Developing a Leadership Mindset
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Click here to view and download the Discussion Guide to utilize with your Group and/or Team over the next 12 months. The Guide and questions will be updated each month to reflect the TOTM concept.
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“The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born-that there is a genetic factor to leadership. That’s nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born.”
― Warren Bennis, On Becoming a Leader
Welcome to the 2022 Tool of the Month!
We are extremely excited to share the theme of the 2022 Tool of the Month with you, Developing a Leadership Mindset. We thank you for joining us on the leadership journey!
For nearly twenty-five years, I have had the privilege of coaching and interacting with hundreds of Leader Managers, in various forms, as they seek to effectively navigate the ever changing and evolving leadership landscape. I look forward to continuing this work alongside you and your Teams in 2022!
This year we invite you to join us on the journey of Developing a Leadership Mindset. Through the twelve tenets we will explore together this year, we hope to bring value to your daily life as a leader. After all, we agree with leadership expert Warren Bennis, who teaches, “leaders are made rather than born.”
Our leadership ability is rooted in the behaviors we chose each day and the experiences we’ve engaged in. What usually “gets” an individual to a particular level of leadership responsibility in an organization tends to be a result of their subject matter expertise, rather than their proven leadership effectiveness.
For each subject matter expert who has assumed or has been assigned leadership responsibility, adding leadership ability to subject matter expertise is critical to becoming an effective leader. Leadership is a skill of its own and expands the effectiveness of a subject matter expert.
Through years of dialogue and coaching leaders, we have found the most effective leaders grow by being introspective and intentional, by working to expand their ability and capacity to lead. Leaders do not have the luxury of self-identifying, “I am an effective leader!" We cannot proclaim ourselves an effective leader under any circumstance. Instead, only those we lead can bestow the title of leader on us. The mantle of leadership is developed as Warren Bennis wrote, “in the crucible moments we experience.” Those crucibles develop us, define us, and at times, wreck us.
Developing a leadership mindset requires each of us explore and examine our self-limiting beliefs and behaviors for the purpose of being and becoming a more effective leader. What type of leadership behaviors are you in the habit of choosing? Stephen Covey, in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, states, “our character is a composite of our habits.”
The pursuit of effectiveness, rather than perfection, is a healthy goal of a leader. I don’t believe we can achieve perfection this side of heaven, however I’m thoroughly convinced I can be and become more effective each day. The greatest battle of leadership effectiveness is fought in one’s own mind.
We encourage and challenge you throughout 2022, to examine your leadership paradigms and to explore developing a leadership mindset with us as we learn, grow, serve, and lead ourselves and others each day.
As this year unfolds, we will be exploring a different leadership concept each month, providing a monthly discussion guide, and recommending one book each quarter we hope you and your colleagues will read together.
In the first of twelve tenets, we begin by sharing the 4 Cs of leadership which are foundational to our Leadership Coaching and Organizational Development Model, “The Code, Unlocking Your Organizational D-N-A.”
We have identified 4 Cs to developing a leadership mindset. We can tell our brains what to think and as such, being and becoming an effective leader means creating a framework for filtering our thoughts and experiences as we lead others. We define the leadership mindset in terms of a filter for thoughts, experiences, and situations in handling yourself and others as:
Caring
Clarity
Communication
Consistency
First C: Caring – Leaders develop the ability to compel themselves to care about and for others. Leaders focus on caring about the quality of life and the quality of work of each and every individual in their scope of responsibility and do not have the luxury of deciding whether they like or “love” their colleagues. A deep passion for ensuring each person is provided with an environment where they can be and become the most effective version of themselves is the highest calling of a leader.
Regardless of an individual’s communication style, personal beliefs, ethnicity or level of self-limiting behavior, leaders recognize and affirm the intrinsic value, dignity, and worth of others. They can prove a deep sense of caring in the workplace by supplying the tools, materials, equipment, compensation, affirmation, recognition, information, training, education, and validation of every individual’s needs and desires.
Creating environments where each individual feels heard, seen, and respected is the foundation for creating high performing teams. A balance of caring about the quality of the lives of others and the quality of the individual and collective work performed results in extraordinary efforts, environments, and outcomes.
Second C: Clarity – Patrick Lencioni in his book The Advantage, states, “if you want organizational health, over-communicate clarity.” An irony of leadership is you and I do not get to decide how much clarity others want and or need. Leaders tend to supply the amount of clarity to others by measure of what they themselves need or by how much clarity they think others need. We have found one of the biggest gaps in effectiveness in organizations is simply a lack of clarity.
Third C: Communication – Communicate, communicate, communicate at all times and by all means, manners, and methods possible. Leaders ensure that appropriate organizational guiding principles (culture) and operational results, expectations, and plans are communicated to every individual, every team, and organization wide. Helpful, appropriate, effective, and efficient channels should be established to give and receive information, set and manage expectations, cheer progress, monitor results, and validate and recognize contributions.
Fourth C: Consistency – McDonald’s, the largest restaurant on Earth, serves food to hundreds of millions each year and has surpassed billions served by consistently delivering their product. Michael LeBoeuf writes, in How to Win Customers and Keep Them for Life, “consistent performance is what people want most.” There is no question in my mind that consistency is foundational to effective leadership.
What we allow, for ourselves and others, in terms of the behaviors we chose and the environments we create, we endorse. What does the culture you have created as a result of your leadership behavioral choices look and feel like? Do you lead and manage in an environment that is more energizing than frustrating to you and others? Are you spending valuable resources pursuing more opportunities and possibilities or are you refereeing squabbles and solving low level problems?
In referencing the path to effectiveness, James Cleary, in his must-read book Atomic Habits, states, “every habit produces multiple outcomes across time.” What evidence do you see and experience as a result of your leadership and management habits? What characteristics and skills are you in the habit of cultivating and employing that result in a positive, productive, meaningful impact and influence on others?
Now, more than ever, I am convinced that leadership is a choice. We decide and determine daily what habits we engage in thereby determining our level of effectiveness. I agree with Warren Bennis that leaders are made rather than born. If we are to be and become truly effective leaders, it is certainly a daily process of behaving and holding to truths consistently and steadfastly, while discovering and refining those very beliefs and behaviors.
Leadership is about living for and focusing on others; meeting the needs of others and creating environments to set individuals and teams up for success, meeting them where they are, by developing the characteristics and habits to be and become the most effective version of themselves possible this side of heaven. We are excited that you will be joining us on the journey in 2022 as we develop a leadership mindset together!
Group Discussion Guide
Click here to view and download the Discussion Guide to utilize with your Group and/or Team over the next 12 months. The Guide and questions will be updated eac
Recommended Quarterly Reading
2022 Managing From The Inside Out Dates
Winter 2022
February 2, 9, 16, 23
March 2, 9, 16
Spring 2022
May 4, 11, 18, 25
June 1, 8, 15
Fall 2022
October 5, 12, 19, 26
November 2, 9, 16
Classes are held weekly and in person from 8:30-11:30 A.M. in Lancaster at the Cork Factory Hotel. To view and download the 2022 flier with additional session information, please click here.
Register today to engage in professional growth and development as a Leader Manager and join us for Managing From The Inside Out! Simply email Katie Williamson at katie@lauraschanz.com to reserve a seat for yourself or a Team Member. The 2022 Registration Fee is $1,195.