Are You a Strong Leader on the Inside?

John C. Maxwell defines leadership as influence. He shares;

“Leadership is not a noun; not a position; it is a verb, action. It is about increasing your influence with others in order to enhance their leadership potential.”

As leaders, we are providing hope and opportunity to the world at large and people are looking for help. You can point the way by providing hope and influence. Leadership is essential and the demand for leadership is greater than it has ever been.

Leadership By Degree

If leadership is influence, then everyone has a certain degree of influence. Everyone can have a positive influence on the lives of others and the companies they work with.

Everyone has the ability to lead because they have the privilege to influence others.

How can you support your team to lead, influence and bring effective change within the organization?

A few of the many attributes we believe are critical to leadership success include:

• honesty
• integrity
• authenticity
• responsibility
• consistency
• creativity
• tenacity
• attitude

What is exciting and inspiring is all of these are achievable. We work and make these leadership choices on a continually basis. Each of these attributes allows leaders to make a difference in the lives of the people they lead. Most of leadership to function with great successes is choices we make on the inside of our lives; no tactics or strategies.

These choices can be taught and learned. Are you making choices that will influence the leaders and teams you “touch” day in and day out?

I believe leadership starts with you. Becoming a leader takes a lifetime of personal growth. If you want to develop great leadership skills in others you must first develop them in yourself.

One key to successful leadership is continuous personal change. Personal change is a reflection of our inner growth and empowerment. ~ Robert E. Quinn

The secret to great leadership success is to start on the inside; lead yourself. Your greatest challenge as a leader is leading you, doing what you know is right.  You must start by working on fixing you. You can’t give what you don’t have and can’t teach what you don’t know.

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader. ~John Quincy Adams.

I want to give each of you a call to action. Pick a single idea that could dramatically strengthen your role and influence as a leader and focus on this for the next 30 days. I always love hearing from you about the differences these best practices make in your life.

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Kristi Royse is CEO of KLR Consulting
She inspires success in leaders and teams with coaching and staff development
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Image Sources: amazingthingsministry.com, tendollarthoughts.files.wordpress.com

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