17 Mar

First Lead Yourself, Then Lead Others

This something we’ve been sharing for years. To be a highly effective leader you need to increase your awareness levels by:

  • Fully understanding your styles, preferences, and behaviors
  • Developing the skills required positioning you to utilize alternative styles that would better fit the situation/person

Writer/author John Addison from Success Magazine published a leadership quiz that is broken into 3 parts: Lead Yourself, Lead Others, Lead From The Inside Out. Because of the categories, it obviously caught our eye and we wanted to share it.

Part 1 – Lead Yourself

How do your values impact your work?

  1. I’m too busy working to sit around thinking about my values
  2. I try to stick to my values but I find myself backing down occasionally to avoid conflict or get ahead professionally
  3. I’m contradicting my values regularly, but I believe the rewards are worth it
  4. I rarely, if ever, do something I feel contradicts my values. I’d rather risk losing my career than be someone I’m not

What are some of your main strengths?

  1. I’m a team player with a strong work ethic and a willingness to go the extra mile
  2. I’m skilled in my industry, willing to learn and open to new ideas
  3. I’m a driven person with the ability to work alone and solve problems quickly
  4. I’m a friendly person who is creative and compassionate    

What part of your work motivates you?

  1. I get great satisfaction from working shoulder to shoulder with my team and meeting a goal together
  2. My motivation seems to shift depending on what I’m working on and whom I’m working with
  3. I want to fulfill my leadership potential and move up in my field as quickly as possible
  4. I feel it’s my obligation to help others become their best selves and live their best lives

Mr. Addison explains that there are 4 leadership styles:

  1. The Hands-On Leader
  2. The Developing Leader
  3. The Lone Wolf Leader
  4. The Inspirational Leader

If your answers are mostly “1”, you’re likely a Hands On Leader.
If your answers are mostly “2”, you’re likely a Developing Leader.
If your answers are mostly “3”, you’re likely a Lone Wolf Leader.
If your answers are mostly “4”, you’re likely an Inspirational Leader.

Here’s an excerpt of his style definitions:

  1. The Hands-On Leader – Humble, hard-working, willing to be a member of the team
  2. The Developing Leader – Genuinely concerned for others, a willingness to learn
  3. The Lone Wolf Leader – Great delegator, strategist, visionary; may struggle with people skills
  4. The Inspirational Leader – A good communicator, make people feel good, create a friendly culture

*Note: The complete style definitions may be found in Success Magazine – April 2016.

Remember, we’re likely to use all styles, but we generally have a preference. All styles have strengths, and all styles, when over-used, or used when another style could obtain better results, can become a weakness. Stay tuned for part 2 next week!

How Does Your Workplace Compare?

We want to invite you to take a short survey that looks at some important aspects of your workplace. We are gathering responses from Journey graduates and others so that we may paint a better picture of the workplace today. Here at PeopleTek, we are interested in using the data to improve our curriculum and our collective workplace performance!

Please join us in this research. We will provide you with your own individual feedback, which you can use as you continue your individual leadership journey.

Take the Survey

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