What is next for leadership?

A couple of weeks ago I joined a cohort taking part in the six-month Lancashire Forum, developed and delivered by Lancaster University; a group of amazing business leaders from a wide cross section of industries in Lancashire.

By Louisa Scanlan, director, Collaborate

One of the opening exercises was to develop a timeline of people who had had both a positive and negative influence on you as a leader. I’d recommend doing it; it was a real eye opener.

One of the surprising outcomes was how I reacted to the different styles and how much leadership has changed.

Leadership is now focused on coaching and mentoring of teams and individuals rather than command and control. Leaders are having to show up in different ways; showing more empathy and compassion.

I wrote this article during the week of World Mental Health Day and gave me time to reflect on the impact of stress not only on staff members but on leaders too.

So how does this link to the leaders in my timeline? Those who have positively influenced my career were the ones who treated me fairly, respected my judgement, empowered me to operate independently and understood what I needed to be successful.

They were genuine and authentic, they were open and honest, even when it was a hard message and they shared their own experiences of tough times.

They also been able to manage complex, challenging change with passion and enthusiasm.

This isn’t being “touchy feely”; its being transparent. It’s about understanding what’s around you and how to get the best from all. Its about responding and reacting; leadership is people, people, people.