WHAT DOES IT NEED TO BECOME A GREAT LEADER?

Imagine you’re on the football pitch and you are the captain of your team. What would it take to win the match, the season or even to qualify for the higher league? It needs clear communication, guidance but at the same time room for personal development of your peers, a big portion of motivation and most of all leading by example. That, you can also apply to the world of business. What does it take to lead a team and to inspire the people around you? - You name it. Especially there, we don’t only need managers but motivating leaders who have visionary ideas.

“Managers are doing things right; leaders are doing the right things.”

Hello, my name is Jana and in the last 6 months I had the privilege to participate in the adidas Manager Development Program (MDE) to be ready to not only lead people in a team but as well to become a good and inspiring leader to others. We are striving for being an inter-dependent community. And therefore, we should combine and share our knowledge / abilities to create something greater together. Translated to sport: on the pitch the players of each team have different skills where all together form a perfect symbiosis. I want to go on the pitch right now, start this exchange with you and share important input / tools which helped me and hopefully will help you to develop yourself in the best possible way – no matter if you’re just about to start your career or if you’re already working for several years: 

Start with WHY

Way too many people are running around and actually don’t know why they’re doing the things they do and what their goals are – in a certain way myself included. Maybe you gained great skills for playing Tennis and have the best gear for it. But it doesn’t help you when you’re currently standing in the middle of a swimming pool. You need to swim when you will be pushed into the cold water. Meaning, in our everyday life we’re sometimes so focused on making progress in certain things by neglecting that we’re currently in the wrong environment.

Take a step back and make yourself clear what your core values are. Start with your WHY. Why am I doing things? Does that fit to my values which are the fundament of my behavior and decision making? If you always keep your WHY in mind - no matter what you’re doing - you’ll always have a special radar for doing the right things which are credible and stuck to your values. This will help you like a lifejacket in the “swimming pool of uncertainties” to give you guidance and trust in yourself. Take a step back and reflect yourself to get the bigger picture. Be the owner of your situation and especially of your life.

Create new HABITS with the right MINDSET

How often do you say “if only”, “I can’t” or “I have to”? We need the right mindset. It’s an ever-ongoing process to improve ourselves every single day – and this we need to practice. Every great sportsman is focusing on their abilities rather than what they aren’t able to do. They never stopped learning until they internalize it. To check your mindset, be more aware of how you say things. It’s always a matter on how you attract things and how you react to them. Stay positive and open for the new. Instead of saying “I can’t do it”, you could say “I can’t do it…YET”. That makes a big difference.

Be proactive. Can you directly change things based on your behavior? – Do so! Can you indirectly change things by influencing people’s behavior? – Do so! Is it something you can’t influence (such as the past or situational realities)? – Don’t spend your time bothering about it! You can’t change it anyways. This will help you to feel more at ease.

Next to that, overcome hurdles and create new habits where you feel they match to your core values and mindset. It's the WHAT to your WHY. To win we have to enter the arena and to win we all have to perform. So let’s start a new sport, learn an instrument, engage voluntarily, improve your presentation skills, learn how to manage your financials or listen more to your inner self – just as examples! Instead of starting several things simultaneously and sooner than later loosing interest, you should focus on one thing first you want to start / improve until you make it a habit. Make sure your goals are SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound. It takes 30 days to form a new habit. Capture your progress every week and see when you challenge yourself you get better every day. You can make mistakes and you can fail. It’s ok. Admit it, correct it and learn from it so that it has no power over you - immediately. And you shouldn’t ask yourself, how long it will take to learn it but rather how far can I go with my ability? Spoiler: Way further beyond than you initially might have thought.

If you are confident in a specific field the next step is then the transition from being a learner to now being a role model. It’s about influencing others to perform at their best. Nevertheless, in some fields you are willing to continue learning and adapt to the fast-changing environment. Because you know: great leaders are always learners.

How can you boost your learning process? Here some advices which will help you to improve:

Seeking out for ROLE MODELS

Honestly, every young (or not so young) football player has one football star they’re totally admiring. They want to play like them, look like them, be like them. Learning from the successes, but also to avoid the failures their idol might have made. This pushes the young players to thrive for more and sometimes they even succeed their old idol.

The same (maybe not in this drastic way) we can apply to the business world as well. There are always people you think they made it and you admire them in a certain way because they act differently than the rest. Why not asking them how they made it there or even directly asking for help/advice how to reach you certain personal goal? Great leaders will not only tell you which great things they achieved but will as well talk about their setbacks and failures, their weaknesses and the not so rosy times - But at the same time how to overcome it by continuous learning about themselves. This should help you to avoid to do this failure by yourself. And it’s not only a one-way street that you will benefit from. Your mentor might also profit from the conversation as you might bring up ideas and views, they never thought of before.

Here I have to admit I always struggle with this one, because I don’t want to bother anyone, think their time is way too precious and I won’t find the right questions etc. But I experienced, every time I had the courage to reach out to certain people, my fear was unfounded because everyone was positive minded, happy to listen/share their opinion and it always had a positive impact – on both sides. Nevertheless, this is something I still have on my agenda to push myself more.

Find a LEARNING PARTNER

It does not always need to be a person in a high position who helps you to grow and get different views on things. When you want to learn a new skill / habit, I really encourage you to partner up with a learning partner. They can be anyone - a colleague, a friend or someone out of your sport class. And they don’t necessarily need to learn the same thing as you do. Let me show you my example:

For a 30-Day challenge, I wanted to start running on a regular base. My training partner stood at a similar point. But that was 10 years ago - now he’s running mountain marathons (which by the way I still think is super inspiring!). The good thing was, he still had the struggles in mind from back then, I might experience, so that he could help me with a lot of empathy. My partner on the other hand wanted to find mechanisms how to react on constant changes and how to deal with it without feeling uncomfortable. Working for a Challenger Brand, I know very well the situation of sudden changes and how to keep motivated. So, this seemed to be the perfect match to teach each other and give advices.

And indeed, it helped so much to exchange on a weekly base. You can reach out to them when you struggle, and they can analyze it as an outstanding person. And at the same time, they will celebrate your successes with you. It is super useful to involve someone else in your thoughts. As soon as you talk about it, it gets easier. Sometimes even a random sentence - we didn’t even mean to give as advice - helped the opposite person to proceed.

One thing I would like you to take to heart in the end. Even though we didn’t know each other before, we had a certain connection and we felt this is a safe space without judging. This is very important when you are looking for a learning partner to really make progress. And like in sport when you have a real running buddy, it's way more fun to run this journey together.

All these points mentioned above should contribute to sustainable and long-term life goals which harmonize with your core values. To keep up with the pace, therefore it’s super important to regularly:

RECHARGE and REFLECT

You can only give 100% if you also have the time to recharge your batteries. You can find your best training results in sport only if you have periods of rest in between. So, focus on a healthy lifestyle, enough sleep and a balanced work-life ratio. I know in our business it sometimes feels quite hard to find the right balance. But if you still keep your WHY in mind (as mentioned above), you know what to do without feeling bad. Be brave to say NO for the sake of prioritization. Remember that your time and resources are precious! And most of all: no job is important enough to prioritize it over your health!

Just try these first steps to become a better leader, include it into your every day life and lead by example. And just to make clear: Being a leader does not necessarily mean that you have a big team below you or that you are the captain of the football team, but you have a general positive and challenging influence on the people in your environment day by day. Leaders think outside the box without forgetting their why, encourage you to tackle things at the root and try things differently - let it be on the pitch or in the office. I hope I did the first step of inspiration herewith now.

Stay positive, believe in your abilities, and support others to create something greater together. You are awesome!

Jana.