others.

It has been extensively validated in research, with results taken from a total sample of almost 22 000 individuals (CREIO, 2018). It is available free of charge for research and clinical purposes.

The full PEC consists of 50 items and takes approximately 1- 15 minutes to administer, and the short form includes 20 items and takes 5 - 10 minutes to complete. The PEC is a self-report measure, however, it needs to be administered by a psychologist who is familiar with the emotional intelligence and emotional competence research and theory (CREIO, 2018).

3. The Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue)

The TEIQue was developed by Dr. K. V. Petrides and is available free of charge for academic and clinical research (CREIO, 2018).

The full-form consists of 153 items, measuring 15 distinct facets, 4 factors and global trait EI. The short-form is a 30-item test that measures global trait EI which was developed from the full-form TEIQue (CREIO, 2018).

Based on correlations with corresponding total facet scores, 2 items were selected for inclusion from each of the 15 facets of the full-form TEIQue.

This questionnaire is also presented to gather ratings from observers - the TEIQue 360° and 360° Short-form (CREIO, 2018). Dr. Stella Mavroveli also designed the TEIQue Child-form that is suited to children aged 8 - 12 years.

This questionnaire consists of 75 items which are responded to on a 5-point scale and looks at the nine distinct facets of trait EI in children (CREIO, 2018).

4. Wong's Emotional Intelligence Scale (WEIS)

This is a self-report measure of EI designed to be used by Chinese respondents (CREIO, 2018). It is based on the four ability dimensions mentioned previously that make up EI. It consists of two parts:

The first part includes 20 scenarios. Respondents choose the option that most closely reflects the reaction they are likely to have in each scenario that is described (CREIO, 2018)

The second part is made up of 20 ability pairs. Respondents are required to select one of two types of abilities that best demonstrates their strength (CREIO, 2018).

Now that we have looked at EI tests, let's consider the types of questions that appear in these assessments. The following questions, from the PEC (Profile of Emotional Competence), are similar to those used in a variety of EI tests.

Hopefully they can provide you with an idea of what it may be like to do an EQ test!

Sample Questions (accessed from CREIO, 2018):

As my emotions arise I don't know where they came from

I don't always understand why I respond in the way I do

If I wanted, I could easily influence other people's emotions to achieve what I want

I know what to do to win people over to my cause

When I feel good, I can easily tell whether it is due to being proud of myself, happy or relaxed

I am good at describing my feelings

I can easily get what I want from others

I easily manage to calm myself down after a difficult experience

Most of the time I understand why people feel the way they do

When I am sad, I find it easy to cheer myself up

I find it difficult to handle my emotions

When I am angry, I find it easy to calm myself down

I am often surprised by people's responses because I was not aware they were in a bad mood

My feelings help me to focus on what is important to me

Others don't accept the way I express my emotions

When I am sad, I often don't know why

In a stressful situation I usually think in a way that helps me stay calm

Are There 'Right Answers' to EQ Assessments?

In fact, yes, there are so-called 'right answers' to EQ assessments - however, this only applies to the objective measures of EQ... obviously, there is no such thing as a 'correct' answer in a self-report assessment!

Research has included efficacious ways to identify 'correct' alternatives in EQ tests- e.g. in facial perception, or meanings of emotions terms (Mayer et al., 2003). This has been claimed due to the convergence between expert and general consensus on EI measures (Mayer et al., 2003). So-called 'right answers' are based on criteria developed from research (Mayer et al., 2003).

What Does an EQ Score Mean?

EQ is an emotional quotient score. It is found by assessing the behavioral factors that reflect EI. For example, the EQ score reflects the way in which a person reacts in a variety of situations, including:

Stressful or frustrating situations

Failures, or disappointing situations

Positions of leadership

How an individual manages the emotions of people of a range of different ages, and

Handling diversity and cultural sensitivities (My Frameworks, 2017).

EQ distinguishes emotional capacity as a distinct type of intellect. The average EQ score is in the range of 90 - 100, whilst the perfect EQ score is 160. What does an EQ score actually mean? Well, as well as contributing to success, EQ plays a role in everyday life (My Frameworks, 2017).

Six EQ Self-assessments

Maybe you are interested in testing your own EQ? Listed below are 6 readily available EQ self-assessments:

1. Emotional Intelligence Test (2019). Psychology Today. Access here.

2. Test your E.I: Free EQ quiz (2018). Institute for Health and Human Potential. Access here.

3. How Emotionally Intelligent are You? Boosting Your People Skills (2019). Mind Tools. Access here.

4. Emotional Intelligence Test (2019). Psych Tests. Access here.

5. Emotional Intelligence Test Free - EQ Test Free Online (2019). Alpha High IQ Society. Access here.

6. How Emotionally Intelligent Are You? (2017). My Frameworks. Access here.

Measuring Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace

EI is closely associated with success in the workplace (Bradberry, 2014).

TalentSmart, a worldwide leader in the provision of emotional intelligence, examined EI alongside 33 other key workplace skills. It was discovered that EI was, in this case, the strongest predictor of performance (Bradberry, 2014). Actually, EI explained 58% of success in all job types!

How, then, is EI measured in the workplace?

The Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence in Organizations (CREIO) have reviewed a number of tests that promise to measure EI in workplace settings, and have selected those for which there is a substantial body of research. Let's examine these different measures.

The Emotional and Social Competence Inventory (ESCI)

This is used to measure EI and enables workplaces to raise awareness of EI based on feedback (CREIO, 2018).

A multi-rater assessment, this test also encourages the coaching and development of crucial work capabilities. It takes approximately 30 - 45 minutes to administer.

It looks at the following competency scales:

emotional self-awareness,

emotional self-control,

adaptability,

achievement orientation,

positive outlook,

empathy,

organizational awareness,

coach and mentor,

inspirational leadership,

influence,

conflict management and

teamwork (CREIO, 2018).

The Emotional and Social Competence Inventory - University Edition

The ESCI-U provides universities with an emotional and social intelligence test at a much lower cost than the corporate version (CREIO, 2018).

It assesses 14 key competencies - 5 emotional intelligence, 7 social intelligence, and 2 cognitive competencies. The multi-rater version is said to be the most well validated and widely used behavioral measure of emotional and social intelligence (CREIO, 2018).

It has been used in schools. colleges and universities, and is currently used at undergraduate, Masters and doctoral levels in a number of countries (CREIO, 2018).

The ESCI-U takes approximately 30 - 45 minutes to administer.

The Genos Emotional Intelligence Inventory (Genos E.I).

This assessment was developed from a wide range of peer-reviewed research, is available in many languages and is used in approximately 500 multi-national companies (CREIO, 2018). It is delivered via an online survey system which is modern and responsive.

The Genos EI consists of 42 items and takes approximately 10 minutes to complete. Although it is designed to be used in workplaces, it has been claimed that it is a valid assessment for individuals aged 7 - 75 years (CREIO, 2018).

It looks into six competencies that reflect the skills and behavior that develop as a result of EI abilities:

self-awareness,

awareness of others,

authenticity,

emotional reasoning,

self-management and

positive influence.

The Group Emotional Competence (GEC) Inventory

This assessment of EI in the workplace was developed from the work of Vanessa Druskat and Steven Wolff who have led the application of emotional competence at the group level (CREIO, 2018).

It provides a measure of 9 group norms that have been associated with team effectiveness. Also, this feedback can help groups to recognize their strengths and weaknesses, and therefore detect areas for improvement (CREIO, 2018).

The GEC Inventory contains 57 items that measure the nine dimension of group EI reported by Druskat and Wolff.

The Work Group Emotional Intelligence Profile (WEIP)

This is a self-report measure that looks at EI of individuals in teams.

Respondents choose from a seven-point reference format (from 1 - strongly disagree to 7 - strongly agree) to items that are designed to engage them in a reflection of their own behavior. For example, " I am able to describe accurately the way others in my team are feeling " (CREIO, 2018).

The WEIP is designed to look at two dimensions of EI - the ability to deal with one's own emotions (which makes up scale one, consisting of 18 items) and, the ability to deal with others' emotions (this is measured in scale two, which has 12 items) (CREIO, 2018).

Scales 1 and 2 are each comprised of 5 subscales. Team EI is discovered by calculating the average scores of the WEIP for all team members.

As you can see, whilst EI is crucial in a work environment, employers and leaders in team settings have a few options for assessments to choose from that measure EI.

Relevant: Emotional Intelligence and Leadership Effectiveness

The Queendom Emotional Intelligence Test

Queendom.com is a subsidiary of PsychTests AIM Inc, which is a high-tech psychometric company that produces a range of services and products based on an extensive battery of psychological assessments (Queendom, 2019).

PsychTests AIM provides psychometric services and related products to a very diverse range of groups: recruiters, HR professionals, business owners, therapists, life coaches, athletic organizations, students, researchers, marketers, and even professors! (Queendom, 2019).

As such, Queendom has developed 'scientifically developed and validated tests and quizzes', including the Emotional Intelligence Test.

What is this test?

Well, the Queendom EI Test consists of 341 questions and takes approximately 60 - 90 minutes to complete (Queendom, 2019). The questions take the type of self-assessment, situational, and image-based questions. A test specifically developed to measure EI, the Queendom EI Test includes self-report and skill-testing components.

What does the test provide?

The Queendom EI Test provides an introduction to EI, an overall score, assesses a range of scales, and also advice - tips that are tailored from an individual's results.

The scales are as follows:

Emotional competencies - this scale measures the ability to identify one's emotions, and being comfortable with emotional expression and emotional situations or people who are emotional. The emotional competency scale also examines emotional reflection, emotional regulation, and emotional integration (Queendom, 2019)

Social competencies - looks at a person's adaptable social skills and social insight. It examines the area of conflict - by looking at a knowledge of conflict resolution and conflict resolution behavior. The social competency scale also looks at empathy, flexibility, and the ability to read body language (Queendom, 2019).

Drive - the 'drive' scale focuses on goal-setting, striving, self-motivation and self-awareness which are all a component of EI.

Stress management - this scale looks at coping skills, emotional selectivity (in terms of magnitude) and emotional selectivity (in regards to precision). Furthermore, the stress management scale measures resilience, adaptability, and contentment. It looks at an individual's positive mindset, their extreme rumination, and the congruence of their behavior according to values (Queendom, 2019).

Self-regard - the self-regard scale measures the aspects of self-esteem, self-confidence, and assertiveness. It also looks at self-efficacy and the need for approval (Queendom, 2019).

The Emotional Intelligence Grid

The grid below is an interesting graphical depiction of the dimensions and components of EI.

The grid provides a clear 'snapshot' of EI, portraying what is a complicated concept in an easy-to-understand form.

Emotional Intelligence and EQ Quadrants

According to research, EI consists of 4 key skills that fall under two primary 'competencies' (Bradberry, 2014). These are personal competence and social competence. These skills can be portrayed in four separate 'quadrants'.

What would such EQ quadrants look like?

Well, the four quadrants would be labeled as ' what I see' and ' what I do ' (Bradberry, 2014). The quadrants of self-awareness and self-management make up 'personal competence'. These two skills focus more on the individual and their interactions with others (Bradberry, 2014). On the other hand, social awareness and relationship management make up 'social competence'.

Briefly, let's look at each of these 4 core skills of EI, the EQ quadrants are:

Self-awareness: this quadrant looks at being aware of emotions as they happen, and being able to perceive these emotions accurately

Self-management: includes being able to apply an awareness of emotions in order to remain flexible and direct behavior positively

Social-awareness: this EQ quadrant is associated with correctly perceiving and understanding emotions in other people

Relationship management: taps into being able to apply the awareness of the emotions being experienced by the self and others in order to successfully manage social interactions (Bradberry, 2014).

Is an EQ Test the Same as an Intelligence Test?

For many years, intelligence tests have been used to look at quantifying a person's cognitive ability - their capacity to reason and 'think'. However, EI is a relatively new concept. Hopefully, this article has shown that EI (or 'EQ') can be measured, so, can an EQ test be compared to an IQ test?

There is a key, crucial difference between testing EQ versus testing IQ. Notably, IQ (the intelligence quotient) measures, broadly speaking, the ability to learn. It is stable, changing very little across the lifespan. On the other hand, the emotional quotient (EQ) taps into EI - which is a flexible group of skills.

Therefore, like all skills, EI can be learned/acquired. It can be improved with practice.

In other words, it is possible to develop a high EI even if a person is not necessarily 'born with it'. As has been argued in this article, the 'ability' of EI can be measured...therefore, the closest comparison between tests of EQ and so-called 'intelligence tests' (such as the Wechsler tests and more recently, the Woodcock-Johnson test) is an abilities-based emotional intelligence test such as the MSCEIT.

Abilities-based EQ tests, such as the MEIS and the MSCEIT assess the actual emotional 'ability' of a person, in the same way that an IQ test measures cognitive ability.

Therefore, whilst not ALL EQ tests are the same as an intelligence test, abilities-based EI assessments share similar properties to IQ tests.

A Take Home Message

The issue of emotional intelligence testing is a really complicated one. Although not all tests of EI can be compared to IQ tests, hopefully this article has explained that EQ is a construct that can be measured. Emotional intelligence is a relatively new area of positive psychology, so expect to hear more about it as time goes on!

This article has provided a detailed look at emotional intelligence testing, including an examination of some EI tests, a closer look at whether EI can be measured by a simple quiz, and exploration of EI in the workplace. However, a highlight for me in writing this article was reading some sample questions from EQ tests - it gave me a good picture of what EI taps into.

Have you ever measured your own emotional intelligence? Perhaps you can follow one of the links and do it today? If you have completed an EI test, were you surprised by the findings? Did they help you learn more about yourself?

Please take a moment to share your thoughts below!

For further reading, see:

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
17 Emotional Intelligence Tests and Assessments (+Free Quizzes)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Perhaps you may have heard that what is even more important than a person's 'IQ' is their 'EQ', or emotional intelligence, and are interested in learning more. Emotional Intelligence involves, broadly speaking, the capacity to understand and manage emotion. Can this be measured?

# data[].attributes.headline
Six steps to improve your emotional intelligence | Ramona Hacker | TEDxTUM

# data[].attributes.subject
Six steps to improve your emotional intelligence | Ramona Hacker | TEDxTUM

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
I want to start with doing a small survey with you. For that, please put your hands into your laps and close your eyes. I will now pose a couple of questions to which I would love to have a very honest answer just by a show of hands. No worries, no one will judge you for it. The first question is, Who of you has thought, within the past week, about whether or not you are an emotionally intelligent person? Now that you think of it, would you consider yourself emotionally intelligent? Please raise your hand if you do so. And who of you has ever worked consciously on your emotional skill? Thank you for sharing. You can now open your eyes again. And thank you also for being so very honest with me. Now I also want to be honest with you. Emotional intelligence is not necessarily my main strength. When I make decisions, I based them solely on my rationale. If friends from school hear me do this talk right now, they will be very surprised because back then, I didn't even consider emotions as something crucial. They weren't logical. I couldn't explain them very well. So why would I care? I never even actively thought about the topic until five years ago when I dropped out of a job because of a burnout. It was then that my very emotional side was revealed, and while I rarely cried before, especially not in front of people, I just couldn't stop the tears from streaming down my face at the most inconvenient of times anymore. Several times a day, I went to the restroom just to hide my suffering. And that made very clear to me that I need to work on this issue. But now, what is it, this mysterious emotional intelligence? When most people think of it, they stop at the term "emotional". What do you connect to it? I'd say it has a bad connotation, describing a person having or expressing strong feelings. And this connotation is also then, therefore, emotional intelligence, a misconception that I had as well. However, it's crucial to differentiate between emotional and the value that emotional intelligence can have, because emotional intelligence is something fundamentally different. It's the ability to identify and manage your emotions and those of others, and it's set to include three skills. First, emotional awareness, so empathy towards others but also towards the self. Second, the ability to harness emotions and apply them to tasks like problem solving. And third, the ability to manage emotions, which includes regulating your own emotions but also calming down or cheering up other people. As you can clearly see by this contrast, very emotional people do not necessarily or automatically have a high emotional intelligence, because they may only display their emotions freely without thinking about or knowing why they have them. And maybe not even considering the appropriateness of showing them in the respective situation. Now, lacking emotional intelligence as a kid or teenager meant for me that I would channel things like loneliness or fear sometimes into aggression. My family background - well, let's say - is improvable. So, instead of finding the support that I'd need, I'd rather get it on the basis of "Oh, don't be such a crybaby" than anything else. My parents didn't teach me the value of emotions. Therefore, losing friends or breakups would hit me harder than many others because I could neither fully understand my emotions, nor those of the others. They just didn't make sense. I thought I'm not supposed to feel that way, because I've never learned how to deal with emotions. And with time passing, I realised I'm just one of many people having this issue. Have you ever thought about why people judge or bully each other, beat kids, or at work, or even in toxic friendships or relationships? And it can be anything, ranging from sexism to racism. It's because of insecurity due to a lack of emotional intelligence, because it's hard to understand the difference between yourself and someone else, And it's even harder to connect on an emotional level, to truly comprehend where someone else is coming from. And in order to change that, we first of all need to consider emotional intelligence as a crucial skill in our society, and then also take the time to consciously work on it. Currently, we do neither. And we also don't give our kids, for example, the space to learn the skill. Kids nowadays - they are supposed to be good in school, do sports, play an instrument, learn a foreign language, and maybe even some additional things. They don't get the chance to get to know who they are, connect to themselves, and to their emotions. And a fundamental part of being emotionally intelligent means knowing who you are. And for them to learn, we also need to learn it ourselves to be the role model that they need. Now you might be thinking, "Yeah, sure, but how do we approach this topic - individually, but also as a society?" And basically it comes down to what everything comes down to: we need to learn a new skill. So, when you learn a new skill, you first of all need to become aware of your incompetence in the field. So I got there with my burnout. I'm pretty sure that you can manage that more easily, and then you work on the skill until you manage it to the level that you want. And after a while, you will even be able to apply it without actively thinking about it. Take for example, your driver's license. After a while you stop thinking, "Oh, I need to put in the next gear" - you just do so. Unconscious competence achieved. Now, the tricky thing, though, is to get from conscious incompetence to conscious competence. And we do that by learning the basics of how a car works and by practicing. So in the beginning it may be difficult to steer the wheel at the same time as putting in the next gear, but after a while, it gets easier. And with emotional intelligence, it's basically the same thing. So I tried to compile my experiences and came up with a six-step guide that hopefully helps people to get more emotionally intelligent. And the first thing that we need to do is we need to acknowledge our emotions. But not only as such but as something valuable because that's what they are. According to research by António Damásio, people whose brain parts that are responsible for emotions have been damaged found themselves even having a harder time taking rational decisions. That's how valuable they are. And the very first small but simple thing that you can do is you can ask people with genuine interest how they are feeling. And when you're asked, answer with authenticity when you feel good but also when you feel bad, so no "I'm fine", but also no complaining. Instead of complaining about your colleagues, say, "I don't feel appreciated at work", or whatever it comes down to - make it an iMessage. And when people show emotions, tell them that it's okay to have those. Talk about them. Erase the taboo that I feel exists in our society of talking about emotions, because that's more often than not the one thing that keeps us from making the next step. And the next step is differentiating and analysing emotions. So sometimes when we talk about or express a feeling, we substitute the original one with one that we think we know better or are better at handling. But there are actually a lot of different emotions and all of them have their functions, and all of them might also need you to handle them differently. Therefore, it's important to get down to the core. And then, you also need to accept and appreciate all those emotions because emotions are neither good nor bad. They just gain connotation through society. Take, for example, grieving or sadness. Why do we so desperately try to cut it out of our lives? Because actually, it's just a very beautiful illustration of the appreciation that we have for someone or something. Now, I approach all three steps by writing my emotions down in a journal just for that - on need basis, so not necessarily daily but sometimes only every few weeks, or maybe even only every few months. Friends of mine do similar things with apps if you want to be more modern. And then there is the next step: reflecting on your emotions and their origin because sometimes just knowing why we feel the way you do already helps us handle the feeling. Again, for me covered when I write them down because it gives me time to actively think about them. And then you get to handling your emotions, because that's what it's all about, isn't it? And as that, reflecting might already suffice. But it might not. And you may still need to find your way on how to handle your emotions. Because there's more than one way to skin a cat, and I can only give you a few examples of what I did. And what helped me, if not handle the emotion but at least find out how to handle it , was writing it down because it put distance between me and my emotions. There has even been a study conducted on the positive effects of written expression of emotions, by Pennebaker and Smyth, and they published it in their book "Opening Up by Writing It Down", if you want to check it out. Because that's actually another thing that I do: I read on the topic. Currently, I'm reading "The Language of Emotions", by Karla McLaren. Literally any book by Brené Brown is good to go, but there are so many more. And I talk to friends. I ask them, How do you approach this situation? How do you approach that topic or this emotion? And then, it's more or less a trial-and-error principle. Sometimes it may be sports, sometimes it may be meditation. It's just important that you find your individual way. And then, handling the emotions of others. And I'd say as soon as you master your emotions, but also in the process of getting better at it, you will find it easier and easier to also handle the emotions of others because you have a different understanding. And understanding and awareness are the keys. It gets even easier because you can simply ask the other person how you can support them because they might know. Or, you can also ask them how they can support themselves, because that way you know only help them in the acute situation but you actually help them develop their emotional intelligence. And then, when we have a few people being emotionally intelligent, we also need to think about "How can we teach our next generation?" And as a society, I feel the most important thing that we need to do is implement emotional education in school. Teach children about the different emotions and their functions. Give them a space to openly talk about them so that they can acknowledge their emotions. Help them to accept and appreciate them. To be honest, it's not that difficult. Most of the things that I mention can be easily put into practice in schools. I mean, how many books have you read in school? Why not make some of them about emotional intelligence? Or make kids work on case studies together so that they can exchange their ideas on how to approach topics. And if we're lucky, they get out of school having learned this fundamental and crucial skill of emotional intelligence. Imagine the world that we would be living in. If every one of us was emotionally intelligent, what do you think would change? Being emotionally intelligent means knowing and understanding yourself. Thus, it helps you make better decisions. It would spare us from emotional suffering because we know where it comes from and we know how to handle it - and maybe not even impose it upon others. It would help us deal with interpersonal relationships because we also connect on a different level. And interpersonal relationships are everywhere. Just think about it. What would it mean to have an emotionally intelligent boss? Or what would it mean to have an emotionally intelligent parent? If we were all emotionally intelligent, how would we approach differences? Or how would we approach topics like mental health? Or how would we approach conflicts? Just imagine the world that we would be living in - a world full of mutual understanding, acceptance, tolerance and connection - a truly inclusive world. How awesome would that be? Thank you. (Applause)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Transcript of "Six steps to improve your emotional intelligence | Ramona Hacker | TEDxTUM"

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
TED Talk Subtitles and Transcript: Sometimes emotions don't make sense, and sometimes being emotional doesn't mean you're emotionally intelligent. Growing up, rationality often came before emotions for Ramona, but as she grew older and realized that she had never actively learned how to deal with her emotions and that she wasn't the only one who lacked this skill, she knew she had to change something.

# data[].attributes.headline
5 Brilliant TED Talks That Will Boost Your Emotional Intelligence

# data[].attributes.subject
5 Brilliant TED Talks That Will Boost Your Emotional Intelligence

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Emotional intelligence is more than a hot topic or trending hashtag. The term describes an extremely important concept: a person's ability to recognize his or her own and other people's emotions, to understand the powerful effect of these emotions, and to use that information to guide thinking and behavior. This quality greatly enhances your efforts to achieve success--in many areas of life.

So how do you develop emotional intelligence? As with any skill, you must study and practice. Here are 5 TED Talks that will help you increase self-awareness and start targeting areas for improvement.

1. Kelly McGonigal: How to make stress your friend

In this open and honest talk, psychologist Kelly McGonigal admits a fundamental change in her thinking regarding stress. She recounts that for years she taught others what sounds like a completely reasonable theory: Stress makes people sick. But then she shares the research that got her thinking differently: Stress may only be bad for you if you believe that it's bad for you.

McGonigal encourages us to see stress as a positive, and introduces us to the resulting benefits in doing so. She also teaches us how reaching out to others--either when we're under stress or when they are--helps build resilience.

2. Arianna Huffington: How to succeed? Get more sleep

You know Ms. Huffington as the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the Huffington Post, as well as an accomplished author and businesswoman.

In four compelling (and very funny) minutes, Ms. Huffington shares a personal experience that led to a personal discovery. In doing so, she urges us to take a closer look at the benefits of getting enough rest--and gives new meaning to the phrase "sleeping your way to the top".

3. Laura Trice: The power of saying thank you

There are few phrases in the English language that match the power of these two words: thank you.

In a simple (yet profound) three-minute talk, Dr. Laura Trice shares with us the potential of those two words to change relationships, along with the reasons why we don't hear the phrase as often as we should, and why we shouldn't be afraid to ask someone else to say it.

4. Daniel Goleman: Why aren't we more compassionate?

Daniel Goleman is a psychologist and award-winning author who greatly contributed to the popularity of EQ through his 1995 best-selling book Emotional Intelligence.

By brilliantly mixing scientific research and absorbing anecdotes, Goleman delves into the theme question with gusto. In doing so, he inspires us to think about the society we've created, what influences our perspective, and how we can do better. (His concluding story is eye-opening, to say the least.)

5. Mandy Len Catron: Falling in love is the easy part

I almost didn't include this one, but in the end I couldn't resist. It's true, the title might not speak to an audience of entrepreneurs and business owners. But the insights Ms. Catron provide go much further than finding romantic love.

In exploring the differences between falling and staying in love, Ms. Catron teaches important lessons about how we get to know others on a deeper level. Even more importantly, she raises thoughtful questions that each of us would do well to ponder. When we do, we are reminded of what it takes to maintain our most important relationships.

Upon reflection, we realize that developing emotional intelligence may not be easy--but it's definitely worth it.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
5 Brilliant TED Talks That Will Boost Your Emotional Intelligence

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Emotional intelligence is more than a hot topic or trending hashtag. The term describes an extremely important concept: a person's ability to recognize his or her own and other people's emotions, to understand the powerful effect of these emotions, and to use that information to guide thinking and behavior.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In 1990, in my role as a science reporter at The New York Times, I chanced upon an article in a small academic journal by two psychologists, John Mayer, now at the University of New Hampshire, and Yale's Peter Salovey. Mayer and Salovey offered the first formulation of a concept they called "emotional intelligence."

Those were days when the preeminence of IQ as the standard of excellence in life was unquestioned; a debate raged over whether it was set in our genes or due to experience. But here, suddenly, was a new way of thinking about the ingredients of life success. I was electrified by the notion, which I made the title of this book in 1995. Like Mayer and Salovey, I used the phrase to synthesize a broad range of scientific findings, drawing together what had been separate strands of research - reviewing not only their theory but a wide variety of other exciting scientific developments, such as the first fruits of the nascent field of affective neuroscience, which explores how emotions are regulated in the brain.

I remember having the thought, just before this book was published ten years ago, that if one day I overheard a conversation in which two strangers used the phrase emotional intelligence and both understood what it meant, I would have succeeded in spreading the concept more widely into the culture. Little did I know.

The phrase emotional intelligence, or its casual shorthand EQ, has become ubiquitous, showing up in settings as unlikely as the cartoon strips Dilbert and Zippy the Pinhead and in Roz Chast's sequential art in The New Yorker. I've seen boxes of toys that claim to boost a child's EQ; lovelorn personal ads sometimes trumpet it in those seeking prospective mates. I once found a quip about EQ printed on a shampoo bottle in my hotel room.

And the concept has spread to the far corners of our planet. EQ has become a word recognized, I'm told, in languages as diverse as German and Portuguese, Chinese, Korean, and Malay. (Even so, I prefer EI as the English abbreviation for emotional intelligence.) My e-mail inbox often contains queries, from, for example, a doctoral student in Bulgaria, a school teacher in Poland, a college student in Indonesia, a business consultant in South Africa, a management expert in the Sultanate of Oman, an executive in Shanghai. Business students in India read about EI and leadership; a CEO in Argentina recommends the book I later wrote on the topic. I've also heard from religious scholars within Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism that the concept of EI resonates with outlooks in their own faith.

Most gratifying for me has been how ardently the concept has been embraced by educators, in the form of programs in "social and emotional learning or SEL. Back in 1995 I was able to find only a handful of such programs teaching emotional intelligence skills to children. Now, a decade later, tens of thousands of schools worldwide offer children SEL. In the United States many districts and even entire states currently make SEL curriculum requirement, mandating that just as students must attain a certain level of competence in math and language, so too should they master these essential skills for living.

In Illinois, for instance, specific learning standards in SEL abilities have been established for every grade from kindergarten through the last year of high school. To give just one example of a remarkably detailed and comprehensive curriculum, in the early elementary years students should learn to recognize and accurately label their emotions and how they lead them to act. By the late elementary years lessons in empathy should make children able to identify the nonverbal clues to how someone else feels; in junior high they should be able to analyze what creates stress for them or what motivates their best performance. And in high school the SEL skills include listening and talking in ways that resolve conflicts instead of escalating them and negotiating for win-win solutions.

Around the world Singapore has undertaken an active initiative in SEL, as have some schools in Malaysia, Hong Kong, Japan, and Korea. In Europe, the U.K. Has led the way, but more than a dozen other countries have schools that embrace EI, as do Australia and New Zealand, and here and there countries in Latin America and Africa. In 2002 UNESCO began a worldwide initiative to promote SEL, sending a statement of ten basic principles for implementing SEL to the ministries of education in 140 countries.

In some states and nations, SEL has become the organizing umbrella under which are gathered programs in character education, violence prevention, antibullying, drug prevention and school discipline. The goal is not just to reduce these problems among schoolchildren but to enhance the school climate and, ultimately, students' academic performance.

In 1995, I outlined the preliminary evidence suggesting that SEL was the active ingredient in programs that enhance children's learning while preventing problems such as violence. Now the case can be made scientifically: helping children improve their self-awareness and confidence, manage their disturbing emotions and impulses, and increase their empathy pays off not just in improved behavior but in measurable academic achievement.

This is the big news contained in a recently completed meta-analysis of 668 evaluation studies of SEL programs for children from preschoolers through high school. The massive survey was conducted by Roger Weissberg, who directs the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning at the University of Illinois at Chicago - the organization that has led the way in bringing SEL into schools worldwide.

The data show that SEL programs yielded a strong benefit in academic accomplishment, as demonstrated in achievement test results and grade-point averages. In participating schools, up to 50 percent of children showed improved achievement scores and up to 38 percent improved their grade-point averages. SEL programs also made schools safer: incidents of misbehavior dropped by an average of 28 percent; suspensions by 44 percent; and other disciplinary actions by 27 percent. At the same time, attendance rates rose, while 63 percent of students demonstrated significantly more positive behavior. In the world of social science research, these remarkable results for any program promoting behavioral change, SEL had delivered on its promise.

In 1995 I also proposed that a good part of the effectiveness of SEL came from its impact in shaping children's developing neural circuitry, particularly the executive functions of the prefrontal cortex, which manage working memory - what we hold in mind as we learn - and inhibit disruptive emotional impulses. Now the first preliminary scientific evidence for that notion has arrived. Mark Greenberg of Pennsylvania State University. A codeveloper of the PATHS curriculum in SEL, reports not only that the program for elementary school students boasts academic achievement but, even more significantly, that much of the increased learning can be attributed to improvements in attention and working memory, key functions of the prefrontal cortex. This strongly suggests that neuroplasticity, the shaping of the brain through repeated experience, plays a key role in the benefits from SEL.

Perhaps the biggest surprise for me has been the impact of EI in the world of business, particularly in the areas of leadership and employee development (a form of adult education). The Harvard Business Review has hailed emotional intelligence as "a ground-breaking, paradigm-shattering idea," one of the most influential business ideas of the decade.

Such claims in the business world too often prove to be fads, with no real underlying substance. But here a far-flung network of researchers has been at work, ensuring that the application of EI will be grounded in solid data. The Rutgers University-based Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence in Organizations (CREIO) has led the way in catalyzing this scientific work, collaborating with organizations that range from the Office of Personnel Management in the federal government to American Express.

Today companies worldwide routinely look through the lens of EI in hiring, promoting, and developing their employees. For instance, Johnson and Johnson (another CREIO member) found that in divisions around the world, those identified at mid career as having high leadership potential were far stronger in EI competencies than were their less-promising peers. CREIO continues to foster such research, which can offer evidence-based guidelines for organizations seeking to enhance their ability to achieve their business goals or fulfill a mission.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In 1990, in my role as a science reporter at The New York Times, I chanced upon an article in a small academic journal by two psychologists, John Mayer, now at the University of New Hampshire, and Yale's Peter Salovey. Mayer and Salovey offered the first formulation of a concept they called "emotional intelligence."

# data[].attributes.headline
Why is EI Important in Leadership Roles?

# data[].attributes.subject
Why is EI Important in Leadership Roles?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Why is EI Important in Leadership Roles?

Dr. Robert Tett, author of the Multidimensional Emotional Intelligence Assessment (MEIA), is featured in a series of videos to explain emotional intelligence (EI).

EI in Leadership

Leadership means getting a group of people to set aside their own personal objectives to pursue shared goals. It's especially important when things get tough. Whether it's an urgent deadline on an important project requiring everyone to stay late. Or maybe an individual team member has lost focus or drive. Good leadership keeps everything and everyone on track and moving forward. It's especially critical in times of crisis.

Recognizing & Regulating Own Emotions

EI contributes to leadership in several ways.

First there is recognizing and managing ones own emotions. An effective leader needs to know when he or she is feeling nervous, angry, disappointed, frustrated, proud, or sympathetic. And then regulate those feelings to best meet the demands of the team. Identifying those feelings in the moment is important because it allows the leader to consider whether they are appropriate for the situation, and whether they signal something that needs to be dealt with. Flying off the handle is rarely effective. And the leader that can see or feel it coming on stands a better chance of controlling and channeling that energy in a more productive direction.

Recognizing & Regulating Others' Emotions

A second way that EI is important in leadership is in seeing and managing the emotions of other people. This lies at the heart of effective leadership. Getting different people with their own agendas to choose the same path often requires emotional adjustments. For some it's a tweak. For others it's an overhaul. But either way, a good leader reads how individual's in the entire team are feeling. Often based on subtle cues and interactions. And finds a way to inspire productive cooperation. Emotional intelligence is absolutely critical for this. And so it's absolutely critical for leadership.

Empathy

A third role for EI in leadership is in showing compassion for workers fates and needs. There is a time and place for everything, and tough-minded leadership is sometimes the only way to go. More often though, effective leadership is achieved by showing workers that you care about them. This builds cooperation and trust which are key features of a productive team. Not all workers will reciprocate the warmth or pass it to their teammates. But showing you understand the workers' feelings and their situation-whether it's about work, home, or anything in between-can go a long way to winning their commitment to achieving the team's goals.

Leaders high in EI show empathy when they need to. Beyond that, being able and willing to put yourself in other people's shoes is a great way to recognize what it will take to get them motivated.

Emotional Expression

A fourth role for EI in leadership is through emotional expression. This is related to emotional self-control, but it really means the outward expression of behavior. Emotional control happens more on the inside. Expression is about what other people see. Leadership is by its nature highly visible. Being in the spotlight is part of most leaders' jobs. A good leader behaves in a way others will respond to positively-toward getting things done both individually and collectively. This usually means showing enthusiasm and optimism especially like I said earlier, when the going gets tough. But it can also include pride, disappointment, compassion, and anger. Especially if directed at the competition.

Workers look to their leader for motivation, and leaders provide that motivation. In large part through emotional expression. You have to balance that with emotional control. Keeping a lid on counterproductive outbursts but displaying cues others will respond to in a positive way.

These four areas: dealing with emotions in the self, dealing with emotions in others, empathy, and emotional expression are keys to effective leadership. Related skills and propensities include using emotions to be creative, to guide intuition on balance with logical thinking, to learn from past mistakes, and to maintain positive thinking. All these things are at the core of EI or closely related. And they are also part of being an effective leader hence the importance of EI in leadership.

Click here to learn more about the Multidimensional Emotional Intelligence Assessment for Workplace (MEIA-W).

Other Videos in the Series
What is Emotional Intelligence? How is EI Important in the Workplace? How is EI Measured? How is the MEIA Different?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Importance of EI in Leadership Roles - SIGMA Assessment Systems

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Dr. Robert Tett, author of the Multidimensional Emotional Intelligence Assessment (MEIA), is featured in a series of videos to explain emotional intelligence (EI). Leadership means getting a group of people to set aside their own personal objectives to pursue shared goals. It's especially important when things get tough.

# data[].attributes.headline
The 5 Features of Emotional Intelligence

# data[].attributes.subject
The 5 Features of Emotional Intelligence

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Goleman's (1998) popular book, Working with Emotional Intelligence, suggests that emotional intelligence accounts for 67% of the abilities needed to be a successful leader and is twice as important as technical proficiency or IQ. This research has subsequently been supported by a number of studies.

In this article, we summarise the key 5 elements of emotional intelligence, the benefits of each and how to improve them.

What is emotional intelligence

Emotional intelligence (EQ) is the ability to identify and manage your emotions, as well as other people's emotions.

If you're emotionally intelligent you have the ability to:

Identify what you're feeling

Know how to interpret your emotions

Understand how your emotions can impact others

Regulate your own emotions

Manage other people's emotions

Some people naturally inherit high EQ but it's a skill that you can practice and develop. By practicing emotionally intelligent behaviours your brain will adapt to make these behaviours automatic and replace less helpful behaviours.

The 5 features of emotional intelligence

Daniel Goleman determined that there are five fundamental features of EQ, each with their own benefits:

1. Self-awareness

Self-awareness is the ability to accurately recognise your: emotions, strengths, limitations, actions and understand how these affect others around you.
Benefits:

Increases the likelihood of you handling and using constructive feedback effectively.

By knowing your strengths and weaknesses you can improve your organisation's performance, for example, you may hire individuals who perform well in areas you struggle with.

Improve self-awareness by:

Keeping a diary of the situations that have triggered disruptive emotions in you, such as anger, and your thoughts and behaviours during those situations. With this information you can form an understanding of your emotions and reactions and work towards self-regulation.

Receiving feedback from staff as this can highlight how others perceive you and it also helps you target unhelpful reactions.

Observing the response others have to your behaviour.

2. Self-regulation

Self-regulation allows you to wisely manage your emotions and impulses - you show or restrain certain emotions depending on what is necessary and beneficial for the situation. For example, rather than shouting at your employees when you're stressed you may decide which tasks can be delegated.
Benefits:

Self-regulation helps earn the respect and trust of employees.

Useful when adapting to change.

Allows you to react rationally.

Improve self-regulation by:

Taking responsibility if you have made mistakes. Rather than blaming others admit that you are at fault. You'll feel less guilty and your team will respect you for it.

Responding to situations calmly as your communication is more effective when you're in this state and this feeling will spread to others. Breathing techniques, such as controlled breathing, can be useful practice.

3. Empathy

To be empathetic means you are able to identify and understand others' emotions i.e. imagining yourself in someone else's position.
Benefits:

Provides you with an understanding of how an individual feels and why they behave in a certain way. As a result, your compassion and your ability to help someone increases because you respond genuinely to concerns.

Especially helpful when delivering constructive feedback.

Being empathetic shows your team that you care. For example, if a manager reacts angrily after finding out that an employee has been arriving to work late because their child is unwell, the team is likely to react negatively towards the manager. It would be more favourable for the manager to be understanding and agree on a plan of action with the employee, such as, the employee starting work earlier and finishing later.

Employees will respect you more and subsequently job performance will improve.

To develop empathy:

Imagine yourself in someone else's position. Even if you have not experienced a similar situation, remember a situation where you have felt the same emotion your employee is experiencing.

Practice listening to your employees without interrupting them.

Observe your employees and try to gauge how they're feeling.

Never ignore your employees' emotions, for example, if an employee looks upset don't disregard this - address it.

Try to understand first rather than form a judgement. For example, you may initially feel annoyed at an employee who seems cold and disinterested. However, after discovering they suffer from social anxiety you may feel more sympathetic.

To communicate your empathy keep your body language open and regulate your voice to show your sincerity.

4. Motivation

Being self-motivated consists of: enjoying what you do, working towards achieving your goals and not being motivated by money or status.
Benefits:

Reduces your likelihood of procrastinating

Increases self-confidence

Keeps you motivated even if you face setbacks

Makes you focused on achieving your goals

Spreads to the team

To increase your motivation:

Remember why you're doing your job - maybe think about why you wanted it initially.

Set new goals if you lack them.

Remain optimistic because to be motivated you must be positive. Even when there is a setback or a challenge identify one positive factor about it.

To increase your employees' motivation explain why they are valuable, using example, as this will provide them with a sense of purpose.

5. Social skills

Effective social skills consist of managing relationships in a way that benefits the organisation.
Benefits:

Effective social skills helps you to build rapport with your employees and earn their respect and loyalty.

Employees will trust you which is especially valuable if unwelcomed decisions have been made, such as a rise in performance targets.

When you interact with your employees you can identify the best way to meet their individual needs and identify how their abilities can be used to achieve the organisation's aims.

Staff will feel comfortable presenting ideas to you and discussing concerns.

Improve social skills by:

Developing your communication skills. Problems can arise if there is bad communication, such as, misunderstandings upsetting employees. Listen to feedback to work out what to target, for example, the manner in which you speak may need work or perhaps your body language.

Learning how to provide praise and constructive feedback.

Cooperating and working together with your employees because you are all working towards a shared goal.

Listening to employees and practicing empathy.

Building relationships with your employees will assist you in understanding how to manage each individual.

Resolving conflict by looking at the situation from all the viewpoints involved and try to come to a compromise that benefits everyone.

The 5 features of emotional intelligence can all be improved with steps outlined in this article. Start working on these today and notice how you're able to connect with people at a deeper level.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The 5 Features of Emotional Intelligence

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Goleman's (1998) popular book, Working with Emotional Intelligence , suggests that emotional intelligence accounts for 67% of the abilities needed to be a successful leader and is twice as important as technical proficiency or IQ. This research has subsequently been supported by a number of studies.

# data[].attributes.headline
Centered leadership: How talented women thrive

# data[].attributes.subject
Centered leadership: How talented women thrive

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Women start careers in business and other professions with the same level of intelligence, education, and commitment as men. Yet comparatively few reach the top echelons.

This gap matters not only because the familiar glass ceiling is unfair, but also because the world has an increasingly urgent need for more leaders. All men and women with the brains, the desire, and the perseverance to lead should be encouraged to fulfill their potential and leave their mark.

With all this in mind, the McKinsey Leadership Project-an initiative to help professional women at McKinsey and elsewhere-set out four years ago to learn what drives and sustains successful female leaders. We wanted to help younger women navigate the paths to leadership and, at the same time, to learn how organizations could get the best out of this talented group.

To that end, we have interviewed more than 85 women around the world (and a few good men) who are successful in diverse fields. Some lead 10,000 people or more, others 5 or even fewer. While the specifics of their lives vary, each one shares the goal of making a difference in the wider world. All were willing to discuss their personal experiences and to provide insights into what it takes to stay the leadership course. We have also studied the academic literature; consulted experts in leadership, psychology, organizational behavior, and biology; and sifted through the experiences of hundreds of colleagues at McKinsey.

From the interviews and other research, we have distilled a leadership model comprising five broad and interrelated dimensions (exhibit): meaning, or finding your strengths and putting them to work in the service of an inspiring purpose; managing energy, or knowing where your energy comes from, where it goes, and what you can do to manage it; positive framing, or adopting a more constructive way to view your world, expand your horizons, and gain the resilience to move ahead even when bad things happen; connecting, or identifying who can help you grow, building stronger relationships, and increasing your sense of belonging; and engaging, or finding your voice, becoming self-reliant and confident by accepting opportunities and the inherent risks they bring, and collaborating with others.

We call this model centered leadership. As the name implies, it's about having a well of physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual strength that drives personal achievement and, in turn, inspires others to follow. What's particularly exciting is that we are starting to discover ways women can actively build the skills to become more self-confident and effective leaders. Centered leadership also works for men, though we have found that the model resonates particularly well with women because we have built it on a foundation of research into their specific needs and experiences.

Centered leadership emphasizes the role of positive emotions. A few characteristics particularly distinguish women from their male counterparts in the workplace. First, women can more often opt out of it than men can. Second, their double burden-motherhood and management-drains energy in a particularly challenging way. Third, they tend to experience emotional ups and downs more often and more intensely than most men do. Given these potentially negative emotions, centered leadership consciously draws on positive psychology, a discipline that seeks to identify what makes healthy people thrive. Although none of the women we interviewed articulated her ideas in precisely those terms, when we dived into the literature and interviewed leading academics, we found strong echoes of what our female leaders had been telling us.

Meaning

Meaning is the motivation that moves us. It enables people to discover what interests them and to push themselves to the limit. It makes the heart beat faster, provides energy, and inspires passion. Without meaning, work is a slog between weekends. With meaning, any job can become a calling.

It starts with happiness. Positive psychologists (including Tal Ben-Shahar, Jonathan Haidt, and Martin Seligman) have defined a progression of happiness that leads from pleasure to engagement to meaning. Researchers have demonstrated, for example, that an ice cream break provides only short-lived pleasure; in contrast, the satisfaction derived from an act of kindness or gratitude lasts much longer. Katharine Graham, the first female CEO of a Fortune 500 enterprise (the Washington Post Company), famously said, "To love what you do and feel that it matters-how could anything be more fun?"

Why is meaning important for leaders? Studies have shown that among professionals, it translates into greater job satisfaction, higher productivity, lower turnover, and increased loyalty. The benefits also include feelings of transcendence-in other words, contributing to something bigger than yourself generates a deeper sense of meaning, thereby creating a virtuous cycle. Finding meaning in life helped some of the women leaders we interviewed take new paths and accept the personal risks implicit in their goals.

Shelly Lazarus, the chairman and CEO of the advertising firm Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, described how she "just followed [her] heart, doing the things that [she] loved to do." This sense of meaning inspired her, early in her career, to jump from Clairol to Ogilvy. Lazarus commented that everyone she knew thought that her decision to go from the client side to the agency side was a strategic move. But "it wasn't really like that," she says. "I just loved the interaction with the agency because that was the moment I could see where the ideas came to life."

People seeking to define what is meaningful can start, as one interviewee put it, by "being honest with yourself about what you're good at and what you enjoy doing." Building these signature strengths into everyday activities at work makes you happier, in part by making these activities more meaningful. Although there is no simple formula for matching your strengths to any single industry or function, you can look for patterns in jobs that have and haven't worked out and talk with others about your experiences.

The connection between signature strengths and work can change because priorities do; sometimes, for example, a job is better than a calling, especially for young mothers. Our interviews show that this ebb and flow is natural and that the key to success is being aware of the shifts-and making conscious choices about them-in the context of bigger goals, personal or professional.
To read more on meaning:
Tal Ben-Shahar, Happier: Learn the Secrets to Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment, New York: McGraw-Hill, 2007.

Martin E. P. Seligman, Authentic Happiness: Using the New Positive Psychology to Realize Your Potential for Lasting Fulfillment, New York: Free Press, 2004.

Sonja Lyubomirsky, The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want, New York: Penguin, 2007.

Managing energy

Actively managing energy levels is crucial to leaders. Today's executives work hard: 60 percent of the senior executives toil more than 50 hours a week, and 10 percent more than 80 hours a week. What's more, many women come home from work only to sign onto a "second shift"-92 percent of them still manage all household tasks, such as meal preparation and child care.

We've found that work-life balance is a myth-so the only hope women have is to balance their energy flows. This means basing your priorities on the activities that energize you, both at work and at home, and actively managing your resources to avoid dipping into reserves. Burnout is a reality for men and women alike, but for women who can opt out, so too is throwing in the towel.

But work doesn't have to be exhausting. Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, a founder of positive psychology, studied thousands of people, from sculptors to factory workers. He found that those who frequently experienced what he called "flow"-a sense of being so engaged by activities that you don't notice the passage of time-were more productive and derived greater satisfaction from their work than those who did not. Further, it energized rather than drained them.

Zia Mody, a top litigator in India, described how she gained energy from a life that most people would see as exhausting. Even when her three daughters were young, she put in 16-hour days to prepare her cases. A woman among thousands of men at court, she lit up as she told us, "I love it! I love winning. I love being in court. . . . It excites me-I cannot tell you how much."

One useful tactic is to identify the conditions and situations that replenish your energy and those that sap it. Self-awareness lets you deliberately incorporate restorative elements into your day. It can also help you to space out your energy-sapping tasks throughout the day, instead of bundling them all into a single morning or afternoon. A particularly useful tip, we have found, is to give yourself time during the day to focus without distractions such as blinking lights and buzzing phones. Your productivity will benefit several times over.
To read more on managing energy:
Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, New York: HarperPerennial, 1991.

Edy Greenblatt, "Work/Life Balance: Wisdom or Whining," Organizational Dynamics, 2002, Volume 31, Number 2, pp. 177-93.

Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz, The Power of Full Engagement: Managing Energy, Not Time, Is the Key to High Performance and Personal Renewal, New York: Free Press, 2003.

Positive framing

The frames people use to view the world and process experiences can make a critical difference to professional outcomes. Many studies suggest that optimists see life more realistically than pessimists do, a frame of mind that can be crucial to making the right business decisions. That insight may be particularly critical for women, who are twice as likely to become depressed, according to one study. Optimists, research shows, are not afraid to frame the world as it actually is-they are confident that they can manage its challenges and move their teams quickly to action. By contrast, pessimists are more likely to feel helpless and to get stuck in downward spirals that lead to energy-depleting rumination.

Martin Seligman, a psychologist who was an early proponent of positive psychology, found, for example, that optimists are better able to deal with the news that they have cancer. Confident that they can handle the prognosis, they immediately start to gather facts and dive into treatment plans; pessimists, on the other hand, become paralyzed with fear. Seligman also shows that optimism can be learned-an important insight that underlies positive framing.

Positive framing and positive thinking, we would emphasize, are two different notions. The latter tries to replace adversity with positive beliefs. The former accepts the facts of adversity and counters them with action. Talking yourself into a view contrary to the facts has a temporary effect at best.

The experience of Andrea Jung, the chairman and CEO of Avon, suggests how useful positive framing can be. In late 2005, Jung recalls, she found her company in a decline that temporary factors could not explain. Recognizing that she was the leader who had created the strategies and the team responsible for the downturn, she listened to the counsel of her executive coach and promptly "fired herself" on a Friday night. The following Monday, Andrea showed up at work as the "new" turnaround CEO. She proved herself to be a "glass half full" optimist, and the recovery plan her management team adopted after a quick diagnosis led to a steady improvement and a return to growth.

No matter how pessimistic you are by nature, you can learn to view situations as optimists do. The key is self-awareness. If a meeting goes badly, for example, you should limit your thoughts about it to its temporary and specific impact and keep them impersonal. It helps to talk with trusted colleagues about the reasons for the poor meeting and ways to do better next time. These discussions should take place quickly enough for you to make a specific plan and act on it. You should also undertake some activity that will restore both your energy and your faith in yourself-perhaps having a hard workout, going out with friends, or spending time with your children.
To read more on positive framing:
Jonathan Haidt, The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom, New York: Basic Books, 2006.

Martin E. P. Seligman, Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life, New York: Pocket Books, 1998.

Connecting

People with strong networks and good mentors enjoy more promotions, higher pay, and greater career satisfaction. They feel a sense of belonging, which makes their lives meaningful. As Mark Hunter and Herminia Ibarra have noted in the Harvard Business Review, what differentiates a leader from a manager "is the ability to figure out where to go and to enlist the people and groups necessary to get there." Yet not all networks are equal. Roy Baumeister, a social psychologist who studies social belonging and rejection, believes that men tend to build broader, shallower networks than women do and that the networks of men give them a wider range of resources for gaining knowledge and professional opportunities. This theory is a matter of substantial debate among academics. Our experience with hundreds of women at McKinsey, however, offers additional evidence that women's networks tend to be narrower but deeper than men's.

The experience of Dame Stella Rimington, who in the late 1960s joined MI5, the UK's domestic intelligence organization, offers an example of the power of broad networks to get things done. Rimington, later the agency's director general, says that "women were definitely second-class citizens" in those days. They weren't allowed to do fieldwork, for example, yet "many of the women were completely indistinguishable from the men: they had the same kind of education."

She continues: "So we women-there were quite a few of us by then-we sort of ganged up and did a kind of round-robin thing and said, 'Why is it that we have a completely different career than men who are exactly like us?' And for the first time, the powers that be started to scratch their heads because they suddenly had to find an answer. . . . And in the end, of course, they decided that they would have to promote a few women." She later concluded that "no one of us would have asked that question on her own. We were supporting each other, and there was power in the many."

The leaders we interviewed also talked about the importance of having individual relationships with senior colleagues willing to go beyond the role of mentor-someone willing to stick out his or her own neck to create opportunity for or help a protégée. Such a person is what Ruth Porat, a vice chairwoman at Morgan Stanley, called a "sponsor."

A number of studies have shown that women who promote their own interests vigorously are seen as aggressive, uncooperative, and selfish. An equal number of studies show that the failure of women to promote their own interests results in a lack of female leaders. Until one of these conditions changes, sponsors, we believe, are the key to helping women gain access to opportunities they merit and need to develop.

Porat explained how a managing director took a chance on her when she was a second-year associate, asking her to present to a client's board of directors. "The consumer client wanted a woman to be present. I had never been in a boardroom, let alone presented in a boardroom. 'Sink or swim,' he told me. 'You're in.' I still remember to this day a mistake I made and that it was, overall, a good presentation. He took a real chance on me."

One surprising thing we learned as a result of talking with female leaders was that they often fail to reciprocate and find expectations that they should do so distasteful. A senior partner at McKinsey noted that men naturally understand that you must "give before you get," but women don't. This tendency-which other leaders have described to us as well-combined with the sometimes awkward sexual politics, real or perceived, between senior men and younger women, makes it harder for women to find sponsors.

Yet women can learn reciprocity. To start, it's important to assess your comfort level with the people you know through work, as well as how influential they are professionally. Most women we've worked with typically find that the colleagues they are close to are not influential-and vice versa. Explicit planning and some risk taking are needed to change this.

One approach is to provide and ask for help on a regular basis. Finding ways to forge connections through interests outside of work is another. Over and over, we heard, "Make it personal," in the sense that others will get along with you more easily if they see your human side. You can express this in all kinds of ways at work, without inappropriately blending your professional and personal lives. The female leaders we interviewed acted on this insight both to find sponsors and to build networks.
To read more on connecting:
Catalyst, Creating Women's Networks: A How-To Guide for Women and Companies, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1999.

Monica Higgins and Kathy Kram, "Reconceptualizing Mentoring at Work: A Developmental Network Perspective," Academy of Management Review, 2001, Volume 26, Number 2, pp. 264-68.

Lois J. Zachary, The Mentor's Guide: Facilitating Effective Learning Relationships, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2000.

Engaging

Many people think that hard work will eventually be noticed and rewarded. That can indeed happen-but usually doesn't. Women, our interviewees repeatedly told us, need to "create their own luck." To engage with opportunities by taking ownership of them, you must first find your own voice, literally. Julie Daum, a prominent Spencer Stuart recruiter who specializes in board placements, told us that even senior women on boards still lose out by not speaking up: they hang back if they think that they have nothing new to say or that their ideas fall short of profound.

One senior woman we interviewed told us how she learned to join in: "Every Monday, we had a senior-management meeting. In the beginning, I just listened. I learned from the guys because they were all there. And after a while I started to speak up. You did the work, so you've got to talk about it. And I did."

Women who want to grow as leaders should also take ownership of their professional development. Mary Ma, Lenovo's former chief financial officer, said that she drew inspiration from using the Japanese auto industry as a metaphor, reshaping herself to become more competitive by identifying what she had to change and then actually changing it. As Ma noted, she didn't complain to her boss or to her colleagues but rather looked inward to see how she could be a more effective leader. Instead of waiting for someone to tell her what to do, she took a systematic approach to self-improvement.

Engagement is equally about risk taking. The women we interviewed accept risk as a part of opportunity. Some have the confidence and courage to dive in; others use analytic problem solving to assess risks and then proceed to action. Psychologist Daniel Gilbert says his research indicates that people who make a choice for risk and work with it, rather than avoid it, report a greater degree of happiness than others do.

Shona Brown, Google's senior vice president of business operations, described how she handles opportunities and the risks that accompany them. "I'll use a skiing analogy because I like to jump off cliffs," she says. "But I generally jump off cliffs from which I'm relatively confident I'm going to land-or if I don't, it's not dangerous." Brown said she enjoys risk. "I like to be at that point where you're about to jump. Your stomach is kind of going 'woo'! It's not so simple that you're sure you'll succeed. But you're not in a life-threatening situation."

Our interviews have shown us that to embrace opportunity, people must often take sharp detours and that the risks of unexpected changes commonly seem more obvious than the benefits. Reaching out to others-not to avoid making decisions yourself but to learn the best outcome from change can often help you see opportunities in the right frame and decide whether to go for them.
To read more on engaging:
Daniel Gilbert, Stumbling On Happiness, New York: Knopf, 2006.

Linda Babcock and Sara Laschever, Women Don't Ask: The High Cost of Avoiding Negotiation-and Positive Strategies for Change, New York: Bantam, 2007.

Marshall Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life, Encinitas, CA: Puddledancer Press, 2003.

Within McKinsey and in the corporate world, our work on centered leadership continues (see sidebar, "Initial results"). To understand how men and women practice it across tenures, industries, and regions, we are interviewing more female and male leaders and launching large-scale surveys-again, with female and male respondents.

Our research is exploring the hypothesis that today's leaders can become even more effective through the model of centered leadership: a shared purpose with deep meaning for the people involved, explicit awareness and management of energy, positive framing, strong informal and formal networks, and the collaborative creation of opportunities. In time, we hope to help increase the number of female leaders significantly by giving them the tools to build leadership skills for any playing field.

About the author(s)

Joanna Barsh is a director in McKinsey's New York office, where Rebecca Craske is an associate principal; Susie Cranston is a consultant in the San Francisco office.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Centered leadership: How talented women thrive

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Women start careers in business and other professions with the same level of intelligence, education, and commitment as men. Yet comparatively few reach the top echelons. This gap matters not only because the familiar glass ceiling is unfair, but also because the world has an increasingly urgent need for more leaders.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
For decades, a lot of emphasis has been put on certain aspects of intelligence such as logical reasoning, math skills, spatial skills, understanding analogies, verbal skills etc. Researchers were puzzled by the fact that while IQ could predict to a significant degree academic performance and, to some degree, professional and personal success, there was something missing in the equation. Some of those with fabulous IQ scores were doing poorly in life; one could say that they were wasting their potential by thinking, behaving and communicating in a way that hindered their chances to succeed.

One of the major missing parts in the success equation is emotional intelligence, a concept made popular by the groundbreaking book by Daniel Goleman, which is based on years of research by numerous scientists such as Peter Salovey, John Meyer, Howard Gardner, Robert Sternberg and Jack Block, just to name a few. For various reasons and thanks to a wide range of abilities, people with high emotional intelligence tend to be more successful in life than those with lower EIQ even if their classical IQ is average.

This emotional intelligence test will evaluate several aspects of your emotional intelligence and will suggest ways to improve it. Please be honest and answer according to what you really do, feel or think, rather than what you think is considered right in this test. Nobody is there to judge you, just yourself...and besides, there are many trick questions.

Read every statement carefully and indicate which option applies best to you. There may be some questions describing situations that you may feel are not relevant to your life. In such cases, select the answer which you would most likely choose if you ever found yourself in such a situation.

After finishing this test you will receive a FREE snapshot report with a summary evaluation and graph. You will then have the option to purchase the full results for $9.95

This test is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. It is not a substitute for professional diagnosis or for the treatment of any health condition. If you would like to seek the advice of a licensed mental health professional you can search Psychology Today's directory here.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
For decades, a lot of emphasis has been put on certain aspects of intelligence such as logical reasoning, math skills, spatial skills, understanding analogies, verbal skills etc. Researchers were puzzled by the fact that while IQ could predict to a significant degree academic performance and, to some degree, professional and personal success, there was something missing in the equation.

# data[].attributes.headline
Emotional Intelligence Has 12 Elements. Which Do You Need to Work On?

# data[].attributes.subject
Emotional Intelligence Has 12 Elements. Which Do You Need to Work On?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Although there are many models of emotional intelligence, they are often lumped together as "EQ" in the popular vernacular. An alternative term is "EI," which comprises four domains: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. Within those domains are 12 EI competencies, starting with emotional self-awareness in the self-awareness domain. Emotional self-control, adaptability, achievement orientation, and a positive outlook fall under self-management. Empathy and organizational awareness make up social awareness. Relationship management includes influence, coaching and mentoring, conflict management, teamwork, and inspirational leadership. Leaders need to develop a balance of strengths across these competencies. Assessment tools, like a 360-degree assessment that uses ratings from yourself and those who know you well, can help you determine where your EI needs improvement. To best improve your weak spots, find an expert to coach you.

Esther is a well-liked manager of a small team. Kind and respectful, she is sensitive to the needs of others. She is a problem solver; she tends to see setbacks as opportunities. She's always engaged and is a source of calm to her colleagues. Her manager feels lucky to have such an easy direct report to work with and often compliments Esther on her high levels of emotional intelligence, or EI. And Esther indeed counts EI as one of her strengths; she's grateful for at least one thing she doesn't have to work on as part of her leadership development. It's strange, though - even with her positive outlook, Esther is starting to feel stuck in her career. She just hasn't been able to demonstrate the kind of performance her company is looking for. So much for emotional intelligence, she's starting to think.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Emotional Intelligence Has 12 Elements. Which Do You Need to Work On?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Although there are many models of emotional intelligence, they are often lumped together as "EQ" in the popular vernacular. An alternative term is "EI," which comprises four domains: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. Within those domains are 12 EI competencies, starting with emotional self-awareness in the self-awareness domain.

# data[].attributes.headline
Types of Effective Leadership Styles in Schools

# data[].attributes.subject
Types of Effective Leadership Styles in Schools

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In researching various leadership theories, I've found that not only do many of the theories overlap, but the theorists' work does as well. This is to be expected, as no one leadership style or theory can work in isolation, and no leader can align with one style to utilize in all situations. Therefore, it is essential that today's leaders recognize and incorporate elements from various leadership styles to apply to unique situations in leadership positions.

What is Servant Leadership?

Servant leadership has become a common term among educational and business leaders over the past decade. The term, however, was first created in Robert K. Greenleaf's essay, " The Servant as Leader " in 1970. In his essay, he states:

The servant-leader is servant first... It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire material possessions...The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.

Servant leadership focuses on the responsibility of the leader not only to ensure the success of the organization, but also a responsibility to his/her followers and stakeholders. This includes:

acting in an ethical manner,

putting others first, and

showing sensitivity to others' concerns.

The servant leader will also assist subordinates in professional growth and empowerment, as well as building a supportive community environment.

This philosophy speaks to leaders who consider the needs of their followers first-especially in education. It inspires us to balance the needs of followers with the desire to lead, and encourages us to treat others with respect, altruism, fairness, and honesty. In addition, it requires a leader to build community and lead in an ethical manner.

2 Other Leadership Styles in Education

In addition to servant leadership, there are a few current leadership theories that have either evolved from or are closely aligned with servant leadership.
Authentic Leadership
Closely aligned with servant leadership is authentic leadership. Northouse stated in his book Leadership Theory and Practice that authentic leadership encompasses both the intrapersonal domain, which focuses on the leader and his or her self-concept and self-knowledge, and the interpersonal domain, which is more relational and created by leaders and followers together (Northouse, 2013, pp. 205-225).

An advantage of authentic leadership is that it is developmental and can be nurtured in any leader. It has a definite moral dimension. However, critics of the process feel that it is still in the formative stages of development and that it is not clear how authentic leadership affects production or positive outcomes for the organization.
Ethical Leadership
Often used interchangeably with servant leadership, ethical leadership focuses on that which is fair and just to others. Particularly, ethical leadership focuses on acting with integrity, fairness, and ethical practices. Ethical leadership also entails knowledge of policy and social justice, as well as district culture.

In addition, a leader must be aware of all moral and legal consequences of decision-making and strive to practice inclusive leadership with an emphasis on cultural diversity. Scholars through the years have supported the role of reflective practice by educational leaders, and this is encouraged in this domain of leadership as leaders strive to become more self-aware and serve as role models of ethical leadership.
Why Servant Leadership is Effective in Schools
While often used in business models, servant leadership specific to school administration can contribute to the success of the school district. It is well known that one responsibility of the school superintendent is to nurture the vision, mission, and culture of the district. Further, research has supported the idea that greater involvement from a wide variety of stakeholders increases the buy-in and ultimately the success of the mission and vision of the district. A superintendent who practices servant leadership maintains priority on the needs of his/her stakeholders and is committed to the success of the corporation.

Another benefit of servant leadership it that it is designed to create leadership opportunities among the disadvantaged. Greenleaf states that it is his hope that the disadvantaged, following education in service leadership, will "return to their roots and become leaders of the disadvantaged". He further discusses the merits of leaders rising from the ranks of the disadvantaged to lead their people on a path to an improved life. This is applicable to school leadership, as no school district is immune from poverty among its children. Instilling servant traits in our children is a responsibility that not only benefits our schools, but our communities as a whole.

Greenleaf's research on servant leadership encourages us to focus on the needs of those in our organization rather than attempting to motivate them to produce greater results.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Types of Effective Leadership Styles in Schools - Standard for Success

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In researching various leadership theories, I've found that not only do many of the theories overlap, but the theorists' work does as well. This is to be expected, as no one leadership style or theory can work in isolation, and no leader can align with one style to utilize in all situations.

# data[].attributes.body
Strategies to Build, Support, and Sustain Teacher Leadership Opportunities

# data[].attributes.headline
12 Effective Leadership Activities and Games

# data[].attributes.subject
12 Effective Leadership Activities and Games

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
More and more people are asked to lead teams nowadays in the workplace, yet the path to becoming a good leader is a long one.

Practical leadership activities are a great benefit toward that path, whether you perform them yourself with your own team or with an external facilitator.

Leaders have both a big influence and responsibility for their teams. Some of the aspects they need to pay attention to are:

Setting the climate of a workplace

Inspiring team members

Setting values for their team

Improving team spirit and cohesion

Being responsible for their team's communication and wellbeing

These are no small responsibilities, and leadership skills do not necessarily come naturally for everyone. Dedicated work, self-awareness and being committed to personal growth is really important for gradually mastering leadership skills.

There are a number of tools to help you with leadership development. Coaching, peer support circles, and leadership development training can all help one to become a better leader.

Below you will find a list of activities that we find particularly effective for practicing and strengthening your leadership and team-building skills.

Better tools = better leadership

Best Leadership Development Activities

We have collected some easy-to-apply leadership activities for you from the SessionLab library of facilitation techniques. You can apply these leadership training activities right away with your team to improve teamwork, facilitate better communication and increase team cohesion.

Let's see where do these leadership development activities help and how to apply them.

Leaders determine the climate of a workplace

Leaders are role models to their colleagues and organization. Their working style, principles and values determine the culture that drives their organization's behaviour.

That is why a competitive, paranoid leader can easily create an organization where coworkers are trying to push others down and think only about themselves. While a leader who is open and inclusive will create a climate of openness and inclusiveness. How they behave, and what they consider as the norm, also affects which kind of behaviours are enforced and celebrated and which behaviours are punished.

The following activities can help you in recognising important leadership behaviours that result in a productive workplace.

This leadership activity helps groups translate abstract leadership principles into practical on-the-job behaviours. Participants work in groups to come up with real-life applications of leadership principles. The groups conduct multiple rounds of discussion to build upon each others' ideas, and in the end, evaluate the best ideas to identify the most useful behaviours.

Leadership exercise in groups, working with practical leadership principles.

This activity helps groups to translate abstract leadership principles into practical on-the-job behaviours. Participants work in groups to come up with real-life application of leadership principles. The groups take multiple rounds to build upon the ideas of each other, and in the end, evaluate the best ideas to identify the most useful behaviours.

In this activity, participants take on three different employee personas and list the behaviours of a positive leader or manager and a negative one from the perspectives of those employees. After some individual reflection, participants compare their lists, first in pairs and then in groups. Finally, they collect the ultimate do's and don'ts for managers and leaders.

My Favourite Manager #management #leadership #thiagi #action #teamwork

Participants work individually, assuming the roles of three different people and brainstorming their perceptions of three most favourite managers and three least favourite managers. Later, they work with a partner (and still later, in teams) to prepare a list of dos and don't-s for improving employees' perception of a manager's style.

This leadership development activity offers a self-assessment framework for people to first identify the skills, attributes and attitudes they find important for effective leadership, and then assess their own development in these areas. This framework is also a great tool to set individual leadership development goals in a coaching process.

Leadership Pizza #leadership #team

This leadership development activity offers a self-assessment framework for people to first identify what skills, attributes and attitudes they find important for effective leadership, and then assess their own development and initiate goal setting.

Leaders inspire others

Great leaders inspire others. It is one of the most important leadership traits. However, there are many different reasons why someone will find a leader inspirational. In order to grasp what facilitates inspiring leadership, try the following exercise:

Everyone is asked to think of a role model they look up to and ask themselves: If a young person would ask these role models for leadership advice and what kind of advice that would be.

Facilitate a group conversation where these pieces of advice are shared and contradicting points are discussed and reconciled. Given diverse enough responses, this structured sharing activity might be a good introduction to the concept of situational leadership.

Leadership Advice from Your Role Model #skills #leadership #thiagi #role playing

This structured sharing activity provides a faster, cheaper, and better alternative to buying and reading a lot of books: You tap into the wisdom of the group-and of their role models.

Leaders set the values of a team

Usually, the values of a leader are mirrored in the organization. If shortcuts are common practice for the leader, then she will see shortcuts made by her team members all across their projects. But if learning and self-improvement are important to the leader, then this will be a good foundation for these values in the whole organization, too.

To be more aware of your own values as a leader, try these activities:

Explore your Values is a group exercise for thinking on what your own and your team's most important values are. It's done in an intuitive and rapid way to encourage participants to follow their intuitions rather than over-thinking and finding the "correct" values. It is a good exercise to use to initiate reflection and dialogue around personal values.

In this leadership development activity, participants are asked to draw their own coat of arms symbolising the most important elements of their leadership philosophy. The coat of arms drawings are then debriefed and discussed together with the group.

In this leadership development activity, participants are asked to draw their own coat of arms symbolising the most important elements of their leadership philosophy. The coat of arms drawings are then debriefed and discussed together with the group.

After the exercise you may prepare a coat of arms gallery, exhibiting the leadership approach and philosophy of group members

Leaders facilitate team building

Every leader has an integral role in the formations of the teams they work with. Whether you are consciously working on it or not, your attitude and actions as a leader will significantly influence team cohesion and the team spirit of the people you work with.

This comes through in small everyday actions, the way you share responsibilities, the way you empower colleagues, and the way you foster a cooperative work environment as opposed to a competitive one.

You can benefit from using the following team building activities to give a focused teamwork experience to your team:

The Marshmallow Challenge is a team-building activity in which teams compete to build the tallest free-standing structure out of spaghetti sticks, tape, string, and the marshmallow that needs to be on the top. This activity emphasizes group communication, leadership dynamics, collaboration, and innovation and problem-solving strategies.

Marshmallow challenge with debriefing #teamwork #team #leadership #collaboration

In eighteen minutes, teams must build the tallest free-standing structure out of 20 sticks of spaghetti, one yard of tape, one yard of string, and one marshmallow. The marshmallow needs to be on top.

The Marshmallow Challenge was developed by Tom Wujec, who has done the activity with hundreds of groups around the world. Visit the Marshmallow Challenge website for more information. This version has an extra debriefing question added with sample questions focusing on roles within the team.

The Crocodile River is a team-building activity in which group members need to support each other in a task to move from one end of a space to another. It requires working together creatively and strategically in order to solve a practical, physical problem. It tends to emphasize group communication, cooperation, leadership and membership, patience and problem-solving.

This is a simple game to help team members learn how to work together (better). It can also focus on the group's understanding of communication, leadership, problem-solving, trust or persistence. Participants stand in a circle, close their eyes and put their hands into the circle to find two other hands to hold. Then they open their eyes and the group has to try to get back into a circle without letting go, though they can change their grip, of course.

Leaders are responsible for their team communication

Leaders are usually viewed as the parents of the organization. It is expected from them that they take care of their people and make sure that proper norms and rules are followed. One of the key areas where a leader has a large influence is the style and amount of communication between people.

Active Listening and giving effective feedback are critical skills to have as a leader, but is also crucial for your team members. In fact, the issue that leaders rank as one of the biggest barriers to successful leadership is avoiding tough conversations, including giving honest, constructive feedback.

Develop good communication practices with the following activities:

This activity supports participants in reflecting on a question and generating their own solutions using simple principles of active listening and peer coaching. It's an excellent introduction to active listening but can also be used with groups that are already familiar with this activity. Participants work in groups of three and take turns being "the subject" who will explore a question, "the listener" who is supposed to be totally focused on the subject, and "the observer" who will watch the dynamic between the other two.

Every time you work together with someone, your trust battery - the trust you have towards a certain person, or the 'emotional credit' that person has in your eyes - either charges or depletes based on things like whether you deliver on what you promise and the social interaction you exhibit. A low trust battery is the core of many personal issues at the workplace.

This self-assessment activity allows you and your team members to reflect on the 'trust battery' they individually have towards each person on the team, and encourages focus on actions that can charge the depleted trust batteries.

This self-assessment activity allows you and your team members to reflect on the 'trust battery' they individually have towards each person on the team, and encourages focus on actions that can charge the depleted trust batteries.

Regular and constructive feedback is one of the most important ingredients for effective teams. Openness creates trust, and trust creates more openness. This is an activity for teams that have worked together for some time and are familiar with giving and receiving feedback. The objective of Start, Stop, Continue is to examine aspects of a situation or develop next steps by polling people on what to start, what to stop and what to continue doing.

Now over to you...

I hope you have found some useful tips for leadership development activities above. Now we'd love to hear from you.

What are your favourite workshop ideas and training exercises for leadership development?

Have you tried any of the activities above? Let us know about your experiences in the comments.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
12 Effective Leadership Activities and Games | SessionLab

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
More and more people are asked to lead teams nowadays in the workplace, yet the path to becoming a good leader is a long one. Practical leadership activities are a great benefit toward that path, whether you perform them yourself with your own team or with an external facilitator.

# data[].attributes.headline
Why Community Involvement in Schools is Important

# data[].attributes.subject
Why Community Involvement in Schools is Important

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
It's no secret that parental involvement is an integral part of a successful educational framework. Numerous studies have identified parent engagement as a critical factor affecting the success of individual students and the school environment itself. But what many schools and educational institutions overlook is the fact that high rates of student success are generally the result of three groups collaborating to provide the best opportunities for the future-teachers, parents, and the community. In a 2002 research review by Anne T. Henderson and Karen L. Mapp - A New Wave of Evidence: The Impact of School, Family, and Community Connections on Student Achievement - the researchers concluded that there is a significant positive correlation between school, family, and community involvement and student success.

Oftentimes, the onus for providing a well-rounded educational experience for every student falls directly on the shoulders of the school administrators, teachers, faculty, and staff. However, this limited perspective overlooks the fact that much of a child's life and education occurs outside the classroom. What happens before the school day starts and after it ends can be just as important and impactful in the lives of your students as what happens during the traditional school day. This is why community engagement and involvement in schools is such an important facet of the educational process.

The Benefits of Community Involvement in Schools

Consistent community involvement and engagement at all levels of the school have been shown time and time again to have significant short and long term benefits.

According to a recent policy brief from the National Education Association (NEA), "when schools, parents, families, and communities work together to support learning, students tend to earn higher grades, attend school more regularly, stay in school longer, and enroll in higher level programs".

With these important benefits in mind, it's clear that a focus on increasing community involvement programs and opportunities should be a consistent goal for your school.

Easy Ways to Encourage Community Engagement in Your School

Volunteering is one of the most common and popular ways to encourage community involvement in schools. Connect with local businesses, civic organizations, charities, nonprofit foundations, and other groups in your community to enlist volunteers to come in before, during, or after the school day.

Volunteering can come in many different shapes and forms. Invite local leaders and individuals in the community to visit classes and speak about their chosen profession for Career Day. Encourage community members to get involved by volunteering with enrichment opportunities before and after school, such as tutoring, fine arts clubs, and athletic teams.

Not every organization, business, family, or individual in your community is going to have the time or capacity to participate in in-person and on-premise volunteer opportunities. That's why it's important to also prioritize community involvement in the form of sponsorship and donation programs.

Does your school need a restaurant to provide food for this year's field day? Do your teachers need iPads or Smart Boards to engage students with new technologies? Does an extracurricular club or team need supplies, uniforms, or equipment?

Create and publicize sponsorship and donation needs throughout your community, to give local organizations and businesses the opportunity to partner with your school.

Make Community Involvement a Priority for Your School

The responsibility for raising a well-educated and civic-minded generation of children cannot rest solely with schools. The research review by Henderson & Mapp examined 51 research studies that offered perspectives on the relationship between parent (and community) involvement and student achievement. As a whole, "these studies found a positive and convincing relationship between family involvement and benefits for students, including improved academic achievement... Although there is less research on the effects of community involvement, it also suggests benefits for schools, families, and students, including improved achievement and behavior."

However you work to increase community involvement, remember that when schools, parents, and communities partner together, great things can happen in the lives of children and young adults.
[1] "Research Spotlight on Parental Involvement in Education: NEA Reviews of the Research on Best Practices in Education." National Education Association. Retrieved from http://www.nea.org/tools/17360.htm on March 3, 2016. [2] Henderson, Anne T. and Karen L. Mapp. "A New Wave of Evidence: The Impact of School, Family, and the Community Connections on Student Achievement." SEDL. Retrieved from https://www.sedl.org/connections/resources/evidence.pdf on March 3, 2016. [3] "Parent, Family, Community Involvement in Education." National Education Association. Retrieved from http://www.nea.org/assets/docs/PB11_ParentInvolvement08.pdf on March 3, 2016. [4] Henderson, Anne T. and Karen L. Mapp. "A New Wave of Evidence: The Impact of School, Family, and the Community Connections on Student Achievement." SEDL. Retrieved from https://www.sedl.org/connections/resources/evidence.pdf on March 3, 2016.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Why Community Involvement in Schools is Important | Pride Surveys

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
It's no secret that parental involvement is an integral part of a successful educational framework. Numerous studies[1] have identified parent engagement as a critical factor affecting the success of individual students and the school environment itself. But what many schools and educational institutions overlook is the fact that high rates of student success are generally ...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
A new school year is a fresh opportunity to revisit, reconnect, and reimagine your school's mission and vision. It's the perfect time to open up your leadership practice and share the work with your team to truly and sustainably make a change. Hear from the leading experts on school leadership to learn how to become a transformational leader for your learning community!

What is transformational leadership?

Transformational leadership in schools is when a leader empowers members of the learning community to improve from within. The transformational leader does not simply run a school, merely keeping it afloat. Instead, such leaders seek to make things better through genuine collaboration between the school's members and stakeholders.

"Transformational leadership fosters autonomy in all individuals, empowering them to problem-solve and innovate without seeking permission and instead trusting their expertise," says Elisabeth Bostwick, educator and co-founder of the #LeadUpTeach chat on Twitter, who has two books coming out this winter. "Traditionally speaking, some schools continue to place emphasis on hierarchical leadership models where top-down decision-making reigns, often negatively impacting teacher motivation as they may be left feeling that their voice doesn't matter. Within a school where transformational leadership flourishes, individuals are confident that their voice matters, elevating collective efficacy and increasing learner achievement."

Transformational leaders are captains who trust their crew to help design and carry out improvement. They create a culture of innovation and motivate teachers and students to continuously progress, ever aiming to create the best learning environment for students.

"Fearless leaders need the self-confidence and courage that allows them to reach out to others. They are acutely aware that transformation is not a one-person performance-that they must take aim at their goals not as lone heroes but as members of a unified effort, says Yvette Jackson and Veronica McDermott in their book Aim High, Achieve More: How to Transform Urban Schools Through Fearless Leadership. "They realize that their role is to be present-to show up for students, staff, and community-and then to get out of the way to allow students, staff, and community to take up the challenge. They make the structural and institutional arrangements that promote risk-taking and alter the culture of the school."

Challenge the status quo

Transformational leadership begins by getting reflective. School leaders and teachers often rely on tried and true practices that may be comfortable, but ineffective. To truly transform a community we must question and sometimes abandon habits, beliefs, practices, and mindsets that no longer work.

"A shift in mindset empowers leaders to create change, not respond to change," writes Eric Sheninger, author of Learning Transformed: 8 Keys to Designing Tomorrow's Schools, Today and senior fellow at the International Center for Leadership in Education (ICLE). "It is this shift that can begin to lay the foundation for transformation. How do we do this? By beginning to challenge the way things are done; by replacing the word 'no' with the word 'yes' more often; and by focusing on the 'what ifs' instead of the 'yeah, buts.'"

Leaders can start to pioneer change by reflecting upon and identifying their current practices and then considering how to challenge them to make room for new ideas and methods. Says Sheninger: "Transformational leaders consistently make observations, listen intently, leverage a growth mindset and, most importantly, take action to improve the organization."

Build together, day by day

It would be amazing if we could stop time and have the hours and headspace to truly get things done, but the reality is schools don't stop. Leaders must effect change while knee-deep in the myriad things happening at once, all while working alongside a very busy teaching staff. Concordia Cavalier John Paul Sanchez, EdD says that transformational leaders need to "be able to rebuild the ship from the inside out. We as leaders are the stewards of the culture. We get to work within the culture for the purpose of transforming the culture."

There will never be a perfect or less-chaotic time to start to change the way things are done. The work has to happen in the midst of the commotion, keeping your school's culture and values at the forefront of this collaborative effort. How can you start? Identify goals with your team and create a series of steps and a timeline.

Set and stick to meeting times with your staff to discuss and work on these goals even when daily challenges make it difficult. Reflect at the end of each day. Check in to make sure you're progressing and not reverting back to what's familiar. Keep encouraging your staff to continue the work and celebrate successes.

Be intentional, not reactive

On any given day, a school leader is pulled in many unpredictable directions - usually due to immediate needs that can't be ignored. This constancy can lead to a habit of jumping from crisis to crisis with no real mission or underlying progress. Transformational leaders must become more intentional with their time and their vision - and with that work, it's likely that day-to-day disorder will lessen.

"As I grew in the principalship, I came to the gradual realization that a random and haphazard approach to events was not compatible with effective leadership," says Baruti K. Kafele, a former principal in New Jersey, in his book The Principal 50: Critical Leadership Questions for Inspiring Schoolwide Excellence. "I needed to 'step up my game' in a big way - to think and act with intentionality. In fact, over time, 'intentionality' became my byword. I learned that if we as a school community were going to meet all the pressures and demands that were thrust upon us, we had to be able to spend our days acting on our intentions rather than reacting to situations."

Be clear about your school's goals, beliefs, practices, and long-term innovations. When we pour our focus into our mission, the commotion and confusion decrease as the culture solidifies. As emergencies arise, view and handle them through the lens of your transformational work. Consider ways that you can advance your practice so that you are an example of growth.

Be ethical and compassionate

Transactional leaders rely on fear and reward to get their staff to function and produce results. However, transformational leaders emphasize collaboration, ethics, and compassion to form a collective momentum to grow and succeed.

"Relationships rooted in trust, respect, and compassion can take a nice school and make it an extraordinary space where excitement and passion become palpable," says Joe Sanfelippo and Tony Sinanis in their book Hacking Leadership: 10 Ways Great Leaders Inspire Learning That Teachers, Students, and Parents Love. "Foster trust by being collaborative. Decisions should rarely be made in isolation; instead, all members of the school community should have some voice, and it is your responsibility to listen to others - to be present - in order to broaden your perspective and make the best decisions possible."

Maintaining that trust sustains the work. When Rachael Hoffert, EdD began her doctoral journey with Concordia University-Portland, she said, "The first course I took was called 'The Ethical Educator.' In that class, we really looked at transformational leadership and how academic knowledge is so important, but so is integrity and compassion."

When a leader is trusted, compassionate, and open-minded, real change can happen. Says Dr. Brad Gustafson, principal and author of Renegade Leadership: Creating Innovative Schools for Digital-Age Students "Transformational leaders take time to develop trust and understand their team's talent." Patience and dedication truly pay off.

Resources

Quick links to follow our experts
Jennifer Gunn spent 10 years in newspaper and magazine publishing before moving to public education. She is a curriculum designer, a teaching coach, and high school educator in New York City. She is also co-founder of the annual EDxEDNYC Education Conference for teacher-led innovation and regularly presents at conferences on the topics of adolescent literacy, leadership, and education innovation.
Tags: Administrative Leadership, District Leaders, Educational Leadership, leadership, Teacher Leadership, Transformational Leadership

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Transformational Leadership Model Applied in Schools

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A new school year is a fresh opportunity to revisit, reconnect, and reimagine your school's mission and vision. It's the perfect time to open up your leadership practice and share the work with your team to truly and sustainably make a change.

# data[].attributes.headline
THE 4 ATTRIBUTES OF TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP

# data[].attributes.subject
THE 4 ATTRIBUTES OF TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The 4 Attributes of Transformational Leadership

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Transformational leadership offers administrators the opportunity to drive organizational change and to create strong schools.

# data[].attributes.headline
3 Characteristics of Authentic Leadership that Inspires Innovation

# data[].attributes.subject
3 Characteristics of Authentic Leadership that Inspires Innovation

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Although it is impossible to think that one could or should have all the answers, too many of us often feel inadequate when we don't. It is hard to get away from the idea that the teacher, principal, superintendent or whoever is "in charge" should be the expert and have all the answers. This was reinforced in an activity where teams were reflecting on what they wanted to start doing as well as what they wanted to stop doing to lead change, one group's response stood out to me: "Stop feeling like we need to be experts!" This expectation of "leader as the expert" is not only unfair but prevents us from being open about what we don't know and working with others to solve the challenges that exist to make change a reality in so many contexts. Instead as Brene Brown shares, "Across the private and public sector, in schools and in our communities, we are hungry for authentic leadership - we want to show up, we want to learn, and we want to inspire and be inspired. We are hardwired for connection, curiosity, and engagement.

This is true across all levels of education but the irony is that although we crave this authenticity in leaders, we are also hard wired to protect our ego and this can prevent us from actually taking risks and admitting that we don't know it all, which can create tension between what we say and what we do. Nobody is perfect and there are times when we don't measure up but if we can be authentic and open to learning and growing with those we serve, we can collectively achieve much more than if we assume we have all the answers.

Here are 3 examples of authentic leaders whose actions inspire others to admit mistakes, take risks, learn from challenges, and share their learning process.
Lead by Example
One of the most authentic leadership examples I know is Katie McNamara , superintendent in South Bay Union Elementary School District, who put herself out there in front of teachers, students and principals to better understand the perspectives of her teachers. As the district was working with the Teacher's College Reading and Writing Project to shift their literacy instruction, she led the way by modeling for teachers and trying it out. What I love about Katie though is she didn't strive to make it perfect, she put in the 10 minutes of prep time that she knew teachers would have and worked through some struggles with students. She also reflected and shared what she learned with teachers so they saw her as a learner who truly wanted the best for everyone, not the expert. Katie gained an appreciation for what teachers were dealing with and are able to connect with teachers and principals about their challenges and successes in their reading instruction as they move forward. Katie led by example and although many expected her to be the expert, she gained more from being vulnerable and taking a risk. Her authenticity has enabled her to build stronger relationships and lead more effectively.

A true testament to the impact that Katie has is when one of her teachers shared that she was really excited about trying genius hour. She told the group, "I launched genius hour last week, invited parents in and told them how we could all work together to support the student in their projects." Then she explained how she told the students and the parents that this was new to her and she was learning too. It was awesome to hear how she was taking risks and empowering students while embracing her role as a learner and a leader. Even more powerful than her willingness to put herself out there was that she was sitting with her superintendent and was able to admit she didn't know what she was doing in front of her and was celebrated for trying something new. The example that Katie has set has paved the way for others to take risks and lead by example.
Empower Others to Lead, Not Follow
Another leader that is committed to change the program focussed approach and develop teacher leaders is David Miyashiro . I remember in his first few weeks as the superintendent of Cajon Valley Union School District, he had convened teachers across the district to develop a shared vision and design learning experiences to support the desired shift. A program provider was scheduled for a three-hour session to help teachers better understand the resources and facilitate the design of the projects. About 10 minutes in it was clear that she was disconnected from the audience and not meeting the needs of the group. He recognized that the time would be better spent through the discovery of the resources rather than listening to someone talk about it. He stopped the presenter and redesigned to day to facilitate small groups of teachers to design the projects and explore the resources together. This signaled to teachers that he valued their time and expertise and that they weren't going to learn about how to create better learning experiences by listening to someone tell them what to do, they had to explore, discuss and try some things out.

As a result, the teams of teachers dove into the resources feeling that they were valued and were motivated to create something better. Instead of using the prepackaged curriculum, they leveraged the expertise in the room to remix the ideas and build on what was provided to create learning experiences that were tailored to the students in their community. At the end of the 3 days together, the team was inspired and felt a deep sense of ownership over the work. They were excited to go back to their schools and share what they had developed with the teammates and continue to build off of what they had started. As Terry Grier once told me, "Those who create the work support the work." This shift was the beginning of empowering teachers to lead and he has continued to develop the expertise of teachers to develop more leaders in Cajon Valley.
Open Lines of Communication
You know the people who say my door is always open but you don't ever see it open or feel like you can go in? Opening lines of communication to listen and learn from people is a critical part of being an effective leader. Rather than creating a vision and sharing it with all stakeholders, as Devin Vodicka began the journey in Vista Unified to create a new model for teaching and learning, he intentionally brought people together to explore various models and collectively define what it means to personalize learning. He created multiple avenues for diverse stakeholders to collaborate and learn from each other through the process. Together- leaders, teachers, families, and the community are pushing boundaries and supporting each other to design learning experiences that meet the needs of their unique population.

One by one, each of the leaders shared how they were challenging the status quo- whether it was through creative scheduling, allocating resources, use of space, or what they were using (or not using) for curriculum. As the committee listened and even cheered each other on and nobody got "in trouble", I noticed more sharing and more confidence in their efforts. Students and parents alike spoke up to question ideas too. A community has been established to explore new ideas and support one another along the way. They support one another but will also challenge ideas to continue to innovate to improve student outcomes. "It's sometimes a struggle to work through" and as one teacher told me, "some days it seems as if there is nothing that is worth replicating but I always learn from our challenges." Through collaboration, reflection, and multiple iterations, there are lessons learned that inform next steps in powerful ways.

Authentic leaders n ot only inspire others, but they lead by example. They create more leaders who have the competence and the mindset to step up when necessary, not just follow. Leadership is not having all the answers or having all the power, it is about developing others desire and capacity to move beyond where they have been.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
3 Characteristics of Authentic Leadership that Inspires Innovation

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Although it is impossible to think that one could or should have all the answers, too many of us often feel inadequate when we don't. It is hard to get away from the idea that the teacher, principal, superintendent or whoever is "in charge" should be the expert and have all the answers.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
What is Path-Goal Theory?

The Path-Goal model is a theory based on specifying a leader's style or behavior that best fits the employee and work environment in order to achieve a goal. The path-goal theory can best be thought of as a process in which leaders select specific behaviors that are best suited to the employees' needs and their working environment so that they may best guide the employees through their path in the obtainment of their daily work activities (goals).

The Path-Goal theory, inspired by the work of Martin G. Evans (1970), can best be thought of as a process by which leaders select specific behaviors that are best suited to their employees' needs and their working environment, so that leaders may best guide their employees through their path in the obtainment of their daily work activities ( goals) (Northouse, 2013).

The theory argues that leaders will have to engage in different types of leadership behavior depending on the nature and the demands of a particular situation. It is the leader's role to assist employees in attaining goals and to provide the direction and support needed to ensure that their individual goals are in concert or compatible with the organization's goals.

The Path-Goal model is a theory based on specifying a leader's style or behavior that best fits the employee and work environment in order to achieve a goal. The goal is to increase an employee's motivation, empowerment, and satisfaction so they become a productive member of the organization. Employee satisfaction is contingent upon the leader's performance as both a facilitator and coach and rewards their employees for effective performance. The original Path-Goal theory identifies achievement-oriented, directive, participative, and supportive leader behaviors rooted in four (4 styles).
The Four Styles:

1. The directive path-goal clarifying leader behavior refers to situations where the leader lets employees know what is expected of them and tells them how to perform their tasks. The theory argues that this behavior has the most positive effect when the employees' role and task demands are ambiguous and intrinsically satisfying.

2. The achievement-oriented leader behavior refers to situations where the leader sets challenging goals for employees, expects them to perform at their highest level, and shows confidence in their ability to meet this expectation. Occupations in which the achievement motive were most predominant were technical jobs, sales persons, scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs.

3. The participative leader behavior involves leaders consulting with employees and asking for their suggestions before making a decision. This behavior is predominant when employees are highly personally involved in their work.

4. The supportive leader behavior is directed towards the satisfaction of employees' needs and preferences. The leader shows concern for the employees' psychological well-being. This behavior is especially needed in situations in which tasks or relationships are psychologically or physically distressing.

How to use it:
If you have a good understanding of what the needs of the group are, then you can adapt to the styles as the situation demands:

Achievement oriented works best when the staff suffers from lack of challenge and boredom.

Directive leadership helps workers cope with otherwise vague and unclear job responsibilities.

Participative leadership is effective in situations where the follower is making poor decisions or improper procedure and the leader can take steps to help them improve.

Supportive leadership is useful with a team that is new, inexperienced, or otherwise lacking confidence.

Path-Goal theory assumes that leaders are flexible and that they can change their style, as situations require. The theory proposes two contingency variables, such as environment and employee characteristics, that moderate the leader behavior-outcome relationship. Environment is outside the control of the follower-task structure, authority system, and work group. Environmental factors determine the type of leader behavior required if the employee outcomes are to be maximized. Follower characteristics are the locus of control, experience, and perceived ability. Personal characteristics of employees determine how the environment and leader are interpreted. Effective leaders clarify the path to help their employees achieve goals and make the journey easier by reducing roadblocks and pitfalls. Research demonstrates that employee performance and satisfaction are positively influenced when the leader compensates for the shortcomings in either the employee or the work setting.

In conclusion The Path-Goal theory is useful because it reminds leaders that their central purpose as a leader is to help employees define and reach their goals in an efficient manner.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Path-Goal model is a theory based on specifying a leader's style or behavior that best fits the employee and work environment in order to achieve a goal.

# data[].attributes.headline
Building a Positive Staff Culture Takes Work

# data[].attributes.subject
Building a Positive Staff Culture Takes Work

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Administration & Leadership

If schools want a strong collegial atmosphere, they need to foster it intentionally-both across the school and on smaller scales.

Some of the best professional advice I've heard and keep returning to is "Designate time to what you want." If teachers want a stronger classroom community, they need to use instructional time to build it. If leaders want more collaboration, they must allot time in the master schedule. The same idea holds if a school wants a strong adult culture.

Speaking from personal experience, the more I know and trust my colleagues, the better I work with them. I'm fortunate to have worked in several schools that allotted time to building a strong adult culture. Here are some of the best strategies I've seen.

School-wide Systems

Social and emotional professional development sessions: We've all experienced feeling tired, burnt out, or insecure about our efficacy. I know this from my experience to be especially true in schools serving at-risk populations.

In one of those schools, our leadership addressed these feelings directly through professional development sessions called Fill Your Cup, which incorporated social and emotional learning. We had staff members sign up to lead activities they enjoyed, such as yoga, cooking, running, biking, singing karaoke... really anything that brought them joy.

Then each staff member signed up for two of the sessions to "fill their cups." These sessions were always highly rated by our staff, and the next day the school always seemed to have a lightness in the air. The sessions provided a chance for staff to get to know each other in new ways, to blow off steam, to build stronger connections with each other, and to break down barriers of mistrust.

Public acknowledgements: Many schools start or end staff meetings with shout-outs, a beneficial practice. I've seen leadership go beyond this-one example is a practice I call "collective cards." My school's leaders had staff members with different roles sit together at tables. Each person wrote their name in the center of a card (a large index card or half sheet of paper will work), and passed it around the table so that each person there could offer a note of thanks or acknowledgement. This continued until everyone at a table had signed all the cards, and then they were returned to their owners.

This kind of practice allows people to offer a compliment they might not normally make the time for, and it also encourages staff to find the good in everybody they work with. A different approach is to end meetings by encouraging staff members to email a colleague a note of thanks.

Gatherings: We all know the cliché: the family that _____ together, stays together. This can apply to school communities as well. Create opportunities for social gatherings outside of the school day. Make sure they don't always include alcohol-find a variety of activities to meet the needs of many different types of people.

One person doesn't have to do all the work-try organizing a social committee. And offer opportunities for staff members' families to mingle as well.

Food: Need I say more? What meeting hasn't been improved by the addition of food? There's not always money in the budget, but potlucks and staff sign-ups can play a role. Either way, caring for a belly is caring for a heart, and that goes a long way.

Working on a Smaller Scale

Sometimes it's hard to start with school-wide systems. Here are two successful smaller scale initiatives I've experienced.

Door banners: Who doesn't want to walk up to their classroom and see wonderful things written about them? At one of my schools, the leadership organized door banners. We put chart paper on the teachers' doors and organized times to visit each other and write celebratory notes.

Not only was this beneficial to teachers, but it was also valuable for students to see the adults participating in a healthy, collaborative culture.

Positive classroom observations: So often when teachers are visited by observers, they tense up as they feel they're being judged on what's not good enough. Additionally, in our professional desire to be better, we forget to pause and reflect on what's going well.

As an instructional coach, one way I alleviated these deficit-based approaches was to visit teachers specifically to note effective moves. During these observations, I would take notes about all the instructional decisions that were to be celebrated... and there were many! Classroom visits focused on strengths shift a school away from a deficit model to an assets-based model.

I want to end with the importance of hearing the staff's voices. The most important element of a strong adult culture is that staff never feel like things are being done to them, but rather with them. Some of the ideas here might work for your school and some might not. The only way to know is to ask. Use surveys to gather feedback about your school's adult culture, suggestions for improving it, reflections on PD sessions, and other creative community-building ideas.

After all, a school where teachers know, trust, and honor each other is a school where students learn best.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Building a Positive Staff Culture Takes Work

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Administration & Leadership If schools want a strong collegial atmosphere, they need to foster it intentionally-both across the school and on smaller scales. Some of the best professional advice I've heard and keep returning to is "Designate time to what you want." If teachers want a stronger classroom community, they need to use instructional time to build it.

# data[].attributes.headline
The rarest commodity is leadership without ego: Bob Davids at TEDxESCP

# data[].attributes.subject
The rarest commodity is leadership without ego: Bob Davids at TEDxESCP

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The rarest commodity is leadership without ego: Bob Davids at TEDxESCP

# data[].attributes.headline
What do all great leaders have have in common | Matt Beeton | TEDxOxbridge

# data[].attributes.subject
What do all great leaders have have in common | Matt Beeton | TEDxOxbridge

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
What do all great leaders have in common | Matt Beeton | TEDxOxbridge

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
From a young age, children learn about leadership by watching the people around them. By observing how others respond to criticism, confront failure, and communicate to large groups, children begin to develop their own habits and thought processes.

Through social and emotional learning, educators and parents can encourage students to begin analyzing their habits and behaviors to create long-term leadership goals.
"As we focus on self-awareness and self-management, students are encouraged to think about their own goals. Leadership development is an important part of that process," said Diana Davis, MHS Social and Emotional Learning Curriculum Supervisor. "We want students to understand they all have the capability of being leaders, no matter what their age or involvement in campus activities."
To gain leadership experience at a young age, 10 percent of Milton Hershey School's elementary student population participates in Student Government Association.

As students gain responsibility and enthusiasm about being a leader, it's important to help them develop specific leadership qualities, including:

Through cooperative learning activities, conferences, kindness challenges, and service learning projects, educators can build on these skills and empower students of all ages to embrace leadership and serve as positive role models for their peers.
Take a look at five ideas for empowering student leaders:
At MHS, proposal writing starts as early as elementary school. Adults on campus work with students to help them research, write, organize, and present proposals that advocate for specific student requests such as winter socials and dress codes.

"Writing proposals and self-advocating for themselves in front of adults has been really good for students who are going through difficult times or want something different in the scholastic realm," said Michelle Weber, student government association coordinator at MHS.

At the high school level, proposal writing can be taken a step further. Selected students can meet with school administration monthly to discuss submitted proposals and reach mutual decisions. As student leaders, they also organize open forums to teach other students how to write proposals.

To create a passionate group of student leaders across campus, MHS hosts leadership conferences multiple times throughout the year for elementary, middle, and high school students. More than 200 high schoolers attended this year's leadership conference where they listened to empowering speeches from local business professionals and alumni.

In addition to gaining knowledge, peer-to-peer interaction is one of the most important parts of student leadership conferences. Encourage high school students to organize and lead conferences for younger students - this gives them experience planning events and sharing their knowledge with peers.

At the elementary and middle school level, adult-like responsibility is exciting and empowering for students. Ask students to read the morning announcements, serve as campus tour guides, volunteer to have lunch with new students, or complete tasks in the school office. At the high school level, consider giving students larger responsibilities such as planning basketball tournaments for younger students or helping at career fairs.

"Leadership opportunities benefit students because they are able to step up and take charge in a leadership role," said Katie Peters, a middle school student program leader at MHS. "This also gives them the courage to lead others through their words and, most importantly, their actions."

When students are given responsibility combined with the belief that they can succeed, they have everything they need to meet and exceed expectations.

One of the best ways to empower student leaders is by connecting them with role models who will guide them and give them a voice. MHS mentoring programs begin in August and continue throughout the school year - more than 250 high school students signed up to be paired with a staff member this school year.

When mentors display important leadership traits such as respect and compassion, it shapes how students approach their own style of leadership and gives them an adult they can trust.

Community-oriented projects allow students to come together and work toward collective goals. Through elementary food drives and middle and high school Mini-THONs, students learn that the world is bigger than themselves - and begin to take action on how they can make their mark on the community.

"We work very hard to help students realize they are capable of seeing what can be better and acting to make changes in their world," said Juli Gerard, an elementary student government association advisor at MHS. "Hopefully, we can teach kids that they are an active and necessary part of MHS."

Educators also can incentivize students by how much they give back through community service hours instead of focusing solely on fundraising. This helps empower students to form strong connections with specific charities and organizations throughout the school year.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
From a young age, children learn about leadership by watching the people around them. By observing how others respond to criticism, confront failure, and communicate to large groups, children begin to develop their own habits and thought processes. Through social and emotional learning, educators and parents can encourage students to begin analyzing their habits and behaviors to create long-term leadership goals.

# data[].attributes.headline
Strategies for Teaching Students Leadership Skills

# data[].attributes.subject
Strategies for Teaching Students Leadership Skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
There has been a flood of research pointing to the advantages of social and emotional learning (SEL) and its benefits for developing the whole child-and even specifically their academic skills and ability to make good choices. But what about its connection to leadership?

According to the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL), good SEL skills can be developed in schools and classrooms in a number of ways, including through leadership opportunities. That comes at a time when leaders in education and the business community don't think we are doing enough to teach kids leadership lessons.

CASEL and other researchers have found that teaching leadership or providing opportunities for students to lead helps them with personal and social skills that are in demand. For instance, Entrepreneur magazine has offered details about the top leadership skills we need to teach children and Forbes magazine discussed top traits of leaders-and both very closely match those skills that groups like CASEL believe are the core competencies for SEL: things like self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making.

It also relates directly to the wide-ranging Partnership for 21st century learning mission, and its goals for life and career skills, which notes that the business community sees a need for teaching more leadership skills in schools.

So, here are some ways educators can offer leadership opportunities, knowing that they'll also be a valuable part of SEL.

Put them in charge. Involve students in leadership opportunities in the classroom-from heading the discussion of a lesson to handing out papers. Experts say such opportunities should become part of the classroom procedures each day. It benefits the student with the assignment and peers who must work with a peer leader. Activities involving student leadership in the classroom may help students most when teachers (or, even, in a respectful way, other students) positively assess their handling of the responsibility. So a teacher might congratulate a student on their introduction to a lesson, but suggest they speak slower. Or, they might write a quick note home to tell a parent how a student either followed through on an assigned leadership task successfully-or without prompting took one on.

Show off yours. Talk to students about why you expect certain behavior (but not at that moment when the behavior is not under control) or how you organize your class as its leader. Explain how leadership works in your mind and how you would like to share it because good leaders do. Shared leadership, you can explain, demands responsibility. Look for an example of your leading responsibilities each day and point it out.

Provide some good examples. Regularly mix in discussions about good leadership-whether it's a more detailed critique of why a famous leader succeeded or a talk about the leadership that their principal must show-or their parents or a coach. Look for examples among their favorites music, movie, or sports stars when they are showing good (or not so good) leadership behavior. Assign a search for one. For example, a story of a sports star getting his team to help a good cause or a musician who can incite a crowd (positively or negatively) with one comment. Talk about the quality of leadership in figures who loom large in your subject area.

Deliver leadership lessons. Explain what leadership is and why it is valuable as a life skill and in careers. Find good short lessons as warm-ups twice a month.

Get them invested in improving school culture. Find ways to get students to change school culture by being leaders. The most common are perhaps stopping bullying, raising environmental awareness, or promoting understanding of students from other cultures, but you can enlist students in small ways in your class to do their part in improving the culture of the school-behaving better and reporting on it in class or inviting a lonely student to join their group at lunch. Reward students who report a school-wide leadership role they took on. Have an announcement every day recognizing a leadership act.

Involve them in extracurricular activities too. Extracurricular activities allow students to lead and can be ignited for that purpose. Include more students in smaller groups, and encourage them to develop leadership in the group and then school generally through a club senate, where rotating members from various clubs serve, separate from the traditional student government. (It often attracts students who already possess these skills.) Individual teachers can start clubs for their specialties-history or math or tech clubs-or even groups related to a personal interest or one's culture. One English teacher had a drumming club, one on African culture, and one a fly-fishing group. It is key then to give members leadership opportunities to run meetings or plan a project.

Give them space. When students are given leadership opportunities-and especially when they step up and take them on, give them freedom to struggle and even fail, but support them. Experts often note there is no better lesson than failure, but you can help break the fall or encourage the comeback.

Jim Paterson has been a newspaper and magazine editor and an award-winning writer for The Washington Post, USA Today Weekend, the Christian Science Monitor, Parents magazine, and a number of national and regional publications. During a break from writing he worked as a school counselor for seven years and quickly became head of a counseling department and "Counselor of the Year" in Montgomery County, Md. He now writes about education primarily. More about Jim at www.otherperplexity.com.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Strategies for Teaching Students Leadership Skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
There has been a flood of research pointing to the advantages of social and emotional learning (SEL) and its benefits for developing the whole child-and even specifically their academic skills and ability to make good choices. But what about its connection to leadership?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Global Emotional Intelligence Test uses 40 questions which are derived from, the Global instrument, which contains 158 items. These are based on Goleman's four quadrant Emotional Intelligence Competency Model (2002). Click EI Capability Assessment here for more details. Short EI quizzes such as this are meant to be fun, and to give you a guide to which EI areas you are doing well in and those which perhaps you need to focus on for development.

This Test, is a forced-choice psychological test which requires you to choose Instructions for the FREE EI Test one statement in each pair of statements that describes you best. For each pair of statements, select the statement that best applies to you. Do not over-analyse the questions, or try to think of "exceptions to the rule." Be spontaneous and choose the statement that comes closest to the way you are.

Occasionally there will be questions that ask you to make a close call between two choices. This is because the Test is trying to distinguish between specific areas. If a question is very close and you can't decide which statement applies to you best, you can come back to it after you have completed the other questions.

The Test usually takes about 10 minutes to complete. At the end of the test, click on the Score Test button, and wait for the computer to generate an EI profile of your scores. If you have answered honestly and accurately, your scores will reflect your capability level within each of the EI quadrants.

We cannot guarantee the accuracy of the results of this Test - only that it can help you begin your journey of self-development!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Emotional Intelligence Test - Global Leadership Foundation

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Free emotional intelligence test developed by Global Leadership Foundation

# data[].attributes.headline
Blog by Stephanie McConnell-Hawkins ISD Principal

# data[].attributes.subject
Blog by Stephanie McConnell-Hawkins ISD Principal

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Being a principal can be hard, but it is a very rewarding journey. The best part of being on this journey is that we have each other. We have an amazing opportunity to reach across the limits of geography and connect with each other via the internet.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
It is hard to believe that this is my fifth year anniversary for my blog!!! Since its inception, my blog has been just a method for sharing my reflections, experiences, and thoughts with other high school counselors. Maybe this will be the year for some expansion and graphic changes...who knows??? So to celebrate my anniversary, I decided to give a shout out to the other blogs that I regularly frequent and read. I love each of these blogs for many different reasons, but they all have one thread in common... committed authors who love sharing with other school counselors. I hope you will visit each blog and find some great resources, ideas, or even products to use in your practice.

My Top School Counseling Blogs for 2018

College Counselor Traci -I love Traci's creative posts, resources, and products. Traci, a junior college counselor, has a gift for creating helpful resources and making exclusive products for school counselors.
Confident Counselor's Connection - Check out this monthly roundup of resources, products, best practices, articles, comic relief, blog posts, giveaways, and ideas in action . This blog is a labor of love by 20 counselor bloggers!!

-High School counselor Patrick O'Connor's blog contains great information for high school counselors and high school students. I am always impressed by his insightful posts!

Erin Luong's Reflection on Counselling, Education, Leadership, and Technology -Blog written by Alberta, Canadian school counsellor, Erin Luong. Erin writes on a wide variety of subjects!

Franciene Sabens-School Counselor Space -Illinois High School Counselor of the Year who has a lot of great resources for professional school counselors! Franciene always has practical tips and information that can be employed in your practice.

The Middle School Counselor -Inspiring blog written by the New York School Counselor of the Year and former high school counselor, Carol Miller. Although not a high school blog, Carol has a great blog with ideas that can be used with high school students. In addition to her blog, Carol creates and sells school counseling t-shirts on her site (check them out!).
Susan Spellman Cann-School Counsellor Talk -Retired Canadian school counselor and psychologist who hosts a variety of chats (#ETMOOC & #SCCrowd) and provides a lot of digital resources for professional school counselors.

The College Solution -Although this blog is not written by a high school counselor or educator, it is definitely worth your time to look at this site by Lynn O'Shaughnessy. She is a former news reporter who writes about "all things college" from financial aid, party schools, standardized testing, and much more!

The Counseling Geek -Outstanding website created by California high school counselor and technology guru, Jeff Ream. The goal of the website is to help school counselors with their technology needs. In addition to helping counselors with their technology needs, Jeff has set up the ASCA Scholarship fund.

The Helpful School Counselor -Not only does Heather have well written posts, but she even offers staff development courses for school counselors. Her latest course on Relational Aggression gives school counselors helpful information to promote social emotional learning among students.

School Counselor Central - Blog managed by Dean Pacchiana and Dr. Deborah Hardy which posts weekly ideas as lessons and activities. In addition to the blog, SCC has a Facebook and Pinterest page!!

Although these are my favorites, there are many other great blogs for elementary and middle school counselors. Check out other blog favorites from some of my counseling colleagues and authors.

Feedspot authors regularly update and feature many popular school counseling blogs on its site. Check out their post on the top 60 school counselor blogs!

Beside featuring only school counseling blogs, Barbara LoFrisco complied a list of her top 50 counseling sites. There is a lot of diversity on this list!

Check out the Online Counseling Programs top school counseling blog list for 2017.

Professor Erin Mason features popular blogs written by professional school counselors from all levels.

Author Jeff Ream recently authored a post about his eight favorite blogs on his popular blog.

As always, thank you for reading my blog!!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
It is hard to believe that this is my fifth year anniversary for my blog!!! Since its inception, my blog has been just a method for sharing my reflections, experiences, and thoughts with other high school counselors. Maybe this will be the year for some expansion and graphic changes...who knows???

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Check out this post featured on the TpT blog!
I love the idea of teaching students positive life lessons rather than a list of things they shouldn't do. Leadership is an essential skill to modern life. Whether you are a leader at work, in your community, or simply within your household, every person will need to take the lead at some point.

In some ways, leadership seems like a gift or talent. Certainly, some people are natural leaders and seem to have a certain je ne se qua about them. However, like all things, leadership skills can be taught and using great historical leaders is a great way to combine a little history and leadership into one lesson.

For the beginning of the first lesson- we do a chalk talk. Students can walk around and write their thoughts on the following sentence stems:

A leader is...

I like it when leaders...

One day, I would love to lead...

Here's where the fun begins: after students get a chance to think about leaders, it's time to use their leadership skills! Each small group is given the same common household item. Groups must demonstrate the "proper" way to use the item. The person demonstrating the object cannot speak and the demonstration must be unique. This takes a lot of planning and working together- where do you see leadership skills? Where would more leadership be helpful? This can be a pretty hilarious activity!
Before they leave, class completes a ticket out. I have included my ticket out page for you here! Students can choose to write: I learned, I think, or I wonder.

Non-violent action is not passive (that's where the word action comes in). Conflict is most often resolved by leaders within the conflict. Stepping up and solving conflicts peacefully is an important part of being a leader.

The nonviolent approach does not immediately change the heart of the oppressor. It first does something to the hearts and souls of those committed to it. It gives them self respect; it calls up resources of strength and courage that they did not think they had. Finally, it reaches the opponent and so stirs his conscience that reconciliation becomes a reality.
Martin Luther King

In this lesson, we create an anchor chart: How to be a Leader to Solve Problems. I let the kids brainstorm their ideas and make a list. If you're not familiar with anchor charts, here is a great explanation of anchor charts as a teaching tool.

After completing our anchor chart, I divide the class into groups for role plays. You can either assign each group a strategy from the chart or allow them to choose for themselves. I created a rubric to show the class what my expectations are for role plays.

All famous leaders have one thing in common -perseverance. Many kids today have one thing in common - a lack of perseverance.

After discussing the definition of perseverance, we complete the activity Famous Failures: You Can Quote Me. Each student has a piece of paper with a famous failure and a quote from this person. I tried to choose people from history that my students were likely to know and connect to.

Students can write a story, poem, play, song, or draw a picture or cartoon to share their thoughts on and ideas about the failure and quote. It's always amazing to see the powerful responses you get. Afterwards, students can share their ideas. This makes a great bulletin board as well!

You can re-create these lessons on your own or find everything together for you on Teachers Pay Teachers. Do you teach leadership with your little ones? What are some of your go-to activities?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I love the idea of teaching students positive life lessons rather than a list of things they shouldn't do. Leadership is an essential skill to modern life. Whether you are a leader at work, in your community, or simply within your household, every person

# data[].attributes.headline
Simon Sinek: Why Good Leaders Make you Feel Safe

# data[].attributes.subject
Simon Sinek: Why Good Leaders Make you Feel Safe

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Simon Sinek: Why good leaders make you feel safe

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
What makes a great leader? Management theorist Simon Sinek suggests, it's someone who makes their employees feel secure, who draws staffers into a circle of trust. But creating trust and safety - especially in an uneven economy - means taking on big responsibility.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Last updated: 4 March 2020

>> Pssst! Want to discover insider secrets from some of the most dynamic and inspirational leaders and entrepreneurs? Join our Leader's Edge 14-day free trial to receive practical tools on how to be a leader, run a business and live a successful, fulfilling life!

Love inspiring Ted Talks on leadership? So do we!

That's why we put together this list of our crème de la crème TED Talks on leadership.

So next time you're needing a little boost, take a 20-minute break to listen to one of these and learn from some of the most forward-thinking and innovative experts to discover what's given them their little-known edge.

With more than 29 million views, Simon Sinek is now on the A-List of leadership gurus, after he gave this incredible talk.

As Sinek himself says, "As it turns out, all the great inspiring leaders and organizations in the world, whether it's Apple or Martin Luther King, Jr. or the Wright brothers, they all think, act and communicate the exact same way. And it's the complete opposite to everyone else. All I did was codify it, and it's probably the world's simplest idea. I call it the Golden Circle."

For Sinek, the difference between these inspirational leaders and everyone else is they start with "why," which is the core concept of his Golden Circle. By asking why, how and what, you can set yourself on a trajectory of tremendous success that, statistically speaking, very few people attain.

To be an effective leader, you need to know what makes people "tick," and especially what motivates them in the workplace to give you their best. Interestingly enough, money only takes you so far.

In this compelling video -which has clocked over 13 million views - Pink (author of Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us) untangles the web of motivation in a way that makes sense for leaders. Here's a hint: traditional rewards aren't always as motivating as we think.

Sandberg left Google to become Facebook's COO in 2008. In this video, she looks at why so few women make it to the C-suite, and offers up three important pieces of advice to women who want to buck the trend and get there. The key, in Sandberg's view, is ensuring women remain in the workforce.

As it turns out, having more women remain in the workforce has other positive benefits on society and households, such as equal earning and equal responsibility between partners. As Sandberg notes, households that demonstrate this equality also have half the divorce rate.

To be a successful leader, what better place to start than by defining exactly what you mean by success? The man affectionately known as "Coach" redefines success to be much more than merely winning. Coach James Wooden explains this difference with profound simplicity, and urges everyone to pursue the best in themselves. The Coach's 17-minute talk is uplifting as much as it is inspiring.

Dan Ariely is a behavioral economist who has gained a deeper understanding of human motivation than most economists could ever hope for. He even designed experiments that would help solve the mystery of motivation, which is what this video is all about.

As it turns out, money isn't the only thing that motivates us to work. It isn't exactly joy, either. The real motivation for going to work every day is to make constant progress and lead a life of purpose. Strong leaders care about the bottom line, but are about much more than that. They have a sense of purpose, and get out of bed every single day to fulfill it.

Simon Sinek's material is so good that he's the only one to appear twice on this list. You know building trust among your followers is important, but actually doing it is another thing entirely.

Sinek's video on the topic will take your understanding of trust to a whole new level. After all, humans are emotional species who struggle with insecurities and vulnerabilities. A good leader brings his or her employees into a circle of trust. This is especially important in today's economy, where jobs are destroyed as fast as they are created. Leaders have a responsibility to make their workers feel safe.

When it comes to forming your dream team, the last thing you should do is surround yourself with what Heffernan calls "echo chambers" who only tell you what they think you want to hear. Mastering the art of disagreement is essential to effective leadership. Leaders must also be willing to cope with others disagreeing with them. Only through disagreement are ideas challenged.

Hefferman outlines a rubric for avoiding echo chambers and allowing ourselves to experience what she calls constructive conflict.
"So what does that kind of constructive conflict require? Well, first of all, it requires that we find people who are very different from ourselves. That means we have to resist the neurobiological drive, which means that we really prefer people mostly like ourselves, and it means we have to seek out people with different backgrounds, different disciplines, different ways of thinking and different experience, and find ways to engage with them. That requires a lot of patience and a lot of energy."
You've no doubt heard leadership described through the metaphor of conducting an orchestra. Itay Talgam operationalizes that metaphor by sharing what leaders can learn from 6 different 20th-century conductors. Don't worry, this TED Talk requires no formal background (or interest) in the symphony.

Talgam describes the "magical moment" when a conductor turns chaos into blissful music. It's a very small gesture, "not very pomp, not very sophisticated." And suddenly, out of the chaos, noise becomes music.

Everyone knows that a staggering number of people are disengaged from their work. Yves Morieux argues that our reaction to the unfathomable complexity of modern work has a lot to do with that disengagement. Traditional organizational management certainly doesn't help, either. His antidote includes 6 refreshing ways to engage in what he calls "smart simplicity." The first rule is understand what your colleagues actually do. This is especially important for business leaders if they wish to simply the workplace and boost employee engagement.

Roselinde Torres has developed a deep understanding of what makes leaders effective. She poses 3 laser-like questions that will spur your own thinking on what it takes to be a great leader.

In a world filled with executive leadership programs and expensive seminars, Torres argues the best way to learn leadership might be right under your nose. Torres' 9-minute talk is candid and to the point.

His book, Purpose-Driven Life, has sold more than 30 million copies. The church he pastors, Saddleback Church, has more than 22,000 members. Clearly, Rick Warren understands a few things about leadership.

This video is an intimate presentation of his own thoughts and crises around leadership. For anyone who's ever looked at their existence and said, "There's got to be more to life than this" will certainly find solace in Warren's 21-minute talk.

Stanley McChrystal is a 4-star general who spent decades in the military. What he gleaned about leadership that can build a shared sense of purpose among an incredibly diverse set of followers boils down to how well you listen and learn, as well as how you position failure.

McChrystal's view of leadership can be summarized with the following quote:
"[A] leader isn't good because they're right; they're good because they're willing to learn and to trust. This isn't easy stuff."
Making toast is simple, right? But what happens when someone asks you to draw how you make toast? Suddenly things get interesting, and complicated.

This simple exercise reveals much about leading solutions to complex problems. Tom Wujec invites listeners to run the exercise themselves while explaining what he's learned from observing thousands of people draw toast. From this talk, leaders will learn some important truths about how to handle real-world challenges.

Drew Dudley's whole approach is to make sure everyone understands how to bring out the leader within. Too many people think great leadership is reserved for extraordinary people.

His humorous take will remind you of all the little things leaders do each day. Leadership may be self-taught, but certainly isn't reserved to a special segment of society. Dudley reminds us that leadership is an everyday act that should be celebrated.

It's easy to think that as a species we have evolved far beyond the days of tribalism, but management consultant David Logan argues that effective leaders understand the 5 kinds of tribes that still crop up naturally in nearly any setting. Logan's talk takes you through the 5 tribes, or stages, beginning with "Life sucks" and ending with "Life is great."

If you missed the opening line of this article, Fields Wicker-Miurin will remind you that leadership is self-taught. People who are looking for the holy grail leadership manual will wait forever in vain.

Leadership comes from within, but that shouldn't stop you from developing the qualities that people admire in a great leader. Instead of looking for a how-to manual, learn the inspiring story of a local leader in your community. They're not as far away or elusive as you might think.

Leaders may be workaholics, but they also value work-life balance. That's Nigel Marsh's main thrust in this 2010 talk. Marsh shows you how to share a balance lifestyle between family, personal time and productivity. He also drops some inspiration from his books Fit, Fifty, and Fired Up and Overworked and Underlaid (yes, he has a great sense of humor).

Achieving an ideal work-life balance may seem like a jigsaw puzzle, but isn't nearly as hard as our productivity-obsessed culture makes it out to be. Through small changes, you can have a big impact on work, relationships and life in general.

Successful consultant-turned-teacher Angela Lee Duckworth reminds us that success requires hard work and grit. While this is nothing we don't know, why are these characteristics so difficult to apply? As Duckworth says, "as much as talent counts, effort counts twice."

Duckworth's quick talk is an essential listen for anyone getting suckered into taking shortcuts. As it turns out, all the old adages about success and hard work are true.

The ability to move others through motivational speech is one of the greatest qualities of a true leader. Author and CEO Nancy Duarte gets it, and that's why she developed this 18-minute talk to help aspiring leaders take their presentation skills to the next level.

Duarte dissects the speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Steve Jobs to uncover the essential qualities of a great presentation. If leadership is your passion, be prepared to spend a lot of time talking in front of people.

Don't let the name of this short TED Talk fool you - Derek Sivers isn't calling for revolution or political anarchy. Using interesting footage, Sivers shows you how surprisingly easy it is to start a movement. As they say, it takes two to tango. That's all that's needed for leaders to inspire a movement.

"Sitting has become the smoking of our generation." - Nilofer Merchant

In her TED Talk, business innovator Nilofer Merchant offers a simple message about the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Leaders spend a lot of time in meetings. Merchant suggests you turn your next one-on-one meeting into a "walking meeting." Not only do you hit two birds with one stone - by meeting and elevating your heart rate - the simple act of walking allows your ideas to flow much better than they otherwise would sitting in a cramped office.

Africa has struggled to live up to its development goals, and its leaders are to blame, says TED Fellow and founder of the African Leadership Network Fred Swaniker.

Having lived throughout Africa, Swaniker highlights the vital role true leaders play in building a society, and what can happen in their absence. Swaniker's description of the next great African leaders is anybody who wants to make a difference in their society, especially where strong institutions are lacking.

It's generally assumed we have to work to be happy, but what if we have it backwards? That's the argument psychologist and CEO Shawn Achor makes in this 2012 talk. Achor says we need to be happy independently of work, and only then will we be able to increase productivity and success in the workplace.

Searching for happiness in the workplace can be a deep rabbit hole that often leads to less happiness overall. This is an important message for leaders, who seek to inspire other people in their line of work. It just so happens that developing happiness outside the 9-5 hours is the most important for our health and success.

You don't have to be a teacher to appreciate Linda Cliatt-Wayman's inspirational talk about her time as principal at a failing school in Philadelphia. It didn't take long for her to realize that leadership was more than just "laying down the law." We won't spoil it for you, but let's just say she managed to turn around her struggling school. There were 3 key principles that helped her get there.

If the title of Tim Harford's TED Talk doesn't pique your interest, nothing will. Harford, an economics writer who studies complex systems, talks about the importance of trial and error in achieving success. Except he doesn't just "talk" about it, but presents the findings of his studies on complex systems.

As the title suggests, Harford's talk centres on the concept of a God complex - refusing to admit the possibility of being wrong regardless of the complexity of the situation - and the importance of trial and error in achieving better results. Go down the list, virtually every successful business leader used trial and error to perfect their craft.

"The greatest originals are the ones who fail the most, because they're the ones who try the most." - Adam Grant

Suffice it to say, all aspiring leaders want to be recognized for their creativity and originality. While creativity often lies within, psychologist Adam Grant studies the lives of "originals" - thinkers whose ideas transform the world. Over the course of 15 minutes, Grant explains the unexpected habits of original thinkers, and their fearlessness in the face of failure.

Fear of failure is one of the biggest inhibitors to success in all of life's endeavors. While never easy, leaders must learn to overcome that fear. Studying the habits of original thinkers will teach aspiring leaders they "need a lot of bad ideas in order to get a few good ones."

Four years and more than 38 million views later, Amy Cuddy's powerful TED Talk has resonated with many aspiring leaders. As a social psychologist, Cuddy explains how "power posing" - showcasing a posture of confidence even when you don't feel confident - can affect your brain chemistry and move you to positive action.

While some of the findings presented in the study are controversial among social scientists, Cuddy's talk is a great reminder of the importance of projecting confidence in every situation. Whether that holds up to tests of academic rigor are less important.

If you think the answer to Seth Godin's talk is "social media," try again. This TED Talk took place back in 2007, a few years before social media became as ubiquitous as it is today. As a leader, getting your ideas to spread requires more than just a Twitter handle. Godin, himself an author and marketing guru, explains the importance of standing out, and why even the craziest ideas can become the most successful ones.

Analyst and bestselling author, Richard St. John, managed to condense 7 years of interviews into an unforgettable 3-minute presentation about what it takes to be truly successful. Believe us, nobody is as cognizant of your time as St. John. This 3-minute talk is normally presented as a 2-hour presentation to high school students.

No list of inspiring TED Talks is complete without Tony Robbins, the globally renowned life success coach who has spent decades helping people achieve their dreams. Robbins shattered many preconceived notions about his work a mere 36 seconds into his presentation.
"I'm not here to motivate you, you don't need that, obviously. Often that's what people think I do, and it's the furthest thing from it. What happens, though, is people say to me, 'I don't need any motivation.' But that's not what I do. I'm the 'why' guy. I want to know why you do what you do."
He then goes into detail explaining the "invisible forces" that make us do the things we do. He also high-fives Al Gore in the front row. With more than 18 million views, Robbins' TED appearance is one of the most popular.

There you have it. More than 8 hours of pure leadership inspiration to help turn you into the type of leader others admire, respect and want to follow.

>>To discover more invaluable leadership lessons from some of the most successful and inspirational leaders and leadership experts, become a Leader's Edge monthly member to receive practical tools on how to be a leader, run a business and live a successful, fulfilling life! Hurry, join now to take advantage of our 14-day FREE trial!
Inspiring Leadership Now
You may also be interested in...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
30 Of The Best TED Talks On Leadership That Every Great Leader Should Watch - 2nd Edition

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Love inspiring Ted Talks on leadership? So do we! That's why we put together this list of our crème de la crème TED Talks on leadership. So next time you're needing a little boost, take a 20-minute break to listen to one of these and learn from some of the most forward-thinking and innovative experts to discover what's given them their little-known edge.

# data[].attributes.body
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzzjFnlBlCo

# data[].attributes.headline
How to Develop a Leadership Philosophy that Inspires

# data[].attributes.subject
How to Develop a Leadership Philosophy that Inspires

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Think about the most successful leaders in the world, past and present. If you were to compare them with inefficient leaders, the difference wouldn't necessarily come from their skills. The more important factor would be how the successful leaders would be able to provide you with a clear and defined approach to how they lead other people: their leadership philosophy.

In this guide, we'll define what leadership philosophy is and the benefits of having one. We'll explore the idea of publishing your statement and provide you the four steps required for creating a leadership philosophy to guide your leadership.

WHAT IS A LEADERSHIP PHILOSOPHY?

The combination of leadership and philosophy might sound rather odd. On the face of it, the terms don't seem to have much in common. So, what does leadership philosophy mean? To understand it, it's a good idea to first examine the two words separately, as it'll allow you to understand how they can fit together to provide you with guidance in leadership.

The definition of philosophy

When you think about philosophy, you'll probably first think about some of the greatest thinkers of our time, such as Voltaire, Plato and Descartes. Furthermore, you probably haven't thought about using philosophy in your everyday life and the concepts and ideas might sound a little bit difficult to comprehend. But as one the oldest disciplines in the world, philosophy has plenty to offer and it's part of our everyday experience whether we consciously think about it.

The word philosophy literally translates to " the love of wisdom". The Oxford Dictionary defines philosophy as, " a theory or attitude that acts as a guiding principle for behavior ". Indeed, the guiding idea of philosophy is to live a good life. It's about striving for expertise and personal as well as collective fulfillment. Philosophy could be seen as the personal foundation or belief in human nature; for working to live your life to the fullest. Through philosophy, you create a system of thought to support your journey and obtain the guiding principles to use for action or non-action.

Watch the intriguing video by the School of Life to understand why philosophy matters to all of us.

The definition of leadership

What about leadership's definition? Just like field of philosophy with its multiple thinkers and theories, leadership has a number of definitions. According to the Oxford Dictionary, the essence of leadership is " the action of leading a group of people or an organisation, or the ability to do this". But as mentioned, the definitions have evolved out of this technical view, with different people viewing the topic through a slightly different viewpoint.

At its core, leadership is about the ability to influence other people and to create a movement towards a specific objective. Having a vision to which the team moves forward to is crucial. Furthermore, the emphasis is on inspiration because leadership is not the same as bossing someone around to do what you want. A leader inspires through his or her vision and motivates by leading by example rather than telling and intimidating a desired action.

The components of a leadership philosophy

The above definitions might already help you understand the connection between leadership and philosophy. When you combine philosophy, the guiding principles, and leadership, which is the model behavior for inspiring others, you create a theory or an attitude, which provides the norms for behavior and action. The definition is brought to life with four key components, which are:

A theory - The way you define leadership and what's it about.

An attitude - Your mindset in regards of approaching leadership.

Guiding principles - The principles and values you hold dear when you are thinking about leading others.

Behavior - The behaviors you showcase in your journey to reach the desired results and outcomes.

You could view leadership philosophy as a compass - it helps define your expectations, your values and provide the roadmap for actions. With a clear leadership philosophy, you create a focused thought system surrounding your leadership, and you define the behaviors and attitudes you want to cultivate in yourself, but also in others. Leadership doesn't just provide focus for you personally, but it can allow the people around you to know what to expect from your leadership.

Examples of leadership philosophies

Just as there are differences in what philosophers think and divergence in how leadership is defined, leadership philosophies also come in a number of different flavors and styles. Since the framework is based on personal values, leaders can approach it from different angles. There are plenty of options to choose from, but we've selected three unique frameworks to provide you an idea of the divergence.

Leader believes followers should have the power to make decisions.

Leader believes in empowering followers through increased responsibilities.

The framework is effective when followers are knowledgeable.

Leader believes that everyone should have equal say within the team.

Leader values participation, consultation and consideration.

Leader emphasizes co-operation and support.

Leader believes results are best achieved in a controlled system.

Leader has clear vision, including how and when things should be done.

Leader is accountable for the decision-making.

You can use these generalized models as guidance for defining your own leadership philosophy. Nonetheless, you shouldn't try to copy a specific leadership philosophy. While learning about other philosophies can be a solid way to identify useful qualities, you need to adopt an approach that comes from your heart. Later on in the guide, we'll provide you with a systematic guide to drawing your unique leadership philosophy.

WHY SHOULD YOU HAVE A LEADERSHIP PHILOSOPHY?

Leadership philosophy has a foundational element to it. The different components included create a strong basis on which to build on and take your leadership forward. You are better-equipped to lead and to succeed in your leadership with a leadership philosophy due to three core benefits: character, consistency and collaboration.

Character

Drafting a leadership philosophy will provide clarity and focus in your character. Character matters because it influences your everyday decision-making and communication with other people. Without a proper understanding of your character and the traits you truly value, you are more likely to fall into bad habits and to let emotions control you.

By making a conscious decision with the help of a leadership philosophy, you outline the characteristics you want to strive for and which you value in other people as well. In a way, you become better at controlling your behavior and you strengthen the qualities required of a successful leader.

Consistency

The above benefit directly relates to the second advantage of creating a leadership philosophy: consistency. The most important aspect of the philosophy is setting out and defining your values and objectives.

Once you define these, you immediately create more consistency to your behavior and actions. You have guidelines, which help you make decisions and take action. You'll always use the same defining values at the heart of your decision-making. Let's assume your leadership philosophy is defined by sustainability.

Whenever you are faced with a decision, you will evaluate the options based on how they relate to the value of sustainability - Will it hinder or enhance it? This assures your actions and behaviours are consistent. You don't flip-flop from one value to another, but you stick to your principles.

Collaboration

Leadership always requires a level of collaboration. Since you need followers to voluntarily to follow you, you can't expect to achieve much without an understanding and focus on teamwork. Getting along with people will become much easier if you have a clear leadership philosophy to follow.

Among the things you need to define with your philosophy is your approach to collaboration. The framework requires careful consideration of engagement, communication and accountability. Defining these, you create more consistency and improve your chances of more meaningful collaboration.

People will know what your values are, they understand your approach to teamwork and thus they feel more comfortable because you follow these well-defined patterns of behavior. Essentially, people can trust you because they don't need to constantly be on their toes.

Overall, leadership philosophy will provide clarity to your leadership. Business strategist and author John Spence has written a good blog post on the topic and in it, he gave a powerful example of the benefits of a leadership philosophy. He used the famous quote by Walt Disney to make a point about why successful leaders need to define the framework for action.

The quote says, " When values are clear decisions are easy." Spence flipped it around stating, " When values are not clear decisions are difficult." By defining your leadership philosophy, you clarify your decision-making by enhancing your focus on the values and actions that truly matter.

PUBLISHING YOUR LEADERSHIP PHILOSOPHY

My Philosophy of Leadership is to surround myself with good people, who have ability, judgment and knowledge, but above all, a passion for service. - Sonny Perdue (American Politician)

We will outline the four steps to developing a leadership philosophy in the next section, with one of the steps involving writing down your ideas. Before providing you with the format for your written philosophy, we are going to explain why having a published leadership philosophy matters.

As you'll see in the next section a written leadership philosophy statement can be useful in getting to the heart of your true values and ideas. By having a written statement, you are sure to have a reminder of the ideals you want to be pushing towards. But it can be more beneficial to have the leadership philosophy published or at least shared with a few people because it increases your accountability.

If you are the only one aware of your leadership principles, you don't need to worry about others calling you out on doing something against your values since no one has knowledge of them. On the other hand, if you are loosing your sense of direction, a person who has seen your leadership philosophy statement can nudge you back in the right direction. The objectives you want to deliver and the values you want to keep at the heart of your leadership will be known. Even the knowledge that people have access to your statement or your closest friends or mentors know it can be enough to keep you focused on following your path.

Aside from accountability, publishing your leadership philosophy will provide another major benefit: the ability to reflect. While the philosophy must naturally be built around your actual values and objectives you want to achieve, bouncing these ideas with another person can provide an invaluable angle to your thinking. The ability to reflect on your ideas and to go them through with another person can add ideas to your thinking you hadn't thought about before. The way you see yourself will always differ slightly from the experience of others and you can learn a great deal about your characteristics by asking questions from others.

If you share your leadership philosophy, you'll be able to reflect on your ideas from a completely different perspective. The feedback can be useful in ensuring your philosophy is the best roadmap for you to move forward. Don't worry about the feedback being negative; a well-constructed leadership philosophy is sure to inspire others. Overall, the idea behind publishing or sharing your leadership philosophy is all about feedback. If you are criticized consider the words carefully and think whether there is some truth to them.

How to publish your leadership philosophy? There are different ways to go about it. You could naturally share with a few close friends or colleagues and ask their opinions. If you have a leadership mentor or a coach, then it's a good idea to talk about the statement with them. But you could go further than that and have your leadership philosophy on your personal website. This could potentially be a good idea even in terms of career progression, as future employers might get a better understanding of what your leadership looks like.

Finally, don't use publishing the statement just for feedback, ensure you have someone to keep a check on you to ensure you are following your values and objectives.

THE STEPS TO DEVELOPING A LEADERSHIP PHILOSOPHY

Hopefully, the above would have convinced you about the importance of having a leadership philosophy. We've talked about the characteristics of the framework, but how do you develop it? Here are the four steps you need to take in order to draft a proper leadership philosophy, which will guarantee you succeed as a leader.

Step 1: Define your values and priorities

The first, and perhaps the most important part of the process is defining your values and priorities. You need to look deep inside you to discover the values you want to highlight and which you think make leaders great. You need to be able to answer the following questions as part of this step:

What are the values I think are the most important in life and business?

What are my personal strengths and weaknesses when it comes to values and behaviors?

What do I feel are the priorities of a leader?

But how do you define the core values and priorities? It's easy to create a list of things you think are important, but you need to dig deeper when it comes to a leadership philosophy. First, you need to actually understand why you think a specific value has value. Second, you can't have a list of 20 values as this doesn't truly clarify your position, but instead, you must focus on just a few core priorities. Entrepreneur and author Kevin Daum has written a great post on Inc. on how to define your values. Daum suggests taking the following steps:

Identifying the following moments from your life and describing them in detail:

Three greatest accomplishments

Three greatest moments of efficiency

Three greatest failures

Three greatest moments of inefficiency

Consider the above moments and examine the possible common themes between them.

Using these common themes, identify the advice/tips you would give yourself. For example, if you find yourself avoiding conflict situations, your advice might be "Don't walk away from difficult situations."

Refine your advice into a value. For instance, the above advice could become "Confront difficulties"

Furthermore, once you have these core values and themed outlines, it's auspicious to take a moment to define them properly. Let's say you realized ' authenticity ' is a value you cherish. Define what you mean by it by writing down a few sentences. You can use the formula:
"Authenticity to me means..."
You can do this with all of your values, whether the value is ' communication', ' family', or ' competitiveness '. It is definitely worthwhile doing this all on paper because it will help you better communicate your ideas to yourself.

When you've selected your values, you need to prioritize them further. If you have around 3-7 values selected, you should consider which ones resonate the most with you or which you think are the most essential in terms of leadership. An effective way to prioritize your values is by comparing them with each other. You can do it by simply taking two values, such as ' authenticity' and ' respect ', and make the following statements with your chosen values:

Authenticity but NO respect

Respect but NO authenticity

Would you pick the first or the second sentence? The value you choose is the one you rank as more important. You can do this prioritization with all of your values by comparing them against each other. You should eventually have a value on top that beat all the others in comparison.

Step 2: Define the desirable outcomes you want to achieve

As well as defining your values, you also need to examine the outcomes you wish to achieve as a leader. In order to do this, you need to study the outcomes you want to achieve in the light of your chosen values. First, you should identify the goals for your leadership and the possible operational goals your organization is looking to achieve.

What are the actions you want to or should achieve as a leader? An auspicious way to set goals is by using the SMART method, described in the image below:

Furthermore, once you've identified the objectives, you need to outline and write down the actions required to achieve these goals. The actions can range from finding tools to motivate your team to enhance innovation.

When you have the goals defined, you must reflect on the ways your values relate to and impact these objectives. You can do this by answering the following questions:

How do my values support the key goals of leadership? Remember leadership was about influencing others to follow your vision. You need to pick each value and examine how it would help inspire others and move you closer to your vision. If you value 'honesty', then you want to consider how it is demonstrated in influential leadership.

How do my values support the operational goals? You should consider the same in terms of the specific organizational objectives you've identified.

How can my values strengthen the actions required to achieve the objectives? Look at each action and consider the different ways your values would have a positive impact on it. 'Honesty' could be seen as a way to strengthen trust, which in turn would boost motivation, for example.

How do my values show in the way I communicate with my teams? Think about the above and the positive or negative impact your values, actions and objectives will have on the team. You want to identify the routes that uphold your values, but create a meaningful partnership with your followers.

What are the behaviors and actions I expect from my followers? Your followers don't necessarily have to subscribe to the exact same values as you do or prioritize the values the same way. Nonetheless, you need to consider the behaviors and actions, which are in conflict with the objectives you want to achieve as a leader and as an organization, and the behaviors, which are not sustainable in terms of your own values.

The above helps you to clarify what your leadership philosophy should look like in action. It makes the values turn into concrete examples in terms of behaviors and actions.

Step 3: Write down your leadership philosophy

With the above steps concluded, you can start putting your leadership philosophy on paper. We briefly mentioned the importance of having a written statement in the previous section. Writing down your philosophy helps clarify your ideas and makes it all just a bit more concrete. It can improve your focus and help you keep yourself more accountable, since you can always go back and read what you've created.

To help you write down your leadership format, we propose using the format below, although you can always just write a document in your own style. The format is based on the four core elements of leadership philosophy: theory, attitude, principles and behavior.

Write the specific elements of leadership you believe are at the heart of being a good leader; the values you prioritize. An example sentence could be: I believe in confronting issues head-on is the key to better communication.
Attitude: My thoughts will ___________ and my words will ______________. Principles: I will lead by/with ____________. Behavior: I expect to ___________ and ____________ in situations.
These sentences refer to the attitudes you want to foster in the workplace; the example you want to set with your own attitude. The aim is to focus on the attitude you think will boost your success as a leader and help to achieve the objectives you've set out. You might say, " My thoughts will focus on finding solutions and my words will be based on honesty and integrity. "

The focus is on writing down the guiding principles you will use as part of your leadership. These are the top priorities to you as a leader; the principles you won't negotiate on and which you'll consider each time you make decisions. You'll most likely end up writing a few of these and an example sentence might be: I will lead by understanding and embracing change and how situations and people can change over time.

Finally, you need to write down how you will behave and react in the workplace, no matter what the situation is. The behaviors should reflect your leadership philosophy and highlight the core ideas in action. The identification of your past successes and failures during Step 1 will help with the last point. You could state, "I expect to consider the different options and listen to feedback in challenging situations."

When it comes to drafting the document, there are a few things to keep in mind. First, keep it concise; you don't want the document to be more than one page. You should be able to state the essence of your leadership philosophy in a few sentences. The other crucial point is to aim for clarity and this is why you also want someone else to have a look at your philosophy.

You need to define the philosophy in a manner that will help others to understand it without the need to ask multiple questions. Even if you decide not to publish it, you want at least one person to view it. Aiming for clarity will guarantee you truly understand what you are looking for with your philosophy and this will guarantee you are focused on your intentions.

Step 4: Evaluate your leadership philosophy

Finally, it's not enough to write your leadership philosophy and continue with your daily activities; you need to actively evaluate how well you are holding on to your ideals. You must regularly reflect on how well your actions and behaviors follow your statements. Essentially, you need to hold yourself accountable.

Take time to review your leadership philosophy and go back to your previous actions. Are you practicing what you preach? What are the things you excel in and which behaviors and actions do you struggle to follow? You could look at these questions each week or every month. Write a list of the major actions you took that week; for example, consider the three successes for the weak and the three possible failures for the week.

Reflect on which principles you held on to and which actions or behaviors went against what you believe in. As you identify the actions and behaviors where you didn't follow your leadership philosophy, consider what were the reasons leading to this situation. Why didn't you remember your philosophy at that moment or why did you reject it? This will help you understand what are the areas where you need to work harder on or even identify the values and priorities that might be unattainable for you.

Furthermore, you should occasionally have a chat with people who know you or who work with you. Finding out what they think your guiding principles are can reveal a great deal to you about how they view you and whether your philosophy shows in action. If your followers identify values that are counter to everything you've written in your statement, then you are properly doing something wrong as a leader. On the other hand, if people relate values to you, which are at the heart of your philosophy, you get confirmation you are on the right path and achieving success as a leader.

As eluded to earlier, evaluating your leadership philosophy will help you realize whether your philosophy is working or not. If it's not, you need to carefully think about the reasons behind the failure. It might be that you are simply failing in staying true and you need more time to instill these values deeper into your actions. Just continue to be more mindful of your philosophy and think more about the ways you can stick to your principles. But your failures might not be due to lack of motivation.

It could well be the actions and behaviors you chose are not truly you and do not fit into your leadership strategy. Therefore, you might have to re-evaluate each value and principle, adding in new ones and removing the ones that don't reflect your philosophy. Successful leadership is a fluid strategy and the philosophy shouldn't be too rigid either. As you gain more experience, both in business and in life, you will develop and grow as a person. This personal development might well change the way you approach leadership and therefore, you should be willing to make small changes to your philosophy if you feel like it.

The video clip below on self-reflection is a valuable watch because it highlights the importance of being more aware of the impact of your decisions. It's an important lesson to keep in mind when evaluating your leadership philosophy.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Leadership philosophy is a crucial element, as it acts as the foundation for your leadership. It helps you determine the guiding principles, behaviours and actions you want to put at the heart of your leadership. By carefully considering your values, priorities and objectives, you can create a framework for effective and focused leadership.

Having a leadership philosophy creates clarity to your decision-making and your actions, which help you to inspire and to motivate the followers to support your vision. You will be a leader with a clear mission and way of operating, which makes it easier for people to respect and trust you because they will always know where you are coming from.

When it comes to drafting a leadership philosophy the key is to spend time analyzing yourself and writing down the things you believe in and value. Creating a document will ensure you are not only accountable, but can easily remind yourself to focus on the essentials. It ensures you aren't just thinking about specific actions and behaviors, but to actually implement these in your leadership.

Leadership philosophy is often based on intuition, but also a careful examination of what your strengths and weaknesses are. It's about finding the voice that truly speaks for you rather than pretending to subscribe to things you don't believe in or can't achieve.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
How to Develop a Leadership Philosophy that Inspires | Cleverism

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Think about the most successful leaders in the world, past and present. If you were to compare them with inefficient leaders, the difference wouldn't necessarily come from their skills. The more important factor would be how the successful leaders would be able to provide you with a clear and defined approach to how they lead other people: their leadership philosophy.

# data[].attributes.headline
6 Questions for Determining Your Leadership Philosophy

# data[].attributes.subject
6 Questions for Determining Your Leadership Philosophy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
I've had multiple occasions recently to reflect on my own leadership philosophy. Not only have I been asked about it explicitly, but in several conversations with friends and others, the topic of leadership has come up with both positive and negative examples. This got me examining my leadership style and the principles that make up my overall philosophy.

Reflecting on your philosophy can be a surprisingly useful exercise, because we don't often examine many of the underlying tenets that govern our actions. But as we do reflect on it, we can begin to uncover not only our own beliefs and principles, but also the principles we value in our own leaders and managers.

When I think of a philosophy in general, it is the set of principles and beliefs that govern our actions and direction. It is made up of many different pieces that are all intertwined, guiding us through various situations.

So a leadership philosophy is made up of the core principles that govern the actions of a leader. Not only what they do, but the vision that they set and the policies they put in place to guide others.

I often see "philosophy" confused for "style". While style will be influenced by philosophy, they are not the same. Style may be the implementation of philosophy, but it is not equivalent. Additionally, style can be much more determined by situation while the underlying philosophy, though subject to reflection and revision, should not be changing situationally. It should be much more resilient and all-purpose.

Everyone has a philosophy, even if they don't determine explicitly what it is. All of our thoughts and actions, especially when it comes to leadership, govern our direction. So even without determining or reflecting on a leadership philosophy, you have one. You just may not know exactly what it is or how it drives your decisions.

By taking time to reflect (and write out) your philosophy, you can begin to have a much better understanding of the forces driving your decisions and leadership.

Additionally, you can start to measure where your philosophy and implementation may not be aligned. Are there practices you currently have as a leader that don't measure up to where you'd like to be? Determining your philosophy and reflecting on it gives you the perfect opportunity to ensure they are aligned. Or what you may need to do if they aren't aligned.

But what if you aren't currently in a leadership or management role? For product managers reading this, hopefully you already recognize that even without managerial authority, you are in a critical leadership role. For others, I'd likely argue that you too are in positions of leadership, even if it's not readily apparent.

Regardless, most of us likely have managers and leaders in some capacity. By understanding our own leadership philosophy, we can better recognize the underlying principles guiding our managers. This is important for working with managers and fulfilling our responsibilities. But it is also critical in determining where we will work best. If your leaders and managers don't have principles that align with your own, how can you expect to do your best work long-term? Ensuring that we determine our own philosophy and then find leaders who also align with our principles is crucial to our individual success and happiness.

As I was thinking about this topic and fleshing out my own philosophy, I asked myself a series of questions that helped me begin to articulate my own philosophy. Here are some of the topics I used to help me determine my philosophy:

1. How do I currently lead on my team and in my organization? It's helpful to take stock of what you currently do in order to understand why you do it.

2. How would I like to be perceived as a leader? This helps uncover additional principles that you may find important to your philosophy.

3. What gaps are there between what I do and what I would like to do? Are there gaps? If so, why?

4. What leaders do I admire and why? Understanding the philosophy of others and why you admire it will help you uncover your own philosophy. This can be famous leaders, or leaders you know personally.

5. What leaders do I dislike and why? This can also be famous leaders or leaders within your organization. I often find that the best examples for me are the ones that help me understand what not to do.

6. What are my personal principles? Your personal principles should align with your leadership principles and philosophy. This is, of course, your philosophy, so it needs to align with your values.

As I've had the opportunity to reflect on the principles of leadership that I value, I've been able to articulate my overarching philosophy and the underlying principles. I go more in-depth on my own philosophy in my post My Leadership Philosophy & Principles, but I'll summarize it here as well:
Get the right people working on the right thing in the right way - and get everything else out of their way.
The key underlying principles for my philosophy are:

1. Get the right people

2. Establish principles and live them

3. Set the vision

4. Define the framework

5. Give continuous feedback and recognition

6. Get everything else out of the way

Not only is this the way I try and lead, but it is how I want to be led as well. Understanding that and articulating it are critical as I continue to lead various teams and take on more leadership roles, but also in understanding the kinds of leaders I want to work with.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
6 Questions for Determining Your Leadership Philosophy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I've had multiple occasions recently to reflect on my own leadership philosophy. Not only have I been asked about it explicitly, but in several conversations with friends and others, the topic of leadership has come up with both positive and negative examples. This got me examining my leadership style and the principles that make up my overall philosophy.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
At the beginning of each advanced leadership workshop session, business thought leader John Spence asks attendees how many currently have a written list of their key leadership values. Much to his surprise, only one or two out of 100 to 150 executives raise their hands.

As a result, Spence wonders how executives successfully lead their organizations and project teams. "I just have a hard time believing that if you've never taken the time to truly think through what kind of leader you want to be, what your leadership values are, what sort of leadership legacy you want to leave ... and then write those things down so that you have a clear and focused guide for your self-leadership ... that you would be a truly effective leader of others," he wrote.

Defining your leadership philosophy and then completing your personal leadership philosophy can help guide and direct how you'll lead others.

What Is a Leadership Philosophy?

A leadership philosophy provides insight into the ideas, values, attributes and expectations that comprise how you approach leadership. Your leadership philosophy reflects what is important to you as a leader, so that you'll be grounded in it and so that others can understand what you stand for and what they can expect from you as a leader.

Leadership coach Deb Calvert identifies three defining aspects of a leadership philosophy.

It's personal. There is no right or wrong.

It's something that you choose. Not having a leadership philosophy leads to an "accidental" philosophy that is vague and unclear to others - as well as to you, even. By having a leadership philosophy, you're making a deliberate and intentional choice based on reflection and determinations.

It's meant as a foundation. Your leadership philosophy provides clarity to guide decisions and a focus for everyday activities and responsibilities.

There are key elements in your leadership philosophy that you'll want to model as a leader. Spence noted some of the most important characteristics people feel make an "ideal leader."

Honest/integrity/character

Visionary

Highly competent

Excellent communicator

Team player/collaborative

Innovative/risk taker

Decisive

Fair and supportive

Creates clear goals and direction

Respect/recognition

Passionate/inspiring

Personally accountable

Proactive/action oriented

Customer/quality focused

How to Develop Your Personal Leadership Philosophy (PLP)

While some leaders may be aware of their leadership philosophy, few have written down these leadership characteristics. For communicating your personal leadership philosophy (PLP), Calvert provides a description of what it means to have a PLP, with bolded verbs that create a step-by-step process for building your PLP.
Successful Leaders know their Personal Leadership Philosophy (PLP) and communicate it by living it passionately every day in all they say and do. They have taken the time to determine who they are, their values and priorities. They know their course and have set their internal compass, which gives them greater self-knowledge, greater self-confidence, and improved effectiveness as a leader. This is accomplished by writing a Personal Leadership Philosophy, which states the core values you live by, what you expect of your people, what they can expect of you, and how you will evaluate performance. -Ed Ruggero, The Leader's Compass: A Personal Leadership Philosophy Is Your Key to Success
You can't develop a meaningful PLP without first determining who you are as a leader, including your values and priorities. What do you believe? What values do you refuse to compromise? And what causes you to have these values? What is the single most important thing to you?

Communicate Your Core Values and Expectations

The act of writing out or communicating your PLP is important. By putting it in writing, you:

Provide clarity and objectivity

Signal that you're serious

Make a commitment

Keep your values and expectations consistent

Cause self-reflection

Make yourself accountable

Make it easier to share

You need clarity, commitment, consistency and accountability. By putting something in writing, you'll take a step back and evaluate your PLP more objectively. Writing it down will help you insert a great deal of thought and analysis - not just emotion - into your philosophy.

Determine Who You Are Through Your PLP

The next step involves becoming intimately familiar with your PLP.
"You have to know your own PLP so well that you live and breathe it," Calvert says. "If it is to guide your actions and provide examples to others of who you are and what you stand for, then you need to be intimately familiar with your PLP. This can't be an occasional thing that you bring out when it suits you ... It needs to be a constant expression."
Once you truly know your PLP, you'll have a strong hold on what you believe in and what you stand for. This leads to authenticity, credibility, clarity, determination and other outcomes.

Set Yourself to Your PLP and Live by It

Let your PLP guide how you lead others. By doing this, you'll project confidence because you know exactly where you're going and you'll have no doubts how you're going to get there. Others will notice, get inspired and be more willing to follow you.

Writing Your PLP Communicates What Matters to Those You Lead

Communicating your PLP takes place through your actions and by distributing it to others. Make sure you're clear and confident in what you stand for; you shouldn't change your PLP very often. Allow some time for it to reach a point where you can live with it for a long time.

Personal Leadership Philosophy Examples

There are different styles of PLPs that you can emulate when you write your document. Leadership training company Academy Leadership has several examples of PDFs. The second example is especially noteworthy for its structure and approach.
"My Leadership Philosophy is based upon the [principles] that I have learned through the study of both strong and weak leaders," Dennis C. Parker, president and CEO of Active Minerals International, wrote in the introduction of his PLP. "It is my belief that following these [principles] will be the most profitable and rewarding way to lead my life and positively impact the lives of those around me."
Parker used the following headers to structure his PLP.

I lead by: Making and keeping commitments, integrity and character, setting goals and earning credibility, along with other leadership qualities.

I place great value in: Honesty, trust, credibility, communication, knowledge, quality and other traits.

What I expect: Telling the truth in a timely manner, showing respect through words and deeds, being a team player and other expectations.

Things I do not accept: Unsafe working environments and safety violations, lying, negligence, types of disruptive or disrespectful behavior and other negative behavior and motives.

Understanding and applying leadership principles requires a strong understanding in business theory and practice. This might mean you'll want to obtain some relevant formal education such as Aurora University's online MBA program that helps students develop the knowledge and skills needed to lead others and advance their careers.

This post was authored by Brian Neese
Brian has been writing about online education for more than five years, with specialties in health care, business and education. In his spare time, he enjoys sports, movies and spending time with family and friends.
Ms. Career Girl was started in 2008 to help ambitious young professional women figure out who they are, what they want and how to get it.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Developing a Leadership Philosophy - Ms. Career Girl

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
At the beginning of each advanced leadership workshop session, business thought leader John Spence asks attendees how many currently have a written list of their key leadership values. Much to his surprise, only one or two out of 100 to 150 executives raise their hands.

# data[].attributes.headline
These 8 Answers will Fill Your Leadership Philosophy

# data[].attributes.subject
These 8 Answers will Fill Your Leadership Philosophy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
As leaders, we each need our own simple, profound leadership philosophy that is grasped easily and modeled consistently.

I believe the most authentic leadership is organic. Yes, it may borrow from various influences, but your most real philosophy is as individual as your fingerprint.

Your philosophy shapes your personal leadership statement. The statement can cover how you lead and influence, what you value, what you expect from team members, what you do not accept, and/or what type of environment you are committed to creating.

Let's look at how to get there.
8 Prompts to Your Core Beliefs and Behaviors
The following prompts can help drill down to your core beliefs and behaviors, as you can see by the examples that I have included from notable leaders.

By answering these, you will collect valuable insight that can help point to your unique leadership philosophy.

Example: "Always be fair and consistent in the principles that guide your decisions, because there will be people who disagree. If you are consistent, they will at least respect you when you make your decisions."- Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
2. I spend time....
Example: "I've made a point of spending a lot of time walking the building at HUD and listening to employees."- Julián Castro, secretary of Housing and Urban Development, who describes himself as a 'man in the crowd' type of leader.
3. I value.... 4. I am curious about... Example: "By nature I am curious about life, and this extends to my business."-business magnate Richard Branson. 5. I respect.... Example: "[I] respect employees [by] making myself available to try to answer questions they have. It gives me a chance to educate, but it also gives me a chance to be educated."- U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. 6. I listen with.... 7. I care about.... Example: "The only thing I care about is winning. That's all. If you don't want to win, you don't want to be around me."-Los Angeles Laker legend Jerry West Your Game Changer Takeaway
Be inspired to fill in the blanks! Go deep with your 8 answers. Which ones resonate? Hone your philosophy to its simplest form, and practice it daily. You are taking a big step closer to your leadership potential, and that benefits everyone on your team.

Game Changers Podcast - Authentic Leadership

Kat Cole, Group President of FOCUS Brands, is keenly aware of how to hone and evolve her leadership style to inspire many different types of teams. Take a listen below to hear her story or visit the Game Changers Podcast page for more in-depth interviews with successful business leaders and athletes.
Molly Fletcher helps motivate and equip game changers to dream, live and grow fearlessly. A , Molly draws on her decades of experiences working with elite athletes and coaches as a sports agent, and applies them to the business world. Her Game Changer Negotiation Training™ has helped organizations and individuals across all industries more effectively ask for what they want, build stronger relationships and close more deals faster.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
These 8 Answers Will Fill Your Leadership Philosophy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
As leaders, we each need our own simple, profound leadership philosophy that is grasped easily and modeled consistently. I believe the most authentic leadership is organic. Yes, it may borrow from various influences, but your most real philosophy is as individual as your fingerprint. Your philosophy shapes your personal leadership statement.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
When teachers believe that together, they are capable of developing students' critical thinking skills, creativity, and mastery of complex content, it happens! Collective teacher efficacy (CTE) refers to a staff's shared belief that through their collective action, they can positively influence student outcomes, including those who are disengaged and/or disadvantaged. Educators with high efficacy show greater effort and persistence, a willingness to try new teaching approaches, set more challenging goals, and attend more closely to the needs of students who require extra assistance. In addition, when collective efficacy is present, staffs are better equipped to foster positive behaviour in students and in raising students' expectations of themselves by convincing them that they can do well in school.
The Effect Size Research
With an effect size of 1.57, CTE is ranked as the number one factor influencing student achievement (Hattie, 2016). Collective teacher efficacy, as an influence on student achievement, is a contribution that comes from the school - not the home nor the students themselves. According to the Visible Learning Research (Table 1), CTE is beyond three times more powerful and predictive of student achievement than socio-economic status. It is more than double the effect of prior achievement and more than triple the effect of home environment and parental involvement. It is also greater than three times more likely to influence student achievement than student motivation and concentration, persistence, and engagement.

Table 1. Factors Influencing Student Achievement and Their Effect Size

Source: Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on learning. New York, NY: Routledge; and Hattie, J. (2016, July). Mindframes and Maximizers. 3rd Annual Visible Learning Conference held in Washington, DC.

An effect size emphasizes the difference in magnitude of given approaches for purposes of comparison. An effect size of 0 reveals that the influence had no effect on student achievement. The larger the effect size, the more powerful the influence. Hattie (2009) suggested an effect size of 0.2 is relatively small, an effect size of 0.4 is medium, and an effect size of 0.6 is large.

Efficacy beliefs are very powerful because they guide educators' actions. Goddard, Hoy, and Woolfolk Hoy (2004) noted that efficacy beliefs "directly affect the diligence and resolve with which groups choose to pursue their goals" (p. 8). If educators' realities are filtered through the belief that there is very little they can do to influence student achievement, then it is very likely these beliefs will be manifested in their practice. However, if a school staff shares a sense of collective efficacy, then they have a greater likelihood of positively impacting student learning, over and above any other influence.
Six Enabling Conditions
School characteristics associated with CTE, documented in the research, helped in identifying six enabling conditions for collective efficacy to flourish (Donohoo, 2017). While enabling conditions do not cause things to happen, they increase the likelihood that things will turn out as expected.

Advanced teacher influence is defined by the degree to which teachers are provided opportunities to participate in important school-wide decisions.

Reaching consensus on goals not only increases collective efficacy, it also has a direct and measurable impact on student achievement (Robinson, Hohepa, & Lloyd, 2009)

Teachers' Knowledge About One Another's Work

Teachers gain confidence in their peers' ability to impact student learning when they have more intimate knowledge about each other's practice.

Cohesion is defined as the degree to which teachers agree with each other on fundamental educational issues.

Responsive leaders show concern and respect for their staff and protect teachers from issues that detract from their teaching time and focus.

Effective Systems of Intervention

Effective systems of intervention help in ensuring that all students are successful.

Fostering collective teacher efficacy is a timely and important issue if we are going to realize success for all students. Fostering collective teacher efficacy should be at the forefront of a planned strategic effort in all schools and school boards. Attending to the six enabling conditions outlined in this blog is a step toward realizing the possibility of collective teacher efficacy in schools.
References:
Donohoo, J. (2017). Collective efficacy: How educators' beliefs impact student learning. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Goddard, R., Hoy, W., & Woolfolk Hoy, A. (2004). Collective efficacy beliefs: Theoretical developments, empirical evidence, and future directions. American Educational Research Association, 33(3), 3-13.

Hattie, J. (2016). Third Annual Visible Learning Conference (subtitled Mindframes and Maximizers), Washington, DC, July 11, 2016.

Hattie, J. (2009). Visible learning: A synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses relating to achievement. New York, NY: Routledge.

Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on learning. New York, NY: Routledge.

Robinson, V., Hohepa, M. & Lloyd, C. (2009). School leadership and student outcomes: Identifying what works and why. Best evidence synthesis iteration [BES]. New Zealand: Ministry of Education.
About Jenni Donohoo
Jenni Donohoo is a Provincial Literacy Lead, seconded to the Ontario Ministry of Education's Curriculum and Assessment Policy Branch. In this role she works with system and school leaders in order to support high quality professional learning and improve adolescent literacy. Jenni earned a doctorate in education from the Joint Program at the University of Windsor, Brock and Lakehead in 2010. Since then, her passion for research and writing has grown. Jenni has written three books for Corwin. Her most recent book, Collective Efficacy: How Educators' Beliefs Impact Student Learning, was released in November 2016.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Collective Teacher Efficacy: The Effect Size Research and Six Enabling Conditions

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
When teachers believe that together, they are capable of developing students' critical thinking skills, creativity, and mastery of complex content, it happens! Collective teacher efficacy (CTE) refers to a staff's shared belief that through their collective action, they can positively influence student outcomes, including those who are disengaged and/or disadvantaged.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
I recently met with school improvement teams at two secondary schools. For the past four years, both school's results were well below the Provincial average on the annual standardized literacy test. The conversation at the first school was driven by the teachers around the table. It centered on research, school-wide strategies, lessons learned from past experiences, and progress monitoring. Teachers' voices were heard as they were instrumental in determining next steps, which included designing professional learning for their peers.

Although the conversation at the second site was also driven by teachers, it was remarkably different. The teachers expressed concerns about burn-out and the majority of the conversation was centered on the high needs population they were trying their best to serve. The school had a high percentage of students with Individual Education Plans (IEPs) and English language learners. In addition, the majority of students came from low socio-economic backgrounds. Rather than helping to identify what could be done, the staff at the second school felt there was nothing left to try, indicating "there is nothing that we can do to make a difference with these kids".

The staff at the first school faced similar demographic challenges but did not let that deter them. They believed that through their collaborative efforts, they could help students achieve - in measurable ways. This team demonstrated a great sense of collective efficacy. The school improvement team at the second site believed that their efforts were in vain. Their belief was that student achievement could not be advanced - no matter that they did and regardless of whether they worked together or alone. This staff was lacking both a sense of self efficacy and a sense of collective efficacy.

What Is Collective Efficacy and Why Is It Important?

When teachers believe that together, they and their colleagues can impact student achievement, they share a sense of collective efficacy. Collective efficacy refers to "the judgments of teachers in a school that the faculty as a whole can organize and execute the courses of action required to have a positive effect on students" (Goddard, Hoy, & Woolfolk Hoy, 2004, p.4). Collective efficacy is high when teachers believe that the staff is capable of helping students master complex content, fostering students' creativity, and getting students to believe they can do well in school. When efficacy is high, educators show greater persistence and are more likely to try new teaching approaches. Educators with high efficacy encourage student autonomy, attend more closely to the needs of students who are not progressing well, and are able to modify students' perceptions of their academic abilities (Ross & Bruce, 2007).

Bandura (1993) demonstrated that the effect of perceived collective efficacy on student achievement was stronger than the link between socio-economic status and student achievement. More recently, Hattie ranked collective teacher efficacy as the number one factor amongst all of the influences that impact student achievement (personal communication, November 19th, 2015). Eells (2011) meta-analysis demonstrated that collective efficacy and student achievement were strongly related with an effect size of 1.57 (more than double the effect size of feedback).

Efficacy beliefs are very powerful as they guide our actions and behavior. Efficacy beliefs help to determine what we focus on, how we respond to challenges, and how we expend our efforts. If educators' realities are filtered through the belief that they can do very little to influence student achievement, then it is very likely these beliefs will be manifested in their practice. It's promising to know that beliefs about our capabilities to impact student outcomes can be shaped and adjusted.

Strengthening Collective Efficacy in Schools

Rather than leaving it to chance, it is timely and important to consider how collective efficacy beliefs may be fostered in schools and organizations. Three ways to strengthen efficacy are suggested below.

#1. Create Structures and Processes for Teachers to Engage in Meaningful Collaboration

Structures and processes need to be in place for teachers to come together to solve problems of practice collaboratively. Teachers need time (during the instructional day) and spaces (conducive to learning) where they can meet regularly. They also need to be introduced to processes that support joint-work (Little, 1990) and aid in addressing challenges related to learning and teaching.

One process that has been found particularly effective in increasing efficacy is collaborative inquiry. Voelkel Jr. (2011) demonstrated a positive relationship between collective efficacy and professional learning communities characterized by collaboration and inquiry. Langer and Colton (2005) noted that "schools that engage in collaborative inquiry develop a sense of collective efficacy that helps educators reconnect with their original point of passion: ensuring student success" (p. 26). When educators collaborate and develop solutions to address their problems of practice, efficacy increases.

Collaborative inquiry situates teachers' everyday work as the central focus for their learning. Teams identify student learning needs, investigate promising approaches, test new strategies in their classrooms, collect evidence, collectively examine results, and determine next steps. As noted by Fullan and Quinn (2016) "the leader who helps develop focused collective capacity will make the greatest contribution to student learning" (p. 57).

#2. Promote Teacher Leadership and Extend Teachers' Decision-Making Power

The power to shift practice and improve student achievement lies in the hands of teachers who need to be entrusted with the responsibility of shaping and enacting change initiatives. Teachers as change agents have the potential to transform their classrooms, schools, and communities. Fostering teacher leadership is not only a viable strategy for school improvement, it is a necessity. Research demonstrated "a clear and strong relationship between collective efficacy and the extent of teacher leadership in a school" (Derrington & Angelle, 2013, p. 6).

Research also showed higher levels of collective efficacy is schools where teachers were afforded decision-making influence on relevant issues (Goddard, 2002). When teacher's voices count in regard to designing curriculum, assessment, and professional learning, efficacy increases. Goddard et al. (2004) noted that "where teachers have the opportunity to influence important decisions, they also tend to have stronger beliefs in the conjoint capability of their faculty" (p. 10). By affording teachers greater autonomy and increased power to make decisions on issues related to school improvement, efficacy beliefs can be fostered.

#3. Build Awareness That Collective Efficacy Exists and that it is the Number One Factor that Influences Student Achievement

Talk about collective efficacy. Help others understand what it is and what it means in relation to student achievement. Initiate conversations about the power of beliefs and share relevant research about the impact of collective efficacy.

Design professional learning opportunities that tap into the sources of efficacy. Bandura (1997) proposed four sources that shape an individual's efficacy beliefs. Goddard et al. (2004) noted that the same sources are important to the development of collective efficacy. Mastery experiences are the most powerful of the four sources which also include vicarious experiences, social persuasion, and affective states. Ross and Bruce (2007) designed a professional development program that explicitly addressed the four sources of teacher efficacy, intentionally including opportunities for teacher to engage in mastery and vicarious experiences. The researchers found that the program had "a positive effect on teacher expectations about their ability to handle student-management issues" (p. 58).

On final suggestion to build awareness is to administer self-report efficacy questionnaires. Using the old cliché - ' what gets measured - gets done ' school leaders might consider accessing an instrument to measure collective efficacy and share the results with staff over time.

In conclusion, Horton and Martin (2013) noted that when district leaders take a participatory approach to professional learning and develop teachers by sharing leadership and providing for collaborative structures, their involvement can aid in the development of a collective efficacy. Fostering collective efficacy is a timely and important issue if we are going to realize success for all students.
References:
Bandura, A. (1993). Perceived self-efficacy in cognitive development and functioning. Educational Psychologist, 28(2), 117-148. Bandura, A. (1997). Self efficacy: the exercise of control. W.H. Freeman and Company, New York, NY.

Derrington, M., & Angelle, P. (2013). Teacher leadership and collective efficacy: Connections and links. International Journal of Teacher Leadership, 4(1), 1- 13.

Eells, R. (2011). Meta-analysis of the relationship between collective efficacy and student achievement. Unpublished Ph.D. Loyola University of Chicago.

Fullan, M., & Quinn, J. (2016). Coherence: The right drivers in action for schools, districts, and systems. Corwin, Thousand Oaks, CA.

Goddard, R. (2002). Collective efficacy and school organization: A multilevel analysis of teacher influence in schools. Theory and Research in Educational Administration, 1, 169-184.

Goddard, R., Hoy, W., & Woolfolk Hoy, A. (2004). Collective efficacy beliefs: Theoretical developments, empirical evidence, and future directions. American Educational Research Association, 33(3), 3-13.

Horton, J., & Martin, B. (2013). The role of the district administration within Professional Learning Communities. International Journal of Leadership in Education, 16(1), p. 55-70.

Langer, G., & Colton, A. (2005). Looking at Student Work. Education Leadership, 62(5), p. 22-26.

Little, J. W. (1990). The persistence of privacy: Autonomy and initiative in teachers' professional relations. Teachers College Record, 91(4), 509-536.

Ross, J., & Bruce, C. (2007). Professional development effects on teacher efficacy: Results of randomized field trial. The Journal of Educational Research, 101(1), 50-60.

Voelkel, Jr., R. (2011). A Case Study of the Relationship between Collective Efficacy and Professional Learning Communities. Unpublished PhD. University of California, San Diego, California State University, San Marcos.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Collective Efficacy: Together We Can Make a Difference | Corwin Connect

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I recently met with school improvement teams at two secondary schools. For the past four years, both school's results were well below the Provincial average on the annual standardized literacy test. The conversation at the first school was driven by the teachers around the table. ...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
This post was first published on Pete Laburn's blog in Feb 2011

After living for seven years as a Jesuit seminarian, practicing vows of poverty, chastity and obedience to the Jesuit general in Rome, Chris Lowney was transformed into a corporate man as an investment banker at JP Morgan. Lowney's years in business revealed that leadership challenges, especially how to recruit and mould leadership in your company's teams, is a universal corporate challenge faced by all companies around the world and throughout time. He realised that the super smart, ambitious and strong willed recruits at JP Morgan didn't always translate into long-term successes at the firm. Lowney noticed that many up-and-comers with raw talent and sheer ambition, either were terrified of making major decisions, or terrorised anyone who dared make a decision without them. Some were good at managing only numbers and not human beings and most were uncomfortable with change and taking personal risks.

As he wrestled with the challenge of developing successful leadership in the corporate environment, Lowney was drawn to think back to the leadership lessons he had learnt from the Jesuit company during his time as a Jesuit priest. He realised that this 470 year old company had grappled quite successfully with many of the challenges confronted by companies today, including how to institute a 360-degree feedback loop, forging seamless multi-national teams, motivating inspired performance and remaining change ready and strategically adaptable. "Heroic Leadership" is a book which lay out a leadership approach that every company and leader should take seriously (buy the book now at Amazon.co.uk and Kalahari.net)

Find out more about our keynote presentation 'Leading in a Changing World' here

Founded in 1540 by 10 men with no capital and no business plan, the Jesuits built, within little more than a generation, the world's most influential company of its kind. Over the years they have served European monarchs, China's Ming emperor, the Japanese Shogun and the Mughal emperor in India, unmatched by that of any other commercial, religious or government entity. Jesuit explorers were among the first Europeans to cross the Himalayas and enter Tibet, to paddle to the headwaters of the Blue Nile and to chart the Upper Mississippi River. In Europe, Jesuits built the world's largest higher education network, starting more than thirty colleges within a decade. By the late eighteenth century, 700 secondary schools and colleges sprawled five continents educating nearly 20% of all Europeans pursuing a classical higher education. Jesuit astronomers and mathematicians were among the leading scholars in Rome, China, France, Asia and Africa.

The Jesuit founders launched their company into a complex world that had changed as much in fifty years as it had over the previous thousand years - a similar rate of change that is experienced in the world today. This innovative, wide-ranging company still exists and has become one of the world's largest religious order. Its 21 000 professionals run 2000 institutions in more than a hundred countries.
So why have the Jesuits been so successful and what can this religious company teach business today?
What often passes for leadership today is a shallow substitution of technique for substance. Most literature on leadership today focuses on what leaders do. Consult any of the current works unlocking the mysteries of leadership and management and you will see a long list of outputs that we want leaders to deliver, such as establishing direction, aligning people, motivating and inspiring and producing change. Despite all we know about what leaders should do, our societies and companies in general have a shortage of quality leaders.

In contrast the Jesuit team does not tell us much about what leaders do or what they achieve, but they have a lot to say about who leaders are, how leaders live and how they become leaders in the first place. In this way Jesuits offer a leadership model that flows against the tide of most contemporary leadership models. It rejects quick-fix approaches that equate leadership with mere techniques and tactics. It finds leadership opportunities not just at work, but in the ordinary activities of everyday life. The Jesuits approach leadership in a totally different light revealing 4 main differences from modern leadership theory:
1. We are all leaders, and we are leading all the time, well or poorly.
The Jesuit vision that each person possesses untapped leadership potential cuts against the grain of the corporate top-down leadership model. The typical model has the 1% in charge (company presidents, generals and coaches) and the 99% as subordinates. This model focuses only on the top 1% as leaders and overlooks the challenges facing the other 99%. Ever narrower is the focus of the 1% of leaders on only key leadership opportunities that have the biggest impact and ignore the other 99% of everyday opportunities to make a leadership impact. That is 1% of the chances to lead enjoyed by 1% of the potential leaders, or 1/10 000 of the leadership pie. Think of what is lost and imagine the power of capturing that potential.

The Jesuits threw aside the blinders that forced people to focus only on those in command and developed every recruit to lead. They shunned the one great man theories in order to focus on the other 99% of potential leaders. Everyone is a leader, and everyone is leading all the time - sometimes in immediate, dramatic and obvious ways, but more often in subtle, hard-to-measure ways.

Who invented the yardstick that measures some as leaders and others as merely teachers, parents, friends or colleagues? And what are the dividing lines? Does one have to influence at least a hundred people at a time to be a leader, or will fifty do? Or what about twenty, ten or even a single person? And does a leader's impact have to become apparent within the hour? Or within a year? Are there not also leaders whose impact is barely perceptible within their own lifetimes, but manifests itself generations later through those they raised, taught, mentored or coached? The confusion stems from an inappropriately narrow vision of leaders as only those who are in charge of others and who are making a transforming impact and who are doing it in a short amount of time.

But this model of top-down, immediate, all-transforming leadership is not the solution, it is the problem. The Jesuit model reveals that everyone has influence, good or bad, large or small, all the time. A leader seizes all the available opportunities to influence and make an impact. Circumstances will present a few people with world-changing, defining-moment opportunities, but most will enjoy no such big time opportunities in their lifetimes. Leadership should not be defined by the scale of the opportunity but by the quality of the response.
2. Leadership springs from within. It is about who I am as much as what I do.
No one ever became an effective leader by reading an instruction book, or learning one-size-fits-all rules. Rather, a leaders most compelling tool is who he is: a person who understands what he values and wants, which is anchored by certain principles, and who faces the world with a consistent outlook. Leadership behaviour develops naturally once this internal foundation has been laid.

A leader's greatest power is his personal vision, communicated by the example of his daily life. Vision is intensely personal and is the hard-won product of self-reflection: What do I care about? What do I want? How do I fit into the world? Company mission or purpose statements don't take root simply because they are elegantly worded. They take root when subordinates see managers take a personal interest in the purpose and it springs from within them. The techniques of how to win buy-in from your team and fashion long term goals can amplify vision, but can never substitute for it.
3. Leadership is not an act; it is a life - a way of living.
Leadership is not a job, not a role one plays at work and then puts aside during the commute home in order to relax and enjoy real life. Leadership is real life. Your way of doing things should flow from your worldview and priorities. By knowing what you value and want to achieve, you will always be able to orientate yourself in a new environment, and adapt confidently to unfamiliar circumstances.
4. I never complete the task of becoming a leader. It is an ongoing process.
Personal leadership is a never ending work in progress that draws on continually maturing self-understanding. The external environment evolves and personal circumstances change, as do personal priorities. Some personal strengths erode, even as opportunities arise to develop others. All these changes demand consistent balanced growth and evolution as a leader. The strong leader relishes the opportunity to continue learning about self and the world and looks forward to new discoveries and interests.

The Jesuits trained every recruit to lead, convinced that all leadership begins with self-leadership that springs from personal beliefs and attitudes, therefore, each person must first decide what personal leadership legacy they want to leave behind. The Jesuits success was based on four guiding principles which can clearly be identified in their words, actions and writings. These four principles infused their work and achievements and leap from their writings and dominated their carefully mapped training programme.

These four leadership principles guided individual Jesuits and formed the basis of Jesuit corporate culture. They are:

1. Self-awareness - understanding your strengths, weaknesses, values and worldview.

2. Ingenuity - confidently innovating and adapting to embrace a changing world.

3. Love - engaging others with a positive, loving attitude.

4. Heroism - energising themselves and others through heroic ambitions.
Self-awareness: To order one's life
Leaders thrive by understanding who they are and what they value, by becoming aware of unhealthy blind spots or weaknesses that can derail them, and by cultivating the habit of continuous self-reflection and learning. Only the person who knows what he wants can pursue it energetically and inspire others to do so and only those who have pinpointed their weaknesses can conquer them.

Leaders invest significant time and money to acquire the professional credentials and skills needed to succeed. Leaders need to invest equally in their human skills and their capacity to lead. No one lacking the requisite technical skills would naively waltz into a company and expect to succeed. Yet we remain naive enough to believe that those who don't know themselves - their strengths, weaknesses, values and worldview can achieve long term success. As the world becomes an even more complex place and change takes place faster than ever, it becomes increasingly clear that only those with a deeply ingrained capacity for continuous learning and self reflection stand a chance of surfing the waves of change successfully.

An introspective journey should involve: appreciating oneself as talented; indentifying personal derailing baggage that could prevent the realisation of one's full potential (especially those that manifest as habitual tendencies); articulating personally motivating goals and ambitions; determining what one stands for and what impact one wants to make; developing a worldview that guides interaction with others; and acquiring the habit of updating oneself regularly on all these areas.

The Jesuits of the 1500's faced a similar predicament to that faced by companies today.

Decreasing birth rates in developing countries since the 1990s is creating a worldwide war for talent that will only worsen over time. As a highly successful, rapidly growing company in the 1500's the Jesuits too faced painful staffing constraints, however their response to this problem could seem somewhat unconventional. Instead of accepting greater numbers of recruits into the society to deal with the staff shortages, the society founder Ignatius Loyola was most concerned about admitting people too freely and so made the screening process even more selective. Recruits underwent a longer, more rigorous orientation than any other religious order or commercial enterprise. While these actions did bottle neck efforts to reinforce operations and many opportunities slipped through their fingers in the short term, they remained committed to personal development. This may have seemed counterproductive, but what transpired was far from a loss of momentum. Instead, membership swelled from 10 members in 1540, to 1000 in 1556, and more than 5000 by 1580.

The Jesuits realised that an organisation can grow only as fast as available capital, talent and management capacity to oversee the growth. Many an enterprise has imploded from unsustainable growth. The Jesuit policy was to "recruit as many as possible of the very best." Jesuit leaders recognised their company's flourishing reputation as the direct result of unique high-quality services. Their reputation for selectivity, high standards and outstanding results was precisely what attracted the most-talented recruits. By reining in overly aggressive growth, and rejecting 'bottom-fishing' recruiting practices, they sustained both their reputation and their steep growth trajectory. Or paradoxically, the Jesuits kept growing rapidly, by not growing too rapidly. The Jesuits realised that ongoing success depends on turning recruits into leaders. Solve that problem and the leaders you have moulded will solve all other problems.

Management and leadership pioneer Peter Drucker writes on the ramifications of our changing economy, particularly the technology driven shift toward a knowledge economy. In the past bosses gave out tasks and employees just needed to follow orders and performed the assigned tasks. This is not so today. Work roles have become largely self-managing.

With fewer supervisors to give direction, most workers are on their own most of the time, independently prioritising and ploughing through responsibilities. In a more competitive and changing marketplace, companies must respond with increasing speed and urgency, further decentralising decision making to workers. Skills once critical only for top management have become essential for everyone. Each employee is increasingly a self manager, making decisions on his own. With the accelerated pace of change, roles and tasks change constantly, requiring continuous judgement and the ability to learn on the job. Individuals who thrive in this environment are those who can learn, innovate, exercise good judgement, take responsibility for their actions and take risks. These skills come from self-understanding, not vocational training.

Daniel Goleman, in his research in managerial self-awareness, has noted that the more senior ones role within an organisation, the less critical to success are intellect and technical skills compared with the bundle of skills making up emotional intelligence. According to Goleman, emotional intelligence is made up of 5 core competencies:

1. Self-awareness - the ability to recognise and understand your moods, emotions and drives.

2. Self-regulation - the ability to control or redirect disruptive impulses and moods, to think before acting.

3. Motivation - a passion to work for reasons that go beyond money or status.

4. Empathy - the ability to understand the emotional makeup of other people.

5. Social skill - proficiency in managing relationships and building networks; to find common ground and build rapport.

Most companies today want to find people with these skills, but these skills do not show up on a candidates CV. The Jesuits are one company that did look for emotional intelligence potential in candidates and then crafted a program to engender it in recruits. Rather than cycle through self-awareness approaches haphazardly, the company developed and promoted one universal tool for all Jesuits: the Spiritual Exercises. Each Jesuit recruit emerged from his initial 30-day Spiritual Exercises programme with invaluable personal strengths. The exercises encapsulate the company's vision and serve as each Jesuits preeminent personal development experience. Engaging in the exercises is the uniquely unifying experience of Jesuit life, shared by recruits from Rome to India and from the founding generation to this year's entering class. Developed by the Jesuit founder Ignatius Loyola, they were called Spiritual Exercises as they are actions to be done not rules to be studied. The individual undertaking them is like an athlete building his own internal resources. Each individual needed to work through the exercises on his own, with only the help of an impartial director to guide him through his experience. This is because all men are more delighted and moved by what they find out for themselves than what they are taught by others. So the purpose of the director is just to "point his finger at the vein in the mine," and let the individual dig for himself to discover what is inside him. Loyola understood what every competent therapist understands about self-discovery, and what every quality manager understands about motivation: that the switches are on the inside and so nobody can tell you what is inside of you, or motivate you to do anything you don't want to.

Recruits who successfully absorb the exercises were injected back into the world as self-aware, ingenious, loving, heroic leaders. But no month long introspective journey is enough to fortify someone for a lifetime. Immersed in the world with all hell breaking loose around them, Jesuits - like everyone else - risk slipping away from their goals and values when faced with pressures, distractions, and competing demands of everyday life. Loyola anticipated this and made sure that the exercises could also be used as a daily follow-up tool to maintain focus on newly embraced values. The exercises were specifically designed for those immersed in a busy lifestyle in an ever-changing world. Every day, upon arising, Jesuits are to remind themselves of key personal goals. Then twice each day they make a short mental pit stop called an examen. Each examin begins by recalling their positive loving worldview, and then recalling to mind all the events of the day so far, the opportunities and challenges presented, and how he reacted to them. This self-reflective habit is as powerful as it is simple. Ambitious goals become manageable when broken down into smaller goals. Moreover, the examens create an ongoing feedback loop. Relevant new information is incorporated and assessed in real time as the individual reminds himself of key goals each morning, not every 6 months, and extracts lessons learned and failures twice each day, not once a year. Few people are willing to set aside even one day a year for self-reflection, but anyone can carve out 5 minutes 3 times a day.

Self-awareness is never a finished product. As our world keeps changing, so leaders must keep changing too. Every early Jesuit dedicated an intensively focused week each year to revitalise his core commitment and assess his performance during the previous year. Moreover, Jesuit self-awareness techniques accommodated change by instilling in recruits the habit of continuous learning and of daily reflection on activities. These techniques remain relevant today precisely because they were designed to allow busy people to reflect on the run. Jesuits employed these techniques in order to remain recollected while all hell was breaking loose around them - just as everyone else has to do today. Recent research is validating the Jesuit emphasis on self awareness showing that IQ and technical skills are far less crucial to leadership success than mature self-awareness.
Ingenuity: The whole world will become our house
Ingenuity appears nowhere in Jesuit regulations or correspondence, but every early Jesuit would have instantly recognised its attitudes and behaviours in the way they did things. Ingenuity is the readiness to cross the world at a moment's notice in full-hearted pursuit of a good opportunity. It is the willingness to work without a script, and to dream up imaginative new approaches to problems that have baffled others, and it is the creative embrace of new ideas and foreign cultures.

Today's modern world is tumultuous and always shifting and changing. Succeeding in this world requires individuals to cultivate the personal skills needed to thrive in an environment of near permanent change. The abilities to adapt create, and respond quickly are core personal leadership skills for the twenty-first century.

There are two vital ingredients for ingenuity. Firstly, indifference which frees individuals from the prejudices, attachments, fears and narrow mindedness that can block the enthusiastic pursuit of new ideas and opportunities. Secondly, a profound trust and optimism that the world presents plenty of opportunities to pursue. Imagination, creativity, adaptability and rapid response become the keys for finding and unlocking these many opportunities.

Ignatius Loyola described the ideal Jesuit as "living with one foot raised" always ready to respond to emerging opportunities. Indifference is key to successfully living with one foot raised. A leader must first rid himself of ingrained habits, prejudices, cultural preferences and the 'we've always done it this way' attitude - the baggage that blocks rapid adaptive responses. Of course, not everything is discardable baggage. Core beliefs and values are nonnegotiable, the anchor that allows for purposeful change. The leader is able to adapt confidently knowing what is negotiable and what is not.

Early Jesuits were able to make themselves immediately and totally comfortable in a world that had changed as much in their lifetimes as it had over the previous thousand years. Jesuits prized personal and corporate agility. They were quick, flexible and open to new ideas. Loyola's spiritual exercises instilled indifference and freedom from attachments to places and possessions which could result in resistance to movement or change.

Another key to ingenuity that might not be very obvious is obedience. In order to move quickly, Jesuits needed to not only be willing to move on a moment's notice, but be able to take orders sending them on a new mission. Jesuits needed to be flexible enough to do whatever the situation calls for - to give an order, to take an order or to plot one's own course. The spirit of indifference helped young Jesuits not to worry about who got to give orders or who had to take them, but to do either well in order to deliver results. Obedience confers speed to the enterprise, allowing managers to recognise and respond to opportunities aggressively. Anyone in today's fast paced competitive business environment will recognise the power of having team members who can take orders, give them, plot their own course and do all these quickly.

Loyola also resolved the complicated management challenge of building responsive, innovative, globally focused teams. Speed and a global mindset in today's fast paced economy often require centralised authority to weigh opportunities and mobilise resources quickly against emerging opportunities. There is often not time to call everyone together to discuss what to do when an opportunity arises. Therefore, oftentimes centralised authority needs to be able to take a decision in order to maximise the opportunity available. But once the decision has been taken, employees need to be freed to make decisions in order to arrive at the agreed upon outcome. In other words, speed, innovation and global focus happen only when lots of delegated authority sits alongside lots of centralised authority.
Love with greater love than fear
The early Jesuits faced the same obstacles to unity that any large global company does. Ignatius Loyola exhorted Jesuit managers to govern with greater love than fear. Love was the glue that unified the company - a motivating force that energised their efforts. Love was also the lens through which individual Jesuits beheld the world around them. Through this lens they saw each individual's talent, potential and dignity and had the courage, passion and commitment to unlock that potential. What separated Jesuit teams from the rest was that they were willing to hire talent that other religious orders shunned, and saw human talent and potential where others didn't even look for it. Love was the guiding vision that enabled them to do this.

Love in today's business world, drives the manager who takes the time he does not have to help the passable employee to do better, to help a promising junior employee chart a career path through the company, to initiate the awkward conversation that forces the high-performing colleague to confront his grating behaviour. Love sometimes even causes confrontation in families and teams.

For Loyola, leading was about helping others "run at full speed towards perfection." It was about the commitment to see others realise their full human potential. His motivation was developing others to achieve a common Jesuit agenda, not using others to achieve a self-interested agenda. Love-driven leadership is a combination of great affection coupled with the passion to see others run at full speed towards perfection. It is not urging others forward without concern for their aspirations, well-being or personal needs. Nor is it being the nice-guy manager who overlooks underperformance that could damage a subordinates long-term prospects. Instead, love-driven leaders hunger to see latent potential blossom and to help it happen.

The team that almost everyone has participated in is a family. Few would suggest that loveless families function as efficiently as loving families do, or that they are supportive, motivating or satisfying. Nor would anyone argue that threatening or brutally competitive schools are our most successful ones. Students learn best and produce most in environments that provide genuine support, care and encouragement. Then why do we think that the needs of adults working in companies are any different?

Teams cemented by love and mutual regard effortlessly outdo most other organisations which settle for the basic teamwork behaviours of respecting colleagues, listening to their views, sharing information proactively, giving others the benefit of the doubt and mentoring newcomers. Anyone who has worked in a close-knit, loyal, trusting team knows that such minimal teamwork standards pale when compared with the behaviours of unified, love-driven teams. Unlike energy-sapping workplaces riddled with backstabbing and second-guessing, environments of greater love than fear generate energy. Team members in such environments are supported by colleagues who want them to succeed and help them to do so. Individuals perform best when they are respected, valued and trusted by those who genuinely care for their well-being. Loyola was wise enough to perceive this bundle of winning attitudes as 'love' and eagerly tapped its energising, unifying power for his Jesuit team.

Leaders face the world with a confident, healthy sense of themselves as endowed with talent, dignity and the potential to lead. They find exactly these same attributes in others and passionately commit to honouring and unlocking the potential they find in themselves and in others. They create environments bound and energised by loyalty, affection and mutual support. The Jesuit approach stemmed from their worldview that saw each person as uniquely endowed with talent and dignity. Out of this worldview, love-driven Jesuits worked with passion and courage so that individuals could thrive in environments of greater love than fear.
Heroism: Eliciting great desires
The challenge for individuals, teams and companies today is how to move from clinical, going-through-the motions performance to motivated, even heroic performance. While many companies aspire to outstanding performance within their fields the Jesuit team did 3 distinct things to turn their aspiration into a reality (and it was not writing out and printing a mission statement).

1. They invited recruits to turn a corporate aspiration into a personal mission.

2. They created a company culture that stressed heroism, modelling the virtue themselves.

3. They gave each person the opportunity to enlarge himself by contributing meaningfully to an enterprise greater than his own interests.

Loyola's most powerful practical insight about heroic leadership was that it is self-motivated.

The Spiritual Exercises enabled each recruit to personalise the company's mission. The recruit was not simply handed the company's vision. Each person considered, accepted, shaped and transformed a general mission into a personal one, and were supported in constant reinforcement from the top.

Indifferent Jesuits stood poised waiting for a heroic ambitious goal to inspire them to spring into action. Once they committed to a goal, total victory was the aim. Jesuits were exhorted to go further than wholehearted service. Early Jesuits captured this aggressive drive, this relentless energy, in a one-word motto: magis which is the Latin word for 'more'. Magis is the restless drive to look for something more in every opportunity and the confidence that one will find it. Jesuits are exhorted to always choose and desire the strategic option that is more conducive to their goals. But it also captures a broader spirit to imagine whether there isn't some even greater project to be accomplished or some better way of attacking the current problem.

Not only were Jesuit teams encouraged to achieve heroic acts but every young Jesuit heard of other such heroes from all over the world modelling the sentiments they preached. Letters from the field, copied in Rome, were circulated throughout the Jesuit world so early Jesuit teams could hear of heroes walking the walk.

If making the mission personal and creating a supportive culture were two ingredients for instilling heroism, the third was giving each individual the opportunity to contribute meaningfully. The Jesuits believed what behavioural psychologist Frederick Herzberg would later observe "You cannot motivate anyone to do a good job unless he has a good job to do." The Jesuits had many good jobs to do and heroes emerged to fill them.

For any organisation to reach a performance plateau of heroic and visionary acts is enormously challenging, but remaining on that plateau is even harder. A restless countercultural instinct to keep challenging the status quo had to be built into Jesuit heroism.

The built-in energy of magis pointed always toward some better approach to the problem at hand or some worthier challenge to tackle. The daily self-reflective habits denied Jesuits the luxury of going with the flow, and when a better path presented itself, their change ready posture of living with one foot raised inclined them to leap into action. Good leaders share this restless, eternally questioning posture that keeps them a little ahead of the curve. It also keeps them pointed toward the future, toward solutions and opportunities that others might overlook or be too timid to tackle.

Heroic, out-in-front leadership became a less compelling choice as the Jesuit company had more and more to lose. It was no more difficult than it is today: risk taking comes easier to the edgy, nothing-to-loose start-up company than the well established everything to loose mainstream player. And many a well-established mainstream player has begun to sink when they decided to stick with what was working rather than pounce aggressively on untested, high-risk ventures - even though most companies first gain prominence by innovating and taking risks.

Few companies maintain the leadership edge necessary for success from generation to generation - let alone across centuries. Consider that only 16 of the top hundred US companies of 1900 were still around at century's end. Why do so few successful companies survive? Success breeds complacency or market leaders turn defensive, conservatively glancing back rather than looking forward for new opportunities or threats on the horizon.

Magis-driven leadership, the continued focus on what lies ahead and on what more ambitious goals can be achieved, remains the only reliable way to ensure that important parts of the vision and mission remain vital and are not overlooked or discarded. Leaders imagine an inspiring future and strive to shape it rather than passively watching the future happen around them. Heroes extract gold from the opportunities at hand rather than waiting for golden opportunities to be handed to them.
Four core values - one integrated life
By figuring out what he is good at, stands for and wants in life, the leader positions himself to choose a career and lifestyle that draw on those strengths, values and goals. The leader's values keep his life feeling pulled together in a complex world. The leader is recognisable to self and others as the same person, animated by the same principles at home and at work. Leadership is a way of living in which basic life strategies and principles reinforce one another.

If a strong set of individual beliefs, goals and values is key for individual success, is a strong corporate culture of shared values and practices key for corporate success? Researchers have found the answer to be yes and no. Harvard Business School professors John Kotter and James Heskett noted in Corporate Culture and Performance that strong cultures sometimes damage company performance by causing employees to reject new ideas and approaches: a culture can blind people to facts that don't match its assumptions. But a strong corporate culture can also spur outstanding results when 3 key characteristics fall into place:

1. The culture is strong, not just on paper, but in a tangible way that guides day-to-day employee behaviour.

2. The culture is strategically appropriate, and

3. Most critically, the culture doesn't block change, but promotes it.

Successful corporate cultures tap the motivating power of deeply held beliefs, but also encourage change and innovation. Energising power lies precisely in the combination of nonnegotiable core beliefs and a willing embrace of change. Warren Bennis in his book Leaders describes the importance of a clear vision that enables confident risk taking, autonomy and creativity like this:
"A shared vision of the future helps individuals distinguish between what is good and what is bad for their organisation and what is worthwhile to want to achieve. And most important, it makes it possible to distribute decision making widely. People can make difficult decisions without having to appeal to higher levels in the organisation each time because they know what end result is desired."
We are all leaders and we are all leading all the time, often in small, unintended ways. The hundreds of casual encounters with fellow humanity that one experiences each day are all opportunities to convey respect or not to. Innumerable fifteen second transactions turn into hours of interaction over a month. Few stop to consider the message they are sending in these passing encounters which add up to most of one's waking life. The leader embracing the one great moment theory is always searching for the defining dramatic opportunity that will qualify as a leadership moment. But in reality more attitudes have been shaped, for good or bad, by a CEOs manner towards employees in the elevator. Heroic leadership invites people to assess their daily impact, to refocus if necessary, and to articulate the leadership mark they want to make. It invites them to replace accidental leadership with purposeful leadership of self and others.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Heroic Leadership - A Summary - Tomorrow Trends

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This post was first published on Pete Laburn's blog in Feb 2011 After living for seven years as a Jesuit seminarian, practicing vows of poverty, chastity and obedience to the Jesuit general in Rome, Chris Lowney was transformed into a corporate man as an investment banker at JP Morgan.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
While servant leadership is a timeless concept, the phrase "servant leadership" was coined by Robert K. Greenleaf in The Servant as Leader, an essay that he first published in 1970. In that essay, Greenleaf said:

"The servant-leader is servant first... It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire material possessions...The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.

"The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant-first to make sure that other people's highest priority needs are being served. The best test, and difficult to administer, is: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will they benefit or at least not be further deprived?"

A servant-leader focuses primarily on the growth and well-being of people and the communities to which they belong. While traditional leadership generally involves the accumulation and exercise of power by one at the "top of the pyramid," servant leadership is different. The servant-leader shares power, puts the needs of others first and helps people develop and perform as highly as possible.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
What is Servant Leadership? - Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
While servant leadership is a timeless concept, the phrase "servant leadership" was coined by Robert K. Greenleaf in The Servant as Leader, an essay that he first published in 1970. In that essay, Greenleaf said: "The servant-leader is servant first... It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
While the idea of servant leadership goes back at least two thousand years, the modern servant leadership movement was launched by Robert K. Greenleaf in 1970 with the publication of his classic essay, The Servant as Leader. It was in that essay that he coined the words "servant-leader" and "servant leadership."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Leadership Freak - Empowering Leaders 300 Words at a Time