Please refrain from throwing people into the fire...

​I recently listened to a leadership training conference and I was reminded about some of the most important factors that go into developing leaders. Sometimes when leaders are thrown into the fire they experience a significant growth but it comes at a huge cost or major brain damage to the individual or the company. Here are three suggestions to help build more effective leaders without all the mess:

1.) Give them, tell them, and show them the love and trust. What I mean by trust, give them the ball and let them run. Micromanaging, constantly questioning decisions or methodologies will paralyze your leader and will likely make them underperform because they will just wait for you to tell them what to vs. taking action.

2.) Be clear about expectations. This relates to point number 1. If you have an idea of how something is supposed to look when completed or what success looks like, tell
them! Be very clear about the end result and then let them fly. Just remember, if they fail or the results don’t look right, if you did not take the time to spell out the expectations, whose fault is it?

3.) Train, train, train! Take the time to train your people. Make the investment in your
team. No professional ever achieved success without having the necessary tools
and training. Even Michael Jordan had to be taught the rules of the game. The
business world is way too fast and too much is at stake to hope that good ole on
the job training will be enough. As Stephen Covey would say, “if I had two hours
to cut down a tree, I would spend one hour sharpening the saw.” While this
statement can have other applications, it seems to be very appropriate when it
relates to training new leaders.


There is a ton of great talent out there in the job market; it just often needs just needs a bit of polish and for someone to take the time to develop and coach. So when you find that potential leader, show them that you trust them, clearly spell out the expectations and provide them the training they need and you are on your way to creating a work-place culture people want to be a part of.