The Inspiring Leader by Jack ZengerHere are a few insights drawn from The Inspiring Leader: Unlocking the Secrets of How Extraordinary Leaders Motivate:

“Adequate leaders get everyone to do their jobs, but inspirational leaders are able to get people to rise far above that mark and achieve more.”

“Inspiration and emotion are inextricably linked together. The inspiring leader learns how to use this other realm of life, despite the fact that we seldom have any formal education or training that would help us to be good at it. The fact is that the proper use of emotion is a key factor in the success of every inspiring leader … the leader’s emotions are ‘super contagious.’”

“One factor that was twice as powerful as anything else in predicting the teams’ success was the ratio of positive comments (approval, suggestions, praise, appreciation, compliments, and overall support) to negative comments (pointing out faults, disparagement, criticism, or disapproval). The ratio of positive to negative comments in the highest-performing teams was 5 to 1, in medium-performing teams it was just below 2 to 1, and in the low-performing teams it was roughly 1 positive for every 3 negative. Studies done in both industry and marriage counseling reinforce the value of positive communication outnumbering any kind of negative messages by roughly 5 to 1.3.”

” … the delegation process that is so familiar to leaders and carried out so frequently can occur in a perfunctory fashion. In that case, the motivational dimension of it will be minimal at best. Or, delegation can be elevated to an important discussion and can be wrapped with important messages that inspire and that generate positive motivation. It is all about how the leader elects to conduct the discussion.”

“Innovation is connected to inspiration. That is a statistical fact. Frankly, we were a bit surprised at the strong link between the two. We never would have predicted it. But in every organization that we studied, this factor jumped out. There is obviously something about a leader’s encouraging innovation that has an extremely powerful impact on people. People are jazzed by the opportunity to participate in new and exciting activities.”