A good leader can make or break a team or even the productivity of a full organisation. When looking for someone to lead a team and bring fresh perspective and vision to an organisation, seeking out the right candidate is crucial. It’s more than just qualifications, skills and experience; it is about mentality, vision, personality and the ability to think disruptively. We will help you find a candidate that has that extra ‘X Factor’ to really breathe new productivity and ideas into your teams. When recruiting for a leadership role, here are some of the key benefits to finding a successful candidate.
Good leaders often become that way because of their experiences. They tend to be roamers and have worked in different environments, varying locations both national and international, and have gained lots of experience collaborating with people in both their personal and professional lives. All of this arms them with key skills, which include professional and soft skills that enable them to add real value and revitalise a team. To find this type of candidate, it’s important to widen the net and reach out to potential candidates that are located further afield. Whether it’s through relocation or remote working, if you can provide the right circumstances and accommodate job applicants that are not local to you, then your chances of appointing a great leader vastly increase.
The need for large infrastructure, offices, equipment, car parking etc no longer needs to be a factor. Remote working means that you can hugely reduce your reliance on having a large base to accommodate multiple employees. In fact, by going fully remote or even flexi-remote, you might be more encouraged to have employees utilise a communal work space like a hot desk on a tech hub or ‘We Work’ type of environment rather than coming into a fixed office. Where you do need to have infrastructure, for example in manufacturing, you can massively reduce the scale of what's required by enabling support and office staff to adopt a more remote based role. Appointing a leader that has the flexibility to work remotely and travel between teams and locations, and also has the autonomy to enable their teams to do the same, breeds a culture of agility, flexibility and good staff morale and wellbeing.
There are more and more studies confirming the benefits to productivity through remote working. Employees that have flexibility, a good work and life balance and less stress to adhere to a mundane repetitive cycle of commuting, clocking in and out and watching the clock waiting for the lunch hour, are far more likely to knuckle down and produce more quality work. Sure, this may not be within the rigid time frame of 9-5, but does that matter? In most cases, no. What’s key is the work produced is quality and adds to the success of the business. From a leadership point of view, the ability to be agile, use your team, location, resources and time in a flexible manner means you’re more likely to be able to conceive new ideas and push new boundaries to help the business grow. If you want great productivity, arm your leaders with the tools, resources and flexibility to do this.
In a world where sustainability and the effects of climate change are key considerations for us all, especially in the business community, every effort organisations can make to reduce their carbon footprint and that of their workforce is a positive one. It’s likely there will be more rigid legislation post COP26 for organisations to meet specific reduced carbon emission targets, so employers should really get on the front foot here and play their role in reducing their carbon footprint. A key way to do this is to reduce the need for communing and the need to power and sustain a large infrastructure to house their staff. When you’re hiring new leaders, they too should be encouraged to think about sustainability and have the flexibility to organise projects and teams to maximise any opportunity to be a sustainable business. When the leaders take these measures and encourage them, the employees too will follow. Again, this is about appointing leaders who can create great workplace cultures.
To be a good leader, you need to have imagination, encourage new thinking and ideas, and really drive positivity among your team members so they feel supported and at ease when at work. A good workplace culture and team morale should drip from the top down. If you are flexible and agile within your own role, then you’re more likely to encourage this sort of approach with your team members in their roles. If you are looking to apply for a leadership position, here are some key benefits and considerations that you have in mind. We’ll help you find a leadership role that encourages some of these key attributes.
Your daily work / life balance opens up when you have far more time flexibility. You’re able to focus on key work tasks and power through work with bursts of energy, knowing that you are able to take breaks and time out to accommodate daily home life. This might be the school run, a doctor's appointment, waiting for a parcel and so on. It also means that you are able to accommodate and adapt to unique circumstances that your employer requires from time to time. Working late on a project, attending an event, travelling, collaborating with external stakeholders and so on. As a company leader, you are able to better manage your team, their time and enable them to target their energy and resources to the important tasks as and when required. You become a flexible leader and have agility within your own role and so can encourage this in the employees you manage.
The daily commute has got to be one of key stresses for most employees. The age old frustrations of the early alarm clock, missing breakfast, rushing about, stuck in traffic etc. None of this lends itself to a productive and comfortable work mindset. When you remove the stress of commuting to a fixed workplace at a fixed time, you’re able to focus your mind and more calmly settle into your workday. Of course, by reducing the need for commuting, you’re also playing your part in developing a sustainable business. As someone with a leadership role, your time needs to be flexible so you can mould your employee and focus your energy on the project outcomes and their well being. If you’re stressed, they too might be stressed. By removing some of these barriers from a leadership role, the opportunity for you to become a better and more productive leader grows.
Good leaders often become that way because of their experiences. They tend to be roamers and have worked in different environments, varying locations both national and international, and have gained lots of experience collaborating with people in both their personal and professional lives. All of this arms them with key skills, which include professional and soft skills that enable them to add real value and revitalise a team. If you're applying for a leadership role within an organisation, it’s becoming more and more likely that you'll travel and visit different locations. With the rise of remote working and decentralised teams, the ability to adopt new communication and project management techniques, and embrace technology will be a key skill to have to allow for a rich, remote team collaboration experience.
Employees invariably want to do a good job and deliver their best work. But this is often hampered by micro-management and daily workplace tasks that take away from your ability to get things done in the way that best suits your skills and work mentality. As a leader, the more autonomy you have to manage your teams in a flexible way, the better the productivity. Good leaders will have a strong focus on encouraging autonomy and reducing micro-management, which in turn improves morale and work output from employees.
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