Master leadership skills with Gallup research insights. Learn how CliftonStrengths, engagement data, and decades of studies define effective leadership capabilities.
Written by Laura Bouttell • Fri 9th January 2026
Leadership skills according to Gallup research challenge conventional assumptions about what makes leaders effective. Rather than identifying a single set of characteristics that define great leaders, Gallup's decades of research—encompassing millions of interviews and thousands of organisations—reveals that the most effective leaders understand their unique strengths and deploy them strategically. This strengths-based approach to leadership, grounded in the CliftonStrengths assessment taken by over 26 million people, demonstrates that leadership effectiveness comes not from conforming to universal competencies but from maximising individual talents.
What distinguishes Gallup's contribution to leadership understanding is its empirical foundation. Unlike leadership theories derived from observation or philosophy, Gallup's insights emerge from rigorous research measuring actual outcomes—engagement, performance, retention, and business results. This evidence-based approach provides leaders with actionable guidance grounded in what demonstrably works.
Gallup's leadership insights derive from extensive empirical research.
Gallup's research reveals that effective leadership isn't about possessing specific traits but about understanding and leveraging individual strengths. The most effective leaders figure out how best to use what they've got—understanding the strengths they have and how those strengths help them be effective. According to Gallup researchers Tom Rath and Barry Conchie, authors of Strengths Based Leadership, the greatest leaders are highly aware of their natural talents and spend countless hours making themselves better at what they do best.
Key Gallup leadership findings:
| Finding | Implication | Application |
|---|---|---|
| No universal leadership profile | Leaders succeed through different strengths | Develop your unique capabilities |
| Strengths awareness matters | Self-knowledge enables effectiveness | Assess and understand your talents |
| Follower needs are consistent | Trust, compassion, stability, hope | Focus on what followers require |
| Teams need complementary strengths | No individual has all capabilities | Build balanced leadership teams |
| Engagement drives results | Leadership impacts engagement dramatically | Prioritise team engagement |
Gallup research identifies four fundamental needs followers have from leaders: trust (honesty, integrity, respect), compassion (caring, friendship, happiness, love), stability (security, strength, support, peace), and hope (direction, faith, guidance). Whilst good communication and motivation matter, these four needs prove most critical for follower engagement and commitment. Leaders who consistently provide trust, compassion, stability, and hope create the conditions for team success.
Follower needs:
CliftonStrengths provides the foundation for Gallup's strengths-based leadership approach.
CliftonStrengths (formerly StrengthsFinder) is Gallup's assessment that identifies an individual's top talents from 34 possible themes. For leadership, these 34 themes organise into four leadership domains: Executing (turning ideas into reality), Influencing (selling ideas and ensuring teams are heard), Relationship Building (forming teams that build on composite skills), and Strategic Thinking (helping teams make better decisions). Understanding your dominant domains enables strategic deployment of your natural leadership capabilities.
CliftonStrengths leadership domains:
| Domain | Focus | Example Themes |
|---|---|---|
| Executing | Getting things done | Achiever, Deliberative, Discipline, Focus |
| Influencing | Taking charge, speaking up | Activator, Command, Communication, Competition |
| Relationship Building | Creating bonds that hold teams together | Empathy, Harmony, Includer, Relator |
| Strategic Thinking | Absorbing and analysing information | Analytical, Context, Futuristic, Ideation |
The four leadership domains represent different ways leaders contribute to team success. Executing leaders excel at making things happen—they're the implementers who transform plans into results. Influencing leaders help teams be heard, selling ideas internally and externally. Relationship Building leaders create cohesion, connecting people and generating trust. Strategic Thinking leaders absorb information and help teams consider alternatives and make informed decisions. No leader excels in all four; effective leadership teams include complementary strengths.
Domain functions:
Strengths-based leadership transforms how leaders develop and deploy their capabilities.
Strengths-based leadership is an approach where leaders identify, develop, and strategically deploy their natural talents rather than focusing on weakness remediation. Research shows this approach dramatically improves both leader effectiveness and team engagement. In organisations with leadership that focuses on employee strengths, the odds of people being engaged increase approximately eightfold. Strengths-based leaders understand what they do best and position themselves to contribute through those capabilities.
Strengths-based approach:
| Traditional Approach | Strengths-Based Approach |
|---|---|
| Fix weaknesses | Develop strengths |
| Conform to universal competencies | Leverage unique talents |
| Well-rounded development | Specialised excellence |
| Remediation focus | Amplification focus |
| Generic training | Personalised development |
Apply strengths-based leadership through: self-awareness (understanding your top strengths through assessment), strategic positioning (placing yourself in roles utilising your strengths), team complementarity (surrounding yourself with people whose strengths differ from yours), strength investment (developing your talents into genuine strengths), and weakness management (partnering with others or managing around weaknesses rather than obsessing over them). The goal isn't ignoring weaknesses but ensuring strengths drive contribution.
Application steps:
Gallup's employee engagement research demonstrates leadership's critical impact.
Gallup research demonstrates that managers account for 70% of variance in employee engagement scores. Leadership directly determines whether employees become engaged, disengaged, or actively disengaged—with massive consequences for organisational performance. Engaged employees demonstrate higher productivity, lower turnover, better customer outcomes, and greater profitability. The quality of leadership, particularly immediate management, determines engagement more than any other factor.
Leadership engagement impact:
| Leadership Quality | Engagement Impact | Business Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Strengths-focused | 8x higher engagement | Higher performance |
| Clear expectations | Strong engagement | Better productivity |
| Recognition given | Sustained engagement | Improved retention |
| Development focus | Deep engagement | Enhanced capability |
| Opinion valued | Meaningful engagement | Greater innovation |
Gallup research identifies that effective managers: individualise (understand each team member as a unique person), set clear expectations (ensure people know what's expected), recognise frequently (acknowledge good work regularly), care about development (support growth and learning), value opinions (ask for and act on input), and focus on strengths (help people understand and use their talents). These practices create engagement that drives performance, regardless of the manager's specific CliftonStrengths profile.
Effective manager practices:
Gallup research emphasises team composition over individual completeness.
No individual possesses all 34 CliftonStrengths or excels across all four domains. Attempting to develop universal competency wastes resources on weakness remediation whilst neglecting strengths amplification. Effective leadership teams deliberately include complementary strengths—ensuring the team collectively can execute, influence, build relationships, and think strategically, even though no individual can do all four equally well. Team composition matters more than individual comprehensiveness.
Complementarity principles:
| Individual Approach | Team Approach |
|---|---|
| Develop all competencies | Cover all domains across team |
| One leader decides | Strengths inform who leads what |
| Same training for all | Role-specific development |
| Universal expectations | Individualised contribution |
| Jack of all trades | Specialist collaboration |
Build strengths-based leadership teams by: assessing all members (understanding each person's CliftonStrengths), mapping team strengths (visualising collective capability across domains), identifying gaps (recognising missing domains or underrepresented themes), assigning strategically (matching responsibilities to strengths), recruiting deliberately (filling gaps through hiring or development), and creating appreciation (helping team members understand and value different strengths). Team effectiveness comes from strategic combination, not uniform excellence.
Team building process:
According to Gallup, leadership skills aren't universal competencies but individual talents that leaders develop and deploy strategically. The 34 CliftonStrengths themes organise into four leadership domains: Executing (implementation), Influencing (advocacy), Relationship Building (connection), and Strategic Thinking (analysis). Effective leaders understand their unique strengths and maximise them.
CliftonStrengths is Gallup's assessment identifying individual talents from 34 possible themes. For leadership, these themes organise into four domains—Executing, Influencing, Relationship Building, and Strategic Thinking. Over 26 million people have taken the assessment, and 467 Fortune 500 companies use it for leadership development.
Gallup research identifies four fundamental follower needs: trust (honesty, integrity, respect), compassion (genuine caring), stability (security, consistent support), and hope (positive direction, guidance). Leaders who consistently meet these needs create engaged, committed teams regardless of their specific leadership style.
Gallup research shows managers account for 70% of variance in employee engagement. Leadership that focuses on employee strengths increases engagement odds approximately eightfold. Engaged employees demonstrate higher productivity, lower turnover, and better business outcomes—making leadership quality critical for organisational success.
Strengths-based leadership focuses on identifying, developing, and strategically deploying natural talents rather than remediating weaknesses. Leaders assess their CliftonStrengths, understand their dominant domains, position themselves for strength utilisation, and build teams with complementary capabilities. This approach dramatically improves both leader effectiveness and team engagement.
Apply Gallup research by completing CliftonStrengths assessment to understand your talents, learning how your strengths manifest in leadership, positioning yourself in roles utilising those strengths, building teams with complementary capabilities, and focusing on the follower needs of trust, compassion, stability, and hope.
No individual excels across all four CliftonStrengths domains. Effective leadership teams include members with complementary strengths—ensuring collective capability in executing, influencing, relationship building, and strategic thinking. Team composition matters more than individual comprehensiveness; diversity of strengths enables teams to address all leadership requirements.
Leadership skills according to Gallup research emphasise self-awareness, strengths development, and strategic team composition over conformity to universal competencies. The most effective leaders understand their unique talents and deploy them strategically whilst building teams with complementary capabilities. This evidence-based approach, grounded in decades of research and millions of data points, provides actionable guidance for leadership development.
Begin by assessing your own strengths through CliftonStrengths or similar instruments. Understand which of the four leadership domains represent your greatest capabilities—Executing, Influencing, Relationship Building, or Strategic Thinking. Consider how your specific talent themes manifest in leadership contexts and where you contribute most effectively.
Build leadership effectiveness by maximising your strengths rather than obsessing over weaknesses. Position yourself for contribution through your natural capabilities, surround yourself with people whose strengths complement yours, and focus on meeting followers' fundamental needs for trust, compassion, stability, and hope. The path to leadership excellence runs through self-awareness and strategic deployment of what you naturally do best.