www.1001TopWords.com |
10 Ways to Develop Your Latent Leader
latent (adj.) ? Not visible or apparent, but capable of developing or being expressed; dormant. Everyone has leadership qualities. The visible difference lies in the degree those qualities are developed. Each individual chooses their own path and determines to what degree skills are developed and how those skills or qualities will be expressed. There are born leaders, but even those people evolve their approach to leadership over time. Leadership skills are valuable in every crack and crevice of life. You could be the most successful person in your field and you will still face an endless stream of problems and situations that require you to seek new and innovative strategies for dealing with them. A leader approaches problem-solving with an eye on the future. Whether you're leading yourself, your family, or a vast enterprise, it is important to develop the skills necessary to move forward with confidence. I have included here what I consider to be the Top 10 Ways to Develop Your Latent Leader. 1. Know your purpose. Everyone has a unique purpose in life. Too often, people settle for what life brings them rather than creating the life of their dreams. You can design your life around purpose if you have a clear vision of what that purpose is and where you are headed by pursuing it. No matter what your current situation, there is a way to bring it purpose and meaning, building from there. 2. Commit to goals. With a clear vision and purpose, goals can be established that provide the road map to be used when implementing plans. There will be regular forks in the road presented to help you refine your vision and goals. Unless you have your road map ready to refer to, there is a good chance you will continually end up in the weeds trying to find your way back to the path of choice. 3. Manage your reputation. Your reputation is one of your most valuable assets. Effectively managing that reputation requires an understanding of how the reputation was built and how it is best maintained or enhanced. The effective leader sets an example to follow and that contributes to their reputation. Your reputation can be parlayed into tremendous success if it is managed and used wisely. 4. Open-minded. Leaders know that they don't have all the answers. In the book by Jim Collins "Good to Great", the first quality demonstrated by leaders of the most successful companies in the study was humility. These leaders were open to suggestions and knew that their success was dependent on a group effort. To have sustained success, you have to be open to all possibilities. 5. Continuous improvement/innovation. Along the same lines, leaders are in a never-ending cycle of improving themselves and whatever they touch. They read the latest material in their field of study expanding their territory in whatever ways they're lead; provide a wealth of information as a resource for others; are continually educating themselves; and seek innovative ways to expand their horizons. 6. Demonstrate collaborative problem-solving. The master-mind experience can be very powerful. The process of collaboration transcends the concept of "two heads are better than one". When a leader begins to employ the ideas of people outside of their familiar decision-making track, innovation becomes commonplace. Collaboration can be applied in every area of life. 7. Grow other leaders. The best way to develop leadership skills is to teach others to be leaders. It is easy to get bogged down in daily activities and inhibit your own growth and the growth of those you lead. When a person begins to develop their latent leader, there is a change in their thought process. It is no longer enough to just get the job done ? it must be done right with awareness of consequences. 8. Be decisive. As a leader, others will look to you for direction. You must weigh your options using the resources you have to work with and make the best decision. Sure you will make mistakes and, in hindsight, see that a different decision might have produced better results. Remember that there is tremendous value in those errors in judgment as long as you take the time to learn from them. 9. Learn from mistakes. The leader takes responsibility for mistakes made. Period! Mistakes are an enormous investment of resources and should be used for all of their value. If you take mistakes seriously, spending the time necessary to determine the root cause that created the opportunity for the mistake to be made, you have turned a costly mistake into a potential gold mine. This is where innovation lives. 10. Realize your full potential. In every individual there are untapped resources. The human potential has only scratched the surface. Each of us has a "sweet spot" where the lines between work and play merge. We have bordered on genius. Our job is to design life so that we spend increasing amounts of our time in excellence. The leader accepts nothing less than the best from themselves and others. Leadership styles are as varied as the leaders that employ them. In order to begin to develop your latent leader, start anywhere on this list. Determine how you might use a new or different approach to a situation or problem you're facing. Once you have experienced a bit of success, it will get easier to use a more innovative and creative approach to problem-solving. The leader will no longer be latent! About The Author Gala is an executive coach focusing on creative problem-solving. She is committed to assisting organizations of every shape and size in developing their leadership with an emphasis on socially responsible business practices and a keen eye on productivity and profitability. Gala is a certified public accountant, certified financial planner, published author, and business consultant with over 25 years of experience. She can be reached at (702) 386-4111, by e-mail at Gala@MetaCommIntl.com, or by visiting http://www.GalaGorman.com. For more information, contact Gala Gorman between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time at: METACOMM MEDIA A division of MetaComm International, LLC (888) 886-4111 or (702) 386-4111 9101 West Sahara Avenue, Suite 105-G36 Las Vegas, NV 89117 E-mail: DrGala@GalaGorman.com Web site: http://www.GalaGorman.com
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Three Factors Of Leadership Motivation Leaders do nothing more important than get results. But you can't get results by yourself. You need others to help you do it. And the best way to have other people get results is not by ordering them but motivating them. Yet many leaders fail to motivate people to achieve results because those leaders misconstrue the concept and applications of motivation. Weakness, Struggle, Fear, Knowledge, Growth, Courage, Leader Theodore Roosevelt was one of the most remarkable men in the history of the world. As a boy he wanted the boldness of his father. As a child he wanted to be a naturalist, but as a teenager he wanted to get into politics. Once in politics he wanted power, and once in power he would change the world forever. 5 Power Keys For Leadership Success! Did you know that you can successfully handle mostleadership challenges with just 5 simple strategies? Byfocusing your attention on these critical areas you canempower your the opportunities hiding within your vision,new venture or project plans. 7 AAA Ways To Succeed! [Abounding Abundant Ample Ways To Boost Your Growth!] Managing Monsters in Meetings - Part 1, General Strategies for Unproductive Behavior It happens easily. You're conducting a meeting and suddenly a small side meeting starts. Then someone introduces an unrelated issue. Someone else ridicules the new issue. Everyone laughs, except the person who mentioned the idea. Then someone insults the person who told the joke. Two people stand up and walk out. Others complain that the meeting is a waste of time. Partnership: Choose It or Lose It Charlotte decides to do good. Charlotte is a highly motivated worker. Something has been bothering her lately, something about the structure of the work flow that's causing redundancy, misallocation of resources, costly errors, and diminished productivity. On her own she does a careful study of the situation and convinced that she is on to something, she spends her evenings writing a detailed report that includes her observations, the apparent costs to the system, evidence of mismanagement (she is a bit caustic here), her vision of how the work flow should be structured, along with the steps she feels would turn things around and assure success. In the end, this is a detailed report, meticulously done, twenty-five single-spaced pages, with charts and graphs. Charlotte is proud of her work, the fact that she did this at her own initiative and on her own time, and she is truly excited about making a positive contribution to the organization. Charlotte finishes her report and sends it to the company president. And then she waits. And she waits. Certainly there will be a phone call, a meeting, some acknowledgment of her contribution, a bonus maybe, even a promotion wouldn't be out of the question. Something. But nothing comes. A week goes by. Two weeks. Still nothing. Hope wanes, and a bitterness begins to settle in. Those executives, she thinks, they go off to these programs on partnership or leadership or empowerment; they learn all the right words, but in the end it doesn't mean anything. It's more of the same old arrogance of top management. They really don't care. And this marks the end of Charlotte as a highly motivated worker. She is angry; she has her evaluations (all negative) of the president; she is feeling very righteous -- I did the right thing and what did it get me? -- and she has lost interest in pursuing her productivity project. What's the point? she asks. That's the last time I'll go out of my way for this company, Leadership A Perspective From Tao Tao Te Ching said to be written by Lao Tzu during the period of warring states in china around the second century B.C.; a compilation of Chinese philosophy dating back to 6th century B.C. or even earlier, is a profound philosophical work with many lessons for the corporate of the 21st century. What Every Manager Should Know About How to See the Talents of Effective Leaders An organization of any size, from the family to the department store, the neighborhood grocery store to the largest international corporations, is a reflection of its leadership. Tough Times Demand Resilient Leaders The stock market gyrates with unpredictable and heartburning results. Icons of solid companies become straw figures before balance sheets. Children are abducted from their front yards and networks of terrorists spiral throughout the world. Religious institutions cast shadows of duplicity while El Nino brings strange fish to the California coasts and out-of-control fires head toward ancient Sequoias. 7 Excellent Ways To Improve Your Leadership Skills! Did you know that there are 7 really effective yetpowerful ways to improve your leadership learningopportunities? Unleash It! On airplanes, in restaurants, in the newspaper and on television, I often hear people saying their businesses are not growing to their satisfaction or that they are not reaching their objectives. The explanations that follow consist of reasons like: E=MC - Is It In Me? How many times have you seen the E = MC2 formula andwondered what it might mean to you? Leadership and Followership in a Team Setting Many solopreneurs work in a team environment either with their client's staff, or with subcontractors. Having spent over 20 years in a teaming environment before becoming a solopreneur 13 years ago, I know that during the course of any highly functioning team effort, the leadership and followership roles flow back and forth between the members. The Code of the Conference Leader Are your meetings generally a waste of time? Do you have trouble getting commitment on the decisions made? The following information is based on "Conference Leadership", an atypical Marine Corps publication that is no longer available to the public (as it has been incorporated into a sensitive and restricted document.)The publication details a method of achieving results from groups and meetings that was far ahead of its time, originally published in 1947. Veins of "stewardship," "dialogue" and "servant leadership" can be seen throughout, though not by those names. Are You a Good Manager or a Great Leader? Your word is your truth - Know that when you speak, you will fulfill your promise to others and others will know they can depend on you. Think before you speak. Under promise and over deliver. Always keep your promise. Top Skills Of Extraordinary Leaders 1. Good Communicator. Extraordinary Leaders are those who can take thevision they have and communicate it in ways that their followers can easilyunderstand, internal, and own. Then, and only then, can they carry it out!So focus on speaking and writing more clearly, and with the passion that youhave for the vision you have. Use different ways of communicating, includingdifferent ways verbally and non-verbally. Above all, communicate often! People or Objects? - - You Decide "How you think determines how you act. How you act, in turn, determines how others react to you." Fighting the Gravitational Pull of Positional Leadership A little on leadership? Value Driver Leadership CHAPTER 1************VALUE The Power of the Leader Within - The Keys to Martial Arts Life Mastery, Key#1 "What do you want to be when you grow up?" |
© Athifea Distribution LLC - 2013 |