Become a World-Class Leader using 4 Core Science-Based Skills
The following is adapted from The Habit Mechanic by Dr. Jon Finn.
I’ve been working in elite sport for a long time. Some time back, the head coach of a high-profile international team asked me to help him use a psychometric test as part of the preparations for a major tournament in Australia.
This coach and his players were under pressure to make the tournament a success. He wanted to use every advantage he could. So I did some personality leadership-type testing with the senior leaders. The test was supposed to show leaders some of their strengths but also some of their weaknesses.
However, I was becoming less and less compelled by personality test approaches. It was interesting to the leaders, and it helped them understand themselves a little bit better. But it didn’t help them move from knowing what they needed to do, to actually doing it and building better habits. I knew there had to be a better way.
Helping Leaders Do Better
I decided to carry out in-depth research to understand how I could better serve the leaders I was working with. It became clear to me that using personality and leadership profiling didn’t actually help people build better habits.
This flawed approach made me redouble my efforts to take what I’d learned from neuroscience and behavioral science to actually help leaders do better. I used these insights to construct my own leadership model and training approach. I call it “Team Power Leadership.”
This model isn’t only about knowing what to do. It also trains leaders how to deliberately build better habits for themselves and their teams.
Turning Knowledge Into Habits
Post-tournament, I kept in contact with some of the international team’s senior leaders, including the team’s captain. About 12 months after that tournament, he sustained a serious injury.
We met to discuss this, and he shared that the injury was particularly problematic because he was going to miss a major showpiece Cup final for his club. He was heartbroken about it, and to compound matters, he also felt it was probably his last opportunity to win this famous trophy.
Despite that, he knew he had to turn up and be present to help the players who were going to play. For me, this was an opportunity to help and test out my new leadership development approach with a very senior and established leader.
I knew he had a good idea of what he needed to do, but I had to help him turn this knowledge into habits.
Building Better Habits
To help him do this, I created a bespoke leadership planner using insights from my new Team Power Leadership framework. This was a tool to help him develop the new leadership habits he wanted to build.
As it happened, the team lost the Cup final. But he was able to extend his career for another three years. And in his final two years, he managed to win the Cup twice.
This piece of work taught me a valuable lesson. Using leadership psychometrics is not very effective or powerful for developing outstanding leaders. Instead, we need to help leaders build better habits.
Over and over, I’ve found the best way to do this by teaching people very simple and practical ways to build tiny new leadership habits — one at a time. I’ve tried and tested this model across different contexts (including business, sport, education, and parenting), and it gets results very quickly.
The Team Power Leadership Model
Team Power Leadership has four core components, all of which are interconnected:
- The Role Model — doing what you expect others to do
- The SWAP Coach — coaching others to develop better habit
- The Cultural Architect — leading the team’s strategy and culture
- The Action Communicator — communicating in a way that gets people to take positive action
Ultimately, leadership is about influencing other people’s behavior. And because everyone in your team has influence, they all need a customized “Team Power Leadership Development Plan.” This will help everyone deliberately and progressively become a better leader, no matter what skills they currently possess.
If you are the senior leader in your team, for example, you may choose to focus on improving yourself across all four Team Power Leadership components. There may be other people on your team — a new university graduate, for instance — who should focus on just developing one or two, because their role doesn’t require anything else.
Use Self-Watching to Improve Leadership Skills
To improve these core leadership components, you need to first engage in “Intelligent Self-Watching.” To help leaders do this, I have developed specific Team Power Leadership self-assessment tools. They are tried and tested in helping leaders of all levels to build more new powerful leadership habits.
After all, as iconic American football coach Vince Lombardi said, “Only by knowing yourself can you become an effective leader.” In other words, the best Team Power Leaders never stop self-watching, learning, and refining their practice.
To access the specific Team Power Leadership self-assessment tools and for more advice on how to develop the four core components of the Team Power Leadership model, you can find The Habit Mechanic on Amazon.
Dr. Jon Finn founded the award-winning Tougher Minds consultancy and has three psychology-related degrees, including a PhD. He has worked in performance psychology, resilience, and leadership science for over 20 years. Tougher Minds uses cutting-edge insights from psychology, behavioral science, neuroscience, and world champions to help organizations develop “Habit Mechanics” and Chief Habit Mechanics” — resilient people, outstanding leaders, and world-class teams. Having trained and coached over 10,000 people, Dr. Finn, and his colleagues, work with global businesses, high-growth startups, individuals, elite athletes, coaches and teams, leading educational institutes, families, the UK government, and think tanks. For podcast episodes and free resources, visit: tougherminds.co.uk.
