Over the last few weeks, I’ve written a series of leadership articles.
I talked about why it’s hard to be a leader; the 10 things every good leader must know; can leadership be learned? and how important it is to receive training and coaching for developing leaders. A great and related topic is how to beat imposter syndrome. Click on each title to read the article.
Today is the last installment of this series and I want to share with you the secret about habits and Steve’s story…
Habits are the cumulative repetition of actions or behaviors, good or bad, that become automated. At a certain point, we don’t need to think about what we’re doing anymore because it’s become a habit.
But habits are just the tip of the iceberg. Some habits are not easy to sustain. We get on the wagon and feel good about doing it for a while and then something derails us and we’re off the wagon. Often, it takes a long time to get back on the wagon.
For long-lasting shifts, we need to dig deep and change something inside ourselves.
So what’s the secret?
You can call it mindset, approach, way of thinking, real clarity or a committed decision, but what it is, is an internal shift that needs to happen before you begin taking action and creating habits, where you just know you’re ready for a change.
When that internal shift happens, habits help you maintain action and consistency.
Here’s an example of how I’ve seen this work.
At the moment, I’m working with a client (let’s call him Steve), who, a few months ago, didn’t think he needed or wanted to work with a coach. He’s a highly successful founder, sharp thinker, and top achiever. Steve has weathered many challenges, as founders do, and managed to see great business growth and results over the years. With all his success and appreciation for his people, he knew that his leadership style was not ideal but always accepted it as part of the deal.
“When you’re building a business from the ground up, you need to be tough and you can’t always stop to think about how people feel. They’ve got to pull their weight or find somewhere else to work,” is something Steve would say.
Over time, it started niggling at him that he wasn’t always so proud of the way he behaved. He was aware of the gossip about him being a tyrant (control freak or bully). He’d have an occasional outburst when his frustration levels were high and started to feel a bit embarrassed about it. He wanted to do better. He wanted to be a better leader.
When the niggle became more than a niggle and the feedback became more frequent, he realised he needed to do something about it. That’s when he reached out to me and our work together began.
This is what I mean when I say something inside you has to shift first, before you can create lasting change. Steve needed to feel the pain of his situation before he realised he needed help to change it. Over time, he practised new ways of doing things, his behaviour began to change and people noticed!
When you get to a point when the pain of the status quo is too big to bear. Maybe you’re fed up with the way things are. And maybe you just know you’re hearing the call to take that next step in learning, growing, and developing yourself to be a better leader.
When you listen and take in feedback from your environment (and sometimes from deep within yourself), you’ll know when it’s time to do things differently.
You’ll know it’s time to build habits to support you on your path of development.
Habits begin with the tiniest actions you can take to create the change you want.
With support and accountability, you’ll begin to notice that things do change and keep them going.
So… If you’re reading this and thinking you’re ready for a change and want to build a new habit around it, join our free leadership habits challenge that will set you on your way.
Here are some examples of what people said about why they joined the leadership habits challenge:
- Build confidence as a leader
- Grow my influence as a leader and build my leadership brand
- Improve my leadership skills
- Be a better role model to my staff
- Get the best from my team
- Improve my personal leadership, productivity, and goal setting
- Better work-life balance
The habits they chose to work on:
- Recognise staff more regularly
- Meditation for 5-10 minutes a day
- Develop a regular writing habit to clarify my thinking
- Better listening skills
- Reading more for inspirational messages or enhancing knowledge
- Switch off technology at a certain time of night
- Daily exercise
- Reduce sugar intake
- Focus on getting a certain amount of sleep
- and many more
The first step is to know what you want to change, why it’s important, and then identify the first habit that will get you there.
In summary,
Small actions, repeated, turn into habits that keep you moving towards your desired change. Once you make something a habit, it doesn’t take that much time or effort to keep it going.
It all begins with the internal shift!
Sometimes you may think of habits as more things to add to your to-do list, but actually, habits are a support for the new way you want to be.
That’s the secret about habits and creating long-lasting change!
For today, I’d like to ask you,
What change would you like to see for yourself?
What habit could help support that change?
I invite you to join the leadership habits challenge today! It’s free and worth it!
Send me your habit and the thing you want to change and I promise to respond with valuable feedback that will get you on your way!