Modern Leadership for Fundraising Executives

2. Communicate with staff and everyone around you.
This isn’t a new concept, yet it remains sorely lacking in the workplace. Effective leaders are good communicators who not only speak well, but more importantly, hear what others are telling them. This requires self-control to resist the temptation to multitask while in meetings and focus on what is being communicated verbally and physically. Generally there are three levels of listening, but the most useful is called the perceptive level, where the listener is intuiting more than words by noticing body language, hearing the speaker’s tone of voice, all in an effort to understand the real message. It’s not an easy skill to master, but when it is mastered, it allows the leader to fully engage and focus on the nuances and true meaning of what is being conveyed.