Be a Self-Aware Leader

In 89 B.C., the Chinese emperor Wu released a document of self-criticism, known to history as the Repenting Edict of Luntai, to publicly apologize to the whole nation about his past policy mistakes. Shortly after the release of the edict, he ceased wars and territorial expansion and promoted agriculture, which set foundation for the successful reign of the Han Dynasty for more than 300 years.

Presently, Wu has been ranked as one of the most successful emperors in Chinese history. Self-criticism took great character strength and self-awareness for a regular person — not to mention an ancient emperor. But in the end, the ability to criticize oneself can help a person correct past mistakes and make the right decisions.

Therefore, if I have to pick one most critical leadership skill, it has to be self-awareness. This is because a self-aware leader can continuously evaluate and adjust his or her behaviors and work toward self-improvement. It also demonstrates a leader’s ability to be true to oneself and others — and understand one’s leadership impact on those who rely on him/her.

Research studies have found that the level of leader’s self-awareness is closely related to many important workplace outcomes. In these studies, a leader’s self-awareness is measured by the degree of agreement between the leader’s self-rating and others’ ratings. The results indicate that those who agree with others as to their high levels of leadership abilities (and were therefore more self-aware) tend to show higher performance and be rated as more effective by their supervisors. Meanwhile, leaders who agree with others that they are poor performers tend to have low performance and effectiveness ratings. They recognize their low levels of performance — but are unwilling or unable to make changes for various reasons. Without the actions to correct and amend one’s behaviors to improve one’s performance, we can’t call them self-aware leaders.

Subordinates of highly self-aware leaders have higher levels of job satisfaction, have more affections toward the organization and are strongly identified with the organization. On the other hand, leaders who overestimate their own leadership abilities (over-estimators) were seen as less effective leaders and associated with poorer performance and lower leadership effectiveness. However, most of the work outcomes were unrelated for underestimators.^1,2,3

Being self-aware was also found to be beneficial for one’s mental and physical health — resulting in individuals with higher levels of self-awareness tending to have lower stress levels.⁴

A leader’s level of self-awareness can be affected by many factors. Males and older individuals tend to overrate their leadership abilities and effectiveness. People who hold higher ranks in an organization tend to overrate themselves, which can be the result of lack of feedback from others. Education, intelligence and one’s personality can also affect one’s level of self-awareness. Educated, intelligent individuals tend to provide more accurate self-ratings in comparison to others, which can be the result of a more accurate assessment of one’s ability. People with low levels of empathy, high levels of narcissism and high levels of self-esteem tend to provide inflated self-ratings.⁵

To understand and improve your self-awareness, try to seek honest feedback from those around you and think critically about the responses. Because when people receive feedback from others over time, their self-awareness tends to increase. Utilize objective and professional tools to assess your leadership ability. Seek out support and help for self-improvement. Accept your imperfections and set goals to improve your weaknesses and reinforce your strengths. Most important of all, never cease to understand yourself.

If you are interested in the topic of self-awareness, read another article from Lead Read Today: "Leadership Tip of the Week: Self-Awareness", and stay tuned for a research white paper coming next month.

References

1. Atwater, L. E., & Yammarino, F. J. (1992). Does self–other agreement on leadership perceptions moderate the validity of leadership and performance predictions? Personnel Psychology, 45, 141−164.
2. Van Velsor, E., Taylor, S., & Leslie, J. (1993). An examination of the relationships among self-perception accuracy, self-awareness, gender, and leader effectiveness. Human Resource Management, 32, 249−264.
3. Szell, S., & Henderson, R. (1997). The impact of self-supervisor/subordinate performance rating agreement on subordinates' job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Journal of Applied Social Behavior, 3, 25−37.
4. Fogel, A. (2009). The Norton series on interpersonal neurobiology. The psychophysiology of self-awareness: Rediscovering the lost art of body sense. New York, NY, US: W W Norton & Co.
5. Fleenor, J. W., Smither, J. W., Atwater, L. E., Braddy, P. W., & Sturm, R. E. (2010). Self–other rating agreement in leadership: A review. The Leadership Quarterly, 21(6), 1005-1034.