6 Steps To Becoming An Outstanding Leader
By Chizoba Anyika (Mrs.) FCILT, FNIS
President, Voice of Women (VoW) Foundation for Peace and Unity.
Anyika is a high-performing leader, an amazing team-player and a result-driven personality. She is also a Deputy Director at the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA). In this article, she shares six (6) nuggets for being the best version of yourself and accomplishing more as a leader. Enjoy it:
1. Accept your challenges and commit to your goal
If you want to earn the respect of your peers, managers, and your team, then let your work speak for itself. Push yourself up and imbibe the winning attitude.
Do not relent even if the chances of winning is very slim. Commit to a cause and stick to it facing your challenges squarely. You will surely succeed but you need to step out of your comfort zone because growth and comfort do not co-exist.
2. Earn your team’s trust
An authentic leader creates the right environment for people and ultimately businesses to thrive.
You should be more of a coach and less of a leader. Be genuine. Genuineness helps build relationships with colleagues, garners a higher level of trust, infuses greater productivity, and promotes a healthier work environment.
Today’s employees seek a people-centric manager that is involved not a boss who commands, controls and intrudes. Employees need a committed leader-coach who offers them full support, an opportunity to reinvent themselves and be creative.
In giving your team the room to explore themselves, trust is magnified, growth is nutured, and mindset is positively transformed.
In carrying them along, they are empowered and encouraged to ask the right questions because they trust you.
At the end of the day, their support magnifies your capabilities and minimizes your flaws.
3. Seek for balance for yourself and your team
A stable work-life balance is essential to job satisfaction so constantly encourage your team to take time out from work to spend quality time with their families and friends, exercise, and get involved in other social activities.
Promoting actions that create peace in their personal lives rejuvenates them, generates power in them. With a peaceful mind, they ultimately give their best to work.
4. Support causes that you believe in
Get inspired. Be involved in a cause you believe in and get involved. Be intentional about promoting that cause. For instance, if you love Women Development, then get involved with groups in whose objectives you believe in, supporting however you can.
Find a way to support, motivate, encourage and openly endorse others in your interest groups for their efforts. Carry other women along in career growth and offer your support if you belong to women groups.
5. Social Responsibility
Find a way to give back to the Society. Be impactful and seek ways to improve the quality of life of your Community. In giving back to the society you will get a deep sense of fulfillment because you are blessed to be a channel of blessing for others.
The more you give, the more you receive.
6. Stay connected with who you are
It is imperative to stay connected with what you are obsessed about, what defines YOU as a person, however unique it may be. Get a hobby and explore your interests. Travel, go for adventures and generally BE YOU.