Listening Skills and Crisis Prevention

A recent article on BBC caught my attention as it underlines, once again - that authentic leadership skills are the basis to any successful organization, even in times of worst crisis.

Even “simple” skills like listening and open communication are rarely found in board rooms. As described by Mr. Baker in his article, most Wall Street bosses didn’t know that trouble was brewing, confirmed by the fact that 58% of workers with “bully” bosses  don’t speak openly with their bosses and also claim that their bosses wouldn’t listen anyway, even if they did speak up.

While European tradition too often calls for those “tough, bully” managers because they seem to push things ahead, research and examples of leading highly profitable organizations show, that the “kind” type of manager with a social attitude and great leadership skills are much more successful and achieve superior results.

Baker outlines, that companies with the “new generation of “kind bosses” reflect high productivity, happy employees, more creative problem solving and better bottom lines. Witness companies like Google, Eileen Fisher, Pitney Bowes, Smuckers, Rodale and hundreds of others.

“Kind” bosses are not doormats - nice guys/women who are walked over by their employees. Rather, they conduct themselves like respectful, knowledgeable “parents” having qualities like compassion, integrity and clear boundaries.

In the current financial meltdown, although many of these “kind” bosses will be stressed to the maximum, their style will allow them to institute layoffs in a respectful and compassionate manner and rally those people around and underneath him to initiate and lead corporate change without compromise.

Under correct leadership whole workforces can be made to feel like a family and willingly tighten their personal belts if top management does the same. And I believe that managers who want to successfully lead through turmoil, need more “soft” than “hard” skills to be able to stay on board and deal with the worst.