As a leader what might you be missing? Shaw in Leadership Blindspots How Successful Leaders Identify and Overcome Weaknesses that Matter discusses the following ideas. As always this is not a full book review but selected aspects.
- The term blindspot refers to an unrecognized weakness or threat that has the potential to undermine a leader’s success.
- Blindspots are often found in close proximity to a leader’s strengths because they may dismiss contrary views/information and become prisoners of their assumptions
- A key for a leader is striving to be confident enough to convince people that they are in charge but humble enough to realize that they are often going to be wrong.
- Common blindspots holding leaders back
- Self
- Overestimating your strategic capabilities
- Valuing being right over being effective
- Failing to balance the what with the how
- Not seeing your impact on others
- Believing the rules don't apply to you
- Thinking the present is the past
- Being overly optimism
- Clinging to the status quo
- Team
- Failure to focus on the vital few
- Taking for granted your team model
- Overrating the talent on your team
- Avoiding the tough conversations
- Trusting the wrong individual
- Not developing real successors
- Department/workgroup
- Failure to capture the hearts and minds
- Losing touch with operations
- Treating information and opinion as fact
- Misreading the political landscape
- Putting personal ambition before the department/workgroup
- To minimize blindspots develop peripheral vision and see what others miss as leadership often demands bold moves
- Know your team members/staff in depth in order to know how to interpret subtleties of their behavior. This knowledge not only includes “knowing” how to read them but also an awareness of deviations from their typical approach
- Pay attention to behavioral flags such as nonverbal behaviors, silence, nonanswers, omissions, specific language, shifting positions, off-line input and email traffic
- Create openings for contrarians by things like allowing silence to enter the conversation and perhaps following up one-on-one with particular individuals so you understand where they are coming from
- Establish the three-strike rule by encouraging people to be tenacious in advancing their recommendations giving them three opportunities to be heard
- Listen differently by being empathic to others taking into account all points of view not just those that support your thinking
- Build a network of trusted advisors in critical areas
- Experts who have deep knowledge in specific areas
- Coaches who can observe you in action and have knowledge of best leadership practices
- Mentors who have been in a similar role and the one you aspire to
- Sponsors who see your potential and are willing to support your career advancement
What has tripped you up so others can avoid?