How To Be A Bigger Influence At Work and Make A Bigger Impact.
"I Want To Be A Bigger Influence At Work and Make A Bigger Impact."
When a client said this to me I thought, wow, you deserve that promotion for sure.
My client came to me to help him enhance his leadership skills. He had just been promoted, leading a team of 5 and he wanted to make sure he serves in his role with influence and impact.
Often times when people are new to leadership or when they are promoted into higher leadership ranks they wonder how they are going to make an impact that leaves a legacy.
However, influential leadership doesn't necessarily mean that one has to be in a position of leadership. One can choose to lead, even when they don't have people assigned to them.
Influential leadership brings meaning to what we do, it makes us fulfilled, happier, and often times we make more money. It is built on empathy, emotion, and empowerment. It is about touching the heart, mind, and soul of those you lead.
If this is what you desire then I'd like to suggest the following tips to help you along the way.
1. Connect To Your Why. Why is it that you want to be an influential leader?
What’s important to you? Why are you choosing this path? Who do you want to lead? What do you want to lead? What values will you be fulfilling within you? What is the bigger picture for you and what/who you lead?
2. Be Ready To Do Hard Things.
This goes without saying. In order to grow you need to challenge your comfort zone. Doing hard things involves making tough decisions and stretching beyond your fears. It requires courage and confidence believing that the win is at the end of the road no matter the outcome. This means that you will allow yourself to grow through the difficult emotions that come with doing hard things. You will stand out from the rest.
3. Always Act With integrity.
Technically you may be the best at what you do at your company, and perhaps in charge of some big-time projects, but this doesn’t make you are a leader if you act out of integrity. Or Be willing to check your faults even when no one is watching. Try to always demonstrate sound moral and ethical principles and do the right thing, no matter who's watching. Or no matter who'll be hurt. Integrity is the foundation of trust. To have integrity means that you are self-aware, accountable, and truthful and that your actions are internally consistent.
4. Be Prepared To Fail.
If you want to go far failure has to be an option. You go for what you want knowing you might fail. You take the lessons from failure to improve yourself. The more you fail the more confidence and courage you build. There is no growth without discomfort. And in order for you to know how far you can stretch is by doing hard things with the willingness to fail. The fear of failure gets in when the brain doesn't want to get uncomfortable. But you can choose to look at failure as an opportunity for learning and growth.
5. Listen More Than You Speak
This is one of the hardest characteristics to develop as a leader. The world makes it seem like leading is about knowing it all. This is not true. Admit that you do not know it all. Always embrace learning from others. Open yourself up, have patience, be curious and take what you receive at face value. Feedback is never personal, it is just an opinion that someone has of you and you are at will to agree or not. But when you disagree be curious about the frame of mind of the one giving the feedback. Understand them before they can understand you. Be collaborative and conversational.
6. Be The Change.
Always look out for opportunities where you can raise your hand to offer support, especially when no one else is. Mahatma Ghandi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” What he really meant was, change has to start with you. Do not wait for someone to change what you want to see. Every human has the capacity to make an impact. But your greatness is determined by your willingness to identify your limiting beliefs and expand your thoughts.
So there you have it. Go out there and be the influence you have always dreamed of. I love helping individuals create a character of leadership, even when they do not think they have it within them. And one last bonus tip I can give you is to learn to generate emotions that will get you into action, for example, courage, confidence, empathy, empowerment, and any other emotion that will move you a step forward to greatness.
If you would like to create your next level of success, do not forget to check out my services here.