Which leader are you? The one who tells their team the answers or the one that asks their team for options and recommendations? I definitely thought that I had to have all the answers in the beginning of my leadership journey. I thought I had to know what to tell my team when they had questions and if I didn’t know, then I felt like an impostor. That thinking was so wrong. You have a team for a reason! They…
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Is there such a thing as being too nice? When you read that question, was your initial response a yes or a no? My parents taught me to treat others with kindness and encouraged my sister and me to avoid conflict with our friends. As adults in the workplace, it isn’t always possible to avoid conflict. There may be issues between departments, team members who don’t get along or managing the work of outside vendors that can lead to conflict….
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I remember working for someone who wanted to know updates on what I was doing each day. It made it difficult to get anything done with all her requests and I wondered if she had lost trust in me. She was a bit of a micromanager, but I also understood that she was under a lot of pressure from our management. We were working on a high exposure program that had high expectations and impact for the organization. My manager…
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A leader who doesn’t feel ready for leadership responsibilities will struggle to trust their abilities. They will compare themselves to everyone else, live with doubt and insecurity. They want to show up authentically, but because of their own doubts it isn’t easy for them. Brene Brown said that “authenticity is a practice and you choose it every day.” I like to believe that all leaders are doing the best that they can to show up authentically. They may not even realize that…
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I know you think your manager knows what you are doing, but you need to know the truth, they don’t. They are in as many meetings as you are and don’t have the visibility to all of the things that you are doing. They can’t possibly stay completely up to date with the latest status of your projects and your team unless you tell them. You may want to ask them how they would like to stay updated. You can…
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“You need to stop doing so much for us and let us try things.” This was one of the comments in the performance review feedback from her team that made Renee pause. She led a team that had a lot of potentials, but they were more junior in experience. In her mind, she was helping them, but her team clearly didn’t see it that way. Leaders who want to support their teams may jump into “help” when they see the…
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I talked to a leader that has been at his company for a while, but was recently promoted into a much larger role. He called me to talk through a situation that had identified a process gap because a key person who normally participates in the process was out. Others tried to step in to do it instead, but it ended up creating more issues and the work ultimately had to be done again. The leader was frustrated that this situation…
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Leadership doesn’t come naturally for everyone. What is fascinating though is that it isn’t because they aren’t good leaders. It is because they don’t believe that they are good leaders. The critic in their heads can get in the way and it tells them that they aren’t good enough. This happened to me and now I can see how so many other leaders do the same thing and hold themselves back. Everyone around them can see how great they are doing, but…
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Think back to the first time you led a team. It may be quite a few years ago now, but can you remember how it felt? For me, I was full of excitement and loved the idea of leading a team. A new opportunity like this doesn’t come along every day and I didn’t want to lose it. I had done so much to prove myself and this was my chance to show my leadership team that I could do…
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John was an intern and proved that he could succeed in multiple areas of the company. They offered him a full-time role and he did a great job. As the company grew they decided to give him people management responsibilities. He began having challenges with the transition from being a doer to becoming a leader of a team. When I met with John he was excited about his new role, but felt unsure of himself. He had never led people before…
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