The following contains excerpts from the book, Strengths Based Leadership (Tom Rath, Barry Conchie).
At our music school in Midland, Texas we believe that music is more than sound, it is relationships. In Leadership, relationships matter, and we believe that participation in learning music and the arts leadership and inter-personal relationship skills are developed and enhanced.
“Without an awareness of your strengths, it’s almost impossible for you to lead effectively…Serious problems occur when we think we need to be exactly like the leaders we admire…What great leaders have in common is that each truly knows his or her strengths – and can call on the right strength at the right time…outcomes highlight the value of leaders knowing their own strengths and also reveal how important it is for leaders to help others uncover their strengths as early as possible.”
The most effective leaders are always investing in strengths. When leaders focus on and invest in their employees’ strengths, the odds of each person being engaged goes up eightfold.
The most effective leaders surround themselves with the right people and then maximize their team. While the best leaders are not well-rounded, the best teams are.
We endeavor to staff our music school in Midland, Texas with the most successful and caring teachers possible, to effectively teach eager students who desire to learn and grow.
The most effective leaders understand their followers’ needs. Followers four basic needs:
- Trust. Followers will not tolerate dishonesty. Trust also increases speed and efficiency in the workplace. Relationship flat-out trumps competence in building trust.
One of the foundational tenets of our music school in Midland, Texas is mutual respect and trust among all who are involved.
- Compassion. Caring, friendship, happiness, and love were…frequently mentioned words followers used when asked what leaders contribute to their lives. Organizational leaders must have ‘a positive bias’ because employees simply ‘don’t want to follow negative people around.’
- Stability. Followers want a leader who will provide a solid foundation. They reported that the best leaders were the ones they could always count on in times of need…your followers also need to know that your core values are stable. At a company-wide level, nothing creates stability as quickly as transparency. Followers need to have a basic sense of confidence about where their career is headed and how the organization is doing financially.
- Hope. The single most powerful question we asked employees was whether their company’s leadership made them ‘feel enthusiastic about the future.’ When hope is absent, people lose confidence, disengage, and often feel helpless.
The vision and hope we have for our music school in Midland, Texas is that we are helping students learn more than music, but also life-skills that will guide them in their decision making, regardless of their career path.
The four domains of leadership strength are: 1) Executing, 2) Influencing, 3) Relationship Building, and 4) Strategic Thinking. Those who execute know how to make things happen. Those who lead by influencing help their team reach a much broader audience. Those who lead through relationship building are the essential glue that holds a team together. Leaders with great strategic thinking strengths are the ones who keep us all focused on what could be.
In our music school in Midland, Texas we encourage our students to not only develop in their personal skillfulness, but also interpersonally, through participating in ensembles. This group activity magnifies what creates the glue that exists in a strong team.
What strong teams have in Common:
- Conflict doesn’t destroy strong teams because strong teams focus on results. Contrary to popular belief, the most successful teams are not the ones in which team members always agree with one another. Instead, they are often characterized by healthy debate – and at times, heated arguments…One reason great teams are able to grow through conflict is because they have a laser-like focus on results.
- Strong teams prioritize what’s best for the organization and then move forward. Members of high-performing teams are consistently able to put what’s best for the organization ahead of their own egos.
- Members of strong teams are as committed to their personal lives as they are to their work. Evidence suggests that the most successful teams have members who are highly engaged in their work and highly satisfied with their personal lives.
- Strong teams embrace diversity. The most engaged teams welcome diversity of age, gender, and race, while disengaged teams may do the opposite.
- Strong teams are magnets for talent. Another way to spot a strong team is to look for the teams that everyone wants to be on.
We regularly ask leaders if they spend more time initiating or responding. While leaders are more likely to claim that they initiate, in reality, they spend the vast majority of their time responding. One challenge is that our ability to progress in our career is often determined by our effectiveness in responding to near-term needs. When high value is placed on solving these kinds of problems, it creates a culture in which leaders spend little or no time thinking about what could be done because they receive more accolades for simply doing what needs to be done. One of the greatest challenges for leaders is to initiate new efforts that will create subsequent organizational growth.
We encourage both teachers and students in our music school in Midland, Texas to focus on the possibilities of the future, and to be pro-active in their approach to learning and the overall benefits to our community.
When teachers, students, and parents come together for the purpose of caring for, and training, the upcoming generation of young people through music and the arts, wonderful things happen.
Students begin to develop not only in their chosen instrument or voice, but also in things like personal discipline, focus, empathy, long-range planning, patience, persistence, emotional maturity, pattern-based thinking, stage-presence, confidence, communication skills. The list goes on.
What STEM-based learning neglects to understand is how education can be wholistic and non-linear. Creative lateral thinking goes a long way towards helping people think ‘outside of the box,’ instead of always following the crowd. This is what leaders are made of.