How to Set Yourself Up for Success As An Executive Leader

Executive leadership is an important topic for many organizations around the world. Post-pandemic recovery has forsaken the old leadership paradigm and has given way to the new executive leader. Organizations that face challenges such as the emergence of new technologies and hypercompetitive competition in today's global environment do not like this transformation. Yet, they must embrace it or be left behind. Resisting engineering, innovation, and creativity could lead to destruction, and by ignoring external threats and the wide array of growing competitors, organizations find themselves missing the train that has left the station.

By Mostafa Sayyadi | Chartered Managers Canada

Many business leaders around the world show that great executive leaders have several distinct characteristics that are recognizable. They question their own frame of reference. They are what Jim Clawson, Emeritus Professor of the Darden School of Business, at the University of Virginia, calls Level One Leadership. This means that these leaders, with cognitive myopia and an understanding of new threats, will adopt new methods of human resource development and recruitment to minimize the resistance of the workforce in the organization to changes. They are more focused on rewards and punishment as their private mantra. At the same time, these leaders have a high power of abstract and conceptual thinking, and if necessary, they discard much of their accumulated experiences in the past as the cost of change. A Level Two Leader will at least help people think and not be so abrasive as a level one leader. This means that these leaders are receptive to new changes and without ignoring the existing threats and without drowning in the daily affairs of their organizations, and using their abstract and conceptual thinking, they look for new and innovative solutions that seem impossible at first. Unfortunately, only the Level Three leaders will survive in the new economic shift of hypercompetitive globalism.

Jim Clawson, a Harvard Business School Alumni, focuses on the Level Three Leadership model with emphasis on the invisible leadership zone of conscious thought and VABES (Values, Assumptions, Beliefs, and Expectations). The habitual area, which is invisible, is revealed when we behave as leaders about what we are feeling or believing as we lead people. Clawson studied more than 1,500 executive leaders from around the world and found that, on average, habitual behavior is 95% plus repetitive from what people believe. Level Three leaders are characteristic very long-term oriented and prefer the long term to the short term. These leaders do not give up ensuring the long-term survival of their company in pursuit of short-term profits. A great example of this leadership characteristic is embodied in Abraham Lincoln, a true Level Three Leader, he did not abandon what guaranteed the long-term survival of the United States of America by abolishing slavery at the same time as many of his critics attacked him brutally, telling his critics that answered:

“Let there be no compromise on the question of extending slavery. If there be, all our labor is lost, and, ere long, must be done again. You think slavery is right and ought to be extended; while we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted.”

This futuristic transformation, now hundreds of years later, reveals how one right decision led to the unity and long-term survival of the United States. On the other hand, this historical incident shows another truth, which is that the focus of executive leadership on the long term is accompanied by pain and authentic leadership. Level Three leaders focus on innovation, while level one and level two leaders focus on short-term profits and their company's stock price. Perhaps the big costs that Richard Branson and Elon Musk are making to achieve space may seem ridiculous to many executive leaders, but it is this foresight and focus on the long term that distinguishes these executive Level Three leaders from other leaders.

On the other hand, the reality is that Level One Leaders are visible everywhere and this type of executive leader wins over their own human nature, which does not seek uncertainty. This group of leaders accepts uncertainty about their decisions and prefers a probable but unusually excellent outcome to a relatively good certain outcome. Contrarily, an excellent example of such a feature of Level Three Leadership can also be seen in Abraham Lincoln's decision to abolish slavery. While this decision caused a great civil war and the southern states of America that had warned that they would not accept President Lincoln's decision started a rebellion. And while this rebellion could have meant the end of Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln was able to move forward and triumph in this engineering of transformation n by accepting high uncertainty and having an unparalleled commitment and became a model for executive leaders around the world. That said, the Southern leaders, acting as level one and level two, at first brutally beat the Northern leaders. However, they did not have the wherewithal of the Level One Leader. Freedom for all men that are created equal was part of the Northern VABE. In the South, VABES where not addressed, only focused on the visible behavior of winning and spreading the conscious thought that the South needed to succeed in the union.

Another characteristic of great executive leaders is that the Level One Leader’s passion and interest in the organization they have started to engineer its transformation, and this passion and interest is like a powerful driving engine that makes them win against resistance. Level Three leaders resist the temptations of new, higher-paying jobs and pursue organizational transformation they are passionate about. A great example of this leadership characteristic can be seen in a leader like George Washington, who, while he had the opportunity to become a monarch, decided that the free country would always be governed by a presidential system. Today, how many business leaders think like George Washington, another true level three leader, did and are committed to their organization and prefer the organization's success to their own success. 

Executive leaders are powerful network builders who mobilize a network of human resources in engineering transformation and in the direction of their goals. The offices of these Level Three leaders are followed by capable and intellectually compatible human resources to create this transformation. To establish this powerful network, Level Three leaders, executive leaders need to create buy-in. Leaders need to follow Jim Clawson’s “Goal of Leadership.”  Buy-In gets to the purpose of leadership being that if we have no followers then we have no leadership.  The range of Buy-In has seven levels.

Level 7 is Active Resistance: People rebel.  

Level 6 is Passive Resistance: People respond slowly or cover their resistance.  

Level 5 is Apathy: People just do not care.  

Level 4 is Compliance: People look for loopholes on how to beat the system.  

Level 3 is Agreement: I will do what you say.  

Level 2 is Engagement: I want to do what you ask me to do.  

Level 1 is Passion: What you ask is the number one thing in my life.  

Only levels 1 and 2 are the positive Buy-In that Level Three Leaders attempt to create.  Regardless of the industry, regardless of the sector, and regardless of organization, the primary goal is to create Buy-In at levels one and two above. Level 1 on the Buy-In scale above is where people have passion and commitment to the organization

In closing, examples of Level Three Leaders, such as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Richard Branson, and Elon Musk show that great executive leaders are ahead of their time and understand things that Level One, and Level Two leaders fail to understand. Transformation engineering in any organization needs Level Three leaders who have the leadership characteristics mentioned above. These Level Three leadership characteristics can ensure the long-term survival of organizations and be like a secure parachute for them in this age of extreme changes and turbulence. Focus on agreement second to engagement. Attempt to stay above the compliance level on the Buy-In scale. Somewhere at this level we have positive level of energy. Jim calls this definition of executive leadership “It is about managing energy, first in yourself, and then in the people around you.” Now let’s spread some positive energy in what is left of 2022 and beyond.

About the Author:

Mostafa Sayyadi works with senior business leaders to effectively develop innovation in companies and helps companies—from start-ups to the Fortune 100—succeed by improving the effectiveness of their leaders. He is a business book author and a long-time contributor to HR.com, People + Strategy, Consulting Magazine and The Canadian Business Journal and his work has been featured in these top-flight business publications.