How to Improve Your Leadership Skills in the Workplace: 7 Tips
Updated on November 19, 2024.
“As we look ahead into the next century,” Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates once said, “leaders will be those who empower others.”
These words of wisdom add a helpful lens when considering how to improve leadership skills in the workplace. In a rapidly evolving marketplace and increasingly polarized society, organizations are looking for the types of leaders who will inspire, include and innovate — and who regularly seek to improve their leadership skills for the sake of their employees and those their organization serves.
When considering how to improve leadership skills in the workplace, an advanced education can be foundational. Even beyond academics, however, there are many practical ways to evolve as a leader.
Why Improve Leadership Ability?
It’s easy to understand why leadership skills matter for professionals who are in management or executive leadership roles. However, it’s vital for professionals at all levels of an organization to understand their leadership styles and intentionally develop effective leadership skills. Leadership skills such as active listening, strategic thinking and empathy contribute to markers of organizational success, ranging from employee morale to revenue growth.
Whether or not employees aspire to management positions, cultivating leadership skills, regardless of roles, can empower stronger teamwork and strengthen shared values within an organization. It benefits any employee and any organization by improving leadership ability.
Understanding the Difference Between Leadership and Management
While leadership and management share significant overlaps, they also have key differences. Management tends to focus on day-to-day resource allocation and task delegation toward a specific goal, such as project completion. Leadership generally focuses on vision casting and motivating others to participate in reaching a large shared goal.
In general, managers have a designated role within an organization. They have strong organizational skills and are often good at handling various aspects of projects, such as timelines and budgets.
While leaders may also share these skills, they don’t necessarily have to be designated as managers. A new hire fresh out of college may have a strong collaborative streak. A long-time employee who prefers to remain in a nonmanagerial creative position may regularly develop ideas that catalyze their entire teams’ ingenuity. Both the new hire and the long-time employee are displaying leadership skills.
Essential Qualities of Effective Leadership
While each leader is unique, there are several key qualities that strong leaders tend to display. Professionals who are wondering how to develop effective leadership skills throughout the workplace — whether within themselves or the employees they lead — can start with the MYRIAD framework:
- Motivating: Strong leaders inspire others by articulating a shared vision and inviting participation in realizing it.
- Yielding: By listening, asking questions and demonstrating approachability, strong leaders know when to defer to others.
- Relational: Honesty, openness and genuine interest in the well-being of others are key traits of strong leaders.
- Innovative: Strong leaders encourage and implement iterative practices that prompt collaboration, ideation and willingness to fail and try again.
- Agile: Rather than being threatened by the ups and downs of guiding a team, strong leaders are flexible and creative in times of change.
- Decisive: Upon gathering information and seeking input, strong leaders have the confidence to choose and create a plan at the right time.
Leaders face a multitude of challenges daily, and MYRIAD can help them do so with the skills they need to succeed.
7 Best Practices to Improve Leadership Skills in the Workplace
Strong leaders are continually growing and changing. Intentionally cultivating leadership skills is important for all professionals who want to make meaningful contributions to their organizations.
Consider these seven strategies for how to improve leadership skills in the workplace.
1. Listen Intentionally
Research from The Workforce Institute states that 86% of employees feel that their voices aren’t heard “fairly or equally.” A total of 63% of employees believe that their employers or managers have ignored them.
Developing active listening and communication skills can make a significant positive difference to counteract these trends. Because disengaged employees can cost companies money, cultivating active listening skills like demonstrating curiosity, providing relevant feedback and engaging without judgment is a clear win for today’s leaders.
2. Keep Learning
In 2019, opportunities to learn and grow ranked as the ninth driver of workplace culture in the LinkedIn Workplace Learning Report. In 2022, it jumped to first place.
Professionals are eager for opportunities to learn and develop, so their leaders must demonstrate a similar curiosity and proactivity. Continuous learning exposes leaders to diverse perspectives and new ideas that can expand and refine their understanding of how to guide their organizations. Lifelong learning is linked to higher self-confidence and self-esteem, stress and anxiety reduction and a stronger sense of purpose — all of which help with effective leadership and talent development. Meanwhile, overcoming educational challenges can be an important way to develop resilience.
3. Cultivate Collaboration
“What do you think?” may be one of the most important questions a leader can ask.
Research by McKinsey & Co. finds that businesses with more diverse, inclusive executive teams outperform less diverse businesses.
By forming diverse teams and instilling collaborative processes, leaders can enhance their organizations’ capabilities while growing in areas such as conflict management, decision-making and team building.
4. Build Emotional Intelligence
When leaders seek to understand their feelings and emotions, they aren’t just benefiting themselves. They’re also serving as powerful examples of emotional intelligence, influencing their teams for the better.
When leaders at telecommunications organization Optus turned to a pioneer in the field of emotional intelligence, RocheMartin, for example, they saw significant improvements in their workplace. As leaders and employees learned how to better facilitate teamwork and trust through emotional intelligence skills such as empathy, adaptability and optimism, Optus experienced noticeable increases in engagement, customer focus and leadership.
The bottom line is that emotional intelligence can be a critical distinction for effective leadership and for differentiating between leadership and management.
5. Request Feedback
When Bill Berry stepped up to lead strategic financial management at Tacoma Power, he thought the organizational change initiative he executed was a success. As it turned out, his actions had caused problems for his team. Even worse, says Berry, he had no idea there were issues.
A consultant brought confidential feedback to Berry that helped him understand some serious concerns. Berry realized that he needed to create a system for soliciting feedback. Now, he regularly asks team members to tell him what he’s doing that works well and what he could improve. He listens carefully, seeks clarification by asking for examples and thanks team members for their insight.
Berry has found that asking for feedback isn’t always easy, but it’s worth it.
6. Be Disciplined
Effective leadership means being disciplined and encouraging others within the organization to follow suit. There are plenty of ways to demonstrate discipline in a way that conveys professionalism and coaxes other employees to step up their game: showing up on time for each meeting, ending meetings at the designated time, adhering to deadlines and more.
Another consideration is to become more disciplined even outside the office. For example, developing and maintaining a daily exercise habit can lead to more energy and better health overall, while also creating the kind of daily structure needed for success at the office.
7. Seek a Mentor
When it comes to improving leadership skills in the workplace, there’s no shame in asking for help. Finding a mentor is one of the best ways to identify vulnerabilities, shore up strengths and pursue effective leadership in a more targeted way.
Mentors can provide direct feedback and guidance and also offer clear examples of how to lead within the workplace.
Get Started Developing Your Leadership Skills
Are you excited about finding opportunities to develop your leadership skills? Do you want to grow in a rich educational community with diverse thoughts, backgrounds and perspectives?
Consider the 100% online Doctor of Education (EdD) in Educational Leadership and Organizational Innovation from Marymount University. The program can be completed in less than three years; offers flexible coursework; and features a practical curriculum that emphasizes social justice, ethics and equity in leadership practices.
Whether you want to make a difference in your organization or community, an online EdD in Educational Leadership and Organizational Innovation will empower you as a change agent ready to initiate and inspire. Learn how our lead doctoral faculty mentors help you apply research and theory to solve a problem of practice facing your organization or community.
Connect with an enrollment advisor to get started.