Becoming a Better Leader

It really starts with understanding who you are and how you're wired. This can take – I mean, there's lots of different personality tests, or even motivational type of tests, so you understand not just your personality, but what really drives you and energizes you. There are several that you can take. Quite a few actually, one of the ones that I've used for myself, my family and other people is called a flag page. It's actually developed as a relationship tool, but really starts to help you understand what drives you, what energizes, what gets you going more than just your job description, or your job title, or what you do for a living. It's only starting there first and understanding who you are and how you're wired can you better understand how to better lead other people.

Listen to full episode: https://lifebridgecapital.com/2019/09/ws326-becoming-a-better-leader-with-miles-anthony-smith/

For me, one of my main drivers, one of the things that energizes and motivates me is I filter people through two questions really, are you genuine? Are you fair? I know that for good or for bad, I might filter people, too many people out through that filter and miss some opportunities. At the same time, I know that when I approach people, that's really the primary thing I'm trying to assess and working with people whether I think they're trustworthy in business or in life. Knowing that about myself, I can also protect against what I would say may be the negative part of that, or the potential negative part is that I'm a filter people too much and not get to understand really who they are and give them a fair shot.

Leadership is multifaceted, I would say a primary tenant is certainly that leadership, the only way you can learn this is to practice. You can buy my books, or other people's books, you can take different tests, you can learn all about yourself. Until you actually take what you have learned and actually try it and put it into practice, it really is going to mean much, but it isn't going to make you a better person. It's only into trying that. I think for me, it's learning from other people, applying that, learning something from that, okay, what could I have done better? What did I do well? You don't always beat up on yourself. Some of us can be perfectionists. I don’t know about you, but I'm a bit of perfectionist myself. Allowing ourselves to make some of those mistakes, because we are going to. We're not perfect. We don't know it all. That's part of the growing process is learning from others, applying it, figuring out what you can do to do better. That's one broad thing. I think another one is just understanding how important culture is to your organization. You can be successful at a personal level to a certain point, but in order to grow further and build a larger company, or larger team, you're going to have to learn how to motivate and inspire people. That is a whole different animal. These days, people don't want to be told what to do. Certainly, the younger generations, but even the boomers and those, that's starting to change from a top-down style of leadership to a servant leadership. Doesn't mean a weak leadership, or somebody who's subservient; you have to be in charge, but it flips the whole model on its head of us serving the people that work for us, not the other way around.

Listen to full episode: https://lifebridgecapital.com/2019/09/ws326-becoming-a-better-leader-with-miles-anthony-smith/