6 Habits of People-Centric Leaders

Use these habits to take your “people first” mantra beyond lip service.

Over the years, I’ve spent a lot of time talking to executive leaders about how they run their businesses.

In these discussions, even though there’s universal agreement that business success is centered around finding the right employees, many leaders use a data-centric approach, rather than a people-centric approach, to operating their companies. It’s more “what” than “who.”

In my own career, I have evolved toward a more human-centered style of leading. With a background in engineering, I once assumed that most business problems could be solved with enough available data and some logical thinking. But I’ve learned that a Spock-like, numbers-driven approach doesn’t work. You have to understand people too.

Here are six habits of leaders who operate with a people-first . These habits have gone a long way toward helping me build and operate several successful businesses.

1. People-centric leaders set a few clear priorities and share them consistently with the team. The data-centric leader has trouble prioritizing: If they can measure something in the business, they’re going to try and manage it. The result is an ocean of reports and metrics, with humans treated like proverbial cogs in the machine, or left out of the equation altogether. The people-centric leader, on the other hand, starts with a clearly articulated vision, then selects a few key priorities and metrics for the organization to focus on. They’re able to tell a story about what the company is trying to do, one that resonates with employees across the team.

2. People-centric leaders make sure everyone knows the “why” behind their work. As Daniel Pink has argued, a sense of purpose is one of the keys to motivating employees. Unfortunately, data-centric leaders often fail to give this to their people. People-centric leaders, however, give employees greater purpose at work by tying individual work to the broader priorities of the company. Your company doesn’t have to be preserving the rainforest or saving whales; simply cascading company priorities down into goals for teams and individuals helps employees see the context and purpose of their daily work.