So You Want to be a Leader: Think You have What it Takes?

Supposedly, we all want to be leaders. Becoming a leader seems to be the ultimate goal for us, the final achievement, reaching the pinnacle of the mountain, standing high above the clouds with a feeling of “I’ve done it.” To get there, let’s take a look at some leadership principles to guide us on this journey.

1. Managers do things right. Leaders do the right thing. Doing things right means I followed instructions. Doing the right thing means I did what is needed to achieve the proper result. It is more important to do the right thing than to do things right. The book says to boil the egg for 8 minutes to be hard-boiled. I would rather boil it for 10 minutes to make sure it is hard-boiled.

2. Seek First to Understand then be Understood. If you do not understand, how do you expect others to understand you? Know where you want to go before you take your first step.

3. Be curious about everything. Ask all the questions and get all the answers. There are no bad questions, they are all relevant.

4. Have a sense of Responsibility. Own it and be responsible for it no matter the outcome. Right or wrong, it’s yours.

5. Have a sense of humor. Take it seriously but find humor along the way. The golf pro always tells me, to be serious about each shot, but if it was not good, don’t worry, there is another one coming up.

6. Develop a passion for whatever you do. Brought this up in an earlier blog, passion can move mountains.

7. Courage of conviction. Find the courage in you to execute. Being a leader needs courage to make decisions, and to do the right thing.

8. Have initiative. Don’t wait for someone to tell you what to do. Take the initiative to act. As they say, strike when the iron is hot.

9. Be creative and innovative. Always look for improvement. There are many ways to do many things, keep trying to find the best and most effective way.

10. Have a sense of urgency. Leaders never procrastinate. They never wait for tomorrow to do what they can do today. If it sits on a shelf, it will only collect dust. Act on it right away.

11. Persistence. Leaders never take “NO” for an answer. Leaders try and try again to get where they need to go.

Have a lot of confidence. Leaders are always confident. They have the facts which give them confidence. They always show confidence in their actions. Failing is not a problem, but lacking confidence will almost always end in failure.