Last Updated on December 30, 2025 by Fly High Coaching
The transformational leadership style is about helping people evolve through clarity, curiosity, and connection. It’s not one-size-fits-all; leaders improve themselves to better others. This episode shows how to build growth-oriented teams without burnout.
In this episode, you’ll learn practical ways to apply transformation at work. Our host and CEO Porschia speaks with Hakim Lakhdar about defining leadership and adapting styles. They share simple steps you can use in everyday conversations and decisions.
They explain why great leaders toggle styles, what the transformational leadership style really is, and how it’s different. Essentials include listening to understand, staying open, and choosing connection over charisma. You’ll also learn to avoid quick-fix traps and build a reflection habit that sticks.
Hakim Lakhdar is a fractional coach and Florida’s #1 transformational leadership coach. An NLP-certified expert with nearly two decades developing senior leaders at top institutions. He blends business, sports, and the arts to help high performers lead with clarity, confidence, and compassion.
What you’ll learn:
- What the transformational leadership style is and when to use it
- A clear definition of a leader and why you should improve yourself to better others
- How to adapt leadership styles to people, context, and goals
- Core essentials of the transformational leadership style: deep listening, openness, psychological safety, and connection over charisma
- Common mistakes executives and professionals make and what to do instead
- Practical tools to enhance your leadership skills: scheduled reflection, peer dialogues, coaching, and thoughtful use of AI
As a thank you for listening to this episode of the Career 101 Podcast, we are sharing our FREE master class – Career 911: Solving the Top 5 Challenges Executives and Professionals Have! It’s a training based on solving the common problems our clients have experienced to reach their goals. You can get access to the master class here!
Resources:
- Episode Transcript
Porschia: [00:00:00] Hello, I’m Portia Parker Griffin, and I wanna welcome you to the Career 1 0 1 Podcast, a place for ambitious professionals and seasoned executives who want an edge in their career. We’re talking about all of the things you were never taught or told when it comes to career growth, development, and change.
Now let’s get into it.
Today we are talking about the transformational leadership style with Hakeem Aktar. Hakeem is a fractional coach and Florida’s number one transformational leadership coach. Through his work, Hakeem empowers high performing professionals across business, sports, and entertainment to lead themselves and others with clarity, confidence, and compassion.
With nearly two decades of experience developing senior leaders and professional education programs at top institutions, [00:01:00] Hakeem len’s expertise with a rich and diverse background. From acting and performing to international team management, an NLP certified coach with advanced certifications in coaching and personal development.
Ha. Keem’s unique and insight-driven approach helps clients address the most significant issues, not just the obvious ones, so they can reveal their full power and achieve lasting transformation. Hi Hakeem, how are you today?
Hakim: Hi. That was a mouthful. I like, I I like it though. I appreciate that intro. Thank you so much.
Porschia: Absolutely. We want to roll out the red carpet for you, Hakeem. I am excited to have you with us to discuss the transformational leadership style, but first we wanna know a little more about you. So tell me about 7-year-old Hakeem.
Hakim: Oh, 7-year-old Hakeem. Well, I have 7-year-old twin boys, so it’s, it, I, I get to watch me in them all the time.
Mm-hmm. I, I got the [00:02:00] question recently. So how long have you been coaching? And my go-to response is, I’ve been coaching since I was seven years old, so it’s fitting that you asked me that question. I was the kid whose friend was picked last for kickball and, you know, would, would sort of shuffle off with their head down and I’d say, you know what, I’m gonna set this game out.
And I’d go walk the fence line and we’d talk about why getting picked last for kickball. Was okay. And that there’s always tomorrow and you can get better at kickball. And you know, I was a little coach. I’ve always been that, that, that guy, I’ve always been that little kid. I was fun loving. I was silly.
I was worried. I was a worried little 7-year-old. I think probably thought a lot about people, thought a lot about feelings, thought a lot about. Situations that I was in and you know what layers there were to each of those. My third grade teacher asked my parents, you know, why is he [00:03:00] always so worried?
Is he always worried like this? I just was a big thinker and a big feeler. And I think that’s served me actually really well in my life.
Porschia: So what did 7-year-old Hakeem wanna be when he grew up as he was thinking and worrying about these things?
Hakim: Hmm. I think I wanted to be a teacher. My father was a a very passionate he’s still with us, but he has retired and he was a professor of special education for 44 years.
And when you hear people talk about, you know, loving what they do and never working a day in their life because they love what they do, he was that guy. He was someone who absolutely loved what he did. He was deeply passionate about that work and I loved that. It was inspiring to me and I thought. I want to have that same feeling.
I want to teach people. I want to you know, develop and, and, and create with, with people who are eager to learn and teaching was something I thought I ultimately would want to do.
Porschia: Love [00:04:00] that. So, Hakeem, tell us about some highlights or pivotal moments in your career before you started your business.
Hakim: So one of the things that I found interesting was, you know, throughout my career I was working in the legal profession as a non-lawyer, and I was always working with lawyers, but not someone who was aspiring to go to law school, but really was passionate about. Professional development, leadership management training.
So I was always confronted with this, well, what are you doing here? Kind of response to my involvement in certain things because I wasn’t a legal professional, I didn’t have a legal background. I wasn’t aspiring to go into the legal profession. So there was always this question of, well, why lawyers? To me, honestly, it didn’t matter who I was in conversation with.
It wanted, I wanted to be in conversation ultimately with people who were passionate about bettering themselves and, and transforming as [00:05:00] individuals and as leaders of people. So I. I think that really shaped me having to have that conversation with myself often and do a lot of self-leadership around, okay what is this saying about me?
Am I in the right place? Am I doing the right thing? And ultimately I was.
Porschia: Love that. And so I know Hakeem, that you also had this very interesting international affairs type background as well. What motivated you to become a coach?
Hakim: Yeah, I remember going over to Kirghistan and Tajikistan for some work.
Not often on a short list of, you know, spring break destinations perhaps. But I, I found myself in Kirghistan and I was going there to help support some of my field staff in, you know, proposal writing and report writing for some of the programs that we were administering overseas. And I noticed that there was, you know, a real [00:06:00] dearth of leadership.
There was a, a real hunger for professional development and coaching and support, and when I connected with my field staff, which I, you know, I have a unique ability to create that trust and rapport very quickly with, with people. And I did so with my field staff. I noticed that what they were really hungry for and, and, and yearning for was.
Opportunities to, to, to elevate their leadership, to advance themselves as professionals, as as individual contributors, and ultimately as a team. So we pivoted a little bit and we ended up. Having some really powerful conversations about how they could operate better as a team and what the leader could do more of or less of.
And that’s really where I fell in love with like sort of the, the formal structure of coaching because I realized these are the conversations I’ve always had. I wanted to have more of these and I started tailoring my career to do more of that.
Porschia: Great. So before we [00:07:00] get into deep with leadership, I wanna know what is your definition of a leader?
Hakim: Hmm. So very, very simply, I will say a leader is somebody who sees opportunity to better themselves in order to better those around them.
Porschia: I like that definition. I like that definition a lot. So we talk about leadership and leadership development a lot on this podcast. Back in episode 89, we touched on different leadership styles and that was one of our most popular episodes. So what are your thoughts on people utilizing different leadership styles?
Hakim: Yeah, it’s a great question and it comes up a lot, as you can imagine. And I, I’m no, not surprised that it was a popular episode because oftentimes when I’m doing trainings for groups of leaders, I’ll go through, you know, 14 different leadership styles and I’ll [00:08:00] describe them in detail and give examples.
And then at the end I’ll ask this, you know, slightly cheeky question where I’ll say, so which one’s the best? Everyone will raise their hand and they’ll say this one or that one, and, you know, give their reasons why. And they say, well, you’re all wrong. You know, or maybe you’re all right in that there’s no one leadership style that is better than the other.
I think a really effective leader has the ability to toggle across those leadership styles in a way that is appropriate for the person or people that they’re leading. The situation that they’re, they find themselves in the industry or business that they’re in. And I think that leadership style also, people default to this idea of, you know, this very structured very set way of doing things as it pertains to a leadership style.
But when I’m talking about leadership style with clients, I’m talking about what’s most authentic to them. And leadership style really varies from [00:09:00] person to person to person, because ultimately I want you to lead in a way that’s most authentic and most comfortable for you, so that you can do that every single day.
Because these leaders who wake up every day trying to reinvent themselves as this best leader, new kind of leader, strongest leader, whatever it might be, every day, it’s just so exhausting and it’s not sustainable.
Porschia: I definitely agree with that, Hakeem, and I think a lot of that. Feeling or pressure to kind of adhere to this specific leadership style?
Comes from a few different areas. I would guess you’ve seen this as well, but I’ve seen a lot of our organizational clients have a preference. For different leadership methodologies and theories. One of the most common ones out there today is transformational leadership. So I was really excited that you are an expert in this area.
For those who don’t know, what is transformational leadership?
Hakim: Yeah, [00:10:00] so transformational leadership, as I see it, is a little bit of what I described a leader to be. I think it’s someone who sees opportunity in everything, sees possibility in everything and everyone, and creates an environment where people can, as we all naturally do, evolve.
They can transform as contributors to a project, to to a process, to a team, to a culture. And if we try to put people in boxes constantly, ourselves included it, it limits our ability to transform. And I think that, you know, one of my declarations without getting too, like, you know, hippie dippy is like.
I am the universe unfolding. You know this. It’s I, this idea that we are always evolving, we are always, you know, there’s, there’s change always happening and if we can embrace that and we can support that, and we can nurture that, then it, it may, it may work out that that [00:11:00] transformation serves. Our purpose, our shared goal really well.
It may also mean that it doesn’t, and that’s okay too. And there’s something else or somewhere else that that person’s better suited to operate in. But I think the transformation is just sort of an acceptance of the natural evolution of, of a, of a pro professional.
Porschia: Yeah. So what do you think are some of the essential aspects of transformational leadership?
Hakim: I think one of them is something, you know, we talk a lot about in training is this idea of just because you’re right doesn’t mean they’re wrong. And it’s this willingness to not always know everything to not always have to have all the answers. I got into a pretty heated exchange with a client one time.
Where we were talking about the role of a leader and they were saying, it’s my job. It’s what I get paid to do, to have all the answers. And [00:12:00] they were pretty set on on that being the role of a leader. I think transformational leadership, one of them is really listening to understand before being understood.
I think that it’s that openness and willingness to see other perspectives. And to be open to other possibilities. And that’s what allows, I think, you know, sort of in the spirit of leading by example, others to do the same.
Porschia: Yeah. And I would be interested Hakeem to know if you see this, more common mindset play out.
We work with organizations a lot and one of the kind of main areas that we touch on a lot is what I call multi-generational workplace issues. And that mindset that’s more authoritative in nature in that I’m the leader, I’m the content process expert. Everyone comes to me for everything. That more and I’m just gonna call it an authoritative [00:13:00] leadership style for now.
I tend to see that more of our clients who are baby boomers specifically mm-hmm. Generally kind of had that belief based on their generation. And I tend to see that younger generations, a lot of millennials, gen Zs, they do not necessarily think of the leader as the person having all the answers.
Being the, the expert on everything. For a lot of reasons. One of which I think is because they know they can go online and find expert answers from someone who might even have more experience than your boss. Yeah, right. They’re looking for something deeper in leadership. So I say that because, you know, your example made me think about it, but I’m wondering, do you see any kind of trends among generations?
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Show notes.
Hakim: Like what I mentioned?
Yeah, I think so. I, I think that it’s, it’s access to information is a big one for sure. And, and the information isn’t just for question answer. I think it’s the information that allows us to understand the difference between whether people understand it in these terms or not.
The difference between a fixed mindset and a growth mindset. And generationally I think just out of necessity younger generations are having to have a much more growth oriented mindset. I. Things aren’t as cut and dry, black and white, this or that. I operate from a place of both and not either or.
And I don’t think that’s common of people in my generation and, and older because options were more limited. [00:16:00] Possibilities were a bit more reduced or selected. And I think that the. Ability for, you know, both generations or multiple generations to be able to engage in a conversation where, again, just because I’m right, doesn’t mean you’re wrong, comes into play.
They realize that they’re coming out of from a place of curiosity rather than of judgment. And they can say, I’m not here to determine whether or not you’re right or you’re wrong. But I’m actually just genuinely curious, like, where did you come up with that? What, why, what, what has you thinking about it that way?
From both sides helps to, to sort of break down the walls a bit and then also create more of a culture of growth mind, you know, growth oriented mindset.
Porschia: Yeah. So how do you think transformational leaders are different from other leaders?
Hakim: It’s a great question. I think. It’s something that I tell my clients all the time, which, you know, they may or may not like [00:17:00] to hear, but transformational leaders understand and accept that the work of leadership whether it be self-leadership or of leading others, it’s a mountain with no top. It’s not the kind of work that, you know, there are 10 steps, and once you get to step 10.
You’re all done and cool. I’m the best leader ever. I don’t need to do any more work. This is, you know, the work. Never ends. It’s ongoing. We’re, you know, as we are evolving and changing, so do you know our leadership skills and our view of the world and our view of ourselves, and it constantly needs iterations and, and reflection and, you know, an audit.
So I think transformational leaders understand that not only of themselves, but of other people as well.
Porschia: I love that leadership is a mountain with no top. That I, I, I think that is a great quote. Definitely a writer [00:18:00] downer for the people listening. So Hakeem, a lot of our listeners know that. I’m a nerd and I’ve got my master’s in industrial and organizational psychology.
And I remember we talked about transformational leadership a lot as just kind of one of the leadership styles. It’s really common in organizations. And I remember that being charismatic and charisma was a big part of that. Do you see that with your clients in terms of charisma being important when it comes to the transformational leadership style?
Hakim: Hmm.
You
Porschia: know,
Hakim: I, I don’t think so, honestly. I, I, I think, I think I, I would probably disagree with that a little bit because I think that again, to place people in, in a specific. You know, lane in which they need to operate from that will ensure that they’re more [00:19:00] transformational than someone else who’s less charismatic or whatever it might be.
Mm-hmm. Ends up creating an opportunity for stories. We all, you know, we all sort of fall victim to where, oh, that person’s more charismatic than me. I must not have the capacity to be a transformational leader.
Porschia: Right? And
Hakim: I think it’s less about charisma and more about connection. I think it’s people’s ability to connect.
Now, if you’re not a strong connector, if you don’t care about people, if you don’t wanna build rapport and trust with people, it’s gonna be very challenging to be a transformational leader. I don’t think that you have to be the, you know, the most attractive or entertaining or or charming person in the room to be a transformational leader, but I do think that you need to care about people and you need to be genuinely curious about them.
Porschia: Yeah. So what are some of the biggest mistakes you’ve seen professionals and executives make when it comes to utilizing the transformational leadership style?
Hakim: Yeah, [00:20:00] I, I sort of alluded to it already. I think that one of the biggest mistakes that you know, we all fall into this trap is just tell me what to do.
Just gimme the answer. Tell me what to say, what’s the quick fix? You know, what’s the secret ingredient? What’s the silver, silver bullet solution? And I get that because we are, you know. Fast food nation. We want things quick and easy. I get that. This is not that kind of work. And as I, as I mentioned, the mountain with no top, this is something that.
Requires a lot of reflection, a lot of conversation you know, a lot of investment of time and energy and money. And, and I’ve certainly done that because I can only take my clients as far as I’ve taken myself. And I really believe that when it comes to leaders, you can only lead others as, as effectively as you can lead yourself.
And that’s why so much of my coaching is rooted in self-leadership. Because the transformation that you [00:21:00] can create within yourself, and it doesn’t have to be this, you know, big dramatic thing, but when you can see that there are parts of yourself that you know you can hold lightly and that you can revisit and you can, you know, from a place of non-judgment work on and adjust and modify, then as you’re able to do that and you understand what work goes into that, you can start to create that and support that in other people as well.
So it’s. It’s really just the, the, the needing, needing the answer versus willing to put in the work to, to create the answer.
Porschia: Yeah, leadership is definitely work. It, it sometimes I think can be an extra layer to someone’s, you know, job title. Right? And then, you know, there’s cross-functional you know, collaboration and leadership and all of that too that can be thrown into the mix as opposed to just having direct reports.
So. It, it sounds [00:22:00] like you’re saying there are no easy answers to this Hakeem, and I agree with that.
Hakim: Yeah. I and I, and I, and I think that while there are no easy answers, this doesn’t have to be hard. Mm-hmm. And I think that’s the, the piece that I help create space for when I’m working with my clients is I want to uncomplicate.
Leadership for people. I want people to love their leadership so that it doesn’t feel like a burden, so it doesn’t feel daunting, so it doesn’t feel heavy because guess what? All the things you just described that goes into leadership, they feel a lot more complicated when things are heavy and dramatic and.
Burdensome. And when you can lighten that load because you’re clear on who you are as a leader, you become more confident. You’re doing that with compassion for yourself and for others. All of a sudden you wake up not dreading the day you wake up thinking, I got this. I can handle this. This is gonna be a good day.
Whatever comes my way, I can handle this. ’cause I’m effective as a leader [00:23:00] myself, first and foremost, and I know that I can do that for my team, for my business, for my family, whatever, whatever else it might be.
Porschia: So what are some additional tips that you can share to help people develop as a transformational leader?
Hakim: I think the biggest one is just slowing down. I mean, I have a, a. Triangle diagram that I show, and we sort of talk about, you know, what all goes into results. And I break it down into action and mindset and views, opinions and beliefs and, you know, values and priorities. And at the bottom as I highlight it, and this is a, you know, coach of mine, Ryan Matthew was using this in a different context, but I’m showing this from a leadership standpoint of creating results.
We all want results. We all want better performance. We all want better leadership. We all want. A better life. We all want to get to work faster, whatever, whatever the result is that we’re after the bottom segment of that triangle, I always, [00:24:00] you know, do a little, the sort of dramatic pause and say, what do you all think it is?
And they give ideas like, oh, it’s legacy and it’s purpose, and it’s all those things I said actually, it’s just space, creating space for ourselves in the day. To reflect and to notice how was I feeling in that conversation? How did I show up in that conversation? If I were to have that conversation again, what would I wanna do differently?
We are all so busy, and again, you know, jiujitsu and baseball and 7-year-old twins and in-laws in town, and you know, my wife’s running the marathon next week and you know, all of these things that could keep us completely consumed by all of the day to day. But where are you creating space? To actually slow down and reflect.
So as a tip, I would just say find that space. And then when you start to notice some patterns very lightly from a place of non-judgment and you know, self-compassion, [00:25:00] think about what you’d want to do differently and identify where the story is being told and what’s actually fact in that scenario. When you can anchor into what the facts are, then you’re starting to able to get, you’re able to get a lot more clarity and you can start more confidently making decisions and taking action.
Porschia: I love those tips. I wanna follow up on that. So in your opinion, what do you think are some of the best tools or resources that people can use for developing transformational leadership?
Hakim: So I think well, coaching of course, but no, I mean, I, I think finding people in your network who are interested doesn’t have to be a coach who are interested in having these types of conversations from a place of openness, from a place of vulnerability, from, from a place of non-judgment where you feel like you are safe enough to share what’s coming up for you.
I had this really challenging day yesterday, and [00:26:00] here’s why. I think it was a challenging day for me and for them to reflect back to you because, you know, none of this is done in a vacuum. We all have partners and colleagues and direct reports, and you know, people are people and we’re, we’re, we’re managing a lot of different personality dynamics and, you know, that’s not lost on me.
So doing this with other people is a really essential part of this. So I think the people around you are a huge resource. The other one, which. You know, I think I’d be remiss to not mention is ai. Ai. I’m not like an AI guru. I’m not an AI advocate per se, but I think that if you see it as a tool and you engage with it in a way where you can ask these questions and start to see what that exchange looks like, maybe that’s the place you’re most comfortable doing that.
Maybe you’re not comfortable doing that with another person right now. Well. Ask those questions in ai, see what comes back, and then you’ll start to see that you’re asking different questions in different ways and you’re being a little more open, you’re [00:27:00] being a little honest, and the reflections back from that are causing you to think of things differently.
And then you realize, I wanna do this with a real person. And you start doing that with your leadership team members. You start doing that with your direct reports, you want them to do that to you. So you create the space for that. And that’s a great resource that is, you know, readily available for anybody.
Porschia: That is a great tool and suggestion. So tell us more about your business.
Hakim: So the fractional coaching that I do is something that was born out of my love of one-on-one coaching. So I had a lot of one-on-one clients that I was working with, CEOs, COOs founders of, of startups. And one by one, each of them kept saying, I wish that so-and-so could have a conversation with you.
I wish that, you know, you could have this session with someone else on my leadership team. And, you know, finally after Boeing, Boeing bowing over over the head, you know, hearing it over and over again, I finally said. Well, why don’t we do that? Like why don’t we actually create that level of access for other [00:28:00] members of your team or other members of your leadership team to engage with me?
And the fractional coaching was born out of that, so that. Coaching isn’t done in a vacuum. It’s almost got, you know, a sort of a 360 feel to it. And we start using the same language. We start buying into the same, you know, philosophy, vision, there’s a lot more alignment. I know that all the players so that when someone’s talking about a colleague who they had a.
You know, challenging, run in with, they’re not foreign to me. I know that person. I know how they think, I know how they communicate. I can be much more valuable in that conversation. So that’s what I’ve really been focusing my business on is the fractional coaching. And I love having conversations with people that sort of unlock those possibilities of what coaching can do.
Porschia: We’ll be providing a link to your website and social channels in our show notes so people can find you online. But what is the best way for someone to get in touch with you?
Hakim: Thank you. I. LinkedIn, I’m all over LinkedIn. You can find me Hakeem, a Ltar and obviously my [00:29:00] website is available as well.
Ltar coaching.com and my email address is hakeem@ltarcoaching.com. I always check all my emails and I’m pretty responsive so anyone can reach out to me any of those ways and I’m happy to, to to connect.
Porschia: So now Hakeem, I wanna ask you our final question that I ask all of our guests. How do you think executives or professionals can get a positive edge in their career?
Hakim: Hmm. I think a positive edge, this is a very coachy response I know is to gain clarity around what that edge would create for you. It’s almost a bit of reverse engineering. Sometimes, again, this goes back to like, just gimme the answer. What’s, what’s the positive edge I can create? How can I create it?
And my, my answer or my question would probably be, what are you trying to create? What do you, what do you [00:30:00] want to have come from that edge? Whatever the edge might be. So rather than fix it on the how or the when that’s gonna happen, what is it that you’re trying to. You’re trying to produce, what is it that you, what’s the vision for what that edge will provide for you or your team or your company and or your career?
I think that when you, when you realize, as I did, you know, in my career, wow, I really love coaching. I really love developing people. I didn’t care who it was with. I didn’t care where it was. My career blossomed and I found myself just growing more and more passionate about what I did. People around me felt that, and it just naturally elevated my career.
Because I was so clear on who I was and what I brought to the table and what I wanted to do and who I wanted to do it with. And I think that’s the clarity piece is something that really ought not be overlooked.
Porschia: Great point. So Hakeem, you’ve shared a lot of wisdom with us today and I’m sure our listeners can use it to [00:31:00] be more confident in their careers and with their leadership.
We appreciate you being with us.
Hakim: Thank you so much for having me. It was been a pleasure.
Porschia: This episode was brought to you by the Brave Bird Career Alliance, the go-to membership designed for seasoned executives and ambitious professionals with everything you need for career planning, strategy, training, and support. Thank you again for listening to the Career 1 0 1 podcast. I hope you have at least one key takeaway that you.
Can use in your own career. If you enjoyed hanging out with us, please rate, subscribe, and share this podcast. Until next time, here’s to your success.
