“The best outcome is on the other side of a genuine conversation.”
Brendan Rogers
The idea to produce The Culture of Leadership (TCoT) great leadership qualities, end of year wrap 2021, over the Christmas period, during the current turbulent pandemic times, was a ‘brain-fart’ between Brendan and his business partner/producer Marc. The delay in releasing this episode is well aligned with the crazy year which was 2021 and the challenges of getting people together, in the same room, for a conversation.
There were 27 episodes released on The Culture of Leadership (TCoT) Podcast during 2021 which included 81 key takeaways. These key takeaways provide the opportunity to share a valuable idea with the audience to use in their business, personal or family life.
Today we have listed our top 10 key takeaways in chronological order. These weren’t necessarily the top ideas, we are not trying to say that some are better than others, but these are just ones that primarily stood out. They were chosen based on the context of the past year and reflect how The Culture of Leadership (TCoT) Podcast and listenership has grown and developed.
These key takeaways are especially focused on leaders; giving them some actionable bites that they can use in their future development.
Leaders focus on the art of self-mastery. Developing and improving yourself underpins every single thing that leaders should focus on. As a leader, if you don’t have that as a foundational piece in your mindset, then what really gives you the right to lead teams and help them become better.
Leaders lead with vulnerability. If you have the courage to be vulnerable; putting yourself out on a limb and opening yourself up for criticism and feedback, it surprisingly puts people at ease and helps build connection. Building connections is a helpful tool for building trust.
(There’s probably no better stage to do that than putting yourself out into a public speaking arena when it is your mortal fear – for some it is scarier than shark attacks).
Leaders connect with people. Leaders with a strong professional relationship with their team can screw up from time to time and the team does not crucify them. You need to invest time to connect with people. An unconnected team is dysfunctional and erodes performance.
BONUS ROUND: The Story of My Broken Soldier, Karen and Matt Page
Leaders face challenges head-on. Karen and Matt get up every day and fight a good fight not only for them, but for so many veterans in Australia and beyond the shores of Australia.
Leaders must understand and work with context. Culture is the organization’s personality. Personality is sometimes contextual and personalities change in different situations. The context of the situation is what creates the variation and this has an impact when it comes to getting the message across effectively.
Leaders have full control over the culture. How the leader acts is what will resonate through the organisation. If they see something in their leadership team (for example), they always need to look at themselves and say, well, what have I done that has enabled that behaviour? A lot of the time, there is a lack of awareness.
BONUS ROUND: How to Become a Highly Effective Leader, Tom Lawrence
Leaders embrace simple. The art of taking on some complicated ‘stuff’ but being able to simplify that in a way that everyone can understand .
Leaders know what they stand for. Michael lived by his simple and elegant 3C.’s. He knew what he stood for and all of his decisions came through in how he acted, trained, played football and kept his football teams.
BONUS ROUND: What do I stand for?, Brendan Rogers
Brendan’s 10 Leadership commandments. A living, breathing document of what he personally stands for as a leader.
Leaders build for after they are gone. Succession planning in a nutshell; a mentality of who is going to replace me? When David was the president of Rotary, he already knew who was going to be the next president and they spent time working together side by side.
Leaders believe in your potential. Your job as a leader is to help encourage potential, bring the best out of your team and help them achieve their best self – whatever that best self looks like.
Leaders build a listening culture. If you spend more time listening than speaking to people you have a better chance of uncovering the real problem or issue. If you take the time to understand, seek to understand, then you are well on your way to help build a listening culture and others will follow.
Leaders have a team-first mentality/mindset. If you don’t have a team-first mentality as a professional sportsman, you probably wouldn’t survive too well in professional team sport.
The best leaders are making decisions that put the team first.
BONUS ROUND: Leadership Observed & Actioned, Michael Crutcher
Leaders never compromise on people. If they are not aligned with the values of the organization, they are not good for the organization.
The complete interview, which includes key actions, can be listened to here, on audio platforms, or watched here, on The Culture of Leadership (TCoT) YouTube channel.