To Make an Impact...Or Not.

For more than 10 years I've been talking about the power of a #SuperObjective. A Super Objective is essentially your purpose in action. It is the impact you want to have (on your team, organization, culture, customers, students, patients, community, etc.) set in active language, so it puts you on an active path to being and bringing your best, most authentic, and powerful self to the situations you face.

But like it or not, whether you achieve your Super Objective, lies in the eye of the beholder.

[excerpt from Brave Leadership, by...me!]

The classroom is the absolute best testing ground for me. My Super Objective is "to connect people to the best of who they are." That's why I get up and write in the morning. That's why I teach and speak. That's why I do the work I do. That's what I'm up to in the world. All day long I get to work toward doing that. Sometimes the actions I take are effective, sometimes they're not. Sometimes they have the opposite effect.

In one session, years ago, a gentle young woman sat in the back row, and she was having a tough time identifying what mattered to her (an early step in the process to identify your Super Objective), so I started asking questions. As I probed more deeply, instead of unleashing her thinking as I intended to do (to connect her to the best of who she was), I saw her disappear into herself. Luckily, I was mindful enough to realize that she didn't feel safe. Instead of experiencing my questions as helpful, she felt like she was being interrogated.

A Super Objective is all about impact. It's critical to pay attention to whether or not your actions have the impact you want them to have. If not, it's on you to change course.

I could have blamed her. I could have thought, "Oh well, she's just one of those people who doesn't get it. She won't let me help her. Her bad." Because that's what we do, right?

But if I stand for connecting people to the best of who they are, do I only stand for that when it's easy and convenient? No! I have to flex an change and do everything I can in spite of the obstacles to achieve what I'm up to in the world.

[end of excerpt]

Now I have to confess, sometimes I really struggle with this. If someone has done something hurtful, if our values are in conflict, or I simply don't like the person very much (hey, we're all human!), I have to work pretty darn hard to keep myself in alignment with the person I want to be in the world.

Because here's the truth: if I'm not, I feel it. You cannot escape yourself.

What's the impact you want to have outside yourself? What's your Super Objective? #BraveLeadership

Kimberly Davis, Author of Brave Leadership: Unleash Your Most Confident, Powerful, and Authentic Self to Get the Results You Need

An expert on authentic leadership, Kimberly Davis shares her inspirational message of personal power, responsibility, and impact with organizations across the country and teaches leadership programs world-wide; most notably, her program “OnStage Leadership” which runs in NYC and Dallas, TX. Additionally, Kimberly teaches Authentic Influence and Executive Presence for Southern Methodist University’s (SMU) Cox School of Business' Executive Education Program, and partners with SMU in teaching for the Bush Institute's Women's Initiative WE Lead Program (empowering female leaders from the middle east and north Africa) for the National Hispanic Corporate Council. 

Kimberly is a TEDx speaker and her new book, Brave Leadership: Unleash Your Most Confident, Authentic, and Powerful Self to Get the Results You Need, which has been named as the number one book to read in Inc. Magazine’s “The 12 Most Impactful Books to Read in 2018,” with a cover-endorsement by best-selling author Daniel Pink, is available at all on-line and brick-and-mortar bookstores everywhere.