Self-Awareness:
Each person, no matter who they are in this world, needs to be aware of how the world views them, reacts to them, and perceives them. This is not always 100% possible because even the most self-aware manager will have gaps in her or his ability to understand reality. As a manager, you must always work to understand how you come off to your employees so trust can be built and unintended actions do not create conflict.
Confident but not arrogant: Confidence in a manager is key. You must be able to lead meetings with confidence, look over a situation and react with confidence, interact with concerned employees and support them with confidence, and know that the majority of decisions you are making will positively impact your institution. But you must be weary; being overly confident creates a barrier between you and the rest of the world. An overconfidence manager is arrogant, has an inflated ego, and is not able to fully collaborate because they are not open to feedback.
Understand your impact: Understanding how your behaviors affect others is one of the most difficult skills to develop. A manager should have the utmost confidence in how they come off to people but you must also understand that some traditional management traits can push people away and create a distance between you and your employees. To mitigate this, a manager should always self-reflect on how you and your message, verbal, non-verbal, and written, are received by people and if possible, collect feedback from someone you trust who can give you honest and critical feedback.
Courage: Courage as a manager is a tricky word. Courage is the confidence and determination to speak the truth when the truth is not desired by your employees, your peers, or your boss. Courage is not ripping into someone for every little performance issue; courage is speaking the truth in the face of a challenging situation where silence is easier and where the status quo is comfortable. Courage requires everyone to grow, to self-reflect, and change for the better even when it is painful.
Humility: Yes humility, the word often given lip service by management but never embraced or truly accepted. The generic manager personality traits of assertiveness and confidence rarely provides enough room for humility and when it does, it is surface level only in front of employees. Humility should always be present because it is an ego check. Every person, every manager, and every leader must have enough self-awareness to know they are fallible and that feedback from every level of the institution helps improve the bottomline and trust.
Distinguished: Does a manager and leader need to be distinguished? Yes. Being distinguished means that you handle yourself with grace and professionalism during typical times and when the pressure is palpable. To be distinguished, you must have a strong moral compass and stay true to the business/institutional ethics that keeps you focused on the task at hand and allows you to always treat your employees with respect and inclusion.
Stay approachable: This is either really easy or really difficult. Some people and some managers are approachable while others struggle being approachable. It is highly recommended that as a manager, you always stay approachable to your employees so there can always be trust and openness that will allow for two way communication. If as a manager you are not approachable, problems that your employees are having might not get resolved and linger affecting morale and productivity.
