Is your leadership transformational?
Anything less is not enough.
LAST CALL: Breaking Open registration closes today. This 6-week course in mindfulness for modern life was designed for the challenges and opportunities facing us in this very moment. Registration is on a sliding scale; all proceeds will be donated. I hope you’ll join us.
This is a transformational time. It calls for transformational leadership.
Leadership is transformational when it takes us from what is to what could be to what works. When it leads a team around a corner into a future no one can see. When it shows us new ways of working together, which show us what we’re really capable of.
I am convinced that this moment calls for nothing less than radically transformational leadership. Those leaders yearning for the past—for example, dragging their people back to the office—will learn the hard way that the world has moved on without them. (In the meantime, of course, many of their people are moving on.)
Those looking ahead, not with plans or predictions but with openness, curiosity and a sense of adventure, these are the leaders who will create the future. This has always been true, but in the year 2021 it’s unavoidably so. This year separates the past from the future of work like few others we’ve seen.
So, what does transformational leadership require?
An awareness of the shifts underway in your world
Can you see what’s happening around you? Or are you waiting for things to go “back to normal”? Are you heads-down, barreling through, or are you pausing to take a breath and look around?A purposeful vision for what could be
I think many leaders are intimidating by the concept of vision, but it doesn’t have to be—shouldn’t be, can’t be—the answer to everything for all time. Vision is simply a glimpse of the new reality you want to play a part in creating.A commitment to bring your vision into being
Change never happens in a straight line, even when the world is transforming right alongside you. There will still be resistance, disillusionment and doubt. You’ll need to keep going regardless.The creativity to leverage the shifts at play
Find high-leverage points in the shifting landscape and build your strategy loosely around them. Be ready to flex and pivot as new information reveals itself. And remember: If you’re not having fun, your leadership is not transformational.The willingness to start with yourself
All are important, but I think this last one is the key. It unlocks real, sustainable change. But it’s the step everybody wants to skip. I’ve always believed leadership is an inside job. The extent to which we are able to effectively lead others is directly related to the extent to which we can know and grow ourselves. This is the gift and the cost of leading in a time of profound change. These days I am seeing that belief proven true in every meeting, in every conversation, in every decision.
Your leadership can transform the world around you. But you have to let it transform you first.
And there’s never been a better time than now.
The Lead is going on hiatus for the summer. I intend to use this time to rest—I hope you’re planning some serious downtime yourself—and to reflect on what The Lead can be, what more it might offer. Want to help? Click here.
In the meantime, let’s stay connected on LinkedIn, Instagram or Twitter.
Take good care. I’ll see you in September.
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