The best way to be an effective and respected leader is by making your employees feel that you are one of them. Instead of being a boss with a set of archaic rules that everybody else should follow, show them that you care about their lives, careers, and success. The best leaders in the world advance the interests of an entire group, rather than focusing on their own personal gain. Otherwise, you may never have a loyal team because they will not feel emotionally invested in your leadership.
Here are the best ways you can earn respect as a leader, even with people you do not always get along with.
Share Your Vision and Delegate
A vision is only a dream if it is not shared with others to make it a reality. Share your thoughts and your ideas with the team. Let other people feel involved so they can succeed or fail together. Find ways to communicate openly and advocate for something worthy that everyone can aspire to achieve. Delegate significant responsibilities and have faith in your team to do their best, instead of micromanaging every person and belittling their true potential. Young employees cannot gain value from work experiences if they are not respected and challenged by superiors.
Make Your Leadership Trustworthy
The best bosses promote and enhance collaboration among team members, rather than just coordination and cooperation. Building trust is the secret to earning respect by strengthening personal and professional bonds. This introduces a long-lasting culture of honesty, communication, performance, and engagement in an organization. Instead of team members doing the bare minimum for a paycheck, they will uplift each other and break barriers to succeed if you motivate them enough.
Share Both Credit and Accountability
The most respected leaders praise others more than giving themselves a pat on the back. Sir Richard Branson’s philosophy is, “Put your staff first, your customers second, and your shareholders third. Effectively, in the end, the shareholders do well, the customers have a great experience, and you are one happy boss.” Make your employees feel valued and appreciate all their efforts no matter how big or small. Understand that all human beings are susceptible to mistakes, and that includes the bosses themselves. Acknowledge your own mistakes, apologize to those who are affected and encourage a healthy learning environment, rather than a critical one. Imagine if someone never gave you a second chance to grow by making mistakes and owning up to them.
To earn respect as a leader, one should practice mindfulness and be ready to make sacrifices to motivate and uplift others. There is no point in being a leader if the race is finished with no supporters at the finish line. Winning is not the ultimate end goal. Sharing hopes and dreams to achieve success through collaboration is what makes an organization more valuable than others in this modern competitive world.