Episode 28 – Leaders who give a damn | Being more effective by doing less

Leadership Conversations with Becky Hammond

This conversation is part 3 of a special podcast series where Becky Hammond and I discuss effective and inspiring leadership.

In the third part of this special Leaders Who Give A Damn podcast series, we unpack the notion of doing less in the realm of leadership.

Over this series, I partnered with Becky from Isogo Strong and if you know her at all, you know that she is a maven in the Strengths world. Becky partners with organisations across the USA to build cultures where people are more engaged and thrive. Becky also inspires couples and mums to look at life differently through a lens of strengths, focussing on what’s right and getting more flow back into their lives.

Together, we get to chat about some aspects of leadership that are perhaps LEAST talked about yet have the opportunity to be MOST impactful in your role as leader. Whether you are in that role as a leader now or it is in your future, this series is for you.

When you think about the role of leaders, there are a broad range of responsibilities, tasks and activities that leaders need to do. Often leaders can feel overwhelmed with all the stuff they need to do and how this gets in the way of the role of being a leader for the people that need their leadership every day.

There is a different way and in this conversation, Becky and I explore achieving a bigger, more effective impact in your leadership through doing less.

We explore why it is so easy to stay in the notion of ‘busy’ especially where you are using the momentum of the busyness to keep all the plates spinning. But is it about doing and rushing and being busy…or should it be about enjoying the journey and being connected with people, too?

With busyness we can often get caught up in excess things filling our day. We need to start by asking, is this element that is filling my day really needed? We can also explore Professor Sidney Dekker’s concept of asking yourself (or your team!), “What’s the stupidest thing I have to do?” to open up the conversation around what is not effective in a role or task, and perhaps do something about it. Providing opportunities where your team feels like they can be more effective by doing less is also an important part of leadership.

It was such a great conversation, with real takeaways that you can apply right away, some of the key highlights on this episode include:

How can we implement the Lean strategy within leadership – achieving more with less and removing waste.
Strategies to analyse your daily tasks and achieve more through less.
The leadership mindset to embrace to be an effective leader, here’s a hint – it’s not always about doing more! 😉

So, catch this conversation about Leaders Who Give a Damn on your favourite podcast app.

Check out www.leaderswhogiveadamn.com to download your free infographic of 90 tips to be a Leader Who Gives A Damn. Also check out the quiz to find out if you’re a leader who gives a damn!

Next up is the final conversation in this four-part series, where we explore the importance in leadership in creating safe spaces.