What Qualities Employees Look For In Leaders

The real power of a leader resides with the group’s willingness to accept the leader. Groups follow leaders who come closest to the group’s expectations. They want empathetic leaders who best understand them and what they want. Successful leadership encompasses empathy, using group expectations to coordinate activities toward the goals of the organization.

Workers look for certain qualities in their leaders that include:

• Sincere, direct answers
• Making good on promises to workers
• Prompt response to complaints
• Availability when problems arise – willingness to find answers he or she doesn’t know off hand
• Understanding when problems couldn’t be avoided
• Showing interest in ideas and suggestions
• Discussing why work changes may be necessary
• Dealing with poor performers
• Recognizing good performers
• Vision – direction of business
• Good listening skills
• Willingness to compromise
• Shares information openly
• Willingness to admit mistakes

Workers want what we all want from people we must deal with: honesty, integrity, humbleness, and value. Employees judge supervisors for both the way they reward good performances and the way they deal with problems. Good leaders must work at both ends of the spectrum continually while covering all scenarios in between. You have your worst and best employees to deal with everyday, as well as the average. The real opportunity for excellence lays in getting both the worst and average workers to do a little more. In most places, most of your workers fall within this category. Imagine the boost your company would experience if each of these employees improved by just a little. The key is finding the motivator for each one, applying it, monitoring and maintaining it.