Insight:

Leadership Partnership

Achieving and sustaining change is difficult (if not impossible) to accomplish without partnership. An organization’s ability to reach strategic goals, therefore, is correlated with leaders building deep and dynamic partnerships with each other. Leadership activity is too often focused on the development of individuals rather than on the art of building leadership partnership.
Leadership partnership:

  • Is less about the leadership of an individual
  • Is more about the partnerships formed among the collective leadership group
  • Requires accountability and a deep sense of shared purpose

The Leadership Partnership Spectrum

Leadership Partnership_Spectrum.png

Level of Shared Purpose - The ‘Leadership’ Element

We build a relationship with someone if we are trying to achieve something together. There is a shared goal, vision or purpose. It is the alignment behind and commitment to a shared goal that creates the drive and direction for the partnership.

To help improve the shared purpose in a relationship, try to:

  • Clearly express your vision and values
  • Consider how you might influence and inspire the other person
  • Ask for their perspective and gain buy-in before making changes

Level of Trust - The ‘Partnership’ Element

Leadership Partnership.png

We also build a relationship with someone if we feel close to and trust them. It’s difficult to fully align behind a shared purpose unless a level of deep personal trust is in place first.
To help improve trust in a relationship:

  • You must first be aware of and comfortable with your strengths and weaknesses
  • Consider how to better empathize with the other person
  • Use self-disclosure and seek permission before giving them feedback

To go from collaboration to leadership partnership, a dramatic improvement must occur in both the trust and purpose elements. This is because we need greater personal trust to establish shared values, and we need greater shared purpose to align fully behind a shared vision.