Blog Posts

By Dr. Scott

We all know that becoming a leader takes more than being assigned a role or being hired to a position.  Leadership is a process.  A collection of skills and actions that, when applied effectively, can influence others and inspire them to higher levels of performance and the achievement of collective goals.  To become a leader, then, we need to actively prepare ourselves for greater responsibility and the many challenges that leaders face. 

In this blog piece, we look at three strategies for helping aspiring leaders gain greater self-awareness.  Through greater self-awareness, individuals can begin to master the skills needed to become effective leaders.  Specifically, we look at strategies for applying self-awareness techniques to become more effective communication skills, to reach higher levels of accountability, and to safely solicit feedback and advice.

Communication Skills

If you’ve been following along with this blog, then you already know that one of the key things I like to emphasize is the importance of effective communication skills.  The ability to communicate well is often the difference between effective and ineffective leadership.  However, for this blog entry, rather than focusing on specific ways aspiring leaders can improve their communication skills, I think it more expedient to focus on the importance of the “how” in effective communication.  The “not what we said, but the “how we say it” is much more aligned with the overarching theme of self-awareness for this piece.

So, aspiring leaders can improve their communication skills by thinking through the “how we say it” and considering both the message and the mode of delivery.  Another way to think about this concept, and the one most often emphasized in leadership communication studies is to “consider the audience” and adjust the message to best suit the intended audience and desired outcome.  This is done with things like word choice, tone, location, and an ever-increasing list of possible mediums—in-person, on the phone, text, email, DMs, video calls, etc. etc.

Simply put, effective leaders deliver the right message, at the right time, to the right audience.  They have mastered the ability to adjust their message to fit different venues, different audiences, and different intended outcomes.  Most importantly, though, they have—over time—sufficiently prepared themselves to quickly assess situations, have difficult conversations when necessary, and communicate their messages effectively.

Thinking through the “how” of communicating builds self-awareness of our own communication skills, and, more importantly, the weaknesses in our communication skills.  To overcome these weaknesses, we need honest self-assessment and a positive feedback loop for improvement.  Aspiring leaders should observe leaders they respect and consider how these leaders apply the “how we say it” in their communication styles.  Another element is self-reflection.  Reflecting on our communications and identifying ways that the conversations could have gone more smoothly or the messages more effectively delivered is another building block toward effective leadership communication skills.  These simple strategies can best prepare us for future communications and enhance our ability to rise to the challenges of leadership.

Accountability

Leadership requires accountability.  Effective leaders take responsibility for their actions, accept blame and correct issues, and recognize the work of the others.  Most importantly, though, leaders who inspire lead by example and encourage their followers to achieve similar levels of productivity and accountability.

Aspiring leaders, then should seek to improve their own accountability.  Self-awareness plays another important role in these efforts.  Individuals must be able to honestly assess their own performance to make any progress toward becoming more accountable.  The good news, though, is that no matter your current level of self-awareness or accountability, everyone can become more accountable by applying some of the following best practices.

First, you need to define what accountability is and this is often done through outlining the specific roles and responsibilities in question.  For example, in a work-from-home situation with only project deadlines and no required work hours, arriving to work on-time may not be the best measurement of accountability, whereas arriving to work on time and prepared to work may be paramount in other leadership scenarios.  You may, though, want to start more broadly and define accountability more generally, such as punctual, trustworthy, proactive, responsible, and honest. 

Both specific and general definitions of accountability can be worthwhile for aspiring leaders, but here again, we see the need for self-awareness and honest assessments.  Other strategies include:

1. Building integrity through honesty and humility, accepting blame when due, and sincere apologies
2. Improving time management skills through study, self-reflection, and/or apps or devices
3. Setting SMART Goals with deadlines and progress tracking
4. Learning from your mistakes
5. Actively seeking feedback from leaders and peers you respect

Seeking Feedback and Asking for Help

It almost needs to go without saying that actively seeking feedback from leaders and peers you respect can help you improve in all areas of leadership skill enhancement.  Once again, this takes self-awareness and a willingness to assess our own shortcomings and actively seek advice and training to improve in those areas.  But, this is of course easier said than done and asking for advice, even from people we respect or admire, does come with a certain amount of risk and uncertainty. 

Hearing feedback and performance critiques can sometimes feel like a personal attack, so it is important to prepare ourselves to keep an open mind and be ready to accept actual criticism.  To begin, you may need to “set the stage” and establish the dialogue.  Typically, if you state that you are interested in improving your own leadership skills and actively seeking advice from established leaders you respect, you’ll find most people willing to share a few thoughts on the keys to successful leadership.  These conversations can help build networks and relationships that you can rely on during your leadership journey.

If improving your leadership skills quickly and comprehensively is one of your immediate goals, then I recommend the Madison School of Professional Development Coaching Academy and the Certified Coaching Certificate programs.  Positive feedback loops and improving self-awareness are both central to the Certified Coaching programs training and outcomes.

In this week’s entry in our Wednesday leadership blog series, we explored the importance of building self-awareness for aspiring leaders.  We broke this down into three strategies for preparing ourselves for increased leadership roles and enhanced leadership skills.  These included considering the “how we say it” as a cornerstone of leadership communications, developing accountability as a key to leadership, and challenging ourselves to seek advice and guidance from others.  Join us back here next week when we explore leadership and leadership skills!

Dr. Scott Eidson is the Executive Vice President of the Madison School of Professional Development and holds doctoral degrees in both history and business.  Dr. Scott had been studying, teaching, writing, applying, and thinking about leadership and leading others for some time now.