What are the most effective tools for developing your leadership skills?

Leadership is built upon experience, so the more you have, the more you are able to strengthen your leadership. A mentor can speed up your learnings by sharing experiences and lessons they've faced. They can provide you with relevant stories where you can be in their shoes for a bit. I also believe you grow your leadership skills by trying new approaches, and a mentor can provide you support and encouragement as you take those steps. Having a sounding board can increase your confidence and help you to reflect back on all you are learning as a leader.

When it comes to developing leadership skills, finding the right mentor is key. Mentors, having walked the path before us, offer invaluable guidance, pointing out pitfalls to avoid and opportunities to seize. They serve as both supporters and objective critics, helping us grow while highlighting areas for improvement. A mentor's role is akin to that of a cheerleader, offering encouragement and insight as we navigate our leadership journey.

Interesse genuíno é mágico no tocante a relacionamentos saudáveis. Escuta ativa e empatia também são grandes aliados à uma gestão saudável!

To develop leadership skills through mentorship, first identify a mentor who embodies the leadership qualities you aspire to. Set clear goals with your mentor about what you hope to achieve. Regularly meet to discuss challenges, learn from their experiences, and receive feedback. Actively seek opportunities to lead projects or teams, utilizing your mentor as a sounding board. Ask for specific advice on decision-making, conflict resolution, and effective communication. Reflect on feedback and continually apply learning to improve. Embrace challenges as learning opportunities, and remember that effective leadership is an evolving practice shaped by ongoing mentorship and self-reflection.

In my opinion, leadership evolves constantly, lacking definitive rules. Combining knowledge from books with hands-on experience has helped me continually develop my skills. Taking on challenges allowed me to refine decision-making, build confidence, and deepen my understanding of effective leadership. This approach emphasizes merging theory with practice. To optimize learning, I have actively applied insights from these books and experiences rather than keeping it passive.

Coming from an academic career, I read a lot of journal articles. As useful as they are, they are often very dry and clinical. I get leadership inspiration from reading bio's of people who have overcome and succeeded in their respective fields. Leadership is not always a man in a grey suit. Recently, I just watched the Netflix documentary on Sylvester Stallone, "Sly.". I am not a boxing fan, but from his story, there are so many leadership traits that he had to develop. I also try to read fiction. Sci-fi books like "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley or "1984" by George Orwell can give a leader different perspectives on the human condition. Love, birth, death, struggle, and overcoming the odds. A good leader will have to face all of these.

It is good to have a role model you look up to for knowing what kind of a leader you want to be but it is even more important to know what some of the most important traits of leadership are. Leaders need to be emotionally intelligent. They should be able to read a situation and adopt their approach accordingly. A leader needs to be truthful and do what they say they will do. This helps to build trust within teams. Moreover to be an effective leader, one needs to be good at communicating and building relationships with their team. From these points assess what you already have and what are some of the skills you can develop and take the opportunities to develop those skills through shadowing opportunities.

For every book or leadership article you read, it is important to pull out 1-2 actionable insights for yourself and apply them. It is best to work only on a couple at a time rather than trying to change everything at once. For instance, a book has great tips on team motivation & morale building. You like a lot of the advice on feedback, trust building activities, freedom in action & speech, reward & recognition. Deciding that ‘recognition’ is an area that you can immediately improve upon; you begin to genuinely appreciate and applaud employees in team meetings and send them appreciative emails too. This significantly boosts the team’s morale and helps you become a better leader.

Think of books and written resources as your go-to guides for becoming a better leader. They're like having conversations with experienced leaders who share their stories, tips, and tricks. You'll get different perspectives, learn from others' successes and mistakes, pick up fresh strategies, and feel inspired to step up your leadership game.

LinkedIn Learning offers an education and learning for nearly any topic. There are many other online training options out there like LinkedIn Learning and Coursera. I recommend going with a reputable source and going deep to gain specific knowledge or skills. You can get lost in all the options so don’t get lost on YouTube but use something like LinkedIn Learning or Coursers is my advice.

"Online Learning" refers to educational opportunities available on the internet, ranging from structured courses and tutorials to interactive platforms and virtual classrooms. These resources provide convenient and flexible access to diverse subjects, enabling individuals to acquire new knowledge and skills at their own pace and convenience.

LinkedinLearning, Coursera or even just YouTube is the best way to get up to date with new tools and concepts coming with the advent of AI. Now online learning will become AI based learning so it is important to use AI to create a customized learning plan for you based on the topic, time you have and the expert level you want to reach.

I am fortunate to have access to LinkedIn Learning and have found it full of useful resources. But the times I have found the best results have been when I learn a lesson or perspective from a course and then apply it as soon as possible. Trying it in the real world. For this to work, the organisation you work for should have a "Learning Experience Design" or LxD plan. That firstly means that they acknowledge and support the idea of human capital development in their employees. Then create a culture of continuous learning and innovation. This could be setting specific time asside where employees can take work time to self improve, and be encourage to innovate.

O ensino à distância, principalmente com o convívio durante a pandemia de COVId, veio pra ficar e se mostra cada vez fazendo parte do dia-a-dia dos profissionais que querem se manter capacitados e aprendendo sempre.

I feel, when it comes to growing as a leader, nothing beats getting your hands dirty. Taking up leadership roles, even small ones, gives you a chance to actually use what you've learned.

Improving my leadership skills involved learning from books and actively seeking leadership roles. By tackling real-world challenges, I refined my decision-making, gained confidence, and deepened my understanding of effective leadership. This approach, which may help others too, highlights the importance of combining theoretical knowledge with practical experience to become an adaptable leader capable of guiding teams through obstacles.

Se está com medo, vá com medo mesmo! Tenha sempre atitude e muita resiliência! A aprendizagem na liderança é contínua. Aproveite cada interação e relacione-se de forma genuína.

"Practical Experience" involves hands-on learning gained through real-world activities, projects, and challenges. It provides opportunities for individuals to apply theoretical knowledge in practical settings, develop problem-solving skills, and gain valuable insights and expertise that cannot be acquired solely through classroom or theoretical learning.

Gain Practical Experience Practical experience is essential for honing leadership skills. Take on leadership roles, regardless of size, to apply and test your abilities in real-world settings. These opportunities allow you to confront challenges, adapt, and understand the true responsibilities of leading and building your confidence. Volunteer Leadership Expand your experience by seeking volunteer leadership positions in community organisations or non-profits. These roles can offer unique challenges and learning experiences outside your professional environment, enriching your leadership skills and providing valuable insights into diverse group dynamics and decision-making processes.

Feedbacks são verdadeiros presentes. O grande lance é passar rapidamente por cada fase do feedback. São elas: Surpresa; Angústia; Racionalização; Aceitação e habilitação para a mudança!

The key term here is ‘constructive’ feedback. While receiving feedback it is imperative to develop the skill of sifting through inputs & suggestions to identify relevant inputs for growth while dismissing irrelevant comments. A lot of feedback, regrettably, may be personal & it is safe to ignore it. A social media creator & active YouTuber whom I know well, once received inputs to wear solid colours for TV interviews as they look better on camera. She open-heartedly accepted this suggestion. She additionally received feedback that — the shiny, silver-painted nails of her hands could distract viewers & take away from her spoken message. She brushed this aside as hogwash. Knowing what feedback to accept & reject is a necessary skill.

Utilise Feedback Loops Constructive feedback is vital for leadership growth. Establish feedback loops with your team, peers, or coach to gain honest evaluations of your leadership style and decisions. This open reception to feedback fuels your development, helping you refine your approach and evolve as a leader. 360-Degree Feedback Implement a 360-degree feedback system, where you receive input from all levels—superiors, peers, and subordinates. This comprehensive perspective can uncover blind spots and provide insights into how your leadership affects different stakeholders, offering a well-rounded approach to your development.

"Feedback Loops" refer to systems or processes that collect, analyze, and provide feedback on performance or outcomes, enabling continuous improvement and adjustment. They facilitate ongoing learning and development by providing individuals or organizations with valuable insights, identifying areas for improvement, and reinforcing positive behaviors or outcomes.

Patience, respect and interest in wanting to be a good leader. What are you bringing to the table as a leader, HOW are you modelling the best (human-centred) values in your life and with your teams. How do you approach difficult issues, how do you deal with feedback? How often do you debrief yourself and/or engage with a professional to discuss your approach/es to leadership? What has been your greatest failure as a leader? What did you learn from it? Only a diamond can polish another diamond, but before it can, it has to go through a lot of change! 💎

For a more unconventional approach, leaders can incorporate reflection practices into mindfulness exercises, like guided visualizations where they imagine ideal leadership scenarios and reflect on their current strengths and areas for improvement. They can also leverage creative arts, such as role-play, storytelling or painting, as a means to explore and process their leadership experiences from different perspectives. This can foster a deeper understanding of oneself and cultivate innovative thinking, enhancing leadership capabilities.

In addition to reflecting on self, also think of leaders, mentors and people who have inspired you throughout your career. What good qualities did these leaders possess that you can replicate or carry forward? Make an action plan to consciously imbibe & work on those qualities. Furthermore, if any leaders have dampened your spirit or discouraged you; reflect and make a note of their behaviours that negatively impacted you. What steps can you take to avoid these behaviours? Make an action plan to decrease/ eradicate disempowering leadership traits.

In today's fast-paced "go, go, go" work culture, often having to meet tight deadlines by the close of business, I often don't make time to reflect on progress made. Not just the day-to-day but the bigger picture. This can make one feel that you are always just behind a deadline. But on the occasions that I do take a few minutes at the end of the day to "debrief" before closing the workday, I'm pleasantly surprised that progress is being made. Taking a bigger view over, say, a few months or a year, I see progress too. As suggested, having a portfolio or record (I use MS OneNote) of a project can be a creative resource as well as a source of positive affirmation. Be kind to yourself, praise your achievements, treat yourself to an ice-cream :)

Self reflection is great and it’s really important to explore the people and situations that have influenced us. In an online class I took recently, we explored our path of service. What brought us to the area of expertise we work in, who and how we serve, and importantly our motivation and our intentions. If we aren’t clear about these things our path can be misguided and we can find ourselves walking someone else’s path and not our own.

Why am I still being suggested for these? Ahshhsushshshs Blue 42 AM I A TOP VOICE YET PLEASE HELP ME LINKEDIN The fact that LinkedIn thinks this is a valuable tool is a joke. Seven

Leadership is saturated with contradictions. If you want to improve your leadership skills do so by diving into the paradoxes and inconsistencies inherent within the endeavor. -'You have to be cruel to be kind' -'Treat everyone equally but make sure everyone gets personal attention. -'Lead from the front, whilst leading from the back'... -The list goes on... One of the most significant disservices we can inflict on ourselves is to assume that there is a play book which describes leadership sequencing. i.e. If this, then do this. Unfortunately leadership is an abstract playing field where often we are picking between multiple crap options as opposed to a 'right' or 'wrong' option.

The most important leadership tool you have is YOU! However, like most tools, you need to understand how to best use it and you need to keep it sharp and well honed. We are our most important leadership tool; listening, motivating, influencing, identifying stakeholders, speaking to crowds, etc. are what we do with the tool, but the tool itself, is ourselves. Like all tools it needs to be looked after, well oiled, regularly sharpened, kept clean and, maybe most importantly, used consciously; even knocking in nails is not as easy as it may seem – if you don’t concentrate on what you are doing ……… ouch!

The best way to be an effective Leader is to build your team of like-minded people. The reality is some people cannot be paid, shown, told or ordered to do what you ask of them... (they know it all... they know best). So it is not What Tools, but it is about not having Tools in your Team.

The most important tools are the one we use constantly to communicate and be exemplary. First, be very clear about your purpose and your values. Then start with your eyes, ears and emotions: stay silent to observe, listen and feel. The third one is linked to your brain and guts: ask open, appreciative and intuitive questions. The fourth one is linked to your heart and consciousness: trust that the people I am leading will do their best and recognize their effort!