In honor of International Women’s Day, here are 3 leadership classes taught by 3 leaders from 3 countries.
For Aiysha (AJ) Johnson, executive director of the New Jersey Society of CPAs, paying attention is a very important component of leadership. It’s hard to argue this, but all too often, leaders (and other people in general) don’t pay attention. Why, I asked, is attention rarely valued so much?
“For those individuals, those leaders who don’t pay good attention,” he said, “I wonder if they think they have other priorities that are more than just paying attention to the people around them. “
“You can be an excellent speaker and communicate constantly,” he added, “but what are you communicating on behalf of?Are you fundamentally the core of your team, what drives your organization? »
For Johnson, listening well is a critical way to advance his organization’s mission: providing pricing to its members and stakeholders. For example, when the government is presented with a bill that will benefit businesses, it works to make sure policymakers appreciate the role they play. Accounting plays in commerce.
“Accounting is the language of business,” he observes. If you’ve ever studied a language other than the one you grew up in, you know that listening to someone who speaks that language well is the first step to being able to speak it yourself.
Leading well by listening well applies to all organizations, only nonprofits. For-profit corporations thrive when their leaders are also doing well.
Whatever your own leadership role, wouldn’t you do better if you listened better to the people you serve?
Yulia Blinova, founder of Zignify Global Product Sourcing, has a refreshing answer to the question: “What is one of your proudest achievements?” This response does not begin with a reference to herself, but instead she credits her team.
“Without the team. . . We’ll be where we are as a company,” he told me. Blinova founded the Leipzig-based company in 2021 and now has more than 60 employees in 20 countries.
Humble leaders give credit to others. Where does Blinova’s humility come from? “I was raised to believe that one user can do a lot, but combined we can do so much more,” she said.
Financial good luck is vital for Blinova, but being able to help her team members achieve their own goals is even more vital. “I’m proud that we can help them in their lives and get off to a better start. ” I can’t make all the money in the world and I don’t want a boat.
How do you meet a business leader who says there are more vital things in the world than money?
When compliance professional Sabrine Makkes launched her Dubai-based company, Envizion Consulting LLC, she saw the need to integrate gaming into corporate educational programs, which are too boring and unattractive. “Why don’t we make education more attractive and less static?” -She asked. “Sometimes you learn more by playing. “
Makkes found that classic compliance training strategies, such as quizzes and videos, were inadequate for long-term retention and engagement. He appreciated the transformative force of games, in which workers are active participants rather than passive recipients of information. In some of his shows, he uses the board game “Snakes and Ladders” (or, as it is called in the United States and some other countries, “Slides and Ladders”).
That’s right: an old-school analog game that you can hold and a board you can touch.
A friendly festival whose purpose is to learn, for example, the key issues of a company’s compliance policies is a wonderful way to make a potentially boring topic entertaining and memorable. The laughter technique for corporate education can also be adapted to other budgets. Companies that need to create a game for many workers may need to offer a complicated augmented truth or virtual truth game.
But no matter what approach an organization uses, incorporating laughter into education makes it more engaging and effective.
Here are leadership classes from A. J. Johnson, Yulina Blinova and Sabrine Makkes who are taking it seriously.
1. Lead through listeningArray
2. Contribution of value above individual success.
3. Integrate the game into the systems you offer.
Which one will you perform in this week?
International Women’s Day is March 8, 2024.
Disclosure: Six years ago, AJ Johnson’s former corporate company gave me a one-hour presentation. Three years ago, I worked as a production consultant on a brief assignment Johnson created as a member of the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Business.
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