TOP LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS THAT WORK

Being a leader is in itself a challenge. Leadership constantly presents challenges both to the leader’s abilities and to the individual as a person. 

Things change, Change brings challenge, and no matter how good a leader an individual is, he/she can’t stop that from happening. How such individual handles those challenges faced will further define him as a leader. Some challenges comes in the form of people or problems that present obstacles to reaching a goal, others come from within the leader himself.

I highlight below top three leadership challenges and possible solutions as learnt from Silvia Pencak:

1.      Challenge of Developing Managerial Effectiveness and competence: Developing relevant managerial skills like problem solving, communication skills, prioritizing, strategic thinking, decision making etc. are major challenges that WILL negatively affect any leader if not in place.

     

     SOLUTION:

a.      Learn to set measurable goals and review them regularly. In accomplishing task, employ the 80/20 rule.

b.      Analyze and Determine your incompetence in management via feed backs from subordinates or company’s appraisals and consciously work at overcoming them

c.      Also learn to delegate some task; in doing this, concentrate more on the task that you are best at while you delegate to others the task they are also better at.

2.      Challenge of Motivating and Developing Team Members: This challenge is to ensure job satisfaction and boost productivity eventually.

SOLUTION:

a.      Lead by example.

b.      Be deliberate in developing others: Discover the needs of your team and meet them.

3.      Challenge of Guiding Change: includes understanding change, how to mitigate change consequences, overcome resistance to change and deal with employees reaction to change. Note that change can come in form of changes in government policy, company’s new policy or change from the market.

SOLUTION:

a.      It starts from you the leader; be evolving and open to fresh ideas as you embrace change.

b.      Empathize with your employees and tell them soothing words when there are major changes in the organization. Note however, that some will adjust faster than others.

c.      Engage and include people in change initiatives if possible. Ask them for feedback, suggestions for improvement etc.

Do you know other Top Challenges leaders face in an organization and solutions that work(ed)? Please share here in the comments field. Your personal experience in this regard is also welcomed