Leadership Tips for Non-Managers

More has been written about leadership—developing it, using it, learning it, etc.—than most other business, personal, athletic, military, or life subjects. Whether you hope to join the management fraternity or prefer to remain a productive team member, learning how to display leadership is valuable to your employer and your career.

What Is Leadership?

Leadership has become more of a cliché or buzzword than defining a meaningful character trait. However, this role remains a critical talent that helps everyone.

Author and public speaker Jim Clemmer expresses some clear thoughts about leadership in his article, “Growing the Leader in Us.” As Clemmer views this trait, he believes, “Leadership is a verb, not a noun. Leadership is action, not a position.”

Those who are true leaders are judged by what they do and not by their thoughts or titles. Employees without management responsibilities can be highly effective leaders, too. They can often make a greater contribution to high performing staff than those charged with this responsibility. These employees inherently understand how to lead, while expressing the commitment and motivation to do so. They often move forward, take responsibility, and serve as leaders by example at the workplace.

Think about your workplace. You can probably identify those co-workers who understand and practice leadership. You may even know one of these leaders intimately. Sometimes the “face in the mirror” is one of the noted workplace leaders.

Here are some simple but effective tips to help that face in the mirror become one of the respected leaders at work—and at life. All these tips need to positively affect the workplace and your career is practice, practice, practice.

Leadership Tips

Consider these suggestions to improve your leadership qualities and actions.

• Refuse to lose. Adopted by many successful athletic teams, this attitude will serve you well as you develop as a leader. This commitment to excel and to never give up is a strong feature in most successful leaders.
  
  
• Accept responsibility for your choices. While most people are anxious to take credit for success, good leaders take responsibility for all of their choices, regardless of the outcome. You might gain just as many leadership points for accepting responsibility for a choice that didn’t result in wild success.
  
  
• Display your sincere commitment to company, team, and personal goals. Management spends valuable time creating goals and objectives. At times, employees resist buying into these objectives, sometimes vocally. Leaders develop commitment to achieving goals. By displaying in word and action that you have committed to management and personal goals, you are showing your peers that you are a leader.
  
  
• Become a source of positive energy and motivation at work. Energy and enthusiasm are highly contagious. Leaders show emotion, passion, energy, and enthusiasm for everything they do at the workplace. Others usually need no further encouragement. Co-workers typically jump on the leader’s train heading toward higher performance.
  
  
• Clearly accept new ideas and grow your role on the job. Commit to growing and developing as an employee and a valuable person. Do not accept security and stability at the expense of career, workplace, and intellectual growth. Developing your skills will label you a leader and achiever. Your co-workers and managers will recognize your evolving talent and your career track will accelerate.
  
  
• Embrace a role as a motivator of your peers and your team. You needn’t adopt a “rah-rah” attitude to become a role model of motivation. Much like energy and enthusiasm, motivation is extremely contagious. Co-workers will begin to look at you as motivator and leader, while they are increasing their own performance.
  
  
• Display consistent focus on the job at hand. Even experienced managers can struggle to focus on tasks right in front of them. All strong leaders are highly focused on the issue, problem, project, or task at hand. If your focus naturally tends to wander, you may have to “fake it till you make it,” but the result establishes your leadership credentials. Your peers will notice your targeted focus and, typically, improve their own attention spans.

Do these tips appear too simple when compared to the many esoteric leadership steps noted by other observers, experts and sources? True, they are relatively simple and founded on common sense more than buzzwords. However, these suggestions are effective and proven over time to work.

Your natural personality matters little to your future leadership success. The popular image of the mercurial, charismatic leader is greatly exaggerated. Even if you’re a natural introvert, you can learn to be a strong leader. If you’re already viewed as a leader, adopting these tips will make your reputation even stronger. Your self-confidence will also increase as you become more comfortable in a leadership role.

Source:
http://www.jimclemmer.com/growing-the-leader-in-us.php