Managing change (72%), dealing with rising complexity (52%), and being a role model (44%): these are the three top challenges of leaders according to a recent study (November 2014). The Institute for Employment and Employability (IBE) in Ludwigshafen, Germany and Hays, a HR (human resources) consulting firm, had asked 665 decision makers (managing directors, HR managers, and department managers) in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria.
According to their HR Report 2014/2015, the most important tasks of a leader are to establish a feedback culture (71%), to motivate employees (69%), and to identify development opportunities for their subordinates (66%). Managing the day to day business (9%) came in last among the most important tasks for a leader.
The survey also showed that the by far most important requirement for a leader is his social competence (78%), followed by method competence (14%), and professional competence (7%). At the same time, the survey participants saw by far the biggest need for action (72%) due to the target versus actual comparison in the area of social competence.
The huge majority (79%) of the leaders in the survey saw “lack of time for leadership tasks” as the biggest stumbling block while more than half of the leaders (55%) saw ” a reduction of their control function and a switch to more individual responsibility of their subordinates (empowerment)” as the second biggest hurdle. Moving from “a being present at the workplace” – orientation towards a results – orientation came in third place (48%).
What can we make out of the results of that HR Report 2014/2015? There needs to be still done a lot of work in terms of leadership in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, and probably in many other countries too.
It strikes me that 79% of the responding leaders state that they have too little time for leadership tasks. That’s what they were hired for in the first place and it surely is part of their job profile. To me, it looks like many of those decision makers have the wrong priorities. They prefer to splash around in the shallow water called “day to day business” (although only 9% stated that it is an important task for a leader) rather than entering the deeper leadership water where you sometimes will have to deal with currents and swirls.
There are still by far too many “command and control” – type of leaders around. Many executives have problems in delegating responsibility to their subordinates and to empower them. And the focus has to shift from watching only the physical presence at the workplace to the results contributed by an employee.
A lot more needs to be done to improve the social competence of leaders. After all, we know that your EQ (emotional quotient) is a much better indicator than your IQ (intelligence quotient) how successful you will be in life. While IQ is used to determine academic capabilities, EQ is a better indication of success in the workplace.
Leaders who possess strong soft skills perform better at driving hard results while executives with weak interpersonal skills are rated poorly on their ability to deliver good business results, especially over time, and receive predictably poor ratings as people managers.
Therefore, in my humble opinion, the development of soft skills has to begin already at schools and universities, not only at the workplace where people often get only their first interpersonal skills training after having been promoted to a supervisory role.
Since we are at the beginning of the year, what are you going to do to enhance your leadership skills and how can you make a contribution to improve the state of leadership at your company this year?
