Continuing this month’s focus on Emotional Intelligence best practices, let’s turn our sights toward the maturation process of becoming a leader. Sounds like a heavy topic for our Friday morning coffee, but let’s break it down a bit and see if we can distill this idea into a few takeaways.

The other day I was reading research, published by Korn Ferry, which stated that data from their firm’s nearly 100 million leadership assessments indicated that 80% of leaders have blind spots about their skills, which by default carries a cost to those around them and their organizations. Their research also revealed that people who greatly overstate their abilities are 6.2 times more likely to derail in their behaviors than those who are self-aware.

Logically, this makes sense; no one is infallible and we are all works in progress. Most of us are hard-wired early on to desire approval, acceptance, and affirmation and when we were young, sometimes we received that through blaming others for our mistakes or deflecting our faults. As you reflect on your younger self, can you hear yourself saying “I didn’t do it…Susan did it!” (Substitute any name you’d like there, I choose to keep it rooted in reality so I chose my sister.🤣)

The fact is, it is easy to point the finger at others for disappointing outcomes while overlooking our own faults. The data tells us it’s happening.

So how can we begin to train ourselves to REFLECT rather than DEFLECT? That is the question.

1. Korn Ferry’s research reveals five key factors for achieving superior organizational outcomes. Three are self-evident – purpose, leadership, and strategy. The other two are not so easily discerned – accountability and capability. Together these two contribute to nearly 50% of performance. Therefore, accountability is a primary foundation needed to reflect rather than deflect. 

2. Take an Accountability Selfie – Be honest, if you are a leader, and you hear the word accountability, do you look through the lens of how accountable others are to you? Or are you taking an accountability selfie and wondering how accountable you are to yourself – for who you are and how you act (or react)? If you’re not sure, try to track how often you say statements like:

  • “You are right.”
  • “I made the wrong call there. What are your suggestions?”
  • “That’s on me.”
  • “I realize how that sounded…could have been perceived…I interrupted you….etc…”

3. Shifting from self-interest to shared interest – Don’t hide your self-interest; recognize it for what it is and own it. And also know that it’s the leader’s job to shift from self-interest to shared interest. How quickly can you make this shift? The quicker you can, the greater the performance of those around you and the organization. 

Distilling down the maturation process of becoming a leader?
Turns out it’s not that ominous after all. 

REFLECT vs. DEFLECT.