The great leaders in history, in addition to having enormous charisma, have been able to see and achieve what other people could not even imagine. Their skills, experience and knowledge were very important, but having a clear vision of what they wanted to do made them a reference for millions of people.
The same thing happens in companies. There are people who promote companies and projects to make the vision they had one day come true and which has become the engine of their lives.
Vision is the main quality that distinguishes a leader, since it sets exactly the destination of everything he does, and in turn, helps him interpret what happens while working to achieve his goal. It implies inspiration, but also observation, reflection, interpretation, prediction and intelligence. It is, therefore, a true leadership tool.
There Are 8 Forms of Vision That the Leader Must Continuously Promote and Train
1. Long Distance Vision
Visualizing the destination you want to reach activates the entrepreneurial spirit of the leader. The ability to look far away helps to face the present with an idea of the future, broaden the focus, detect opportunities, set objectives and design strategies. It is also an essential factor in anticipating and adapting to the changes that are constantly taking place.
2. Front View
Knowing where we are headed helps to face the present with energy and determination. The action reinforces and sharpens the vision, helping to prioritize, manage time efficiently, solve problems decisively and constantly update knowledge about all issues related to the final objective.
3. Inner Vision
Some people are born with leadership skills. They are very few and the innate qualities are not enough. To be a good leader you have to constantly cultivate and train new skills. For this reason, the “leadership backpack” must be filled with values such as responsibility, a service attitude, the ability to make decisions, integrity, authority, resilience, creativity, fighting spirit, justice, generosity and self-esteem.
And a quality that comes from within and that is essential is motivation. The leader moves motivated, that is, he always has a reason that drives him to act.
4. Side Vision
Looking both ways serves to know who your rivals are and also who can be your allies. Parallel relationships with other leaders reinforce leadership if they are built with verbs such as listening, understanding, sharing, uniting, or trying.
5. Hindsight Vision
When advancing, sometimes, you tend to neglect the rear. The leader must always have everything under control, identifying the key indicators that inform him about the evolution of his company, movements of the competition, market trends and changes in the environment. Deciphering what has happened in the past, and why, helps to anticipate what may happen in the future, but also to recognize mistakes and rectify them in time. The lessons learned from past experiences always travel in the backpack of a good leader.
6. Peripheric Vision
The essence of leadership is having followers. A 360º look, with the filter of empathy, will allow the leader to know them well: characteristics, feelings, concerns, expectations, illusions and motivations. In this way, communication to share his vision with his followers will be more effective, the bonds created will be stronger, and the commitment will be reciprocal.
The leader is like a sports coach who must manage people in the most efficient way, knowing the physical and mental state, organizing teams oriented towards the achievement of objectives, extracting the best from each team member, training skills, demanding the maximum, listening, motivating, building trust, helping whenever necessary, sharing successes and standing up in the most difficult moments.
7. Artificial Vision
In the digital age, the leader has many technological tools to obtain and manage information, communicate their ideas, plan and manage their projects, speed up decision-making and create links with their collaborators. He must know all the solutions that he can use, make good use of them and be attentive to future innovations in order to continually renew himself.
8. Night Vision
There are circumstances, whether of crisis, conflict, response to a competitive attack or simply business innovation, in which there is not enough information or time to make decisions under optimal conditions.
In those moments, and just as there are animals that are oriented by natural systems such as echolocation, or military devices that provide vision in the dark, the leader has to develop special skills or a sixth sense that allows him to orient himself in difficult or difficult situations. insufficient visibility. Experience, intuition or artificial intelligence are part of the leader’s night surveillance system.
The Leader’s Glasses
Some leaders may be lacking in one of their visions. As with eye diseases, we can talk about situations of myopia, presbyopia or blindness. All of them can be corrected with the appropriate training or with customized coaching processes. They are the leader’s glasses.
With or without glasses, the 8 visions must articulate a set of skills and techniques that give the leader the necessary charisma to become a benchmark for his followers and help him achieve his dream destination.
