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Harness the Power of Positivity

We give way to much power to negative thoughts which limit our abilities and relationships.

Minds cluttered with doubts, fears and negative thoughts have an impact on our health.  Negative attitudes and feelings of helplessness and hopelessness can create chronic stress, which upsets the body’s hormone balance, depletes the brain chemicals required for happiness, and damages the immune system.

Stress from negative thinking creates changes in the brain that may affect our mental health and lead to disorders such as anxiety, depression, ADHD, schizophrenia and mood disorders.

Negative thought impacts your work, your family and your friendships.

Here are 5 steps you can take today to become a more positive person:

  1.  Start your day listing 5 things you are grateful for.  Better yet, keep a daily postivity journal. If inclined, double up on the positive by adding another 5 things you are grateful for before going to bed.
  2. Replacement therapy works.  Every time a negative thought pops into your mind replace it with a positive thought or two or three.
  3. Seek and you will find a positive side to every situation, even if you are surrounded with negativity.
  4. Change your words. Instead of, “I’m nervous” try “I’m excited”.  Or “I’m going to fail” to “I’ve got this”.  Along with your words change your posture for 2 minutes to a power pose.  Think superman with your legs wide apart and hands on your hips.
  5. Promoting positivity creates a culture centered around supporting, inspiring and recognizing one another.  Try it at work.  One kind act leads to another in which an exciting chain-reaction of positivity is set off.  After all, it’s much easier to succeed in a work environment that actively promotes positivity compared to one where stress and anxiety rules the day.

In fact, one study by the University of Warwick found that positivity among employees causes a 12% jump in productivity, while employees who are less-than-pleased with their working situations are 10 percent less productive.

Workplaces that embrace positivity are more productive, profitable and have higher satisfaction levels.  Here are some examples to create an empowering, supportive and happy environment conducive for success.

• Caring for your colleagues as friends.
• Forgiving mistakes instead of assigning blame.
• Supporting colleagues and showing compassion in times of stress and difficulty.
• Sharing random acts of kindness.
• Inspiring one another.
• Treating each other with respect and trust.

Relationships are strengthened, energy is heightened and buffers are built that help people bounce back from difficulties better. Instead of feeling overwhelmed and stressed, everyone feels empowered to overcome challenges.

Harness the power of positivity

 

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Your Personal Development Plan

In construction, we make sure that we have deep and wide footings anchored upon solid rock.  The larger the building the deeper and wider we go to handle the weight or load.

The same is true for leadership.  The more people and responsibility weighted on your leadership foundation the deeper and wider you must go in your personal development as a leader.

There are four (4) corners in laying any building’s foundation that must be strong enough to withstand the weight otherwise it will crack and crumble.  Just as there are four (4) corners in laying your leadership foundation.

The four corners of leadership are:

  1. Personal Development
  2. Leadership Learning
  3. Preparation
  4. Practice: (Being an intentional leader)

Today we are looking just at the first of the four corners — Your personal development.  It is the corner where your entire foundation begins.

Personal Development

Every leader has a different style, different life experiences and a unique outlook.  The better you understand yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, the better you will be to lead others as well as give them the tools they need to better understand themselves.

Look for tools  you can utilize for your own self-leadership development.  There is an abundance of reading materials and workshops that will increase or validate your emotional intelligence, your ability to communicate and listen, and increase your ability to stay poised under pressure.

Here are a few of the personal skills that will prepare you as a leader:

  1. Develop your EQ (emotional intelligence). People with high emotional intelligence (EQ) are consistently the top performers in their organizations. They’re more resilient and flexible when things get tough, and they’re held in the highest regard by their bosses, peers, co-workers and others.A good start is by working through the book “Emotional Intelligence 2.0” by Bradberry & Greaves.  Emotional intelligence is the #1 predictor of professional success and personal excellence.I like this book as a jump-start to growing your emotional intelligence.  I recommend the proven strategies to increase your self-management, self-awareness, social awareness and relationship management.
  2. A leader has strong abilities to communicate.  I recommend the international non-profit Toastmasters.  Join a club that meets weekly.  There you will find a supportive and positive learning experience that should empower you to develop your communication skills.  As you become a better speaker self-confidence and additional personal growth also takes place.
  3. Hone your ability to listen. Too many leaders are full of themselves and think they have all the solutions and then wonder why their people aren’t engaged and don’t perform well.  Become an active listener.
  4. Develop strong self-management skills and organizational abilities. Organizational skills focus on prioritizing one’s tasks, and then working accordingly, so that these are achieved.
  5. Foresight is a skill that comes with practice in working through all potential outcomes. This skill will help you and your team make plans 3 months, 6 months, or a year or more in advance. The key is knowing how to design a winning strategy, and how to execute it effectively using foresight.   Exercising your foresight muscles and thinking through what could happen in several circumstances will enable you to respond more quickly and easily, even if you encounter an emerging future that you didn’t foresee. Your resilience and agility are improved because you have thought about several futures and have a number of plans you could build on.
  6. Tenacity is a skill that enables the leader to push through when things go wrong.  Start by finding like-minded, passionate people who can help provide guidance and encouragement.
  7. Pressure and stress can you handle it and stay poised, calm and effective no matter what.  Here are some strategies for staying cool in a heated situation:
    • Stay focused in the here and now
    • Change your mind-set — visualize the outcome your want and switch your language.  For example, instead of saying, “I’m so nervous”, you can tell yourself, “I’ve got this”.
    • Switch off the fight or flight by taking a break, breathing and then let go.

Working on you is a high priority and a lifetime pursuit.

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5 Levels of Leadership

5 Levels of Leadership

–  review

Everybody’s a leader. It doesn’t matter if you are in kindergarten or retired – whatever position in life  — a mother, a father, a friend, a brother—you are a leader in some way, shape or form.

We should all be learning how to be better leaders.

There are several stages of leadership. You can’t just skip to the final stage of leadership; rather, you have to go through the stages, and if you know what the stages are and if you know that the levels exist, you can navigate through them and become a successful leader.

I like John Maxwell’s book The 5 Levels of Leadership because it begins with the premise that the purpose of leadership is to produce more leaders and to help each person move toward the highest level of leadership they can reach. Then he lists and explains the five levels of leadership that he has seen and experienced.

The 5 Levels of Leadership are:
1. Position – People follow because they have to.
2. Permission – People follow because they want to.
3. Production – People follow because of what you have done for the organization.
4. People Development – People follow because of what you have done for them personally.
5. Pinnacle – People follow because of who you are and what you represent.

Maxwell uses humor, in-depth insight, and examples as he describes each of these stages of leadership. He shows you how to master each level and rise up to the next to become a more influential, respected, and successful leader.

“No matter where you are in your leadership, remember, what got you to where you are can get you ahead of the next level.” John C. Maxwell

In this book, John Maxwell explains further by stating ten (10) insights to help people understand these leadership levels. The insights are:

  1. You can move upper level but you must never leave the previous level behind.
  2. You are not on the same level with every person. You may be at level two with your family at home but level 3 with your employees at work.
  3. The higher you go, the easier it gets for you to lead.
  4. The higher you go the more time and commitment is required to win a level. There is no easy way to get up.
  5. Moving up the levels goes slowly but going down goes easily.
  6. The higher you go the greater the returns.
  7. Moving further always require further growth. Every risk at a higher level is a natural extension of what the leaders have by then developed.
  8. Not climbing the levels limits you and your people. If your leadership is a 4 out of 10, you effectiveness would be nothing more than 4.
  9. When you change positions or organizations, you seldom stay at the same level.
  10. And finally, you cannot climb the level alone.

“The goal of life is not to live forever; the goal of life is to leave something that would live forever.”

John C. Maxwell