11 Career skills to become a better leader

Effective leadership skills are essential now that remote and hybrid work remain the ‘new normal’. The future of work looks different to how we once imagined it, and leadership styles are evolving too.

Effective leadership skills for the new era of work 

1. Emotional intelligence 

Emotional intelligence is the ability to manage our emotions, which enables us to handle crisis situations. Our emotional quotient (EQ) also allows us to appreciate and understand the emotions of others.  

An emotionally intelligent leader has a strong understanding of people’s emotions, with the ability to manage them successfully. But compassionate leadership is not about being a pushover. Instead, it’s about such qualities as self-awareness and the ability to build trust and put yourself in someone else’s shoes. 

2. Self awareness  

Our internal self-awareness focuses on how clearly we see our own values, aspirations, and our impact on others. Meanwhile, external self-awareness is our understanding of how other people see us.  

Key to developing that self-awareness is adopting a regular habit of mindfulness and self-reflection. Good leaders can develop better critical thinking skills by reflecting on their skills, strengths, and weaknesses. A strong sense of self awareness empowers leaders to identify what their people need from them. 

3. Adaptability  

Successful leaders need to be able to adapt and tackle new challenges on a near-daily basis. In the new era of work, adapting to changes and uncertainties will become an essential future skill.  

Your business and senior leadership team must continue taking an adaptable approach now, and in the future. Take steps now to build plans that will help your business to navigate new challenges in the long term. But be ready to pivot quickly, and turn in a completely different direction, if required. 

4. Communication skills 

As a leader, you will also need to adjust how you communicate for the ‘hybrid team’. Some of your team may work from the main office, but others may work from home or remotely. You will need to maintain clear and fair lines of communication. This approach should include every team member equally and share common goals.  

5. Creative problem solving 

The ability to tackle challenges creatively, think outside of the box, and drive new innovations continues to be vital. This will especially be the case as the pace of change increases and customer demands change more quickly than ever before. 

Writing for European CEO, Charlotte Gifford talks about how we think we are most creative when we have time and resources.ts that constraints help us unlock our brightest ideas.” 

6. Critical thinking  

We all need to show greater willingness to routinely question our own thought patterns. By using our critical thinking skills we can explore every leadership problem from every possible angle. We can place ourselves in a better position to find the right solutions. 

Shawn Doyle, President of New Light Learning and Development Inc., describes critical thinking as “thinking about how you think”. Speaking to Entrepreneur, he went on to cite several steps that we can all take to develop our critical thinking skills. These include taking virtual or online classes and teaching team members how to think more critically and objectively. 

7. Inclusiveness  

It has never been more important for leaders to lead their teams in an inclusive way. Every member of the team needs to feel valued and valuable. 

Dan Robertson, Diversity & Inclusion Director at Fairer, says inclusive leaders inspire diverse thinking with a compelling vision. Effective leaders also show high levels of empathy, accepting everyone without bias.  

It is important for a great leader to listen to the opinions of diverse groups of people. This approach  minimises the likelihood of unconscious bias in talent selection, retention and recruitment. 

Former Hays Australia and New Zealand MD, Nick Deligiannis, talked about leading remote and hybrid teams inclusively. Steps include: 

• setting expectations 
• making accountability clear to all staff,  
• committing equal time and focus to each team member  
• discouraging a ‘them and us’ culture 

8. A commitment to lifelong learning  

The best leadership and management teams commit to their own lifelong learning. Leaders should demonstrate learning behaviours within the work environment. Leading by example can encourage your employees to develop a growth mindset too. Inspire your team to be on the lookout for new opportunities to add to their skills. Be a role model, and commit to your own continuous lifelong learning.

9. Considered risk taking  

The ability to take well-reasoned, calculated risks has always been an important component of leadership. A leader in the workplace should not confuse it with reckless risk taking that combines high risk with low potential reward. 

Effective leadership ought to grasp opportunities as they arise. New opportunities will always involve an element of risk taking and venturing into the unknown. 

To make risk taking an effective part of your own leadership strategy, ensure you first have a clear goal and vision. Gather all the information you will require to estimate the risk of a given action. 

It is also important to consider the costs of the particular action relative to your resources. You must always evaluate the potential positive and negative outcomes of taking that risk. 

10. Resilience  

Closely interlinked with the importance of risk taking is that of adopting a positive and proactive attitude.  

Even the most effective leader will not exclusively experience success in their life and career. The reality is that you will encounter setbacks from time to time. To overcome these disappointments, you will need to build personal resilience.  

A resilient leader sees the opportunity in every failure. They face obstacles head on and draw strength from within for the most challenging moments in their life and work. 

11. Authenticity 

It is also crucial that amid everything else that makes us leaders, we are also human. Your leadership approach shouldn’t be cold and impersonal – it should feel human and authentic. 

Despite the highly connected nature of today’s world, we seem to be in danger of losing that sense of human connection. There is evidence that a fifth of the UK population could be experiencing loneliness. In addition, 40 percent of employees feel isolated at work. 

This loneliness and isolation epidemic seems to be ongoing, especially with increased working from home. Restoring a sense of human connection and employee engagement must be a key priority for leaders.

Capgemini says authentic leadership is about “creating belonging, shared values, and success among a team. All of these are aspects that may easily disappear in the modern, virtual workplace.” 

Effective leadership skills will always be key for the future of work 

Keep in mind that it’s not just the skills listed above that will help to make you a better leader in the coming months and years. You also need to adopt different styles of leadership as and when needed. 

Take the time now to build on your future skills in all of these key areas. Then, you will be in a strong position to lead your business effectively into the new era of work and beyond. 

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