Great Leaders Love
If you think it ever was about you as a leader, you are wrong. Leadership is about others. Great leaders love and care about others more than themselves.
Here are four tips to help you love and care about those you lead. However, let me preface these tips by saying that the most important thing you need to do is not fake caring. Either you really love those you lead or you don’t. If don’t feel it, don’t fake it. Faking it will erode your trust as a leader very quickly. People know when leaders are genuine and when they are not.
- Serve. There is a positive correlation between serving others and love. The more you serve others, the more you will care for and love them. The more you care and love, the greater desire you will have to serve. It can be as easy as sending a heartfelt card during a tender time in an employees life, or doing something nice for their family. There are many opportunities to serve those we lead, we just need to be aware and look for them.
- Be empathetic. See those you lead as people with needs just like you. I was talking to a colleague of mine the other day who has an employee with a very sick father who lives clear across the country. She can’t afford an airline ticket to see him. This kind and generous leader is going to buy her a ticket so she can see her father, and he is doing it anonymously. He has truly seen those he leads as people just like him that he can reach out and serve.
- See the positive. Everybody has good in them. The more you think and speak positively of others the more you will care. If you are always seeing the negative; it is difficult to care because those feelings are in direct conflict with caring. Some of you might be saying, “well, that is fine and dandy, but there is negative, and I have to address that too.” And I agree. But look for the positive first and then address the negative because you love that person, not because you are upset or angry.
- Express it. Now, you don’t need to say “I love you.” That could be construed as something different from what you are trying convey. But telling those you lead that you really do care about them; that you appreciate them, and feeling it as you say it, will increase your love for them. There is a real connection that occurs when you express how you feel genuinely to others.
Please leave a comment below and let me know what you do that helps you love and care about those you lead…
See these past posts of leaders that care and love, who care about others more than themselves.
Layoffs – Why the “C” and “E” in CEO should stand for Caring and Empathy
Compassionate and Caring Leadership – Very Inspirational Video
Anyone can be a leader – Powerful Video
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