Why Should I Follow You?
Four Tests of a Leader
By David C. Miller, FSA. MAAA, MSCC
This article is reprinted from The Stepping Stone, newsletter of the Management and Personal Development Section.
Are you an independent professional who knows your success depends upon leading other professionals? Maybe you lead a consulting practice group, a division in your company, a sales team, a down line or employees of your own business. In any case, winning the power to lead others is no easy task and must be earned.
You must meet some stringent criteria before you can obtain effective influence. Your potential followers are sure to be asking the question: “Why should I follow you?” According to David H. Maister, author of the book True Professionalism, four tests must be met for a leader to answer this question.
- Motives
A follower will only accept your influence and direction if you give them evidence that you’re primarily committed to the success of the group, rather than your own success. Your primary task as leader is helping others succeed. If a follower doesn’t trust your motives, nothing else will matter because the most important thing is your integrity.
How do you convince a follower that your motives are good? Simply put—your actions will speak more loudly than your words. Do you make it a habit of helping others on the team in terms of time, support and ideas—even when there were no immediate benefits to you? Are there examples where you put another’s interests first? What’s your track record as a team player? Do you keep everyone in the group informed? Do you take the time to teach and coach?
- Values
If a follower is comfortable with your motives, the very next thing they want to know is, “What are your core values?” They will accept your influence, guidance and direction if they believe they share similar goals with you—ones that inspire them. People want to follow a leader who has crystal clear values that they act on. They want to be led by a person of principle, not by someone who is driven by expediency.
Again, they will look at your behavior to decide what your values are. Did you ever incur personal cost to stand by your values? Did you ever turn away a prospect, work or an invitation to propose because taking it on would violate your code of values? For example, maybe taking on this new assignment would overload the group and the quality of the work would suffer—what do you do in those situations? Some practice leaders feel that you never turn away any revenue as long as an “adequate” job can be done. You’ve just sent a message! Are you practicing what you preach?
- Competence
Next, if a follower is to listen to you, they will require you to have constructive new ideas on how to improve things. It’s often said that leaders must have vision. But isn’t vision the easy part? “Let’s be the best, work as a team, provide superior service”—the words are always the same!! What’s hard is coming up with innovative approaches that will help the team achieve these goals!
So what’s your track record for creating new ways of doing things? Have you ever suggested (or even better, implemented) new approaches to customer service or marketing? New methodologies, templates or tools? New ways to train and develop people? Where is the evidence of your creativity in running any aspect of your business?
- Style
Finally, if all the other tests have been met, a follower will be interested in your style. Great leaders are effective coaches, helping everyone on the team to stretch and to fulfill their goals. Great coaches must excel at two seemingly opposing skills: they must be supportive and nurturing, as well as continually demanding—nagging their followers to stretch to the next goal.
You must demonstrate both of these skills. If you’re only demanding, you’ll be perceived as Atilla the Hun. If you’re only nurturing, you’ll be perceived as a wimp! In either case, people won’t follow you. What people need in a leader is a friendly skeptic, a loving critic, a challenging supporter—someone who’s not afraid to give both positive and negative feedback, and is involved enough to know when either is due.
It’s been said that, “A leader doesn’t build a business—a leader builds an organization that builds a business.” For you to be perceived as leader, you must be interested in building a team. And you must be prepared to get your satisfaction from the success of others. It’s more about attitude than it is about natural talent.
David C. Miller FSA, MAAA, MSCC is a professional business coach. He can be reached at dave@translifecoach.com.