Leading attracts a lot of attention and this should not come as a surprise when people’s criticism becomes one of the outcomes of leadership. Every leader is criticized loudly or silently by their followers or by their observers. What differs between a successful leader and just a leader is how they handle criticism.
Criticism is a Source of Information
Criticism in its respectful form is not an insult but a source of information as to the areas that people are mostly concerned about and what they perceive to be critical. The more the input the more it becomes obvious what people are interested in. One can be a leader in the corporate world, church, political, society groupings or any other forum of choice, criticism will always be there. No one is perfect and if you want to understand how to be great at leading find out what people criticize about.
Criticism is not personal it is objective
Leadership is not about being personal it is about providing people with the right form of guidance to enable them to achieve what they need to achieve. In the same context leadership should never become personal but rather should be a tool for people to succeed. If one assumes leadership in order to make themselves wealthy then the objective of leadership is lost. Leadership is about service to people not service to one’s self. When people criticize a leader it is not the person that they are criticizing it is the leadership outcome that they have a problem with. A CEO is a leader in order for the success of the company to be realized which means that the shareholders, clients, and employees are also happy, similarly a church leader must be a success by ensuring that the spiritual needs of the people are met. When people then criticize a leader they are criticizing the lack of leadership success. Leadership is not defined by subjectively but by what it is meant to be achieved. Leadership is the enablement of a people to succeed.
Criticism means the people are interested
When people have no interest they keep their peace and will not say a word, but when something matters to them then they will speak out. For a leader to succeed the people that are being led need to care about what is happening and what needs to be improved on. Once in a while a good leader must create opportunity for people to highlight areas of improvement that need to be looked at. Such sessions must not be approached with the view of identifying personal mistakes but identifying areas of concern that need to be looked at. Dialogue is key to any leader.
Criticism creates strategy
When people criticize they are actually giving strategic points that can be used to create a strategic plan for greater success. A leader who addresses a problem or point of criticism is viewed as a hero and acquires more emotional mileage from the people than a leader who seems to ignore everything that is said by the people. Leadership strategy is about success for the people, every CEO of a business must understand that their plans must result in the shareholders, clients, employees, and even suppliers being happy; of which all these stakeholders are people. If leadership loses sight of the fact that people are involved in a strategy then that leadership fails.
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