There are three essential skills that every successful leader has learned how to leverage. Although they are quite elementary, even basic, they are critically important to know how to put to good use to lead and grow an organization:
- Knowledge Skills (Know) – How much do you know about your organization, your team, your marketplace, your industry, and your competition?
- Thinking Skills (Think) – How quickly can you move from assessment to strategy to market with an idea? Do you view assessments as an intrusion to your leadership or do you welcome it? The unencumbered mind will typically arrive at a great solution way ahead of someone who takes everything personally.
- Execution Skills (Act) – How quickly can you and your team begin to execute a strategy that has just been formulated? Of course, some strategies have longer runways than others, but that misses the point. Does it take days, weeks, or months to get your team fully engaged and into full action?
Each of these three skill sets is required to transform an organization from its current position to its next desired position. While all of these skills are ultimately necessary for an organization to be successful, MarketCues’ research shows that there is no one pervasive ideal skill mix and that the optimum mix varies as the organization evolves from Startup, to First Growth Stage, to Second Growth Stage, and becomes mature.
The importance of each of these three skills cannot be over estimated as they are required at every stage of an organization’s growth curve. Being able to balance the right mix of them is the key to driving growth in your organization.
