10 Radical Qualities to Develop Your Leadership Skills – Part 1

Taking on a leadership role shouldn’t make you satisfied and think that you have arrived.  Complacency is a problem for many middle manager and supervisors, but being called upon to lead your organization, your business or company should make you work twice as hard, especially since your responsibilities have grown and your role has shifted.  If you want to succeed and excel as a leader, there are certain qualities you should develop.

Here are 10 radical ones to get you started:

1. Focus on your strengths.

You are much more likely to excel as a leader if you know what it is you can do and do well and accept what you can’t.  What are you good at? Why try to be a pilot if you’re a better engineer?  Find out what you’re good at and focus on doing it better.  Instead of always trying to improve on your weaknesses which you can delegate, you’d have a better chance at success and gratification if you fine-tune and build on your strengths.

Delegation is one of the core concepts of leadership and John Maxwell, # 1 leadership expert on Inc.com stresses delegation through development. Rather than tell people what to do, show them. This allows your team to use their and develop their skills. Explore the specific abilities of your team members and develop a plan to gain full advantage.  If you must excel as a leader, learn to delegate.  There are still only 24 hours in a day.

• Learn from your mistakes.

There is no single leader in the world who is without fault and it is a huge problem when you can’t admit your mistakes.  Whether we’re talking about CEOs, church or community leaders, presidents, prime ministers, all of them have made mistakes in their lives and it is in the acknowledgement of these mistakes that the opportunity for learning is recognized.

• Refuse to accept mediocrity.

To excel as a leader, always aim for excellence!  When you compromise on just being okay or just being second-best especially when you can insist and actually obtain the best, you show your team that your standards are easy to attain without much effort. Halfhearted effort translates into an apathetic culture within the organization.

• Consistency.

Be consistent in your dealings with your team, your subordinates, and your colleagues. Don’t turn your back against a policy as if nothing happened or renege on your promises.  Avoid double standards and be fair.  If, for any reason, you feel you must make a 360-turn, be ready with a plausible explanation. Your team will understand that your decisions are made for the good of the company.

To be continued…………….  Please see our Continuation in Part 2’s Blog Post next week!