As a leader working with diverse stakeholders, you’ll need to manage a range of different personality types, various experience levels, and different types of roles.
As part of this, you’ll encounter very different dynamics of how comfortable people are presenting their perspective.Â
Some stakeholders are virtually impossible to keep quiet and want to tell you absolutely everything, while others have absolutely critical information and are reluctant to share unless you explicitly invite them in.
A client of mine recently shared an example of a colleague who was exceptionally insightful, but struggled to get into conversations. My client had a private chat with him, asking if he would be comfortable if he invited him into the conversation in the team huddle each morning.Â
The reaction? Absolute relief, as it was a challenge for him to open the conversation, but once he was invited in, he felt comfortable participating.
A big part of being an effective leader is signalling; being very clear about what you’re about to do is critical, and encouraging people to speak up in a very explicit way is crucial.
