Kent Batman, Contributor of the Price of Business on Business Talk 1110 AM KTEK (on Bloomberg’s home in Houston) recently interviewed Tom Northup.
About the interviewee
My name is Tom Northup. My company is Leadership Management Group. In my first career I spent over 30 years running companies. Now I am an executive coach, speaker and author. I assist executives to lead and develop people to produce their stretch results they want to reach. You can see my work in my leadership blog, my published book, The Five Hidden Mistakes CEOs Make, and my coming book, Leadership Is Not a Soft Skill. Using my unique experience, I share expert insight and simple methods that enhance a leaders ability to build a focused, outstanding organization to meet their vision, create sustainable growth and to develop “unfair competitive advantage.”
Tell me about your firm (number of employees, location, type of companies you work with, etc.).
I am the founder of Leadership Management Group located in Newport Beach, CA. The company has two employees and over 200 consultants across the country available as needed. Our focus market is small to medium sized companies, 25 to 500 employees, where employees are key contributors to the bottom line. Manufacturing, distribution, business to business and contractors are common examples.
As a former CEO, I understand the issues and stresses of senior executives. Based on my management experience I assist clients to become results and execution focused. My process is developmental. At the end of an engagement clients are regularly working at a more effective successful level. I know theory but understand clients want to know what works; I deliver practical how-tos.
Tell us about what it means to you to show your employees that you care?
Effective executives develop an outstanding high performance organization. Research finds that positive culture, where people want to be and want to do their best, may improve performance by as much as 30%.
Employee habits and thoughts determine the level of performance. Employees who are emotionally and intellectually committed to their organization’s success far outperform employees who work primarily for a paycheck.
Strong leaders show employees they care by making it easier for employees to do their jobs, making them feel their jobs have significant value and treating them as individuals. Successful leaders are developers of people. They have significance in the lives of their employees and leave an indelible impact on them.
The caring leader has great personal success. Professionally he generates outstanding performance and strong results. Personally he has great satisfaction contributing to employees’ personal development.
What mistake do businesses make when it comes to taking care of employees?
Many managers make the mistake of limiting employee engagement by minimizing employee involvement.
All leaders want improved results. The successful leader understands the adage of leadership. The more success his employees have the more success he has.
It is easiest to just tell people what to do. This management style is restrictive and possibly fear based. The result – outstanding organizational performance is not realized.
Successful leaders build a results based culture of enthusiastic, motivated, confident employees working together to achieve the organization’s vision.
This culture is best developed when we understand employees work for themselves. With this attitude work becomes a joy not drudgery and offers the opportunity to develop personally. It increases their energy and capacity to perform.
Developer leaders understand that performance, processes and transformation start with people. Effective leadership is the catalyst and they develop people to reach more personal potential.
What is your firm doing to demonstrate your beliefs in this principle?
I help managers understand the difference between good and great leaders. Good leaders get results through people, great leaders develop people too. They become significant in employees’ lives.
Who generates success; your key employees. You budget for maintenance items. Do you budget for improving the effectiveness of you and your key people?
Developer leaders set firm standards. They build a culture where accountability is expected. They hold themselves and the organization accountable to reaching their desired future.
This style overcomes a common objection to developing significance.
When working through others, as opposed to giving firm direction, executives may feel they are relinquishing control. With accountability they both maintain control and build employee success.
To become an extraordinary leader and develop sustainable success, executives must build a positive inclusive culture. They become significant by making an indelible impact on the lives of others. They build accountability into their culture.
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