Lead Different People Differently

Most of the leadership experience that I have is based in the nonprofit sector working with volunteers. A majority of these individuals have had a sincere and caring heart who want to help people and are always glad to offer their time for free.

This has been the filter that all my leadership experience, knowledge, and teaching has come through. I will be honest and admit that this past January I was given a wake up call to different styles of leadership because I had to learn to lead different people differently.

A major element in our Maximum Impact seminar in April was selling tickets for the event. In order to make the event happen, we needed to sell a certain amount of tickets to pay for the food, sodas, hosting fee, electricity, equipment, and other stuff that had to be paid for. So I recruited six business professionals from the community for one specific task: To sell tickets.

I had these six professionals do nothing else but sell tickets, and I made that very clear to them several times. There were two additional teams working on the audio/visual set-up equipment, and working on the food for the event. However, I let these business professionals know that they didn’t need to worry about what those other two teams were doing. Their job was to sell tickets to the event, and nothing else.

As I spent four months preparing for the event I learned about the major differences in leading the business professionals, versus leading volunteers. Their reasons for helping with the event and their motivation was very different. They were motivated by recognition, feelings of significance, money, and wanting to fulfill their self interests. Very different from the volunteers I lead on a day-to-day basis who simply want to make a small difference in the world.

I had to take a step back to listen to each of their individual needs and desires. Then it was my job as a leader to serve them in a way that met those needs, and in a way that motivated them to sell tickets.

Many of the leadership principles I used on the business professionals were the same as what I use for volunteers, but how I used them was the difference.

When leading people you need to realize that different people need to be led differently. They need to be led in a way that fulfills their needs and makes them feel good.

Comments

[Roger Carr]

Hi Christopher,
This is a great lesson. Volunteers can also have different needs regarding motivation even if they are driven to participate for the same reasons. We are all created to be unique and that means we have to be careful we don't treat everyone in the same way. If we do, we will not help them (and our organizations) reach their full potential.

[Jason Curlee]

right on Chris...you are so right in your evaluation of leading people...plus this is a great living example.

Hey Guys-

Thanks for your encouragement and insight.