The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership
There are ten practices of personal leadership. In a previous article, we talked about the first five. As you read the next five below, think about how these five practices might enhance your ability to be a better leader, and lead a better life.Personal leadership means leading yourself – a kind of leaders so essential to success and achievement that the management expert Peter Drucker once called it “the only leadership that’s going to matter in the 21st century.” Are you practicing personal leadership?
The Sixth Practice: Maximize Time
How can you achieve more with less?
Maximizing time is the sixth practice of personal leadership. In business, we try to accomplish more with time management. But it’s not working. Leaders are busier than ever, and it seems to be getting worse. Like all effective leaders, you need to stop managing your time long enough to get a handle on what you want to do with that time and learn new ways to maximize the time you’ve got so you can do more, with less.
The Seventh Practice: Build Your Team
Who can support you?
The seventh practice of personal leadership is building your team. In business, leadership involves putting together the right team to complete the work. For leaders, building a team means finding the right people to support their growth. Building a personal support team brings you the insight you need to expand and stretch in new ways – not because you cannot do things for yourself but because you can do more with the help of others.
The Eighth Practice: Keep Learning
What do you need to know?
The eighth practice of personal leadership is to keep learning. In business, “learning” often takes the form of workshops and seminars. Leaders need a more customized way to learn – a highly personal, completely self-designed approach to becoming even better than they are today.
The Ninth Practice: See Possibility
What’s possible?
The ninth practice of personal leadership is to see possibility. In business, despite a push for innovation and creativity, the approach is typically concrete. Specific. Analytical. But leaders have another, more intuitive option. You can learn use creativity, openness and trust to recognize to the possibilities around you.
The Tenth Practice: All…All at Once
How can you have it all?
The tenth practice of personal leadership is called “all…all at once.” In business, we tend to compartmentalize our work and ourselves, keeping separate the personal and professional parts of our lives. But leaders succeed more when they bring all of themselves to their work. It is possible for you to have it all…all at once.
Leading on the Edge
What kind of a gift do you want to be?
The practices of personal leadership comprise ten ways leader can learn who they want to be and how they want to be to access their true potential, whether that means leading a company, leading a team, or leading a life. Now it’s time to pass on the gift.
Whether you’re the CEO of an international organization, a business owner or executive, an entrepreneur working out of your home, a stay-at-home parent, or a person just trying to get along in the world, you have a choice. You can lead your life or you can just live it. If you choose to just live it, you are leaving life to chance and risking a life of less than: less than you’d hoped for, less than you could be, less than you wanted. If you choose to lead your life – to really take responsibility for it, to take charge, to take control – you are choosing a life of possibility. You discover that you have more time, more joy, more success, more happiness, and more peace of mind. When you choose to lead your life rather than just live it, you experience a life of more than you ever thought was possible.
All ten practices of personal leadership are described in detail in The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership.
Joelle K. Jay, Ph.D.
Joelle K. Jay, Ph.D. (http://joellekjay.com/) is an executive coach who strategizes with business leaders to enhance performance and maximize business results. Her book, The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership, shows leaders how to improve their effectiveness by learning to lead themselves. Her newsletter, The Inner Edge Quarterly, offers articles, exercises, tips, quotes, and success stories from real leaders to help you excel.