Speaker 1: Helping leaders motivate their people to a higher level of
Speaker 1: performance through strong human relations, team building, and goal achieving.
Speaker 1: This is the seven minute Leadership Podcast with your host
Speaker 1: Paul Fellavaliedo. Hello everyone, and welcome to this seven minute
Speaker 1: leadership podcast. It's episode five sixty five and let me
Speaker 1: start with a hard truth most leaders never hear clearly.
Speaker 1: If your leadership style has not evolved in the last
Speaker 1: few years, it is probably falling behind right now. Leadership
Speaker 1: is not a fixed skill. It's not a certificate that
Speaker 1: you've earned once and get to rely on forever. It's
Speaker 1: a living system that has to adapt to people, pressure, pace,
Speaker 1: and reality. And here's the dangerous part. Leadership styles rarely
Speaker 1: fail all at once. They fail quietly. They fail in signals,
Speaker 1: and those signals show up long before the damage becomes obvious.
Speaker 1: So today I want to walk you through the signals
Speaker 1: that tell you your leadership style needs to evolve, not
Speaker 1: because you are failing, but because growth demands movement. The
Speaker 1: first signal you're getting compliance, not commitment. People do what
Speaker 1: you ask, Tasks get done, deadlines are met on paper.
Speaker 1: Everything looks fine, but the energy is gone. No one
Speaker 1: brings you ideas, no one challenges weak plans, meetings feel flat,
Speaker 1: conversations feel safe, maybe too safe. That's compliance. It's not
Speaker 1: leadership success. When people only give you what you ask
Speaker 1: for and nothing more. Your leadership style may be controlling
Speaker 1: outcomes but suppressing ownership. At some point, leaders have to
Speaker 1: shift from direct work to developing thinkers. If you're the
Speaker 1: smartest person in every room, in the only voice shaping decisions,
Speaker 1: that's not strength. That's a warning light. The second signal
Speaker 1: you solve everything yourself, and this one sneaks up on
Speaker 1: experienced leaders. You build your career by being reliable, decisive,
Speaker 1: and capable under pressure. When something breaks, you fix it.
Speaker 1: When a decision stalls, you push it forward. Over time,
Speaker 1: that strength turns into a bottleneck. If problems keep flowing
Speaker 1: to you instead of being solved where they occur, your
Speaker 1: leadership style is overdue for evolution. Strong leaders build systems
Speaker 1: and people that reduce dependency on them. If your team
Speaker 1: cannot function well without your constant involvement, you are not
Speaker 1: leading a team. You are carrying one. The third signal
Speaker 1: feedback has slowed down or stopped pay attention to who
Speaker 1: tells you the truth? If people stopped pushing back, stopped
Speaker 1: offering honest feedback, or stopped disagreeing with you. Something changed,
Speaker 1: either the culture shifted or your leadership signals changed. Silence
Speaker 1: is not agreement. Silence is often self protection. When leaders
Speaker 1: stop receiving real feedback, it's usually because people believe it's
Speaker 1: no longer safe or useful to speak up. That's not
Speaker 1: a people problem, that's a leadership signal. Evolving leaders actively
Speaker 1: invite tension, questions, and uncomfortable conversations. They do not punish
Speaker 1: honesty with defensiveness or dismissal. In the fourth signal, your
Speaker 1: old playbook no longer works. What got results five years
Speaker 1: ago may fall flat today. The workforce changed, expectations changed,
Speaker 1: communication norms changed, stress loads changed. If you find yourself
Speaker 1: saying this used to work, that's not frustration talking, that's data.
Speaker 1: Leadership evolution means updating your approach without losing your values.
Speaker 1: You keep your standards, but you adjust your methods. Aviation
Speaker 1: teaches this well. Pilots do not fly today using procedures
Speaker 1: from decades ago. They respect the fundamentals while adapting to
Speaker 1: better systems, better information in new risks. Leadership is no different.
Speaker 1: The fifth signal, you feel constantly drained instead of challenged.
Speaker 1: Leadership is demanding, but it should not feel like a
Speaker 1: constant grind that drains purpose. When leaders operate with outdated styles,
Speaker 1: everything takes more effort. Conversations are harder, Motivation feels forced,
Speaker 1: decision making feels heavy. That exhaustion is often a signal
Speaker 1: that you're leading against the current instead of with it. Evolving,
Speaker 1: leaders simplify, they clarify. They build alignment that reduces friction
Speaker 1: instead of absorbing it all themself. The sixth signal you're
Speaker 1: protecting authority instead of building trust. Watch how you respond
Speaker 1: when your authority is questioned. Do you default to position, title,
Speaker 1: or rank or do you lean into explanation, accountability, and
Speaker 1: shared purpose. Leaders who feel the need to constantly remind
Speaker 1: people who is in charge or usually compensating for a
Speaker 1: lack of trust or credibility in that moment. True authority
Speaker 1: grows when people trust your judgment and your intentions. That
Speaker 1: requires evolving from command based leadership to influence based leadership
Speaker 1: when the situation demands it. The seventh signal, you avoid
Speaker 1: aid certain conversations. Every leader has conversations that they delay
Speaker 1: performance issues, culture problems, behavior that everyone else sees, but
Speaker 1: no one addresses. Avoidance is a leadership signal when your
Speaker 1: style no longer gives you the tools or confidence to
Speaker 1: handle hard conversations effectively. Evolution is required. Leaders grow by
Speaker 1: expanding their capacity for discomfort, not by side stepping it. Now,
Speaker 1: here's the most important thing I want you to hear.
Speaker 1: Needing to evolve does not mean that you've failed. It
Speaker 1: means you're paying attention. The best leaders that I have
Speaker 1: worked with reinvent parts of their leadership multiple times over
Speaker 1: their career, not because that they were broken, but because
Speaker 1: the mission changed, the people changed, and the environment changed.
Speaker 1: Leadership evolution starts with awareness, then humility, than intentional adjustment.
Speaker 1: So ask yourself this week what signals am I seeing?
Speaker 1: Where am I clinging to what worked instead of what works? Now?
Speaker 1: That reflection alone puts you ahead of most leaders Leadership
Speaker 1: is not about becoming someone else. It's about becoming more
Speaker 1: effective for the people and problems that are in front
Speaker 1: of you right now. Pay attention to the signals you're
Speaker 1: trying to help you grow, not push you out. This
Speaker 1: has been the seven minute Leadership Podcast, and I thank
Speaker 1: you for listening. For more. Paul fell of Alito podcasts.
Speaker 1: Visit Paulfellowalito dot com.