WHAT DO YOU LISTEN FOR?
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For reinvention, uncover your hidden beliefs about your success, its benefits and limitations.
What is your context and perception about Your success?
The human side of change is complicated. It can be difficult for smart and intelligent people to reassess skill-sets, behaviours or their level of emotional intelligence. People who want to reinvent or renew themselves have to first understand what happens inside them and the constraints of the past.
In the fast-paced, action-oriented, transaction-driven corporate world there is little time to being self-reflective. In fact, reflection and the unlearning of habits that is needed for the executive to move to the next level makes them feel uncomfortable and anxious.
Context is the sum of the unspoken or unacknowledged conclusions, experience and interpretations of the past. It determines both your behaviour and what you regard as possible for the future.
Perception is your distinct way of awareness. It shapes what you pay attention to including when listening. It could be unexpressed needs of the other person, what’s missing or flawed, difficulty of a problem, possibilities, strategic opportunity, process, goal clarity, what is or what isn’t. Whatever it is - it is relevant to you. This leads to the actions you then take, patterns you see or miss, who you choose to hear.
listen for YOUR ‘success methodology’
Executives often do not realise that they are successful because of some behaviour and in spite of others. The behaviour traits that make an executive successful and upwardly mobile may also be the clues to their vulnerability. These traits can signpost when there is a need to create a second curve on the career path to avoid derailment or a career crisis.
And, paradoxically, what makes good executives even better is failure. Success is not the only teacher. Failure tests people in the most fundamental way.
Consider your process to experiment with changes in your leadership in a safe environment and to consider options and make choices.
listen for ‘CONTEXT’
Context is the sum of all the conclusions, experiences and interpretations that people in the organisation have reached. Context is the formula for success – and limits. It determines culture, social networks and webs of power. It colours thinking on what is possible and the choices that can be made. It shapes who gets to exercise authority, take up roles and participate.
Reflect on why you are in the role, for what purpose and with what expectations.
Who do you want to be in this situation or context?
listen for THE ‘WHY’
Why do you do what you do and in the way that you do it?
Why do you feel energised or drained?
Why do you respond in certain ways?
listen for THE ‘what’
What do you listen for in the role, day-to-day?
What do you become aware of?
What actions are you likely to take based on that listening? What do you need to do? How do you need to relate?
What is the payoff (especially psychological) that you seek?
Coaching Advice and Steps For The Next Level
Understand your conscious and underlying recipe for success and how it works to your advantage and how it limits you
Consider how this aligns with your values and core purpose
Align your inner-most aspirations with the demands and requirements of your current and next role
Design an inspirational and motivational path to develop the key leadership competencies to get you to the next level.
>> Source and recommended reading: “The Last Word on Power: Executive Re-Invention for Leaders Who Must Make The Impossible Happen’ by Tracy Goss
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LOST LEADERS When life and work don’t go as planned, sometimes under challenging and confronting circumstances, there can be a painful sense of ‘lostness’. Rather than making mental mistakes about the future or being stuck within not knowing, look for that breakthrough to overcome the obstacles and reach your potential.
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