Being a Successful Executive Leader



In spite of many recent publications, successful executive leaders require more than developing their leadership skills and behaviors. While extremely important, these skills and behaviors on their own may not be enough? Why?

We view four major areas for an executive leader to be successful:

• Planning
• Execution
• Leadership
• Domain- and industry-specific skills

Planning is key for a leader. A plan requires a vision of what needs to be accomplished. It requires defining the steps and resources, people and other, required for the effort. And it requires negotiating with stakeholders to ensure appropriate support.

Execution can be complex. How does the leader monitor and adjust the execution? At what level of detail? How do you avoid getting stuck in the weeds of execution and ensuring you achieve the goal?

And leadership is essential to articulate a vision, understand what our people can accomplish, share with them the importance, help them take the initiative while being responsible stewards of the organization. The Six Domains of Leadership(TM) model is a good model to start with, but there are others such as Situational Leadership, Tuckman's Model of Team Development, and many others.

Domain- and industry-specific skills are different for each leader. Most executives acquire these through education and training and experience on the job. In some cases, the coach has specific experiences that can be help. In my case:

• Software development
• Manufacturing (semiconductors)
• Transportation (railroads)
• Insurance (health and ancillary)
• Security, both physical (post-9/11) and software (Symantec)

Want to discuss? Book a free session!