Avoiding Leadership Mistakes and Recovering from the Ones That Happen Anyway

Leadership doesn’t come with a title at the office. Leaders can be seasoned CEOs, brand new managers, or captains of a flag football team. The one thing they all have in common is their human capacity for making mistakes.Real leaders understand that mistakes happen to everyone -- and when they happen to them, they acknowledge their error, fix it as best they can, apologize if necessary, and move on. The key is to learn from mistakes and try to avoid repeating them in the future.To help you and your colleagues avoid some common leadership mistakes, or recover from those that happen anyway with class, I’ve assembled a collection of articles and blog posts with information and advice on leadership mistakes.

• Why One CEO Tells Job Candidates About Her Own Mistakes. Business Insider: “It's fairly normal for interviewers to ask job candidates about their past mistakes and what they've learned from the experience. However, it's far less common for the CEO to sit down with a candidate and share their own missteps. But that's precisely what Janet Elkin, CEO of Supplemental Health Care, does.”

• How to Stop Making the Most Common Leadership Mistakes. Inc.: ”One of the most common leadership mistakes is to think you are the only one who has the ingenuity. It's the trait that probably got you into the role you are in and maybe even helped you start the company. It's easy to get hyperfocused on your creativity but forget that others can come up with brilliant ideas on their own. Reward that. Be confident with your leadership to the point at which you can let others have the great ideas.”

• The Two Commonest Mistakes New Managers Make. Forbes: “Some new managers, rather than wanting to be liked, are all too eager to wield their newfound power.  It’s true, power can be intoxicating, and it can take time to learn to use it judiciously and with discipline.  Just as too little authority can hinder a new manager from delivering results, too much authority can as well.  When new managers come on too strongly – especially to a veteran staff who know their jobs well – it only breeds resentment.  Dollars to doughnuts, it’s a recipe for employee frustration and alienation. Ultimately, new managers need to strike a balance in how authority is exercised.”

• A Common Mistake That Destroys Leadership. Ty Bennett: “Too many leaders are guilty of hypocritical expectations – meaning they expect their people to behave one way and exempt themselves from the same expectations...Think about the resentment and disrespect that comes from people who are given hypocritical expectations from their leader. It undermines influence and destroys leadership.”

• How to Recover From a Leadership Blunder. BeALeader: “Dwelling on a mistake simply makes it larger than it has to be. It is imperative that leaders fix the issue and continue to work on it while still moving forward. Allowing employees or themselves to dwell just means the mistake will never go away. This certainly isn’t to imply we should ignore, but after owning it, dealing with the consequences and fixing it, we should all be able to move on.”

Let us know if you’d like our help coaching your organization’s leaders to help them in avoiding leadership mistakes and handling those they make the best way possible.Success Labs is a leadership development and management consulting firm in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. For more than 25 years, our expert team of consultants has worked with hundreds of companies to explore their business potential and improve their company and cultural performance. Contact us to get proactive about your people strategy.