5 things that define leadership

1. TIME

For you to classify yourself as a leader, you need a track record and acquiring a track record only happens over time.

You must have gone through the process of time to deliver and consistently demonstrate that you are capable of leading. For instance, in an organization, you can have long-timers who have worked there for a decade or more. If you bring in a new person to lead them, their first instinct is to resist because they have not seen the new leader’s abilities over time therefore, they withhold their respect. To be fully appreciated and respected as a leader, you must have time on your side. Time means delivering results over a considerable period and then at a certain point people begin to respect you. That is why job positions come with a probationary period. The logic behind a probationary period is to buy you some bit of time to prove that you earned your stripes.

2. ACHIEVEMENT

You can’t just wake up on a random day and proclaim yourself a leader without any tangible achievement to back up your claim.

You only emerge as a leader when there is something of substance that you have done. Those you might claim to lead will expect you to have something to show for it. If all these years you have achieved nothing, you will fail to command respect when you self-proclaim that you are a leader. As a bare minimum, you must have been able to achieve something. It doesn’t have to be a great achievement for it to qualify you as a leader. Achievement is dependent on your level. So whatever level you are at, you should have achieved something that is consistent with the kind of effort and subsequent output required to excel at that specific level.

3. SCALE

For you to be a leader, your achievements must be at scale because scale affords you credibility.

Scale gives you a competitive edge, greater visibility and access to more opportunities. For instance, if you only have 1 shop that is a fair achievement at that level. However, the person who has 50 shops has greater scale and therefore higher credibility in terms of leadership credentials. They stand a better chance of accessing opportunities, resources, lines of credit and a sit in the room with other decision-makers. A person with 50 shops can call and be granted an audience by other leaders much easily compared to someone with just 1 shop. This is because scale makes you stand out; it gives you a platform and makes you influential in a sector as well as impactful in a society. So, leadership does require scale.

4. KNOWLEDGE

You can never lead people if you do not have knowledge of the discipline at hand.

You can have all the qualities of a leader but the most important thing is to be a well rounded individual. You must develop and maintain a fair and cross-cutting level of knowledge (whether it’s in operations, HR, or other business unit) across the business. You must empower yourself with knowledge so that when you are sitting with those that you superintend, you demonstrate a strong grasp of issues. Most subordinates can be brighter than their leaders in one specific discipline, but the leader must be familiar with disciplines across every spectrum of the organization. The leader must be able to engage and demonstrate knowledge. A leader must be intentional, invested in and inclined towards acquiring knowledge. You must be committed to continually learning, applying yourself and growing. If you have no amount of knowledge in their discipline, your subordinates will not respect you and worse still, you cannot meet the needs of clients if you have no knowledge. You don’t need to be an expert, but you do need a fair knowledge of the disciplines and of the external environment. How you respond to external environment (e.g., threat of strikes when you are in the service industry, heavy rains when you are in construction) is a function of knowledge that you need to navigate in decision-making.

5. TECHNICAL COMPETENCE

In a technology-driven context, a leader must future-proof themselves by improving their technical competence continuously

Oftentimes, people venture into the workplace relying on formal education and skills they acquired based on existing (and often outdated) curricula which is outpaced by innovations. One of the biggest challenges remains the technical skills deficit where a workforce does not have the necessary skills to match or fulfil the business objectives. A leader cannot be the weakest link in terms of technical competence because they need to evolve and stay abreast of new cutting edge developments in their field. The reality is whatever discipline you are educated in has evolved and continues to evolve with time. Whether it’s finance, medicine, or engineering where you might have gotten your qualifications 15 years ago, you have to upskill to maintain relevant technical competence. You cannot start a business and remain trapped in the past. No leader worth their salt should resist change or remain loyal to how things have always been done. A leader must future-proof themselves and develop technical competencies that are relevant to a technology-driven world.