The Power of Influence: Redefining the Importance of Authority

I have always wanted to be a leader, even before I understood what it was and the definition of it. In elementary school, I served on the student council, attended special meetings, and got to feel the power to vote on student activities, decision-making, and influence. Everyone had the opportunity to do something like this during the school year, along with being ball monitor, line leader, and a few other small leadership tasks. I just loved that feeling and thought that is what it means to be a leader. I guess that is when I realized I wanted to be a leader and be a leader in charge of things. I think it's actually in all of us to want to be a leader, develop, grow, build, organize, and create something beautiful for us to do. Still, too often, we confuse leadership and distort leadership. We get leadership twisted as I did on the student council; too often, we think leadership is about power and authority. Leadership is about a position, and I've noticed that leadership training is directed to that one percent of those in charge, but what about the rest of us? What about the other 99% of us that are not in leadership? How does the lightbulb come on one day and say I want to be a leader. Every single one of us has an opportunity to influence. We find ourselves in the seat at work where our heart is out the door thinking well, where do I need to start, or where else do I need to find a place? No, leadership is way more than just getting to the top. Leadership is more than just finding our time and waiting for our moment. Leadership is about influence, not authority; making a difference in whatever seat you're in, you can impact the trajectory of your organization from wherever you find yourself, whether you're an intern, whether you're on a team, whether you're a new hire whether you just became a boss. Do you feel stuck in the middle like the 99% of us? Leadership begins when we believe it is all about influence. I want to give you a good place to start so you can figure out what influence looks like for you; how much do you already have? And what do you need to do to grow your influence? Question: how much influence do you currently have? if you were to measure your influence like something in an account, just like at a bank, and you were to look at that amount in there, have you figured out how much you have right now? How much influence do I have with the people that I work with? What am I doing to grow my influence? What am I doing to develop my influence? I don't know if you realize this; however, we all are growing in influence at different points, or we're doing things costing us influence. We have to decide and be gracious enough to figure out what those behaviors are, but are we doing that; is it helping us grow our influence? This means becoming more aware of our strengths. Do you know what brings the most value to the people around you? What is your superpower? What are you good at? What is the thing that you do that other people go to? What are you doing that is costing you influence? This is the hard part because no one wants to know the things about themselves that aren't going well right, but we all need to do it. There's information orbiting around our world that would help me get better. Why would I not want to know it if there's information or meeting around your life that would help you be a better leader at work? I will help you be a better employee. It would help you be a better coworker, maybe even a better dad, mom, or friend. Why wouldn't you want to know it for something costing you influence? Will you be courageous enough to find it? There are a couple of different ways to do this. One of them is to ask some people around you. Hey, what is it like on the other side of me? What is it like when you sit with me? What is it like when you're around me, and do you experience something that bothers you? Do you experience something that inspires you? If you were in my role, if you were in my shoes and you just left that meeting, or if you were in that meeting, if you were in charge of that project, if you were running that campaign, what would you have done differently? If you were me, I would like to ask my boss another question before a promotion becomes available and someone asks you about me: what would cause you to hesitate to recommend me? Important visions about your career are going to be made when you're not in the room, so you may as well go ahead and figure out what that conversation is going to be like; what are people going to say when you're not there, I'm telling you if you can be courageous enough to go down the road of "I want to grow" you're going to have to get over the intersection of "I want to be liked" to many people retreat, and go the other way. Still, if you can cross that intersection and go, I want to grow more than I want to be accepted or I want to be liked, that's where you can begin to identify those areas that are costing you influence. So many people are sitting in jobs now that feel like they may have the steering wheel; however, the wheel is attached to nothing, and I don't think it works. You're trying to turn it this way, and it doesn't seem to move in either direction. What I've learned about leadership is that 99% of us are not in charge. The steering wheel does work, but it doesn't work because of authority. It works because of influence. How are you growing in your influence? #influnecewithoutpower #shapingperspectives #inspirechange #mentoring #influencematters #channelpartners #telarus