ESSENTIALS FOR LEADERS AND THOSE THEY LEAD

For a long while, self-awareness and mindfulness were popular notions in new-age circles—though in the corporate world, not so much. After much research and, yes, contemplation, we now understand the connection between our internal and external environments to be critical to the success of leaders at all levels, and of the people they lead. An introspective, emotionally intelligent mindset is especially important for CEOs, whose words, behaviors, and decisions have an outsize impact on their organizations. This week, we look at the mindsets that great leaders bring to work.

AN IDEA

Put beliefs into practice

Whether you’re on the front line or the management team, some skills are bound to come more naturally than others. Indeed, McKinsey senior partners Gautam Kumra, Joydeep Sengupta, and Mukund Sridhar report that CEOs can be self-aware and aren’t always superhuman. Early results from a self-assessment of CEO performance show that corporate leaders tend to rate themselves highest on managing their personal effectiveness and lowest on engaging their boards of directors. While CEOs tend to say they have good relationships with their boards, they rate themselves lower at tapping the board’s wisdom and focusing board meetings on the future. The good news is that time and training can improve these skills. So can a mindset shift: the best CEOs think about the board’s expertise more expansively, embracing directors’ perspectives rather than relegating them to the sidelines.

A BIG NUMBER

750,000

That’s the number of employees working at General Motors in 1980, the year that Mary Barra (the company’s current CEO) began there as an engineering intern. Despite the leadership skills Barra honed and the other senior roles she held at GM, there were twists and turns along the way: all evidence of how narrow the path to the top job can be. To increase a CEO hopeful’s odds of success, McKinsey’s Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, Vik Malhotra, and Kurt Strovink offer four recommendations, including an honest assessment of why they want the role in the first place. Passion and vision are essential to sustainable success as a chief executive; ego is not. And a humble, open-to-change mindset is just as important for aspiring or newer CEOs as it is for mid-tenured leaders.

A QUOTE

“From my studies of great leaders in history, I would offer one resource that never failed them: their own inner voice.”

That’s Hitendra Wadhwa, professor at Columbia Business School, on the connection between inner success (being true to one’s self and sense of purpose) and outer success (acclaim and approval from family, society, or the organizations where we work). For Wadhwa, personal leadership—how individuals inspire and influence themselves—is a prerequisite for inspiring and influencing others, especially through change or adversity. It requires tuning into your true self, or “inner core,” to bring out the best in yourself and in others. “That’s what we seek and expect from our leaders and organizations, but it’s something that any of us can take on in any of our pursuits,” he says.

A SPOTLIGHT INTERVIEW

After interviewing exceptional CEOs for their bestselling book, CEO Excellence, senior partners Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, and Vik Malhotra uncovered an abundance of insights about this group’s habits—then distilled them into six mindsets that leaders of all stripes can learn from. In a recent interview, Dewar and Malhotra note the ways in which the best CEOs’ mindsets can make the difference. “On aligning the organization, the mindset of treating the soft stuff as hard stuff is a critical one,” Malhotra says. “On mobilizing through leaders, many great CEOs focused on the question, how do you create not just a team of stars but a star team?” Another key insight: that great leaders are built, not born. “Great CEOs come to the role with a certain drive, background, and education, but that’s a small part of the equation. The eight or ten roles they held before becoming CEOs prepared them to be bold in setting direction or to focus on what only they could do in their leadership models. Those are learned skills.”

– Edited by Daniella Seiler, executive editor, Washington, DC

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