Officially Marlyne Pierce is known as “a Business Consultant and Leadership Strategist with 15 years of experience working with C-level and Senior Executives at Global
Companies such as Accenture, Amex and CitiBank to develop and launch
large scale and disruptive technology products to award winning market
success”.
Unofficially, I call her “a bad-ass boss babe” that I recently had the amazing opportunity to interview! With such phenomenal expertise and experience before me, one of the things that I was itching to pick Marlyne’s brain about was how to thrive and improve as a leader in the understanding that:
“The secret to success [whatever that may be to you] is good leadership” (Tony Dungy)
In no particular order, here are just some of the gems she shared:
Great leaders don’t expect to do everything themselves
“A great leader is not a micromanager. A manager manages people. A leader is an influencer”
You’re an influencer because you understand your value and you understand the value that other people bring. Therefore-
Great leaders leverage their zone of genius as well as others
“You definitely want to leverage your zone of genius and the zone of genius of people around you- so leverage the expertise of others”.
If you look at today’s environment, it’s really
about collaboration and partnering with others in order to bring the maximum
value forward. So you want to think about leveraging your experience and the
those of others in order to accomplish your goals.
Great leaders serve
“You always want to be in a place of service; so [be] a servant leader”.
If you’re running a business, you’re serving
your customers; you’re serving your employees- your job is to serve. And by serving, to elevate them and make sure that everything progresses towards the ultimate; shared vision or goal. As such-
Great leaders Advocate
“I think leaders also advocate. They advocate for
something bigger than themselves; they have a cause”.
They are also mission or purpose-driven, meaning that they have a burning desire that is calling them. They have to do it! That’s what makes your goals or vision as a leader matter- it’s meaningful to you and to others.
Great leaders are disruptors
“Be a disruptor. Question the status quo. It doesn’t have to be in
an aggressive of offensive way. Come at it from a place of value”.
This can be controversial, even in business, because people do not like change- which is why Pierce speaks about the importance of having a cause.
“As a leader,” she points out, “if you have something that’s powerful; that’s pulling you forward or a vision that you need to see actualised, you’re going to find the power, the strength and the way to communicate it [so] that others can really get it”.
Great leaders reflect and renew
“I think it goes without saying, but you want to
be reflective and you want to continuously renew. Renew your commitment to your
goals. None of this matters if you don’t have a key goal or a key intent of
what the outcome should be like; look like and feel like”.
According to Marlyne, if you have a goal that you want to accomplish you need to think critically about it. This involves asking questions. For example,
Before executing it- ask yourself:
“What’s my intention behind it? What do I want
the outcome to be for others in it? How am I going to do it? What’s my key strength?
Who can I get to come and help me to do it to make sure that it’s the
best that I can produce?”.
During execution- ask yourself:
“Is the plan that I’m putting into place working?
Is it not?”
After execution:
“Reflect on it once it’s over. Once it’s gone, you want to reflect [on things like] did it go the way that I expected it to go? You want to renew your commitment to the bigger vision because [the goal you executed is] a part of something bigger. [For example] it’s one event, it’s one product, it’s one workshop but it’s a part of your overarching cause; so how do you start to renew your commitment to it?”
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Are you demonstrating these 6 leadership qualities? If not, how can you incorporate more of these into your daily practice?