Leadership is the ability to influence and motivate others towards a common goal, and it’s pretty simple, actually, and hopefully leaders will also inspire people along the way to believe in a cause or a project.
The most important leadership skills to learn right now depend on what you need to focus on, really, what you need for your team. I would say focus on what’s really important to you, tackle some of those areas that are challenging for you, and get the training and development that you need. I’d say the best place to start to build leadership skills is really start with an assessment. Start by assessing your leadership strengths. Really, formulate a plan, a development plan for yourself that would take about two to three years and start tackling it.
One of the best ways to identify your strengths and the challenge areas that you need to focus on as a leader is to get a mentor, and to have a mentor reflect back to you what you need to work on. A mentor situation could be very informal, for example. You could just take someone you value. You could take them to dinner once a month, for example. So, ask for some, some ideas. So that will help you break through some of the frustrations, and some of the road blocks that are really common for entrepreneurs.
One of the things that I do to hone my own leadership skills is to take lots of Webinars. I just have found so much professional development out there. I’m on a lot of ... I get a lot of e-mails about them, and I’m on a lot of lists. I attend conferences. I think it’s really critical that you get out there and really put yourself out there, because there’s no reason to be isolated these days as a leader. Leaders have so many resources today, there are so many fantastic groups online to join, for example. There’s LinkedIn, there’s Open Forum, there are so many resources, where you can meet people, you can learn, you can learn about your industry. There is so much to read, there’s fantastic blogs. I would say find the leadership blogs and follow them, follow people on Twitter, for example, who have some great things to say about leadership, and these are easy ways to learn, and they’re free resources.
One of the things that’s an important characteristic of being a powerful leader is knowing that you’re not alone. The new leader admits that she or he needs some, some help. So I think it’s really critical that you get the help that you need. I would describe a, a good leader as someone who understands their strengths, someone who is passionate, and willing to share that passion with others, someone who really believes in their cause, or their project, or their business, and really wants to talk about it and share, and also encourage leadership in other people, and is open to help from others, as well.
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