(Expansion) – When you look for the word leadership on the web in any language, you not only find thousands of related pages, you also find millions of references, books, etc. It is one of the most studied and analyzed modern management concepts.
With good reason, the foundation of organizations is built on the quality of leadership, the influence of one trend or another in the style of the leaders of an organization not only determine the culture but also directly influence the results.
However, there is an element in the equation that does not finish closing, since we have delegated almost 100% of the responsibility to the leader, but are not the other members of the team, in the world of work, adults with the capacity to act and make decisions?
Today many organizations face the challenge of multi-generational leadership, where we are supposed to develop the leader to fit the needs and expectations of their team members. We repeatedly begin to hear the question of how to inspire the centennial generation and help them find their purpose, or how leaders should understand that millennials need a different work-life balance?
But the question also brings an interesting component of challenge: how to get other generations to achieve their goals and have the ability to accept the leadership of their boss?
Beyond the fact that the leader’s job is to achieve a level of influence sufficient to lead his team through results, we also have to start talking about the responsibility of each team member to support this mission and not become a obstacle for the leader, for himself and for his companions.
Therefore, there are three keys to developing multigenerational leadership in an organization:
1. Give responsibility to each member of the team in the adaptation and effectiveness of the group: not only the leader must know the expectations and needs of each person, all members should have the task of identifying the needs of others and especially those aspects that can help them function better together, this includes each team member also identifying the leader’s needs.
2. Define a role for each member of the team to improve the effectiveness of the group. There are many functions that the team can develop to improve its effectiveness. For this reason, the team can distribute roles of communication, well-being, training, for example. .
3. Set a goal for the team in terms of functioning as a group, in such a way that each member understands their responsibility to ensure that everyone connects with their purpose, everyone finds their balance and, above all, everyone develops their maximum potential.
Leadership itself is a key concept; however, it is necessary that we broaden the definition of the responsibility to exercise it, giving each person a space in the process and in the result.
Editor’s note: Blanya Correal is an Industrial Engineer with more than 25 years of international experience in Human Resources and labor strategy, in various multinational companies such as Coca Cola Femsa, Danone and Nissan. She has been recognized for two consecutive years as one of the 30 best CHROs in Mexico and is in the top 20 of the ranking of the Most Powerful Women in Mexico, according to Expansión magazine. Follow her on . The opinions published in this column belong exclusively to the author.
