How to build leadership skills
We don’t all have ‘leader’ in our job titles, but anyone can take leadership action.
At Impact, our approach to leadership is that it isn’t a special type of person; it’s a kind of action. This action emerges in the moment and responds to the need for a change. It doesn’t matter who or where this action comes from; what matters is that it serves other people and moves the situation or group forward.
Five top leadership development tips
So, if anyone can take leadership action, what can you focus on to help you get better at this? We often get asked how people can start building leadership skills. Here are five things to focus on:
1. Don’t wait for a job title
Anyone can build their ability to take leadership action through experimentation, practice, and a good dose of courage. Notice, Decide, Act is our practical, three-step process designed to help people improve their leadership skills. It starts with noticing that something is needed, deciding what to do about it, and then acting – all followed by reflection.
2. Focus on your human capabilities
Leadership is, and has always been, the work of working with other human beings. So, forget technical skills, hot trends, or whatever the latest adjective to be placed in front of the word 'leadership' is; it's the core human capabilities that matter. Self-awareness, listening, empathy, curiosity, and trust building – these are the deeply human building blocks that empower individuals to build strong relationships, get the best out of people, and create high-performing teams. Some might call these leadership skills; we see them as a collection of behaviors and capabilities that are foundational to human-centered organizations and leadership.
3. Adopt a learning mindset
We live in a time of increasing complexity. And the greatest leaders now and in years ahead will be the greatest learners – those who can implement change management by identifying skill gaps, adapting, and continuously learning. A learning mindset is the starting point for this. It’s about being oriented towards curiosity, exploration and future possibility, and being able to find a learning opportunity in every interaction and experience. Over time, this approach empowers people to develop their leadership agility (sometimes known as adaptive leadership), enabling them to adapt to rapidly changing or ambiguous environments.
4. Practice feedback
Well-intentioned, well-delivered feedback is invaluable, empowering us to develop our self-awareness, identify areas for learning, and ultimately achieve better outcomes. Great leaders build effective leadership skills by constantly seeking feedback from those they interact with, asking others how they experience them, what they notice, and what they can do to develop. Coaching is another great way to get high-quality feedback, with a good coach holding up a mirror to a person and supporting them to work through what it is they see.
5. Build your network
The quality of a leader – and the quality of an organization – can be measured by the quality of their trusting relationships. And this matters now more than ever, as the most complex challenges we face will not be solved by one person alone. Instead, success lies in diverse groups of people collaborating, learning, and innovating together. This relies on leaders who don’t necessarily know the answer but do know who to ask for help. These individuals demonstrate strong team leader skills and have a diverse network of existing relationships that they can draw on. As a result, they can bring people together from across the system to combine their different perspectives and learn from each other.
Developing your leadership
There’s no blueprint for leadership. No secret recipe of leadership skills that will combine to form the perfect leader. And that’s because the perfect leader doesn’t exist – we are all capable of taking leadership action and making a difference.
If you want to focus on developing leadership skills, start by practicing notice, decide, act; taking a human approach; adopting a learning mindset; asking for feedback; and building a strong network of relationships. These are five behaviors and actions that anyone can undertake to build their leadership muscles.
We’ve distilled our 45+ years’ experience working with some of the world’s biggest organisations into an interactive playbook that captures our point of view on leadership.