Guest post:
When you think about leadership, what are the characteristics of a leader that first come to your mind? For most people, it's self-confidence, excellent communication skills, or being an authority. While there are so many characteristics of a true leader, compassion is among the most important ones.
Compassionate leaders used to be a rare thing, but more and more people realize how important it is to have someone who’ll treat the employees or team members with respect. If you’re curious to learn about compassionate leadership, and how to implement it, just keep reading.
We’ll break it down together.
What Is Compassionate Leadership
Compassionate leadership is a specific way of handling your leadership tasks and obligations.
As a leader, you’re expected to guide and navigate. But, this doesn’t necessarily mean you have to be strict, intimidating, or prone to conflicts.
What it means is that it is desirable for you to develop a better understanding of the people to whom you're a leader. It involves the following:
- providing support
- listening to their needs
- give directions
- keep the whole team together as one
Now’s the time to read about the steps for implementing compassionate leadership. You’ll know exactly what to focus on and how to make this transformation.
- Start with Yourself
If you want to make a change in your surroundings, try to start by taking a deep look into yourself. Ask yourself the following questions:
- What kind of a leader are you right now?
- Do you feel like you could make adjustments?
- What are you most and least proud of as a leader?
Once you answer these questions, you'll be able to understand how close or far from a compassionate leader you are. Then, you'll be able to get to the actual steps of transforming your tactics and approach.
- Set Mutual Goals
Every great achievement starts with a good foundation. Setting goals is a process you have to go through to achieve what you've envisioned.
When it comes to compassionate leadership, set your goals along with the rest of the team. It’s a good idea to:
- gather your team
- express your vision
- ask for feedback
- listen to ideas and suggestions
- together, come to an agreement of what your mutual goals are
This way, you’ll all be striving towards the same things and you’ll kick start the mutual understanding that needs to exist continuously.
- Communicate Effectively
Healthy communication is yet another important aspect of implementing compassionate leadership. There’s nothing more important than nurturing effective communication between yourself and the team members.
To ensure you’re making room for effective communication, it is recommended to:
- encourage your team members to speak to you openly
- listen to what they have to say
- provide meaningful feedback
- share your doubts, ideas, and observations
Encouraging open communication will help you understand your team members better and provide better guidance and leadership to them.
You could even put together monthly reports of establishing and keeping up with effective communication in the office. Provide examples and thank those who are on board with you. In case you need help with writing it, you can turn to ClassyEssay, Subjecto or TopEssayWriting.
- Be Someone to Look up to
You have to set a strong example for the people in the team you’re guiding. That means that to be the best version of yourself and radiate the following characteristics:
- self-confidence
- strong work ethic
- a motivational approach to work
- making brave decisions
- fighting with problems
Also, keep talking to your team members about how they need to grow professionally and personally. Give them the support they need and they'll see a true leader in you.
- Show Empathy & Compassion
A compassionate leader is someone who's able to keep the fine line between being supportive and becoming overly personal with the team they're leading. This might be one of the biggest challenges you'll face when transforming into a compassionate leader.
But, to experience the full potential of such an approach to leadership, you have to learn how to show empathy and how to handle it.
Think about such aspects:
- encouraging your team members to approach you with problems
- giving them proper security
- show them they can count on you
- bond with them and develop mutual trust
The people you lead need to know you’re always there for them, and they can turn to you when problems arise.
Final Thoughts
As you can see, a compassionate leader is the one who knows how to approach his team members, how to guide them, and how to help them get the best out of themselves. Compassionate leadership is all about mutual understanding and giving support to each other.
The steps above will help you implement compassionate leadership into your workspace. Start building it step by step until you reach the goal of being a compassionate leader.
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