During the past decade, I have trained more than 5,000 federal executives in leadership and executive core competencies, coached political appointees, and worked with roughly 400 executives entering into the Senior Executive Service (SES) or SES Candidate Development Programs. Hearing the stories of these leaders has given me a unique perspective into the federal leadership world. My conclusion: successful leadership depends on trust, credibility, and respect.

I always begin classes by exploring leadership behaviors on a spectrum I call "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly." Keep in mind that everyone falls somewhere on this spectrum; it is a matter of degree and of intent that is important. We then examine the implications of these behaviors on the staff, organizational environment, and mission. It is uncanny how closely each group mirrors the others in describing leadership behaviors and agreeing that ugly behaviors negatively affect a group and the performance of the mission.

I agree with the conclusions in Bob Tobias's article in Government Executive, "When Executive Core Qualifications Aren't Enough." In my view, while we evaluate possession of Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs), not enough is done to evaluate an executive's character and emotional intelligence in either the selection or performance process, because they are much more difficult to assess. While I believe we can train individuals to improve their leadership competencies, I do not believe we can improve their character with training.

Now that we have the negative out of the way, let's look at great leadership. After a decade of these class discussions and individual coaching sessions, I discovered a rather simple leadership model for executive success (see Figure 1). Successful leadership relies heavily on three factors that are only loosely tied to the five ECQs: trust, credibility, and respect, which I call the "linchpins of success." These linchpins, however, can be closely tied to emotional intelligence and character.

Using the model from my coaching system, imagine a leader within a circle engraved with these three words and with senior leaders above the circle, staff below the circle, peers to one side, and stakeholders to the other. To lead successfully, the leader's relationships with these four groups must be nurtured with the three linchpins.

These three linchpins and the leader relationship model apply to both individual and organizational leadership. Good leaders give respect and trust to others and expect to receive the same. They also work on building relationships and understand the power of others' perceptions of their behaviors.

I would like to share some stories that illustrate leadership successes based on these three linchpins. First, there was an executive at NASA who volunteered to be the media spokesperson when the space shuttle disaster struck. I often use this example in class, pointing out that he, an engineer by profession, was not the best writer I had encountered, yet he wanted to be the media person.

Indeed, he wasn't a great writer, but he was a great spokesperson. More importantly, I believe he was given the job by the NASA administrator because he had the other critical linchpins. He had worked at various centers and at headquarters and had gained the trust and respect of both senior leadership and those in the field, and his technical credibility was unquestionable. He was able to glean facts and find answers that others could not, and was able to deliver clear, honest messages on this very complex and sensitive topic.

After it was all over, he visited the other agencies that had helped during the disaster and brought awards and other tokens of gratitude, showing that their assistance was valued and respected.

My second example involves the executive in charge of the Customs and Border Protection Academy who was faced with training 2,000 new agents virtually overnight following the events of 9/11. He was able to convince his senior leadership to take an incredible risk and approve an investment: consolidate training in one location by moving the Academy to the desert to train the new agents in their future working environment.

Even more surprising, he convinced his East Coast staff to follow him into the desert. How? By getting senior leadership to make a commitment to his staff and their families that if they could not adjust to the new environment, they would be given priority consideration for reassignment to another area after the Academy was up and running. What's more, the agency set aside funds to cover these potential personnel moves as proof of their commitment.

In the end, his risk paid dividends—virtually all his staff followed him to the desert and the Academy was able to meet its greatly expanded mission without disruption. But, more than that, I believe the employees felt their contributions were valued and they could trust the agency to act in their best interests.

As someone who had been involved with DoD Reductions in Force (RIF) and base closures, and observed the leadership decisions that were made, I can safely say that during times of change, crisis leadership shows its true colors. Trust, credibility, and respect can be destroyed in a day, often taking years to rebuild—meanwhile, employee engagement is evaporating and the mission suffering.

While training executives at the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), I witnessed good strategic planning and an exceptional level of transparency around its pending move to Fort Meade. Although I wasn't privy to all the details, I understand this also reaped trust—a fact borne out by an unprecedented number of staff moving to the new location. Again, trust, credibility, and respect played a large role in this effort: DISA leaders did this well.

My last example returns to NASA. I had the privilege of teaching an executive leadership class the day the NASA administrator and his senior team held a town-hall meeting to roll out the 10-year strategic plan. That morning the class and I had been exploring general leadership behaviors, values, and priorities. That afternoon the video of the live town hall was presented in my classroom. How exciting!

The administrator began his session with an emotionally charged statement that he believed NASA was its people, presenting an excellent example of good leadership. As his presentation progressed, each point I had made earlier in the day about leadership values and priorities and the leadership model was reinforced by the administrator's and his senior leaders' discussion of the plan: encouraging creativity, taking reasonable risks, building relationships, proving credibility, showing value, engendering trust and accountability, and recognizing achievements of staff—what a great teaching moment!

We in government tend to reward short-term gains. We generally are better at measuring "what" than measuring the "how" when evaluating our leaders' performance or potential for advancement. But poor behaviors are not sustainable for either an individual or an organization.

We need adaptable, sustainable government organizations. Using the linchpins of success—trust, credibility and respect—we can not only meet our agency's goals today, but create agile and healthy organizations for the future.

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Successful leaders gain credibility, trust, and respect.

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