Personal Mastery: Awareness

Leadership from the Inside Out remains one of my top picks for teaching leaders how to become the best leader they can be...starting within themselves. Over the next week, I will post segments of my in-depth review of this book.

This is the SECOND of the series about Leadership from the Inside Out (second edition)

Personal Mastery—Leading with Awareness

Awareness: At all levels of leadership, if people don’t develop, they stop advancing. And the place to start is with awareness of who we are. “What we believe, we become.” So, reaching inside, in the middle of ourselves and asking, “Who am I?” is critical for any leader. While that sounds overly lofty, even philosophical, it makes a huge difference.

--Example: Take a leader who’s very competent and believes s/he knows what’s best.That belief propels such a leader to move forward on major initiatives without asking for input. The result is frequently frustration among followers and eventually a label of “arrogance” and eventually rejection from a team or an organization.

--Korn Ferry’s research found that the key career stoppers are: Arrogance, over reliance on a single skill, lack of composure….and a number of others mentioned in the book.

--Shadow Beliefs are often repressed, unresolved, even secret belief that lives deep in all of us—which can leap up at any time and topple our leadership authority. Sometimes it’s feeling inadequate that makes us work tirelessly to become successful—therefore, overworking and becoming compulsive. Or it might manifest itself as manipulation if we believe we need to continuously succeed regardless of the price, or if you need to be always seen as exceptional, such a shadow belief could erupt and present you as a narcissist and self absorbed leader. Great summary quote: “The idea is in thyself; the impediment, too, is in thyself.” –Thomas Carlyle.