8 Habits that Elevate Leaders into the Top 2 Percent of Performers

I would ask my team each year, “how can you perform your job 10% more effectively in the year ahead?” This could be learning a new skill, exploring best practices, improving a process, or managing their teams. The exercise challenged our team to be more innovative and effective in our roles. And when successful, we add 50% more value and capacity to the organization over 5 years.

As a new year beckons (those of you living in a June 30 year-end), how are you investing in yourself to grow by 10% in the coming year? You can look to your associations, CASE, AFP, and others, for technical expertise, but how are you learning more, exploring new ways of doing things, creating renewal, and endurance to stay at your best throughout the coming year?

Studying outstanding leaders and exploring their habits is a valuable way to identify how you can take control of and elevate your performance. It is not just what they know about work, but how they go about living a more fulfilling personal and professional life.

What habits support effectiveness as a leader, and how are they preparing their minds and body to sustain the high performance demanded by their work? In talking with leaders, reading about leaders, and exploring literature on mental, physical, and emotional health, here are the eight common areas that build a growth mindset and allow you to perform at your best and live a full and rich life.

The experts recommend paying attention to the following 8 areas to build good habits:

1. Personal relationships: If you read obituaries, what is the one thing mentioned most? The most rewarding aspect of their life was spending time with family and friends. Are you nurturing those relationships with your spouse, children, family, and friends? Take a moment and create three concentric circles and put yourself in the center; in the next circle around the center, identify the 5 most important people in your life, and then in the next circle, the five most important people to your professional success. On a scale of 1 to 10 (highest), rate your relationship with each person in your circles. How are you doing? On the flip side, are there relationships in your circle that take energy from you that should get less of your time and attention?
2. Purpose: Have you defined your purpose beyond making a living to support your family? Mine has become to use my organizational expertise and coaching skills to help nonprofit leaders and organizations elevate their ability to serve their missions. Your purpose will guide your professional direction, sustain you when things get difficult, and give you the courage to change direction if need be.
3. Be a continuous learner : Warren Buffet reads 5 hours a day. Bill Gates puts out a top book list every year. Others take courses or meet with the top 5 experts in their field for advice and counsel. Whatever your approach, make a plan and use all the resources available (many of them are free and inexpensive) to learn something new every day.

Here are some of my favorite books and podcasts:

Good to Great, by Jim Collins, provides a 30,000-foot view of how to build a great organization.

The Infinite Game, by Simon Sinek, encourages us all to find our just cause and focus on the long-term and become less transactional.

Drive, by Daniel Pink, shares that your team is looking for autonomy, mastery, and purpose. You will retain and build a great workforce if you provide that to your team.

The Five Dysfunctions of an Executive Team, Patrick Lencioni, shares a parable that identifies the top 5 reasons senior management teams fail to come together as a team and how to overcome these obstacles.

Emotional Intelligence, by Daniel Goleman, offers that technical competence is critical, but the most influential leaders have the emotional capacity to stay calm, address concerns, eliminate friction, and find win/win solutions.

What are some of your Mount Rushmore business books?

Podcasts:

The School of Greatness, Lewis Howes, interviews thought leaders in business, health and fitness, relationships, and entrepreneurs who have had remarkable success.

Freakonomics , Stephen Dubner, brings forward a unique perspective based on research on current issues, such as gun control, cost of higher education, domestic violence, and international relations.

Maxwell Leadership , by John Maxwell, shares leadership insights from his work from over 40 years of writing about leadership.

The Ed Mylett Show, by Ed Mylett, interviews extreme sports, health, and wellness experts who offer insights on how to optimize your health, fitness, and psychological well-being and how to be an effective leader.

Newsletters that I have tagged:

Harvard Business Review

McKinsey Newsletter

Chronicle of Philanthrop y

Chronicle of Higher Education

4. Sleep : When you read anything about the best health move you can make, sleep is often at the top of the list. Research suggests that only 5-6% of the population can get by on less than 6 hours of sleep. Researchers recommend at least seven hours a night. I know many of you struggle with this but spend time trying to enhance your sleep.

5. Exercise : It is recommended that you get 150 minutes a week of moderate activity. That amounts to 30 minutes of brisk walking 4Xs a week. For those older readers, build strength and flexibility into your routine. We lose 3-5% of muscle each decade after age 40, so spending time reversing that is worth your time, and you will feel significantly more energized.

6. Diet: There is much information on this subject, and I am not a health expert, so I will not offer any diet-specific recommendations; however, listening to and reading what experts provide, there seems to be a set of superfoods a set of foods to avoid. Here are the top 5 in both categories based on what has received the most attention in the literature.

Top 5 Foods superfoods:

• Whole grains
• Berries (blueberries, strawberries, blackberries)
• Dark Chocolate (I knew you would like this one)
• Fish
• Green leafy vegetables
• Nuts

Just as important is what foods to reduce the intake of as much as possible:

• Sugar
• Salt
• Processed foods of all kinds, including cold cuts
• White anything- bread and pasta (I know you would not like this one)
• Vegetable and corn oils

7. Spiritual : Finding a way to manage stress while bringing focus to your life. The literature supports several activities, including:

• Meditation
• Yoga
• Breathing exercises
• Living your life aligned with your values
• Attending religious services

8. Hobbies/ activities: You are in the business of relationship building. If you are not living a rich and interesting life, how will you talk with people who live rich and interesting lives? How do you fill your time outside of work? Try something new each year. During COVID, I committed to learning the piano, a lifelong bucket list item. What’s on your list?

What becomes clear is taking care of your mind, body, and spirit is necessary to nourish you to live a full personal and professional life. ?James Clear, who wrote Atomic Habits, suggests taking one area you want to address and doing that one thing for the next 60 days to make it a habit. For others, you might shift your attention to your diet or exercise routine; for others, the takeaway might be to find a new learning source. Regardless, time spent on how you can grow by 10% in the coming year will produce many returns for you and your team. I wish you the best on this journey and would look forward to getting additional thoughts about how you sustain and renew yourself.