What Leadership means to me - by Vanessa Phillips (Executive Leader, and Lead Trainer for ABOVE)

There I sit by a pool in sunny Key Largo on a warm sunny Florida day. My phone starts bing bing bing Geez I thought to myself, someone at work must be burning the hospital down. Dry the sunscreen and pool water off my hands, put my tequila down and pick up the work cell. “CONGRATS” “BEST LEADER EVER” “WELL DESERVED” I dry my face as I am confused and figure it’s some silly group text. Its not. It’s for me. My fellow colleagues and teammates at work are congratulating me as they are sitting at a meeting / leadership conference that I chose Key Largo over, and they all jump to their phones when they put up on the screen that I won the Division President’s Award for Excellence in Leadership.

Whoa….first thought is, thank goodness I chose PTO over sitting there and getting this award because I could already envision my bright red face and awkward hand gestures. Why? Because I am shy? Scared? Hell no….its because I don’t ENJOY winning awards. I don’t like the spotlight on me. Leadership isn’t about me. It’s about my TEAM! The team I WORK FOR - No, not the team that works for me. That’s a leadership mistake right there. My team is who I WORK FOR.

So, why am I winning awards? Why am I speaking at events? Why is my employee engagement at 93% when I picked up a unit at 56%? Why do I have zero turnover? Why do people follow me whenever I go to a new opportunity?

I understand how to LEAD. I understand leadership is serving my team. It is not MY way, it’s OUR way. I chose leadership when I left direct bedside care because I wanted to now take care of nurses and ancillary colleagues so that they could love their work and have the best environment to care for patients, therefore, giving patients and people great care. So, FOUR strategies to make you a better leader NOW:

PERSONAL CONNECTION Knowing every single member on your team is key. Knowing how they like to be communicated with, what makes them tick, what makes them feel good, knowing their home situation, knowing their struggles in and outside of work. Every single person. I have a team of 75. None of them are exactly alike and they all require 75 different Me’s as a leader. That’s exactly what they get. They get what they need in a leader.

GIVE YOUR TIME: I serve them 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. That’s my commitment. When you give yourself as a servant leader, they learn to love and respect you and your time. You are available 24/7 365 or 25/8 366 as my husband and I say; but you have taught them autonomy, decision making and culture.

ACCOUNTABILITY not just for them. Yes, I hold people accountable. Do they need to be written up or called to the office or HR for their first or even second mistake? No. Mostly your team member’s mistakes are a leadership failure. Did I communicate my expectations correctly? Did I validate they understood me? Did I reach every single person? Did I remind them (yes they’re busy)? If you don’t first take accountability for yourself as a leader and the culture in which you have created, then your team will follow your “lead.” When you show your team you take responsibility, show them you care, tell them when they do well, reward them, go to bat for them….the rest follows.

CONSISTENCY (with a will to bend when necessary) You have to be fair and consistent with your team. We all have favorites, just like at home, but once an employee sees you treating someone “better” than them, you’re done. Discipline and rules are necessary. However, if a new metric rolls out and the 25 year veteran messes up because he/she cut corners that’s different than your brand new no experience employee messing up. Every situation takes thought and investigation. When you move that way, consistency will always come in time. Every situation develops a subject and title and it forces you to stick with that mode of addressing each identified situation consistently every time. No matter what mood you are in that day, what happened at home, what happened in your boss’ office, your team is looking to you to be the you they know - the consistent, positive, happy YOU.

Leadership isn’t supposed to be easy. Aspects of leadership can be simple, but being a true rock solid high performance leader with a high functioning high performing team, takes continual effort - if you don’t take care of yourself you cannot take care of your team - BUT if you take care of your team, they will take care of you.