“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” -Socrates
We live in a volatile, multicultural, everchanging world, and each of us brings in different cultures, languages, and circumstances. When everyone runs away to hide, resilient leaders stand by, reassess, readjust and find different ways to bring solutions to any given problem.
Resilient leaders know leadership excellence is a challenging, continuous journey that requires hard work and determined attention. They reject shortcuts and take ownership of their development, especially in times of crisis. Leaders bring rigor and grit, working hard to hone their expertise and continuously improve, reflect, acquire new knowledge and focus on strategizing diverse perspectives on important decisions from trusted peers. They actively work to combat narrow-minded thinking and confirmation bias. They find other business leaders who’ve tackled similar issues but in different industries. Resilient leaders understand the nuances and challenges of the role but bring fresh perspectives, unhampered by institutional knowledge
An intelligent person would see that self-awareness decreases stress, improves attention span, reduces job burnout or any external pain stresses.
Inject resilience so your company is able to adapt to life’s changes, as well as builing character, commitment, courage, confidence.
What is the role of business in tackling the urgent sustainability challenge we face? What can corporate leaders do to help us address them?
The checklist for self-aware leaders
Increasing self-awareness is a practice that should be at the forefront of your leadership development.
Doing so is a practice that should be at the forefront of your leadership development. Use to this checklist to identify gaps in your self-awareness. By doing this, you’ll know which areas to focus your improvement efforts on.
- Self-awareness in knowing that you have a clear understanding of your emotions and how you react to difficult situations.
- I understand the “triggers” and “stressors” in my life and have a plan for processing stress and disappointment.
- I continue to stay curious and frequently take steps to learn more about myself.
- When I receive criticism, I ask: “How can I learn from this experience?” (Self-awareness in working with others)
- I have a clear understanding of the emotions of the people around me and how those people react in different environments.
- I tailor the way I provide feedback to others based on their innate behavioral drives and needs.
- I regularly ask others to give me feedback about my actions, communication, and management style. I am also aware of the non-verbal cues (e.g. body language).
- I give to the people I work with and I’m aware of my tone of voice when I’m speaking to others in the workplace. I defer judgment and allow others to finish their thoughts before responding.
- I practice active listening when interacting with others.
- I use behavioral assessment tools to identify my innate strengths, as well as areas I need to work on.
- I use behavioral assessment tools to understand the best way to motivate and manage my direct reports.
- I have completed a 360-degree review to gather honest feedback from co-workers, direct reports, and my manager.
- When I make key decisions, I write down what I expect will happen; nine months to a year later, I compare the results to my expectations.
Curiosity
It isn’t enough for a leader to sit back and let their co-workers take the reins. By making constructive inquires, managers can inspire their colleagues to do the same. With more people asking the right questions, everyone benefits.
Boosting creativity
When ideas from different departments are flowing, people are also more likely to disagree with each other. In the collaborative mode, that can be a good thing. If teams can manage difficult conversations respectfully, the resulting creative tension can often result in some of the best solutions.
Forever be a student
Why is it important to be a lifelong learner and what are the benefits?
Every time I learn a new concept, I feel rejuvenated. I have an “aha” moment where I can see and synchronize things differently!
What is something that you remember for the rest of your life that builds for how you are and what type of leadership you possess?
Personally, I experienced repression and totalitarianism that builds up my resilience, compassion, discipline, and dedication to pursue and build my service leadership style.
Today the world of business is going through many changes, so leadership qualities have evolved, and the question is, do we build resilient qualities in new leaders? If not, then they will be replaced in no time. It’s not always that work and life go in the way you plan. Obstacles and unexpected events happen, businesses or projects are about to fail, and when everyone runs to hide and give up, a resilient leader does not quit or give up. Instead, they step back, take a deep breath, look at the whole picture and details that caused the business’s or project’s failure, and learn from the loss.
Change is unavoidable and positioning for success by developing a customized change management strategy is eminent for the input from all employees’, managers’, and leaders’ feedback. That way, you guarantee success in your purpose.
Great leaders speak from the heart, putting in place an open book policy, teaching, motivating, and embracing a mission that brings prosperity for all.
Achieve adoption and usage of the change by creating, implementing, and adopting plans that will move individuals and the organization toward success.
Great leaders impact followers by their sincerity, enthusiasm, clarity, credibility, and confidence. As a result, people pay attention to what you offer, teach, or propose.
Education is a necessary foundation for a productive conversation or overall performance. The first step is building self-awareness, acknowledging conscious/unconscious biases, and learning about the experiences of marginalized, underrepresented groups or people.
Great leaders fill gaps in their team. Consider developing training and continuing education and professional development, including training, awards, and other additional information that can further show that you are committed to refining your employees’ skills.
Demonstrate personal characteristics and qualities by volunteering work and other professional development to show qualities such as commitment, dedication, loyalty, empathy, and compassion that your employees are looking for.
Lead by example by enhancing your professional development, as people learn by looking, not telling! Define the approach of what it will take to achieve success and track your performance.
How are we doing? What adjustments do we need to make?
What will it take to achieve success?
When people are involved and take ownership, they will be motivated to be a high performer and sustain success.
What is something that you will remember for the rest of your life that builds for how you are? What are your personal leadership qualities that bring success and impact lives positively?
- They are inquisitive, welcome new ideas from trusted sources and are eager to explore. Vulnerability is viewed as an asset, and they are the first to admit they don’t have all the answers.
- They ask questions to seek input and pressure-test their assumptions, so they can come to the best decision for the business–not to prove their own point. These trying times present the opportunity to be open to and apply new ideas.
- Resilient leaders follow a disciplined approach to decision-making. They use a systematic process that takes into account their instincts; judgment based on experience and data; and perspectives from peers, mentors and employees.
- The key is to focus on what can be done today, not necessarily developing long-term strategies that may need to be changed after a crisis. Focus must remain on mission, vision, purpose and values as the North Star. With these values as the foundation, leaders can make decisions with speed, consistency and accuracy – even under the heavy pressures.
Find a trusted guide
Successful leaders view a coach or mentor as a critical component to leadership excellence, especially in stressful times. They value a trusted guide who challenges their assumptions, identifies their blind spots and holds them accountable. Leaders who take a comprehensive approach to development that includes feedback from trusted peers, effective mentoring, and insights from subject-matter experts continuously outperform their competitors.
Rise by helping others
Great leaders help others think critically through their challenges and fine-tune their own decision-making skills in the process. Leaders also recognize relationship matter even more during a crisis, whether these relationships are with coworkers or customers.
By staying available, you will become acutely aware of the challenges that need to be addressed and convey a sense of stability and continuity during a crisis. High-integrity leaders leave a legacy.
The way you manage in a crisis like this will be a key part of the legacy you leave and an example for those who follow in your footsteps.
Develop the ability to identify people with different brain functions/behaviors and decision-making ability and develop the ability to obtain greater productivity at work or at home.
Set an example
Be aware that we pay the price for not keeping agreements, so authenticity is a must. When you don’t keep your agreement, you lose trust, respect, relationships, business, jobs, income, money, integrity, self-esteem and power.
Crisis management
As humans, it comes down to our self-awareness and our choice to feed or not feed it. However, this is easier said than done because of our flaw based on fear and the need to survive. It’s not easy to cure; there needs to be a new way to approach it directly and indirectly. After all, this is the beauty of being human as we discover more and more about ourselves.
Challenge your thinking with fresh perspectives to know your strengths, weaknesses, and blind spots. You must know yourself, to know yourself you need to know the human nature, and to know the human nature you learn.
What’s your hidden confidence blocker?
What’s your personality type?
What’s your #1 success blocker?
What’s your stamina killer?
What’s your conflict resolution personality?
What’s your body’s natural stress response type?
Build resilience, discipline, be humble, hungry and never give up! These, my friends, are critical skills and tips to build success in your life and business.
“People of different religions and cultures live side-by-side in almost every part of the world, and most of us have overlapping identities which unite us in very different groups. We can love what we are without hating what- and who we are not. We can thrive in our tradition, even as we learn from others, and come to respect their teachings.” -Kofi Annan