Tag Learning to Lead

Learning to Lead

Steve Keating Leave a comment

In our last post, we discussed why so many people who are promoted into leadership positions fail to actually lead. One of the big reasons is simply that they don’t know how to lead. And no one shows them. The vast vast majority of people in leadership positions never receive even one minute of formal leadership training.

So I suggested that if you find yourself with the opportunity to lead, you shouldn’t wait for your company, organization, or anyone else to teach you to lead. You should take the initiative and learn to lead on your own.

I received a bunch of feedback from people telling me that they couldn’t do that. In fact, they said there was nothing they could do. They were doomed to muddle through the best they could.

So let’s get something clear right from the start. There is ALWAYS something you can do. No matter what situation you find yourself in, no matter how you got there, no matter if you put yourself into that situation or you were put there by someone else, there is ALWAYS something you can do.

There is probably no more limiting belief in life than the belief that you are powerless over any situation in your life. If you buy into that belief, you will be unlikely to ever live your best life or come close to reaching your full potential.

You may need some help, it’s likely in fact. You could benefit from a mentor, coach, or close friend to help you strategize your way through whatever situation you’re dealing with. But never lose sight of this amazing truth: there is ALWAYS something YOU can do.

So, what does that something look like when it comes to learning to lead? That’s an interesting question because neither I nor anyone else can teach you to lead. I can share with you the characteristics of an Authentic Leader, I can offer ideas on how to develop those characteristics for yourself. I can even advise on more effective human relations approaches for dealing with people. But I can’t actually teach someone how to lead.

Using their own personality and skills, they must teach themselves the most effective way to lead others.

That will involve developing a range of people skills, characteristics, and attitudes. Here are some ideas to help you on this journey towards Authentic Leadership.

1. Self-Awareness and Self-Improvement

• Assess Strengths and Weaknesses: Understanding your own strengths and weaknesses is crucial. Tools such as personality tests, 360-degree feedback, and self-reflection can be helpful. Being 100% honest with yourself is vital here.

• Set Personal Goals: Identify areas for improvement and set specific, measurable goals to work on. Then work on them EVERY SINGLE DAY.

• Seek Feedback: Regularly ask for feedback from peers, mentors, and team members to understand how you can improve. Don’t be even a little defensive when accepting this feedback. If you’ve asked the right people, they’re legitimately trying to help you.

2. Learning and Development

• Education and Training: Take courses in leadership, management, communication, and other relevant areas. Online platforms, universities, and workshops offer valuable resources.

• Read Widely: Read books, articles, and case studies on leadership to learn from others’ experiences. Read constantly, read consistently, and never stop reading.

• Learn from Leaders: Study the behaviors and strategies of successful leaders in your field. Authentic Leaders lead by example; one of the best ways to teach yourself to lead is to closely watch those who already lead authentically.

3. Practical Experience

• Take on Leadership Roles: Seek out opportunities to lead, whether in your job, community, or other activities. Volunteer for projects or committees where you can practice leadership skills. Leadership is a skill that’s learned by doing, so do.

• Start Small: Begin with smaller leadership roles and gradually take on more responsibility as you build confidence and competence.

• Reflect on Experiences: After leading a project or team, reflect on what went well and what could be improved. Doing a “debrief” with yourself and a mentor or coach is crucial to self-improvement.

4. Develop Key Skills

• Communication: Work on both verbal and written communication. Effective leaders are good listeners and clear communicators.

• Decision-Making: Practice making decisions, both small and large, and learn to weigh the pros and cons effectively.

• Conflict Resolution: Learn techniques for resolving conflicts and managing difficult conversations.

• Emotional Intelligence: Develop the ability to understand and manage your own emotions and those of others. As I’ve said thousands of times, leadership is about people. People, including you, are emotional. To master leadership, you must master your emotions.

5. Building Relationships

• Networking: Build a strong network of contacts within and outside your organization. Networking can provide support, advice, and opportunities.

• Mentorship: Seek out mentors who can provide guidance and support. Being a mentor to others can also develop your leadership skills.

• Team Building: Learn how to build and maintain high-performing teams. This includes understanding team dynamics and fostering a collaborative environment.

6. Demonstrating Leadership

• Lead by Example: Model the behavior you expect from others. Integrity, accountability, and a strong work ethic are essential.

• Empower Others: Encourage and support team members to take the initiative and develop their own leadership skills. You don’t have to be at the top of your organization to begin the process of building more leaders. Start where you are and begin with whatever skills you possess today.

• Adaptability: Be open to change and willing to adapt your leadership style to different situations and team needs. No two people are truly identical. You’ll need to make adjustments early and often if you’re going to succeed as a leader.

7. Continuous Improvement

• Stay Informed: Keep up with trends and developments in your industry and in leadership practices.

• Adapt and Evolve: Be willing to change and improve your leadership approach based on new insights and feedback. Becoming an Authentic Leader is a journey. The moment you think you’re good enough, you’re no longer good enough. The moment you think you’ve arrived, you’ve missed the boat. Never never never stop evolving because when it comes to leadership, the last thing you want to be is good enough.

If it sounds like Authentic Leadership requires a lot of effort, you are correct. It absolutely does. But the rewards are beyond incredible. Helping someone is great. But, helping them become a leader means you’re also helping them help another person, someone you may never know. That’s phenomenal!

So I highly encourage you to make the effort. You will never regret that you did.

What a Leader Needs to Know

Steve Keating 1 Comment

I still remember being promoted to my first leadership position. I was a fairly new salesperson when I was promoted to the position of General Sales Manager. I skipped several layers of leadership to reach that level. That put me in kind of a strange position. It put the people who were my bosses on Friday in an even weirder spot because the following Monday I was their boss.

Many people were shocked by my sudden rise in the organization but no one was more shocked than me. It all happened so quickly that to this day I don’t know exactly why I was promoted so far up the organizational chart. But I do know I felt like kind of a fraud. 

The people working for me had a lot more experience. They knew stuff I didn’t know. 

In fact I didn’t even know what I didn’t know. But I knew this much, many of the people suddenly working for me were very unhappy about it. They didn’t like working for someone much younger and far less experienced than them. 

So I resolved to fake it until I learned everything I would need to know to be a successful leader. 

I’m pretty sure I didn’t fool anyone…except maybe myself. 

That was many years ago and I’ve yet to learn everything I need to know to be a truly complete leader. But I’m okay with that because I now know I will never know enough to avoid every possible mistake. 

All leaders need to know that they can never know it all. They need to know that saying “I don’t know” doesn’t make them a weak leader, it makes them a human leader. 

Authentic Leaders don’t need to know more than the people they lead. In fact, the best leaders want people on their team who know things they don’t. They want people who know enough to  challenge and enlighten their thinking. 

If you’re a leader who believes they need to fake it until they know more than everyone else then you’re a leader who needs to rethink that. You can never know it all. So stop believing you need to and accept the fact that if you allow it to be, every day is an opportunity to learn something new. 

Authentic Leaders never miss that opportunity and neither should you.

Are you Really Leading?

Steve Keating Leave a comment

Most, and yes I definitely mean most, most “leaders” I know are not leaders at all. They have a title or position that fools them, and a few others, into thinking they are a leader but upon a little examination they are not a leader at all.

While a leader in name only can fool some people into believing they are a leader they rarely if ever fool the people they think they are leading. People looking for Authentic Leadership can spot a fake leader from a mile away.

But here’s one of the things I find most interesting about leadership. Leaders in name only often have no idea that they aren’t really leading. Not only can they fool other people, they can even fool themselves. 

So how can someone in a leadership position tell if they are in fact leading? Well take a look around. If no one is following you then you’re not leading. Period. 

No matter how lofty your position or important sounding your title leaders lead people. If people are not following you then you may be managing a business but you’re not leading. 

So let’s say you take a quick look over your shoulder and you see a bunch of people. Even that doesn’t mean you’re an Authentic Leader. Take a closer look. Who is following you? If the people “following” you all have the same favorite word then you may not be a leader. If that word is “yes” then you’re most certainly not a leader. 

Authentic Leaders attract a higher caliber of people than leaders in name only. They are followed by people who are not afraid to speak truth to leadership. Authentic Leaders are a magnet for people with authentic leadership aspirations of their own. 

Authentic Leaders challenge their followers to continuously improve and their followers challenge them back to do the same. 

Authentic Leaders are also great followers. So consider for a moment who it is you’re following. Who do you know? I don’t mean following on Facebook or some other social media platform. I mean who do you really know? Who are your mentors? Who can you have a face to face conversation with? Who can you learn from? Who leads you? Who is pushing you to improve? Who is invested in helping you grow as a leader?

You can learn a lot in a book, blog, or video but leadership is a close personal contact operation. You need to follow and interact with real people who will help you grow. People who will tell you the truth about yourself and who will keep you on the path towards Authentic Leadership. 

If you have short comings in any of those areas then you have opportunity to improve as a leader, or maybe, even become an Authentic Leader for the first time. 

Either way, the self-improvement process for a leader begins with the question… Am I really leading?

Do You Have Gaps?

Steve Keating 9 Comments

The only honest answer to that question is yes. If you’re a leader who believes they don’t have any gaps in their skills or abilities then you are likely a leader who has been blinded by their success.

Even the most successful, authentic, and committed leaders have skill gaps. They have gaps not because they are poor leaders but because they are human. All humans have gaps of one type or another, I’m guessing it’s just part of being alive.

Authentic Servant Leaders deal with their gaps in one of two ways, they either grow themselves to fill their own gaps or they hire people who can fill the gaps for them. Most likely, they do some of both. They realize that they can’t excel at everything and they also realize that not everything that needs to be done needs to be done by them.

Step one for filling your gaps is acknowledging that you have some. 

This is going to require honesty and the courage to admit to some shortcomings. You will never fill a gap that you can’t admit to having so admit where you’re weak and deal with it. If you’ve decided to fill your own gap then take a class, read a book, talk with your mentor or someone who doesn’t have that particular gap. Whatever you do, do it now! Procrastination is the worst possible way to deal with any gap.

If you’re going to hire someone to fill your gap then once they are hired you need to allow them to actually fill it. Let them do their job. Micro-managing something that you couldn’t manage to begin with is totally unproductive and will quickly destroy the morale of the “gap-filler” you just hired. If you’ve summoned up the courage to acknowledge your gap and you’ve hired a qualified individual to fill it then dig a bit deeper for even more courage to let them do their job. 

Mentor if you must, (and yes, you must) but don’t mettle in details that you don’t truly understand. Remember why you hired the person in the first place!

The acknowledgement of gaps and the process of filling them is a constant of leadership. As a leader you can never stop growing, you can never stop learning and you absolutely can’t afford to think for even a moment that you’ve learned all you need to know. 

Great leaders never get where they are going because once they get someplace they know that they aren’t there anymore. Great leaders know that few things of consequence stay the same for even a second, almost everything is always changing. That’s why true leadership isn’t a destination, its a journey. (Just an aside here, principles and core values DO NOT change, regardless of the circumstances a leader may find themselves in) 

The very second you start to think you’re “good enough” you’re not good enough anymore. So don’t think in terms of good, focus on better, always better, and as your abilities and knowledge grow your gaps will shrink. 

Now, do you have gaps?

People Don’t Follow Positions

Steve Keating 2 Comments

People follow people. They don’t follow positions and they certainly don’t follow titles. If you believe that your position or title makes you a leader then you’re making one of the most common leadership mistakes you can make.

Your title or position does not give you the right to lead. You can be promoted to a position of leadership but you can’t be promoted to “leader.” You must earn the right to lead and that right can only be given by those who would follow you.

Your title or position may buy you some additional time to earn that right but that’s about all it does. To earn the right to lead you must walk your talk and that is easier said than done. As someone in a leadership position you will be watched. 

People will watch to see if what you say matches what you do. If it doesn’t then your leadership is pretty much dead on arrival. You may be given the occasional pass for a minor lapse here and there but overall if you hope to truly lead then your words and actions must match.

When your words and actions match your potential followers will see you as an honest person who is credible. When people see you as credible they will allow you the opportunity to lead them. It’s only when people actually follow you that you are truly a leader. 

That’s why it is a good idea to turn around once in a while to see if anyone is behind you. If no one is there then you may be going for a walk but you aren’t really leading anyone.

Clearly there is more to leading than just walking your talk but matching your words and actions is a critical first step in earning the right to lead. Skip it and you miss the opportunity to make your leadership matter.

If you’re in a leadership position and no one is following don’t think for a minute that your position has failed you. In order to grow into a true leader you must understand that you have failed the position and the people who needed you to lead. 

Learn from that and you’ll be learning to lead.