Leadership skills for accountants are vital as you move into more senior positions.
If you’ve been promoted into a strategic leadership role then congratulations – you’ve moved into an exciting new phase!
However this can be daunting – many people are expecting you to find answers to complex problems, to motivate teams, to generate strategic options and set the direction for others.
There’s no right answer and the environment is uncertain and fast-moving. Indeed this can be in sharp contrast to accounting where there are right answers and the technical rules are more certain.
How do you transition from a technical or managerial role into a strategic leadership role successfully?
Leading people
As a manager you will have realised that people don’t always act in rational, logical ways. Now in a leadership role you are expected to inspire and motivate teams using soft skills. Other people now do the routine finance work and you have to set the overall direction, not just for your team but, working alongside other senior colleagues, for the organisation as a whole.
Your authentic leadership style
With a finance background you are likely to have a particular set of experiences that will shape your approach to leadership. This may or may not be successful. You will need to continually develop your approach and adapt your style to create your truly authentic leadership style.
Meeting the needs of the organisation that you are in whilst being true to yourself can be a challenge. Bringing your true self to the role and developing your own unique and authentic leadership style will enable you to carry out your role with confidence.
Instead of following rules and processes you are now setting policy and asking others to create the rules and processes. But how do you know what the right policy is? What is the right thing to do? Understanding your own “true north” gives you the inner direction you need to make the right call and to follow through with integrity.
How are you developing your leadership style?
How do you get in touch with your true north?
What sort of leadership does your organisation require from you right now?
Which of the other key soft skills for accountants do you need to develop?
