Do you have a leadership reflection routine?
In your calendar are there regularly scheduled times when you examine your underlying assumptions, decisions, and goals? Do you set aside time to ask questions, while making connections between apparently disparate pieces of information? This reflection practice is essential to effective leadership.
?Reflection serves as a bridge between experience and learning. It is an effort to understand how the events of our life shape our leadership, how we see the world, ourselves and others.
?Reflection is a game-changer for any leader. It can be as simple or complex as you want to make it.?Here are some suggestions:
- ?Get a journal (digital or paper) so you can?capture your?thoughts in writing as you reflect. Ryder Carroll, the creator of the Bullet Journal, explains that “the point of reflection is to make sure that the things you’re pursuing continue to matter to you even as life changes around you. It will help you focus on the why rather than the what.” Using a journal enables you to clear your mind by “flushing” your thinking onto the paper!
- Schedule unstructured thinking time. Many top leaders block their calendar to ensure adequate reflection and processing time.?Jeff Weiner, Chairman of Linked In, schedules between 90 minutes and two hours every day (check out his post, as he does an excellent job of explaining why this is so essential). Brian Scudamore, founder and CEO of O2E Brands, blocks an entire day each week. Here he describes why successful people spend 10 hours a week just thinking. William Deresiewicz made an excellent case for thinking time when he challenged the plebe class at the United States Military Academy at West Point to put down their electronics and stop multitasking. He says, “multitasking, in short, is not only not thinking, it impairs your ability to think.?Thinking means concentrating on one thing long enough to develop an idea about it.”
- Cultivate questions that you use for regular reflection. Marshall Goldsmith talks about his daily question process in this post. He has someone call him every day to ask him a list of 32 questions! That enables him to remain focused on what really matters. Harry Kraemer, clinical professor of strategy at the Kellogg School and former CEO of Baxter International, also uses a daily question practice for reflection. His list of eight questions can be found in a post on How Self-Reflection Can Make You a Better Leader.
Find some questions that work for you and use them on a regular basis to assess your leadership, your progress and what matters most to you.
