6 ways to demonstrate people-centered leadership

Expectations of leaders have shifted and employee preferences are changing as work-life balance becomes more of a demand than fringe benefit. Leaders can no longer get away with taking a strictly business mentality – they must account for their employees as unique individuals, not robots with zero feelings or external pressures.

As a result, people-centered leadership has become more of a focal point. Not only are employees demanding an end to toxic leadership behaviors, but they are asking that leaders bring a level of intention and consideration to the role. So how does people-centered leadership become engrained within an organization and why is it one of the top skills for leaders to put into practice?

People-centered leadership in practice 

Overall, the call for leaders to adopt a more people-focused, or employee-centered leadership style, has grown increasingly louder. At the same time of course, leaders must balance this with the necessity of delivering organizational success and, where required, driving business transformation. 

Talogy’s research highlights behaviors that leaders need to focus on to provide more people-centric leadership. Interestingly, a key insight from our research was that employees and leaders reported that the leadership behaviors that drive organizational results are the same behaviors that create a positive employee experience. The six key behaviors we’ve identified each directly meet a core need employees have at work. 

1. Inspiring, motivating, and engaging people 

Many employees are looking for organizations that have an inspiring purpose and vision that they can personally engage with through their work. People-centered leaders focus on creating this meaning and purpose for employees – giving them a ‘why’ to their work and providing a clear line of sight between what they do and the overall goals of the organization. Scientific research indicates that meaningful work is strongly associated with employees having higher work engagement, commitment, and job satisfaction. 

2. Empowering people to deliver

With many teams now functioning in a hybrid or remote workplace, it is more important than ever that leaders empower their employees by putting their trust in them to find the best way to achieve organizational goals. People-centered leaders recognize the complex problems employees are facing today can no longer be solved by the ‘heroic leader’ that always has all the answers. It’s okay for there to be a level of vulnerability in leadership because they are human like everyone else.

From an employee perspective, this is also important because autonomy is a fundamental psychological need. Research suggests that leaders who adopt an empowering leadership style are more likely to have positive, motivated employees who perform better. 

3. Fostering collaboration, trust, and respect

For organizations that have moved to a hybrid or remote working model, leaders face a challenge in terms of building and maintaining collaboration. People-centered leaders work to find the most effective ways to foster team spirit, connection, and inclusion between team members working remotely. This is important because feeling a sense of relatedness is another basic psychological need that helps encourage intrinsic motivation at work. Beyond this, people-centered leadership requires managers and executive leaders to think carefully about which activities may benefit from being worked on in-person versus in a remote setting. 

4. Demonstrating authentic leadership characteristics

Now more than ever, there is increased focus and expectations around a leader’s character and values. Being open, authentic, and honest, as well as demonstrating a clear moral compass are essential ingredients to build trust, loyalty, and commitment in the workplace. Leaders who behave unethically – such as lying or treating people unfairly – lose credibility quickly with their employees.

A leader’s own integrity and behavior is also important for setting standards within the organization to help build an inclusive culture that embraces cross-cultural leadership. Therefore, people-centered leaders need to be accountable for setting the right example for employees to follow. 

5. Coaching and developing people

To address the challenge of retaining talent, people-centered leaders proactively look for opportunities to help employees grow and develop within their organization. People are more likely to feel intrinsically motivated when their role provides them with an opportunity to build their competence and mastery – a third basic psychological need. 

Additionally, effective coaching from leaders should also increase individual and team performance. Leaders should provide regular, constructive guidance and feedback to help individuals build on their personal strengths and improve their development areas. 

6. Showing empathy and compassion 

Leaders have a critical role to play when it comes to well-being in the workplace and work-life balance. The most effective people-centered leaders can recognize the emotional stress and anxiety that individuals and teams are under and respond by showing genuine care and concern towards their challenges.

Leading with empathy and compassion is important because, according to a report from the UK Chartered Institute for Personnel & Development, stress remains one of the leading causes of absence at work, and management style has been identified as one of the most common causes of stress by employees. 

The impact of people-centric leadership in the workplace 

These six attributes lie at the heart of effective people-centered leadership, according to both employees and leaders themselves. Each of these attributes supports a core need which employees have in their work: to have purpose and meaning, autonomy, connectedness, trust, opportunity to develop, and genuine concern for their well-being. For many leaders, this will require them to reflect, adjust, and evolve their approach to be successful in the future. 

Leaders who can demonstrate these qualities consistently will be well prepared to provide a more people-centered leadership approach moving forward. In turn, this will enable leaders to navigate the key challenges they are likely to face in the future and help them achieve sustainable success both for the organization and their employees.