Author: Mark S. Brown

As a leader do you have the freedom to act? Or, do you find yourself reacting to the situation around you? Immediate events can cause you to react and lose sight of your goal. Your carefully crafted strategy can evaporate in a minute if you react without thinking.

As a leader your first task is to convey a mission to your group. You need their buy-in and support. Casting a vision is a skill of a talented leader. Your people need to be able to see, feel, and know where you are taking them.

The moment you act in discordance with your vision, you could lose them.

Recently, a manager I know reacted to an email. His response was immediate and defensive in nature. He was responding to data that reflected badly on his area’s performance. He sent a series of emails trying to defend the performance, and discredit the interpretation of the data.

In retrospect, those few emails eliminated the vision he created, that his organization was dedicated to continuous improvement. He had spent a great deal of time building a team vision based on “it is OK to fail”, and “experiment to find your path for improvement”. His credibility quickly vanished because of his reaction.

When you are a leader, you need to lead. Be out in front clearing a path. Act, don’t react! This week take a moment and reflect on when you have reacted badly, and what course of action would have prevented the situation that it caused.

When you are communicating to a group, increase your ability to connect with the following three tips.

1. Entertain: An audience loves to be entertained. This does not mean you need to perform stand up comedy or sing. If you integrate a personal story or a humorous story, you will increase the engagement with your audience.

2. Educate: Knowing your audience can help you decide how much teaching you need to do. Explaining the meaning of your data or words can increase the benefit for many in your audience.

3. Motivate: Let people know the purpose of your message, and your expectation for their next step. Motivate them to take action.

This week’s tips seem simple, but reviewing and practicing your message with these three things in mind can help you connect successfully. As Anthony Robbins has said, “The way we communicate with others and with ourselves ultimately determines the quality of our lives.”

P. B. Fitzwater said, “Character is the sum and total of a person’s choices.” You are required to make choices continuously. You decide when to get up, what you will eat, if you will exercise, with whom you will speak. Not all choices are equal in importance.

The simple choices are usually the easiest to make. The larger the impact of the decision, the more difficult it sometimes becomes to make the right choice. Mary Lou Retton once said, “As simple as it sounds, we all must try to be the best person we can: by making the best choices, by making the most of the talents we’ve been given.”

It sounds simple. Yet the biggest gap in our performance is the difference between what we know and what we do.

You can make excuses for not doing something. You can delay choices as long as possible. You can avoid situations that force you to choose.

If you feel you do not have control of your choices, it is time to get control. This week’s reflection exercise is to think about the choices you are making everyday and the choices you are avoiding. Review your to do list and see how long some of the items have remained on that list. Develop a plan to improve your daily choices.

I agree with Pat Riley when he said, “Look for your choices, pick the best one, then go with it.”

Patrick Lencioni has said, “If everything is important, then nothing is.” Our world is operating at an ever increasing pace. We are connected by electronic messages and news to people and organizations that continually demand our attention. Is it important?

John Maxwell’s Law of Priorities states, “Leaders Understand that Activity Is Not Necessarily Accomplishment”. We cannot focus on everything, and we need to be able to decide what is important to us. In John’s book he gives us his process of prioritizing using the 3 R’s.

1. What is required of me?
2. What gives me the greatest return?
3. What gives me the greatest reward?

Are you ready to shake up your life, and find your true priorities? Developing the ability to eliminate the tasks of little value, and drive focus for yourself and your team, is challenging. Prioritizing can be painful. Keeping busy is not the same as achievement.

The challenge for this week: Reflect on your schedule, cut activities that are not adding value. Add time to focus on what is really important to you.