Competencies for Leaders in 2021

HR's main priority this year is to build a broad leadership bench that is always stocked with the proper (mid-
level) leaders. HR professionals should be familiar with these 15 important leadership skills and how to
implement them in their workforce in this article.
Knowledge, abilities, and skills (KSA) are the building blocks of successful organizational leadership
(Hollenbeck, McCall, & Silzer, 2006).

According to this concept, there isn't a single set of leadership skills that can be used across all business
sectors. A single company may have a wide range of leadership roles that demand different sets of skills and
expertise than another business.

As a result, many businesses use a framework for developing their leaders' leadership competencies, which
consists of a set of skills that the company has recognized as essential to its success. For efficient succession
planning, it is essential to acquire certain skills.

Organizational leadership skills

Intelligence in Relationships (SI)

If you want to be a great leader, you need to have a high social intelligence level, according to Psychology
Today. Social intelligence refers to our ability to comprehend the dynamics of many social settings. It also
includes our capacity to perform well in a wide range of social contexts.

Two. Conflict resolution.

This is a leadership skill that falls under both the 'competencies for leading others' and the 'leadership
competencies' headings. Facilitating the prevention and resolution of interpersonal disputes is an important
part of your job as a leader.

Organizational researcher Fons Trompenaars connects conflict management to what he terms the
reconciliation competence. As Trompenaars describes it, reconciliation is "the art of integrating.". If you can't
make a decision between two opposing viewpoints, then you find a method to integrate them.

Making a decision

One of the most important leadership skills is decision-making since it is at the heart of a leader's work. A
smart leader understands when to make a choice on their own, when to discuss their teammates or peers, and
most vitally, when to step aside and allow others make the decision.

Encouraging others to see things in a new light

Having a clear vision of where you want your firm to go in the future is a major factor in why people want to
work for you and stay with you.

We need leaders who can articulate our goal in a manner that inspires others to follow in our footsteps. It
should be supported by both current and potential employees and recruits.

Managers should be re-educated

Organizations undergo a great deal of evolution. A few of these transitions are minor, while others take occur
over a lengthy span of time. A excellent illustration of this is the automation and/or digitalization procedures
that many companies are now doing.
Organizational changes need the preparation, support, and guidance of an effective leader.

the ability to guide and inspire people

The ability to communicate effectively with others

People skills, or soft skills, are sometimes known as interpersonal skills or interpersonal competence. A few
examples include the ability to actively listen, provide and receive criticism, effectively communicate
nonverbally, solve problems, and work well with others.

Ability to Manage One's Emotions (EI)

To be emotionally intelligent, we must be able to recognize and respond appropriately to the emotions and
circumstances of others. Emotional intelligence is partly about our ability to recognize and regulate our own
feelings.

There are various elements that make up one's emotional intelligence.

You must be conscious of your own skills and shortcomings in order to succeed.

• Self-regulation — The ability to control one's own feelings.

Motivation — People with a high emotional intelligence are also likely to be self-driven.

The ability to empathize and connect with others is a key component of empathy.

• Emotional intelligence - Emotional intelligence may be shown by a person's ability to communicate

effectively with others.

Being a competent teacher and a dependable mentor

As a leader, you must be able to do a variety of things for a variety of individuals. This includes being a great
coach, not only for their teammates, but also for their colleagues.

The ability to recognize when to push someone out of their comfort zone, give them helpful criticism, and help
them discover their own vision are all examples of this.

For the sake of this discussion, let's talk about trustworthiness, not simply because it's essential to a successful
mentoring relationship. Leaders must also be able to establish and sustain effective working relationships with
the individuals under their control.

Frances Frei, a Harvard Business School professor, describes how trust is built in a video below:

• Being genuine - Simply said, this means always being true to who you are.

Making sure your rationale is sound and that you can convey it clearly is an important part in guaranteeing its
quality.

Being able to empathize with others by listening intently and engaging ourselves in their thoughts and feelings.

To learn more about how to develop and regain trust, we suggest watching Frances' video below.

All-inclusivity

They know how to build an atmosphere where everyone is accepted. It is their goal to ensure that every
worker is treated fairly, has equal access to resources, and is given every opportunity to succeed. Being
inclusive is one of the qualities of a successful leader.
Harvard Business Review conducted a study that found that inclusive leaders have the following six
characteristics:

Diversity and inclusion (D&I) is a personal priority for me and I make it a public commitment to it.

It's important for leaders to be humble, to accept errors, and to provide room for others to participate.

To guarantee that there is no prejudice in the hiring process, they demonstrate a keen awareness of their own
biases as well as the system's, and they strive tirelessly to correct these errors.

Openness to others - They show a profound interest about others by listening without judgment and seeking
to understand people around them with compassion.

People with cultural intelligence are aware of and responsive to the cultures of others.

Effective collaboration: They empower people, pay attention to variety of thought and mental safety, and
concentrate on team cohesiveness;

10. Human resources

Great people management is essential while leading others. This includes monitoring the training, growth,
motivation, and day-to-day administration of staff, depending on the degree of leadership.

Clarity, context, fluidity, bravery, and commitment are the five c's of people management that great leaders
instill in their employees.

Self-awareness and self-management skills

11. Agility (Study)

We learnt a valuable lesson from the year 2020: the need of being flexible in the face of ever-shifting
conditions. This applies to everyone in the workplace, but particularly to leaders, who must assist and guide
their employees and the business through these sometimes difficult times. Those that lead with agility don't
fear change; rather, they welcome it.

Learning agility is a characteristic of effective leaders that includes the capacity to continuously learn, unlearn,
and relearn. They are aware of the need of always learning, evolving, and adapting to the ever-more-complex
challenges they confront in their workplaces.

12. Expertise in the industry

As a general rule, individuals are changing careers more frequently than they were 10 years ago. And sure,
advancements in some fields occur at such a quick pace that executives may find it difficult to keep up with
everything else on one‘s to-do lists.

Effective leaders, on the other hand, understand the need of gaining experience in the industry and firm in
which they hold the position of leadership.

Self-control is an essential life skill.

This applies to a variety of aspects of your life, such as your workload, emotions, and daily routine. To be
capable of leading others, you must first be able to control yourself on a vast scale. Everybody has a unique
manner of doing this task, but a well-structured approach is essential.

Courage is the 14th quality.

Making choices is a common task for a leader to do. There will be no simple decisions in life, and sometimes
making a choice implies taking a (large) risk. That's a brave thing to do.

Courage is also about sticking up for what you believe in and defending it in the face of criticism.

An employee's conduct as a "organizational citizen"

"Organizational Citizenship Behavior" (OCB) is a phrase that describes employee acts that aren't directly
related to their official job description. Volunteerism is anything that employees undertake for the greater
good of the company and their coworkers.

the following are the five most prevalent OCBs:

An example of altruism is when a worker lends a helping hand to another without expecting something in
return.

• Courtesy - This is the act of being courteous and respectful to others. Greeting a coworker with a "good
morning" or "how are you?" or "how are your kids?" are just a few examples of workplace civility.

When things don't go as planned, it's important to show good sportsmanship and not show any bad conduct.

In a professional situation, this implies that workers don't simply come up on time in order to meet targets, but
that they also plan in advance before going on vacation so that their peers aren't drowning in a large amount
of work.

• Civic virtue - This refers to an employee's actions when they aren't in an official role, and how they assist
their employer. Employees may display civic virtue by participating in company activities such as fundraisers or
running a (semi)marathon with a group of coworkers for a charity.

To inspire others, leaders must lead by example. Showing people the OCB you want to see in them is one
method to go about this.