Leadership Done Right

Brandon W. Jones

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Leadership Qualities

What Type Of A Listener Do You Want To Be?

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As a leader, it is very important to be a good listener.  When you are the leader, you have many responsibilities that you must do on a regular basis.  There can get to be a lot of hustle and bustle around you.  Amongst all the hustle and bustle, it can be a real challenge to listen to people around you. It is, however, very important to listen effectively and intently to those around you.  As you listen, you will find answers to questions without having to ask them.

So how can you be a good listener?  What type of listening do you do when you are around others?  There are four different types of listening.

Inactive Listening

Hearing only the words or sounds; the listener is disassociated from both content and sender.  This type of listening happens when you are in deep thought and you hear something around you all of a sudden that you didn’t even know was going on. [Read more…] about What Type Of A Listener Do You Want To Be?

The Correlation Between Goals, Expectations, And Success

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One of my main goals as a leader is to have success. Success comes in many forms. Seeing a big project get completed, helping an employee improve and overcome a weakness, hitting a budget target, meeting customer needs and keeping them satisfied, and implementing a new procedure within the given parameters are all forms of success. There are many other forms of success that you will see in your career.

Success

One important aspect of success is that success is in the eye of the beholder.  What one person sees as success may be failure to someone else.  Success is dependent on your expectations.  If you reach your expectations, you will feel successful whereas if you don’t meet them, you will probably not feel successful.

Expectations

In order to be successful, you need to set correct expectations.  You need to set your expectations based on your own desires and abilities.  It is very easy to get caught up thinking that you should set your goals based off of someone’s past performance, when in reality you should set your goals based on your past performance. I have seen many cases where one person is successful in a specific way so the next person has to have the same success in the same way for them to be as successful. [Read more…] about The Correlation Between Goals, Expectations, And Success

What You Should Be Dedicated To As A Leader

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In leadership, there are many things competing for your time.  As a leader, it is a challenge to effectively identify what is worth your time and what is not.  It is important to give your full effort to the things you decide to do.  It is better to be dedicated to a few things to be able to give your full effort, than to not be dedicated and give a mediocre effort to many things.

The more dedicated you are to something, the more time you will devote to it. Although you can’t always decide where you spend your time due to various responsibilities, it is important to know when to delegate and when do it yourself. By effectively delegating, you give yourself more time to be dedicated to what is most important to you.

So what does it mean to be dedicated? Dictionary.com defines the word dedicate as, “to devote wholly and earnestly, as to some person or purpose.” So what should you be dedicated to? As a leader, it is important spend your time doing the most important things. I have seen many leaders that have said that they were dedicated to one thing or another, yet they spend very little time on it. Are they really dedicated to it? I would say that they are not. [Read more…] about What You Should Be Dedicated To As A Leader

How Do You Set The Tone As The Leader?

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Since I entered the workforce, I have seen leaders that were very strict and ones that were very lenient. I have also seen leaders that were happy and relaxed, as well as, ones that were very stressed, unhappy, and constantly tense.

Leadership Tone

There are many other types of leaders as well. All the leaders I have seen, however, have one thing in common. They all seem to set the tone for those they lead. With each tone the leader sets, there was a different mood or environment. Each of the different leaders has a strong influence on the feelings and mood of those they lead.

Strict Leadership

I once worked under a strict leader. He followed all the rules and kept a tight leash on everyone. This made everyone tense and uptight. The leader kept a strong hand on what people did and didn’t do. He was also very quick to get rid of people when they disobeyed the rules and/or didn’t work hard enough. It didn’t take long and everyone was not only following the rules, but they were working as hard as they could.

This leader was able to keep everyone working hard all the time, but wasn’t always able to keep the people happy or in the group. Under this leader, as well as other leaders like this, it is not uncommon to see people come and go quickly and frequently. [Read more…] about How Do You Set The Tone As The Leader?

Be Your Best Self As A Leader

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Lesson From Wrestling

Several years ago I had a defining moment.  I was a wrestler in high school and it was my senior year.  Prior to the start of the wrestling season, I hurt my back working out.  During the first few weeks of the season I was still on the mend, but I was fit/healthy enough to do a full workout.  I still had a some back pain as a result of the injury, but it was more of a soreness than pain.

The pain led me to be more lazy and put forth less effort.  I used the excuse of my back pain as the reason for my lack of effort.  I know back pain can limit a person’s ability, but this was not the case for me.  I had the ability to do more, but I was just not giving my full effort as I should.

Around that same time, I had an appointment with a doctor to get my back checked out.  When I went to the doctor’s office to get my back checked, he said there were no major problems from the injury and I could return to complete physical activity.  The doctor didn’t set any limitations on me because of my injury.

Once I had been cleared by the doctor, I had to make a decision.  I could either give wrestling my full effort and be a different wrestler than I was in the past, or I could just work as hard as I had in the past and be a mediocre wrestler.  Well, I chose to work hard and be different than I was in the past.  [Read more…] about Be Your Best Self As A Leader

The Difference Between A Leader And A Controller

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Recently I received a request to talk about the difference between leadership and the control of others.  So what is the difference?  Do you lead or control others?  In leadership it may seem like there is a fine line between controlling others and leading them, but in reality they are completely different.  The biggest difference between the two is choice and accountability.

The Controller

The controller uses a completely different set of tactics than a leader.  They don’t give people the freedom to make choices.  They use threats.  For example, you may hear them say, “If you don’t do _______, I won’t do ______ for you.”  Or you may even hear them say, “You do this, or you will get it.”  You can fill in your own blanks.

Those who control others are very dominant on the outside, but insecure on the inside.  They have the tendency to control because they don’t trust their followers.  They don’t think people will follow them unless they are controlling over them.  The controller also uses manipulation and/or blackmail.  They tell people that if they don’t follow them, they will hold it against them. [Read more…] about The Difference Between A Leader And A Controller