Archive for April, 2010

Today’s letter is H.

In terms of leadership success, H is about:

• Holding others to account for what they have agreed to deliver
• Helping others to succeed
• Highlighting the successes and achievements
• Helping others understand the reasons for certain decisions
• Holding the bigger agenda when everyone else is lost in the detail

What else would you add to the list?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

In seven days time, Britain will go to the polls and vote on who should lead the country over the next 5 years.

Without doubt whoever wins faces a challenging agenda. The run up to the election has provided some interesting lessons in leadership more generally.  So what are some the key lessons.

The Demands Are Huge

Just look at the amount of time those seeking election have had to put into their campaign and if elected they will be expected to hit the ground running.  Being a leader of an organisation is no different, everyone is looking to you for answers.

It Is Difficult To Please Everyone

I was listening to an interview with Gordon Brown on the radio where listeners of the local radio station were asked to put questions to the current Prime Minister.  What I noticed is that rather than the questions being about general policy, people tended to ask about things that were very specific to them.  If you are a leader in a large organisation, just think about the diverse range of interests you have to meet.  In reality you cannot meet the needs of everyone.

It Takes Courage To Lead

We all have opinions and views about what needs to happen and what should and what should not be done.  Being the observer or commentator is easy but stepping up to lead takes courage and is not for the faint hearted.

You Need To Make Choices

In the ideal world you would do everthing but sadly we don’t live in the ideal world.  Any form of leadership relies on you making choices.  Some of them will be popular whilst some will be unpopular but you need to be willing to make choices.

There Are No Quick Fixes

As a leader you want to be creating long term success.  Sure there may be some quick gains along the way, but when faced with big challenges there really are no quick fixes, it is a long term project.

Bottom Line: Leadership can be both challenging and rewarding and it is key that you take the opportunity to continually learn to achieve long term success.

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to become highly effective leaders and managers.  To sign up for his Weekly Leadership and Management Success Tips click here

Today’s letter is G.

G in terms of leadership success is about:

• Goal setting
• Giving effective feedback
• Gaining the support of others
• Gauging the impact of key decisions
• Getting honest feedback

What else would you add to the list?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

The letter of the day for today is F.

F in terms of leadership success is about:

• Forward planning and thinking long term
• Figuring out the best way from the options available
• Framing your communications in a way that engages others
• Fearlessness or at least a willingness to working through your fears
• Finding the strengths in others that they cannot see for themselves

What else would you add?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

Our letter for today is E.

E in terms of leadership success for me is about:

• Energy and being able to keep up the pace
• Engaging with all of the different stakeholders
• Eliminating wasteful or non adding value activities
• Encouraging others to bring forward their ideas
• Employing the right people

What else would you add to today’s list?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

Today is D Day.

D for me in terms of leadership success is about:

• Direction setting
• Determining the priorities
• Deciding, when you have many options
• Delegating effectively
• Delivering results

What else would you add?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

Today we are looking at the letter C.

C for me is all about:

• Caring about others
• Controlling your emotions under pressure
• Cost control
• Communicating clearly and concisely
• Changing what’s not working
• Customer focus

What else would you add?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

Today in our A to Z of Leadership Success we are going to be looking at the letter B.

B for me is all about:

• Building a great support team
• Believing in yourself
• Bringing out the best in others
• Balancing work and life

What favourites would you add to the list?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

I am starting a brand new series of blog posts on the A to Z of Leadership Success.

So what about the letter A? For me it is about:

• Action focus
• Acknowledging the contribution of others
• Acting with integrity
• Applying what you learn
• Accepting that you cannot be great at everything

What else would you add?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here

I don’t know about you but I am continually amazed how some people automatically believe that successful people were always successful.

Truth is, in my experience, those that really achieved long term success were willing to go the distance.

What I mean by this is that they:

• Got clear about the results that they wanted.
• Found out what it would take to achieve them.
• Got the help and support to get there.
• Put in the effort and made the sacrifices to make it happen.

So my question to you is, are you willing to go the distance to get the success you want as a leader?

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps accountants and health professionals to achieve success and realize their professional potential through being highly effective leaders and managers. For more information and to sign up for his free audio e-course click here