Leadership 2.0: Re-Calibrate and Keep Evolving The Leader In You

Being an organizational leader can be a hectic job. From the outside, owning and managing a business looks elite, but only a few know about what it takes to be a successful leader.

It is important to be a good leader in an organization, not only for the owner of the company but also for the leaders at other hierarchical levels. However, sometimes the leaders face the issue where they tend to stop growing due to the reasons of monotonous nature of work and other factors.

Other times, it could happen because a leader become comfortable in their current position and they stop hustling. As a result, they end up being within a cocoon as a manager.

Although this can be a critical situation for leaders and their growth, they do not willingly get into this situation.

Some experts believe that leaders also get distracted or deviated from their work, role, and overall growth due to pressure, self-doubt, and insufficient knowledge to keep up with the ever-changing world. Some leaders also tend to feel insecure.

Some personality traits such as arrogance, power, and dominant nature also contribute to even good leaders hindering their success. In such a situation, it is necessary for them to re-calibrate the leader in them. But how can a leader do that?

Firstly, not only a leader in the business world but anyone, in general, must realize the need to change and improve.

One can gain this realization by noticing a few signs, including a wish to prove something, lack of critical thinking and effective listening, insecurity, tendency to get influenced by a political division, downhill motivation, or distrust of your team.

Being a leader, if any of these signs exist in your behavior and functioning, you immediately need to work upon yourself to prevent going downhill.

If you notice the said signs, it is your cue to pause and think. The first step to deal with it is to accept that these negative qualities lead you towards being a horrible leader, which would eventually result in your failure.

Accept that you lack a few qualities as a leader and try to recall where you lost your quality of being a good leader.

The best way to re-calibrate is to look back and remember the people and other leaders who inspired you to become a leader yourself. Get the motivation to get better and discover the ways that would work for you to bring a positive change in you.

Recall the leadership qualities that your employees and others praised you for, instead of letting those compliments and reviews get to your head, making you stop working as hard as before with the feeling that you have achieved all.

You can also enhance the leader in you by inspiring leadership in others. When you guide someone based on your experiences, you also get a chance to go back and relive all your hard work and inspirations that helped you become a good leader.

While teaching others, you also teach yourself what and why you have become a leader. You will also have a feeling of achievement if you feel that you have achieved nothing in a long while.

As a leader, support your team to blossom and get a working experience with all of your employees to figure out their leadership style and help them realize their strengths. Calibrate by regarding people for their work, not only the result.

Of course, good results from employees are important for a business to boom, but a good leader should never let it be the sole criteria to appreciate their employees. Hence, celebrate failures.

You can also foster an innovative culture in the organization, where you make the staff at level heard. Ask for their opinions and suggestions, which do not bring out the good leadership quality in you but inspire others to sustain that quality.

Another area of improvement for you to re-calibrate the leader in you could be cultivating the long-term vision. Every company or business has a vision that it works for. Now you, a leader, understand that, but it also becomes important for you to properly explain it to your employees so that it becomes their vision.

To do so, make sure to bring up the company's vision in the team meetings and connect the new initiatives with the big picture.

Make it a habit to periodically refer to the big picture and long-term goal to remind yourself and your employees of what they are working towards, especially when they feel low and unachieved.

The power of re-calibrating your leadership and leadership goals will make you realize that you still have a long way to go. Whether you are a leader at a large organization or a small company, it does not matter, as any leader can go through this phase.

Hence, it would help if you excelled in these areas to unleash the leader within you. Just follow the formula, Reset, Reframe and Re-calibrate.