Are you ready and willing to lead?

Leaders are similar to everyone else. We sometimes wake up in the morning not particularly thrilled to go to work. Often, we would like to call in sick and go play golf, play tennis, or simply stay at home with our family.

But we don’t.

One thing that sets leaders and soon-to-be leaders apart from most people is our ability to motivate our readiness and willingness to lead. Even if we don’t automatically feel like leading, we can still shift our state of being to one in which we are ready and willing to lead - regardless of the way we actually felt originally.

We could imagine a 2 X 2 grid that puts people into four categories, based on whether they feel like leading or not, and whether they take action or not. The four categories could be named as follows:

The Zombies: These are people who neither feel like leading nor take action. Some people worry that we are reaching a tipping point in some parts of the world where these people are receiving a disproportionate share of government assistance, to the point where they see no point in working and the ‘Zombie effect’ is indirectly being encouraged.

Complainers and Procrastinators: These individuals feel like leading, but they don’t take any action. Instead, they either talk a big game and do nothing, or they whine a lot and do nothing. They are dreamers.

The Lucky Few: These are the very small minority of people who feel like leading and wake up every day actually feeling like leading. They are truly blessed! Note that there are fewer of these people than you think, many people say it but in our experience when you drill down, they are simply telling ‘white lies’.

Dignified Leaders: Finally, these leaders make up the majority of people in leadership roles. These are the professionals who take action as leaders, and yet often don’t feel like leading. We find ways to be resilient. We have learned how to endure. We know how to motivate the positive, proactive state that is needed to make things happen – even if our original state is something totally different.

Being a Dignified Leader is what leadership is about for the majority of us. It is about being ready and willing to lead, even if we don’t actually feel like it.

There are strategies we can put in place to make it easier to create this state of being ready and willing to lead. We can make it a habit to tap into the attitudes that generate natural and authentic leadership, that move us from not feeling like leading to being ready and willing to lead.

Once we know how to do this, it becomes easier, more rewarding, more natural, and far more enjoyable. Best of all, this work is grounded in psychological research; there is nothing ‘fluffy’ about it.

Would you like to learn more about how to tap into these states of high performance? Once you discover how simple it is to put our methodologies to work for you, you will be delighted by the outcomes and regret you didn’t reach out to us sooner. Contact us to discuss further.