Why Should Anyone Be Led By You?

If you want to silence a room of executives, try this small trick. Ask them, "Why would anyone want to be led by you?" You will find that without fail the response is a sudden, stunned hush. All you can hear are knees knocking.

Executives have good reason to be scared. You can't do anything in business without followers, and followers in these "empowered" times are hard to find. So executives had better know what it takes to lead effectively—they must find ways to engage people and rouse their commitment to company goals. But most don't know how, and who can blame them?

In this 2000 Harvard Business Review article (http://hbswk.hbs.edu/archive/1710.html ), Robert Goffee and Gareth Jones show that inspirational leaders share four unexpected qualities:

•They selectively show their weaknesses. By exposing some vulnerability, they reveal their approachability and humanity.

•They rely heavily on intuition to gauge the appropriate timing and course of their actions. Their ability to collect and interpret soft data helps them know just when and how to act.

•They manage employees with something we call tough empathy. Inspirational leaders empathize passionately—and realistically—with people, and they care intensely about the work employees do.

•They reveal their differences. They capitalize on what's unique about themselves.

While you may find yourself in a top position without these qualities, but few people will want to be led by you.

Why Should Anyone Be Led By You?