Leadership Vitality: Be Agile Not Erratic | #EmployeeEngagement
by Kate Nasser | Comments Off on Leadership Vitality: Be Agile Not Erratic | #EmployeeEngagement
Leadership Vitality: Be Agile Not Erratic
To succeed, leaders and their teams must be agile. Agility is the ability to adapt quickly and still perform skillfully. Agility is action with a purpose. It isn’t random and unpredictable.
Some leaders confuse being agile with being erratic and this has dire consequences. Erratic is random and wild. It lacks purpose and thought. Erratic creates chaos and slows employees down. It crushes leadership vitality and success.
Leadership Vitality: Be Agile Not Erratic. Image by Jenene Chesbrough via Flickr.
Leadership Vitality: Agile vs. Erratic
When leaders tap me to address morale and employee engagement, I first look at their leadership behaviors. Are they exhibiting wild swings in beliefs and positions? Do they have employees jumping from one task to the next? Do they descend into volatile outbursts? This is not leadership vitality nor agility. It is unpredictable erratic behavior that crushes morale, innovation, and success.
Do you think you are agile when in truth you are erratic?
- You make frequent shifts in position and vision.
- Your every move has shock value.
- Your outbursts are random — especially negative ones.
- Employees start to wonder if you are “all there”.
Leadership Vitality: Not by Pushing Random Change
Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that pushing people with random change builds agility. It doesn’t. It makes them jumpy not skillful. Agility starts in the mind and has reason, intention, and goal. It isn’t erratic, random, and unpredictable.
When leaders are erratic they:
- Rattle employees and undermine skillful work
- Slow completion of tasks as employees spend time sorting through the confusion
- Overwhelm and demoralize employees
- Fuel employee hopelessness that they won’t reach any goal
- Drive away employees who see erratic as irrational and scary
- Devalue clear thinking, facts, logic, intuition, and insight
Being Erratic Creates Power Struggles
Being erratic also creates power struggles as people try to make order out of chaos. It can give rise to chameleons who make people feel safe by telling them whatever they want to hear. No aspect of being erratic creates success.
Developing Leadership Agility
To develop agility, seek alternate views. Uncover and replace habits and status quo thinking. Replace statements like “the process is” with questions like “how and what do we change to meet these goals?” Agility starts with purposeful nimble thinking that becomes quick skillful action. It is not randomly jumping from one idea to the next.
Be agile not erratic. Your leadership vitality and business success depends on it!
From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People Skills Coach™
Related Posts:
Consistency and Agility Are Not Enemies
Leadership: Persistence vs. Distorted Resistance to Change
©2017-2022 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. I appreciate your sharing the link to this post on your social streams. However, if you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please email info@katenasser.com for permission and guidelines. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.
Kate Nasser, The People Skills Coach™, delivers coaching, consulting, training, and keynotes on leading change, employee engagement, teamwork, and delivering the ultimate customer service. She turns interaction obstacles into interpersonal success. See this site for workshop outlines, keynote footage, and customer results.
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