When you think of leadership you may consider yourself a leader but you may not consider yourself a great leader. Maybe you do not even consider yourself a leader at all and you wonder where you can start to become a leader.
Luckily leadership is just like any other skill that you learn in school at on the sports field. Leadership is something that can be taught and learned overtime. With the right guidance and feedback you can learn how to become a great leader and take that wherever you go in life.
Here are 5 things you can do to become a great leader:
Get Ready to do Some Research
Amazing leaders do not just happen. This means that people who you consider to be great leaders did not just stumble upon or trip over leadership. Most people do not grow up taking classes on leadership like you do with history or math.
But there is a whole field of researchers who are making new discoveries about leadership and how you can become a great leader for your company. If you don’t really understand how you can become a leader you have the opportunity to start understanding where you can start and make changes.
Work Smarter, Not Harder
You may be used to hustling day in and day out. While this may seem productive because you are always working on something and constantly busy. This will eventually lead to burnout which is never healthy and will most likely end up with you missing work and staying in bed.
Since working constantly isn’t a sustainable solution you are going to need a new approach to how you work and that is working but not wearing yourself down. This may mean practicing self care and understanding that you do not have to be super woman to be successful.
Ask for Feedback
When you think of any sport, from baseball to swimming, all athletes have some kind of coach and mentor. Whether you are athletic or not you should adopt the practice of finding someone who can offer you quality feedback without being too critical.
This can be someone who is farther along than you in a specific career path or someone who you sincerely admire. If you do not know someone in your immediate circle it may be time to reach out to others. Use your connections and network with them and see if they can introduce anyone to you who would be helpful.
Look at Others
If you don’t know where you want to go a good place to start is to find people that you admire and want to be like when you get your dream job. This does not have to be a major superstar or celebrity, it could be someone you know personally. It could also be a person who has been successful in running or starting a business, such as D Gary Young, who was a great business leader. Whoever you look up to you, start to think about why you look up to them. Keep a running tally of those attributes and characteristics and see how you can develop them in your own leadership.
Rinse and Repeat
By now you should have a pretty solid foundation of who you want to be like and where you want to go. After you have put in the sweat and tears of finding out where your strengths and weaknesses are your life will become a little easier.
You know yourself fairly well and will not have to start from the very beginning anytime you want to develop new leadership skills. These skills are always changing and you want to keep your leadership skills up to date and see what ones the most valuable for you and your company.
What are some moments that you realized that you were a good leader in a position you held? What helped you to become an even better leader? Share this with a friend or colleague who wants to develop their leadership skills.
