Leadership - It's A Personal Thing

So this is it.

My first ever blog.

When the lovely Amanda Sterling asked me to write a post only six weeks ago, sadly, my immediate response was “Me? Really? Oh I don’t think so; I don’t have anything interesting to say”.

But I've been encouraged by meeting so many amazing leaders at the HR Game Changer Conference in Auckland this week.

We all have a role to play, a new perspective, a new thought, we can all step up.

So this blog will be a collection of my thoughts as they are still being developed. A summary of the questions I’m pondering as we all change the game. My thoughts are not yet fully resolved, but a work in progress. 

I’m continually learning, but I’ll speak out anyway.

And I've been thinking, observing and learning a lot about leadership over the last while.

I love Mark Sanborn’s ideas on leadership.

He views leadership as influence and he asks the following four simple questions –

- Do you shape your life and career?

- Do you affect the quality of others' experiences?

- Do you inspire or influence others?

- Do you work to achieve specific goals by working with and coordinating the efforts of        others?

It occurs to me that leadership is a very personal thing.

And I want to lead.

I think deep down we all want to lead.

In HR we often say "it’s all about the leadership".

Well I think it’s about everyone learning to lead. And that starts right here with me. I’m learning. I want to always be learning.

So my challenge, how can we as HR Leaders create environments where every single person is encouraged to lead?

- Where everyone is shaping their life and career?

- Where everyone has a positive impact over others’ experiences?

- Where everyone inspires and positively influences?

- Where everyone is working towards clear goals and maximising the efforts of others?

This is our challenge.

A challenge to create environments where everyone sees the possibilities as endless, where everyone spots the opportunities not the problems, where everyone believes they have something great to contribute.

A culture, which at the very heart of it, always encourages people to be better people.

A place where everyone is learning, growing, stepping out and stepping up.

I want to be part of creating great places like this.

The question is, do you?