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A Culture of Impactful Leadership

Developing your Company Culture: 4 Key Principles  

Join us for a 4-part series that explores developing your company culture and taking your organization to the next level.

  1. A Culture of Impactful Leadership
  2. Continuous Development – The Path to Employee Engagement & Retention
  3. 5 Simple Steps to Foster Inclusion & Diversity
  4. 6 Secrets to Purposeful Collaboration & Equitable Experiences

Part 1: A Culture of Impactful Leadership

Leaders have an incredible opportunity to shape the culture of an organization and infuse the work with purpose and meaning. To create an environment where the employees are driven by a compelling vision and potential impact – and even more so by the incredible things we can accomplish working together as a team.

When we think of leaders, we often think of the CEO and the Executive Leadership Team. But when we think about the fabric of our daily existence at work – we’re interacting with countless leaders throughout the organization. Managers lead their teams. Project managers lead projects. Many people take up the leadership mantle. The success of an organization rests on the shoulders of its leaders – all of its leaders, from the CEO to the team lead.

Top 6 Attributes of Impactful Leaders:

  1. Create a Compelling Vision

When we think about inspiring leaders, we think about leaders who crystallize and communicate a vision so compelling it rallies the troops and irresistibly pulls employees toward that vision, like an inescapable gravitation pull. It’s a subtle, but powerful shift from I have to, to I get to!

A powerful and compelling why is irresistible to high achieving employees. At HealthEdge, our vision is innovating a world where healthcare can focus on people. This powerful why empowers our employees with a motivating reason to bring their best self to work to achieve that inspiring vision.   

  1. Lead Change

Change is constant, especially in dynamic industries like healthcare. The ability to lead people through change is a critical trait of impactful leaders. Well-led change can positively influence company culture, while poorly led change can damage company culture with a malignant spread of leadership mistrust and rumors.

Change initiatives don’t fail because of the content of the change – it almost always fails because the people aspect of the change wasn’t considered.

  1. Be Present

This one is amazingly simple, yet so hard with the constant demands of work, life, and pings from every device in your vicinity. When meeting with your team, be present. Pause your notifications, take a break from multi-tasking. Being truly present so your team members can feel truly heard is a powerful way to build trust and a strong bond with your team.

  1. Foster a culture of diversity & inclusion

Impactful leaders inspire and create a sense of belonging and purpose for the people working for them. Diverse teams lead to greater innovation and ultimately, greater financial results– but it’s up to the organizational culture and individual leaders to foster an environment where people feel they belong, can bring their true, authentic selves to work and perform at their highest levels. 

  1. Drive Accountability

In the words of Peter Drucker, what gets measured gets done. Impactful leaders set expectations, work with their teams to create the execution plan, and hold their people accountable. Nothing kills employee motivation like toiling on a task with no purpose or result.

  1. Be invested in the development of your people

An impactful leader is actively engaged in the development of their people. They work with their employees to understand their career goals, abilities, and aptitudes. Together, they develop a roadmap for their development, and then meet regularly to discuss progress and adjust as needed.  

Learn more about HealthEdge’s culture here.

About the Author

Heather Bender brings over 25 years experience to HealthEdge. She joins us from iRobot, where she served as Vice President of Talent. In that role, she was responsible for leading the efforts to elevate and renew the company’s talent strategies and culture as iRobot transformed to a consumer technology company. Heather was responsible for the global HR Business Partner teams, Talent Management, Organizational Development, Learning and Development and Diversity & Inclusion programs. Prior to iRobot, Heather held HR Business Partner roles at Nokia, working the transition of the mobile phone business to Microsoft, and then moved to HERE Technologies, a privately-held location services software business spun out by Nokia. At HERE she led the global HR Business Partner organization, ran global HR operations, and assisted with building out a new set of learning, leadership and talent programs. Heather lives in Hollis, NH, with her husband, Andrew and three children. With two in college, they are moving towards being empty nesters and travel as much as possible.

Profile Photo of Heather Bender