They say that if you are to understand anyone, you have to peel away the layers to see what’s inside.
This is very true. How a person behaves, acts and performs comes from within.
We say that people are our ‘greatest asset’ in organisations, yet we usually have more plans and knowledge relating to the physical buildings and material assets, than the individuals who work for us!
It is essential for any leader to really get under the skin, and peel away the layers of those working alongside them, to really understand them. Only then can you show genuine empathy, support, and encouragement. Only then can you stop seeing what they show you, and understand what lies beneath, what their true motives are and how you can influence. Only then can you unlock their full potential.
This is to help you understand what’s at the heart of a human life, and how you can understand people more clearly than ever before. A better way than attempting to peel the layers away is to start deep within the human soul, and get to the heart of the matter.
Beliefs and core values
At the core of any human are their fundamental beliefs. These are the basis for their whole life. A person may have an unshakable belief in themselves, their own ability to get through life, or a profound faith in God. They may believe in humanity or destiny, or even fate. These beliefs create a person’s core values, and the basis for their life.
These values are the real internal true motivators in a person’s life. They may be desirable qualities, or selfish ones. They may be a set of standards or principles such as fairness, integrity and honour but they shape, not just influence, how a person is.
These beliefs and core values also determine how a person views themselves (their self-belief) and how they then feel about themselves (self-esteem).
For those familiar with Maslaw’s Law, you will know that once basic needs, safety and security are assured within an individual’s life, it is self-esteem and a sense of belonging that form the next level.
We all hold a strong self-belief, and many of us do not like the image we have of ourselves. This is why people create priorities in their lives to build up their self-esteem. For many it may be their commitment to work, their social standing, family, faith or a love of money that they believe defines them. When successful individuals are asked why they strive for even more wealth, the answer is often that it is a measure that they use to distinguish themselves from others. They don’t need any more money, but they do need to achieve greater self-esteem.
The priorities we set in our lives may be influenced by our upbringing or conditioning. Along with how we respond to the external influences we feel in our life, it creates the person we are. External pressures can come from many areas including family, our local economic environment, peer pressure, our gender or society’s expectations. These all influence what’s at the heart of an individual, as well as the choices they make in terms of how much they need or wish to invest in boosting their own self-esteem.
Leaders need to understand that these elements to an individual are at the heart of who a person is. We cannot change anyone’s core values overnight, but over time a person’s priorities change and self-esteem can grow, particularly when there is less dependency upon requiring external support or materialistic needs. Self-esteem has a huge impact upon how every person faces life.
Attitude/behaviour
We may have to look very deeply to understand a person’s core values, and how they view themselves. What is more apparent to us, is how individuals conduct themselves. Everyone chooses an attitude towards life which manifests itself in how they behave. If someone’s core values are very self-centred, their attitude may be to take as much from others as they can, or they may have a strong personal faith which creates the desire to display compassion towards others.
We can see an individual’s attitude ebb and flow throughout the day, and from day to day, but I have found that their underlying attitude (‘What’s in it for me’ or ‘life is for living’ for example) remains surprisingly consistent.
From this underlying attitude stems an individual’s behaviour. You may argue that managers are responsible for managing an individual’s actions and how they behave at work, not their attitude. Nowadays a manager also has a say in a person’s attitude; the days when someone could do their work whilst remaining in a foul mood all day are gone! We quite rightly have higher expectations of good behaviour and an appropriate attitude. However, as leaders we need to look beyond simply getting a cheerful demeanour at work, for if we are to truly influence and support others, we need to develop an understanding of people which encourages positive change within, and a desire to do their best.
So if a person’s attitude is what they feel, their behaviour is what they show. Work with someone long enough, you will start to see what they are truly like. There are moments of truth where they will respond in a way which displays their underlying attitude and approach to life. It will show their commitment to others around them, their attitude towards authority, the influence of others upon them (whether they follow the crowd) and expectation of others (reciprocity – I expect a favour for a favour, what goes around comes around).
I mentioned earlier the ‘self-esteem’ an individual holds. Everyone becomes aware of their own level of intelligence, skill, abilities, their strengths and shortcomings, and it has a profound effect upon their self-esteem. This feeds through to defining in part their attitude towards life. I know that I personally enjoy playing to my strengths; the areas I feel I can do well at, whilst trying to avoid the areas I realise I do not have the same level of abilities. We are all the same in this respect.
This is why learning new skills and new ways is great for our self-esteem. This is why as a leader it is so important to show a personal commitment to individuals, investing time in them, coaching and encouraging them. In doing so you really start to influence how people feel about themselves, and start to create an opportunity for real and lasting change at the heart of an individual’s life.
Temperament
We know that if you are around an individual for any reasonable period of time you will soon start to see the ‘real person’. Individual differences in emotion, reactivity and self-regulation, demonstrated consistently across situations and over time, are the basis of the person we all see. We can all be on our best behaviour for a while, but not forever! Sooner or later out natural internal ‘style’ shows itself. This is our temperament. We have a temperament, like it or not, and how we manage that temperament is key to how we consistently behave around others.
We say that a car can have great performance and capability, yet it may be ‘temperamental’ in damp weather. This refers to an underlying often niggling characteristic, something the car is prone to. People are no different. A person’s temperament is their ‘natural response’ to events; their underlying characteristic.
A great deal has been written about defining an individual’s temperament. There are categories people refer to such as ‘melancholy’ or ‘sanguine’, but these are generalised and not particularly helpful.
An individual’s temperament is more a set of ‘rules’ or principles a person holds, guiding how they believe they can react in any given situation. They are often defined through upbringing, or experience, and are very emotionally driven. They can in their most basic form be the ‘fight or flight’ of self-preservation, which can also manifest itself as an over-reaction or response ‘in the heat of the moment’. We see this with sports players when they feel another player has cheated or taken advantage. The ‘red mist’ descends and often their true ‘temperament’ is displayed, a temperament which over-rides reason and dominates behaviour.
How people self-manage their temperament, defines their true ability to interact with others. Fortunately everyone can recognise, control, suppress and fine-tune their temperament – if they choose to! We would not let an out of control person dominate our lives and dictate to us, so why would we allow an out of control ‘self’ to do the same?
There are other temperaments which have a less immediate and longer term influence upon a person’s behaviour. These include persistence, sensibility, attention span and adaptability. I believe our temperaments are probably more hard-wired in us that we would ever wish to admit, and it’s the management of these we have to master.
Whilst we cannot change our temperament, recognising any personal weakness to temperamental outbursts, and controlling them before they occur, will help reduce its impact on your life.
People see the picture you paint for them. So if an individual’s temperament forms the fabric of the canvas upon which you paint (rough or smooth in texture), then your ‘personality’ is the colour you place onto that canvas. So what then is ‘Personality’ and how does it fit into our understanding of what creates an individual?
Personality
Defining an individual’s personality is for many a way of explaining how a person comes across (larger than life) or their approach to life (happy-go-lucky). Someone with a ‘strong’ personality is often to be avoided, unlike a person with a ‘great’ personality (easy to get on with and always friendly?). As you can see, these are very simplistic and unsatisfactory ways of describing any person, although in common use.
An individual’s personality can make them more approachable, relatable or even desirable. Others play to their personalities – they become the person they are labelled and play on their reputation for personal benefit, such as ‘type-A’ personalities, or extroverts.
Many people play on their ‘personality’ to great effect. A person with a magnetic personality attracts friendships easily, and comedians work upon their personality to project themselves in a particular way. Indeed, when we refer to ‘television personalities’, this is probably the best use of the word!
Let’s just think about this. For me if someone is ‘extrovert’, ‘neurotic’, ‘stubborn’ or ‘impulsive’, this personality stems from their attitude towards life, and how they behave. So whilst ‘personality’ is a really convenient tag to label someone’s approach, and often suitability for certain roles – we need to reflect more on the underlying drivers that portray them in this way.
For me an individual’s personality is the combination of their two strongest outward traits – behaviour and attitude – both of which are the strongest colours on any personal canvas, as we paint the picture of ourselves that others see. Therefore I firmly believe that Personality is a combination of attitude and behaviour, which flows from within a person.
The good news is that an individual can change their personality. It’s not who they are – it’s simply a manifestation of how they portray themselves. Changing what lies behind your ‘personality’ can change the person others see.
The other generalisation we use is when we speak about a person’s character. We say they are ‘of good character’ but this is more about how they have behaved in the past as opposed to the type of person they are. The most useful application of this word is when we speak about the ‘characteristics of say a group, or family, which captures their collective approach.
If we believe what is within a person is that which comes out, I would suggest that it is more than just attitude and behaviour which shapes a person.
I believe a person’s confidence, which flows from their self-belief plays a significant part of what others see, as well as their base-line emotions, flowing from self-esteem. Either of these can be positive or more negative, but forms how a person is with others. Add to this their drive and energy, again a positive or negative force within, and you create a much better understanding of how, and why, a person comes across in the way they do.
Underlying all these traits is, of course, temperament, our natural inclination. This can adversely affect an individual’s emotions, and can instantly create a different ‘personality’ – as if someone had just picked up a full tin of paint and thrown it over their canvas!
Controlling our temperament is not the only challenge we face. Managing how our other characteristics come out is equally important. Achieving the right balance from our attitude, behaviour (personality), emotions, confidence (self-belief and self-esteem), and drive and determination is essential to build the right leadership qualities from within.
Emotional Intelligence
We have all heard the phrase ‘Emotional Intelligence’ and how those with effective Emotional Intelligence perform well, but I believe there is much more to this than merely managing your emotions.
For any high performing Leader, Emotional Intelligence needs has to be a way of understanding how to manage not just ‘emotions’ but to have an equal awareness and self-regulation of energy, drive, confidence, personality and temperament as well as pure emotions. How many times have you come across a Leader who puts personal gain and ambition ahead of everything else, or who displays such arrogance it alienates others around them; or the leader who has an unbalanced sense of self-confidence to be a team player, and ignores reasoning.
The self-awareness of Emotional Intelligence leads to self-regulation, which can build self-confidence in being the person others expect you to be. Although this is a very internal process of self-awareness and self-regulation, its greatest benefit is received by those around you!
There is much written about Emotional Intelligence, and I do not wish to dwell on it here, apart from stating that for any leader to be genuine, their authenticity has to come from within. We cannot achieve this simply by controlling ‘superficial’ emotions on any given day. We need to have consistent ‘control’ of ourselves that delivers a reliable, trustworthy, genuine dependability others can warm to. An actor can be someone else for a period of time, but a husband or wife cannot hold a pretence forever, and our work relationships need to be more of a marriage than a play.
Social Intelligence
Success and achievement as a leader not only relies upon core values, strong self-belief, and an ability to keep emotions and temperament filtered. It also requires you to have the ability to ‘fit-in’. Social Intelligence is the second internal filter, or check and balance every great leader needs.
‘That’s just the way I am’ is one of the most frustrating phrases I ever hear from people. Those who are not interested in how others feel about them, or how others perceive their attitude towards them, will never truly engage others. The position you hold in an organisation is reflected by others but not respected – you have to earn this! Position power can see you achieve the basics of leadership, but will not sustain the deep, empathetic relationships you will require to be truly successful.
Social Intelligence is more than just engaging with your workforce. I have seen so many people being open and friendly, chatting about their lives with others, but completely alienating their audience. Low paid workers often don’t want to hear about your most recent ski holiday if they could never afford to go themselves. Often, Social Intelligence is about shutting up, being there, and listening!
Social Intelligence is not about trying to be someone you are not – it’s a form of situational leadership where you manage or temper your approach and tone to suit those around you, whilst being there for them. Predicting how others may feel, and managing how you project yourself, is the key to Social Intelligence. You should be a person others want to engage with.
It often takes sensitivity, and simplicity in how you speak – people warm to leaders who are relaxed, open, warm and genuine. Great leaders relate easily to others, and make them feel comfortable. They ‘get into their world’ and show a genuine interest in the other person. The ability to display empathy is so important, and you cannot do this without first asking about someone, listening to all they have to say, and reaching out to them on their level. Empathy is showing you care about the person, that you truly understand how they feel, and that it matters to you.
This is where Emotional and Social Intelligence come together – they both require good self-awareness. Our ability to be self-aware and self-managed supports the level of success we are able to achieve. Leaders who are too aggressive, who bully others or who care very little for how others feel, will not win support easily. Great Leaders are individuals who carry others with them, and ensure that everyone contributes to achieving amazing outcomes.
The whole picture
No single man can achieve greatness – we all need others to achieve success with us, and on our behalf. Understanding who we are, can help us be the person others want to follow, to work hard for, and to be associated with.
Finally it is worth realising that the more we understand how we are, helps us understand the reasons for others reacting in certain ways. This will help you coach others – another essential element of an outstanding Leader.
