Step 9 - Be Yourself

Use your relationships with mentors and your research on great leaders as models or reference points to work from, but never copy or imitate them like a parrot. 

Everyone has vastly different leadership styles. History books are filled with leaders who are soft-spoken, introverted, and quiet, all the way to the other extreme of being outspoken, extroverted, and loud, and everything in between.

Ghandi

A quiet and simple Gandhi or a soft-spoken peanut farmer named Jimmy Carter, who became president of the United States and won a Nobel Peace Prize, have been just as effective world leaders as a loud and flamboyant Churchill, or the tough leadership style employed by The Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher.

Jimmy Carter



Margaret Thatcher

Daniel Goleman

I admire Daniel Goleman as a leadership academic and writer. But if I copy Daniel Goleman, I’d be a second or third rate Goleman, at best, instead of a first rate Janette Sheerman. Be yourself, your best self, always competing against yourself and bettering yourself, and you will become a first rate YOU instead of a second rate somebody else.

So what or who influences your leadership?

One of John Maxwell’s more famous quotes is “Leadership is influence. Nothing more, nothing less.”

Do you agree with this philosophy? Influence can cause people to willingly follow you; not because they have to, but because they choose to. Influence sways people. It impacts them, possibly even enough to change a belief or a behaviour. A strong influencer can gain much power, and an ethical influencer will gain people’s trust as well.

As you’re busy trying to build and extend your influence outwardly, how much attention do you pay to what’s influencing you inwardly?

It’s important to understand what builds into your beliefs, opinions, values, thoughts and behaviors. It’s those things and people that you surround yourself with – your environment – that ultimately affects who you are and what you become. These are your influencers, and you need to make good choices with them if you intend to get closer to your leadershipgoals.

 

I’d like to suggest that you take some time to consider who and what is influencing you.

 Are they helping you to become a better leader or person? Are there people you are letting “in” that you shouldn’t? Are there people you are shutting out that could help you improve?

Let’s ask the “5 Ws and How.”

WHO – Who do you admire most and why? Are you spending time with them? Have you asked them to help you develop the leadership skills you admire about them? Are there people you associate with regularly who aren’t in alignment with your values? Do you seek different viewpoints from people who have different backgrounds and experiences, but who share your same values? Find those people who will sharpen you like iron sharpening iron.

WHAT - What are you reading, watching and listening to? How are they helping you to grow or achieve? What gaps have you identified between where you are and where you want to be, and what will help you close the gaps? What things distract you from meeting or advancing toward your goals? What affects your mood, energy level and creative vision? Understand what makes a difference for you.

WHEN - When are you most productive throughout the day, and are you using your time wisely during that period? When do you rejuvenate and are you allowing yourself the time to do so? When is it easiest for you to lose focus of your goals and how can you keep yourself on target? When do you feel drained and can you minimise those times? Manage your time wisely and effectively.

WHERE - Where do you need to be to get your best work done? Where are you most likely to get distracted from doing the tasks that need to be completed? Where in a current project would you benefit from leveraging the expertise of someone else? Where would you like to be five years from now and what tools, resources and people will help or hurt you from getting there?

WHY – What’s your why? What drives you to become better and who will support that? And who won’t? Your values and beliefs carry your why. They fuel your purpose. Be clear on your purpose and communicate it to others for buy-in. If you’re not clear or passionate about your why, you can kiss your own influence goodbye!

HOW – How will you accomplish your goals? What does your plan look like and who will be a supporter or an obstacle? How can you further develop and grow as a leader? How will you manage your plan? How will you remain accountable to your plan? Who and what tools can help you?

Go ahead. Really think about each of these questions. Consider what people, tools and resources are positive influences, as well as what takes you further away from your goals.

Keep in mind that you want to increase your own influence as leader. You’ll be most effective when you become clear on these questions and you build a support system for your success.

Boringness: The Secret to Great Leadership

After spending time with a range of leaders for his new book, Man Made: A Stupid Quest for Masculinity, Joel Stein writer of a humour column for the Time magazine learned that his vision of what makes a good leader was all wrong.   To his surprise, the best of them tended to be quiet listeners who let other people make most of the decisions. 

Follow this link and check out what he has to say  Harvard Business Review blog

Step 8 - Get a Mentor

My next challenge is for you to find yourself a mentor. The ideal person would be someone who has already achieved a high degree of success in your field. Don’t be afraid to ask. You’ve got nothing to lose.  In addition to mentors, take time to study autobiographies of great leaders that you admire. Learn everything you can from their lives and model some of their successful behaviours.

Over the years I have identified a couple of mentors that have helped and guided me through my academic career.  They have been able to support me and more importantly I have been able to learn from them and to model their positive leadership practices and behaviours.  It has been a developmental partnership through which my mentors have shared their leadership knowledge, skills, information and perspective to foster my personal and professional growth in my role as a Senior Lecturer. 

I think we all have a need for insight that is outside of our normal life and educational experience. The power of mentoring has created a number of opportunities for me to collaborate and problem-solve.  Mentors rely upon having had similar experiences to gain an empathy with the mentee and an understanding of their issues. Mentoring will provide you with an opportunity to think about your leadership career options and progression.

Finding a Mentor

Finding a good mentor can often be difficult, if not almost impossible as good mentors are normally very good at their work, thus they already have high demands for their skills and time, which means they might be reluctant to take on anyone new.

To increase your chances, it helps to be specific about what you want from a mentor. The more certain you are about your needs, the more likely you will find a mentor to meet those needs. So my advice is not to ask “will you be my mentor” but rather ask targeted questions like:

“Dorothy, if you have some time available soon, could you explain to me why you are successful at leading your small business”

or,

“Tim, if you have some spare time, could you explain the actual skills I need to become a better leader?”

Most people, especially those with the instinct to be a mentor, will respond positively to such requests, in addition, they have probably learned from others, thus will encourage and support others who want to learn from them. And if so, then ask another question. This might or might not lead to having that person become your full-time mentor, but in any case, it will increase your knowledge and skills. Some people might only give a two-minute lecture, but they should be impressed with your curiosity, even if they do not say so.

Go on take the time to find yourself a mentor.........and as Delboy would say "you know it makes sense"

As a leader does how we look matter?

When Julia Gillard became Australian Prime Minister she was attacked by some for her wardrobe and for not having children. Now Germaine Greer has been on Australian television saying Gillard should stop wearing jackets that don't fit and that she has, quote, "a big arse"! What does this say about Australian politics and would it have been an issue if Julia Gillard was a man?

Check out the discussion on Radio 4 Womens Hour on the 18 May 2012 and let me know YOUR thoughts.....

Read further

Julia Gillard joins a list of female world leaders

Australia's new prime minister takes her place beside 18 other elected female leaders. But does a woman at the top make any difference to the lives of ordinary women?

Step 7 - Honour Your Word

Every time you break your word, you lose power. Successful leaders keep their word and their promises. You can accumulate all the toys and riches in the world, but you only have one reputation in life. Your word is gold so you should honour it

Authentic Leadership builds on the notion of being honest and authentic check out Rene Carayol's presentation to help you reflect on your authenticy as a leader.

R E N E C A R AY O L P R O F I L E

SPEAKER | FACILITATOR | MODERATOR | HOST | CHAIRMAN | PRESENTER

René's focus is on inspirational leadership and culture, bound together with a compelling philosophy founded on his own board level experience. Extraordinary times demand extraordinary leadership and make no mistake about it; we are in unprecedented and turbulent waters.

 

What have you learned from Rene? Are there valuable lessons that he has modeled for you?

Join the conversation and leave a comment! I’d love to hear about it .



Blogging and Communities of Practice

HI everyone please check out the links below that my active bloggers have suggested may be of use to you in your professsional leadership practice and in supporting you to complete your leadership assignment.  Keep the knowledge coming we are now starting to create a Community of Practice.

Friedman's Theory of Differentiated Leadership

Managers Dont Really want to Innovate HBR Blog

It's Time to Rethink Continuous Improvement HBR Blog

Leadership Community of Practice

Etienne Wenger summarises Communities of Practice (CoP) as “groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.” This learning that takes place is not necessarily intentional.  The group can evolve naturally because of the members' common interest in a particular domain or area, or it can be created specifically with the goal of gaining knowledge related to their field. It is through the process of sharing information and experiences with the group that the members learn from each other, and have an opportunity to develop themselves personally and professionally (Lave & Wenger 1991).

CoPs can exist online, such as within blogs, discussion boards and newsgroups, or in real life, such as in a lunch room at work, in a field setting, on a factory floor, or elsewhere in the environment.  This type of learning practice has existed for as long as people have been learning and sharing their experiences through storytelling. Wenger coined the phrase in his 1998 book, Communities of Practice: learning, meaning and identity.

Originators: Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger in 1991 and further elaborated in 1998.

Step 6 - Perseverance

Perseverance......Victory belongs to those who want it the most and stay at it the longest.  Now that you have a dream, make sure you take consistent action every day or every week. 

I recommend doing at least 5 things every day/week that will move you closer to your dream.  Outline and identify the 5 things each day or more realistically each week that will help you get closer to your dream.

Share some of the actions that you are going to take to make you a better leader and help reach your dream.

Here's a fantastic talk given by Fields Wicker-Miurin: Learning from leadership's "missing manual" where she share stories of amazing leaders with perserverance. Fields Wicker-Miurin dream is to improve the quality and impact of leadership worldwide by discovering leaders in unique, local settings and connecting them with one another.


[Good leaders] have tried to connect worlds they didn’t know existed before. They’ve built bridges, and they’ve walked across them. They have a sense of the great arc of time and their tiny place in it.” (Fields Wicker-Miurin)

Engaging Learners in Reflective Practice

What is reflection? 

Most of us would probably think of ‘what we see when we look in a mirror’ as the answer to this question.  The Oxford Dictionary does indeed have a definition very similar to that, but also includes ‘serious thought or consideration’.

This suggests something which is more than what we see or think about on the surface, and many writers believe that deeper, more thoughtful reflection is the key to Reflective Practice. 

Effective learning situations require time for thinking. Students should also reflect on themselves as learners when they evaluate the thinking processes they used to determine which strategies worked best.  you can then apply that information about how you learn as you approach learning in the future. 

What is Reflective Practice?

Reflective Practice is a concept which has been extensively used in education for some time.  As with reflection, there are several models of Reflective Practice which vary from writer to writer, and organisation to organisation.

Definition of Reflective Practice

“Reflective practice is viewed as a means by which practitioners can develop a greater level of self-awareness about the nature and impact of their performance, an awareness that creates opportunities for professional growth and development. put in a simple way “a dialogue of thinking and doing through which I become more skilful. (Schön 1991). 

Reflective practice involves thoughtfully considering one’s own experiences in applying theory to practice.

 

When writing this post i  started to ask myself questions about the following: my teaching routine, my everyday teaching practices and went onto ask  myself questions about what really does and doesn’t work. 

On reflection What is the One thing you are going to change about yourself or your Leadership practice.  post your comments here

Step 5 - Creating a Personal Vision

In business, good leadership means good vision: a successful business must have a clear vision of its aims and purpose. And, like a business, we, too, should have a “vision statement” in order to lead and manage our lives effectively.

Your Personal Vision Statement is a concise expression of your philosophy, beliefs, and vision of what you want your life to be about. A clear vision statement says directly – and helps you focus on – what you want to be and do.

In this exercise, you’ll take the first steps toward writing your personal vision statement. You won’t have to write a finished essay; all you need to do for now is jot down some ideas, and make a list of what you’d like to do and who you’d like to be.

Before you begin writing, take some time just to think about it. Ask yourself: What contributions would I like to make? How would I like to be remembered? What effect would I like to have on people? What do I want my life to “add up to?”

Go slowly; these questions are important to you.

There are no “wrong” statements, so don’t get hung up or too self-critical here; let this just be your own personal vision of how you’d like your world to look.

To help you get started, I have provided a few examples. After reading them, let your imagination run free and think about what your fondest desires and deepest hopes would look like if they became real in your life.

 What would you like to be? : Examples- Gourmet chef; Civic leader; Loving father/mother; Musician; Computer wizard; Someone others rely on; A person of my word; Well-liked; Someone who organizes volunteering events; Trustworthy

 What would you like to do?- Examples- Climb mountains; Run a marathon; Write a best-selling book; Retire by age 50; See my grandchildren graduate college; Become a minister; Serve the poor; Learn to paint; Learn a foreign language; Live in a foreign country; Pay off my mortgage; Run for public office; Own my own company.

After you’ve made some notes, look over the lists you’ve compiled. These are the things that are important to you now.

Take your notes and start shaping your vision statement. Without a vision, we perish. If you can't see yourself winning that award and feel the tears of triumph streaming down your face, it's unlikely you will be able to lead yourself or others to victory. 

Visualise what it would be like accomplishing your dream. See it, smell it, taste it, hear it, feel it in your gut.

Heres a link to help you on your way to writing your own personal vision statement

WRITING A PERSONAL VISION STATEMENT by Dr. Linda Phillips-Jones

Follow Your Bliss - Reflection and Feedback

Hi folks had great news this week that I had a work in progress abstract accepted at the following conference

8th European Conference on Management Leadership and Governance

Neapolis University Pafos, Cyprus

8-9 November 2012

I took a conscious decision to "follow my bliss" and wrote and submitted a conference abstract with my colleagues Dorothy McKee and Michelle Rusk entitled "Civic Leadership for Communities in Transition"  and was delighted to hear this week that it had been accepted.

Would love to hear your "leadership" good news and reflection on your leadership practice  or development following on from your leadership workshop.