We’re getting to the fun bit of the framework now! The Traits of a Human Centric Leader!

I’ve broken these into two very lovely components;

1 – Traits you show actively, such as how you communicate with people

2 – Traits you show passively, such as how people see you behaving

The red are the former, the greyed out are the later… so guess what we’re focusing on first? Lest my framework turn into a listicle!

Caring – Actually stopping to see how your people are. Showing them that they matter by giving a damn about them, their work and their lives. It’s easy to show and doesn’t need to be the over-dramatic approach (because authentic is what we’re looking for), but a genuine interest and kindness towards people is essential.

Trusting – Confiding and believing in your people. So many leaders now expect to be needing to hand-hold or to be able to constantly micromanage their people. Trusting your people means giving them ownership of their time and workload. Working with them to verify that trust is just having 1-2-1’s, making sure they’re not overloaded, making sure they’ve got what they need and then letting them figure out the best approach towards things. Trust your people until proven otherwise!

Calm – Being composed. Ever had a leader give you an information dump that’s clearly misunderstood in their own head, let alone yours? I’m prone to stopping after sentences, replaying them to make sure they made sense (The joy of ADHD.) Checking in with yourself to make sure you’re delivering feedback, sessions, information, messages in a calm and considered manner can ensure that you’re approachable and respected by your people. It also can put people at ease when you have to have those harder conversations when you’ve got support someone. No-one wants someone with chaotic energy around them when they’re having the worst day of their lives, right?

Inspirational / Optimistic – One I personally struggle with because of the sardonic way I speak. But part of being a good leader? Even during the tough times? Is that sense that “We’re moving in the right direction” that you give your team. My go to is always, “We’ll get there”, it’s not inspiring in itself, but when we’ve got a plan, when we’ve got a strategy that we’re going after? We’ll get there. Even when there are setbacks. Afterall, No plan survives first contact with the enemy. (The enemy here being frustrating business processes.)

Thankful – “Thanks for the tough work this week lads/lasses/everyone” is a go to for me. My signoff for a week when I know it’s been hard. Being able to say “Thank you” to your people for cracking on, for owning what they need to do, for understanding and rolling with the tough times. But also for when people show you that they really are fantastic. I have a team I inherited and the Lead Engineers are fantastic people leaders too, I’m always thankful that they’re exactly the people we know we need in those positions and they hear that too. Being thanked and thanking should be default? But it’s seen as a reward, not just normal.

Honest – I’m honest to a fault. Zero fluffy words. Zero messing about. I just want to know the problem, fix it, crack on. But that also means I have to be honest with people to understand what’s going on with them, it breeds an authenticity that you can’t get unless you’re honest. An that authenticity is far more powerful that you could ever realise with your people (Be they leaders, or do’ers.)

Empathetic – How frustrating is it when you tell a boss something, and you get the cold, dark, disproving businessperson instead of a human? Being empathetic means recognising and understanding peoples emotions towards things. It’s a skill long-lost in our modern and digitised world, but my God it’s the most powerful one. Being able to see the joy, cheer, fury, frustration, anger, disproval, disappointment and dismay in your team (and you’ll see all of them), relate to them, understanding what and where it comes from and then helping them (or celebrating with them) is part of the best thing about being a leader.

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Some of these you might go, “Well, Yeah, Sure!” – But when was the last time you actually stopped to think about how you use them daily? Do that now, when did you last get a chance to show your staff these traits? Do you even have them?

Each of these traits are foundational to what it means to be a leader who focuses on their people. You need to be able to show each of these authentically, genuinely, pointedly to the people in your care and command for them to excel at what they do.

This isn’t just a list of “When the going gets tough” type of showing them. These are for day-to-day interactions that you need to show people and almost a creed that you must live by. They’re the foundations of being led by someone who really does give a damn about their people.

Empathy is always the biggest one for me. The ability to naturally put yourself in someones shoes, be they having the worst day of their life or the best. Frustrated with paperwork, or trying to solve a problem. Empathy gives you the divining rod to figure out the best way to help them. It can also be the Achilles’ Heel of a good leader if you’re too emotionally driven, if you hear something that sets off something in your mind, it can be difficult to help others if you cannot help yourself (I’ll take more about knowing one’s self in later posts.)

Developing each of these behaviours / traits comes naturally to almost everyone, but it’s often squeezed out by management courses or business processes (Anyone made anyone redundant before? Awful process, but ‘legalities’ take precedence, rather than people.) Hell, life can take it out on you and it can be difficult to show them to others when you can’t show it to yourself!

But both you and your people deserve a leader who can show these traits individually and in groups, who can ensure that people know they’re emotionally cared for and psychologically safe to do what they need to do in the workplace.