"The miracle power that elevates the few is to be found in their
industry, application, and perseverance, under the promptings of
a brave determined spirit." - Mark Twain
Many motivational experts like to say that leaders are made, not
born. I would argue the exact opposite. I believe we are all
natural born leaders, but have been deprogrammed along the way.
As children, we were natural leaders - curious and humble, always
hungry and thirsty for knowledge, with an incredibly vivid
imagination; we knew exactly what we wanted, were persistent and
determined in getting what we wanted, and had the ability to
motivate, inspire, and influence everyone around us to help us in
accomplishing our mission. So why is this so difficult to do as
adults? What happened?
As children, over time, we got used to hearing, No, Don't, and
Can't. No! Don't do this. Don't do that. You can't do this. You
can't do that. No! Many of our parents told us to keep quiet and
not disturb the adults by asking silly questions. This pattern
continued into high school with our teachers telling us what we
could do and couldn't do and what was possible. Then many of us
got hit with the big one institutionalized formal education known
as college or university. Unfortunately, the traditional
educational system doesn't teach students how to become leaders;
it teaches students how to become polite order takers for the
corporate world. Instead of learning to become creative,
independent, self-reliant, and think for themselves, most people
learn how to obey and intelligently follow rules to keep the
corporate machine humming.
Developing the Leader in you to live your highest life, then,
requires a process of unlearning by self-remembering and self-
honoring. Being an effective leader again will require you to be
brave and unlock the door to your inner attic, where your
childhood dreams lie, going inside to the heart. Based on my over
ten years research in the area of human development and
leadership, here are ten easy steps you can take to awaken the
Leader in you and rekindle your passion for greatness.
1. Humility. Leadership starts with humility. To be a highly
successful leader, you must first humble yourself like a little
child and be willing to serve others. Nobody wants to follow
someone who is arrogant. Be humble as a child, always curious,
always hungry and thirsty for knowledge. For what is excellence
but knowledge plus knowledge plus knowledge - always wanting to
better yourself, always improving, always growing. When you are
humble, you become genuinely interested in people because you
want to learn from them. And because you want to learn and grow,
you will be a far more effective listener, which is the #1
leadership communication tool. When people sense you are
genuinely interested in them, and listening to them, they will
naturally be interested in you and listen to what you have to
say.
2. SWOT Yourself. SWOT is an acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses,
Opportunities, and Threats. Although it's a strategic management
tool taught at Stanford and Harvard Business Schools and used by
large multinationals, it can just as effectively be used in your
own professional development as a leader. This is a useful key to
gain access to self-knowledge, self-remembering, and self-
honoring. Start by listing all your Strengths including your
accomplishments. Then write down all your Weaknesses and what
needs to be improved. Make sure to include any doubts, anxieties,
fears, and worries that you may have. These are the demons and
dragons guarding the door to your inner attic. By bringing them
to conscious awareness you can begin to slay them. Then proceed
by listing all the Opportunities you see available to you for
using your strengths. Finally, write down all the Threats or
obstacles that are currently blocking you or that you think you
will encounter along the way to achieving your dreams.
3. Follow Your Bliss. Regardless of how busy you are, always take
time to do what you love doing. Being an alive and vital person
vitalizes others. When you are pursuing your passions, people
around you cannot help but feel impassioned by your presence.
This will make you a charismatic leader. Whatever it is that you
enjoy doing, be it writing, acting, painting, drawing,
photography, sports, reading, dancing, networking, or working on
entrepreneurial ventures, set aside time every week, ideally two
or three hours a day, to pursue these activities. Believe me,
you'll find the time. If you were to video tape yourself for a
day, you would be shocked to see how much time goes to waste!
4. Dream Big. If you want to be larger than life, you need a
dream that's larger than life. Small dreams won't serve you or
anyone else. It takes the same amount of time to dream small than
it does to dream big. So be Big and be Bold! Write down your One
Biggest Dream. The one that excites you the most. Remember, don't
be small and realistic; be bold and unrealistic! Go for the Gold,
the Pulitzer, the Nobel, the Oscar, the highest you can possibly
achieve in your field. After you ve written down your dream, list
every single reason why you CAN achieve your dream instead of
worrying about why you can't.
5. Vision. 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. Visualize what it would be like accomplishing
your dream. See it, smell it, taste it, hear it, feel it in your
gut.
6. Perseverance. Victory belongs to those who want it the most
and stay in it the longest. Now that you have a dream, make sure
you take consistent action every day. I recommend doing at least
5 things every day that will move you closer to your dream.
7. Honor 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. Honor it.
8. Get a Mentor. Find yourself a mentor. Preferably 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. Mentors.ca is
an excellent mentoring website and a great resource for finding
local mentoring programs. They even have a free personal profile
you can fill out in order to potentially find you a suitable
mentor. 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 behaviors.
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 out- spoken, extroverted, and loud,
and everything in between. 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. I admire Hemingway as a writer. But if I copy
Hemingway, I'd be a second or third rate Hemingway, at best,
instead of a first rate Sharif. 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.
10. Give. Finally, be a giver. Leaders are givers. By giving, you
activate a universal law as sound as gravity life gives to the
giver, and takes from the taker. The more you give, the more you
get. If you want more love, respect, support, and compassion,
give love, give respect, give support, and give compassion. Be a
mentor to others. Give back to your community. As a leader, the
only way to get what you want, is by helping enough people get
what they want first. As Sir Winston Churchill once said, "We
make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give."
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