You want to be a better leader. You know that you can do more, but you just don’t know-how. It might seem too time-consuming and difficult to improve your leadership abilities, but it doesn’t have to be! There are many ways for you to improve your leadership abilities. We will discuss 3 of the building blocks I have used over the past 30+ years in my leadership journey in this blog post: using Apps to help simplify routines, systems, and processes; finding books to always learn from, and finally getting coaching so that we can hold each other accountable on our leadership journeys.
A is for Apps.
Let us start with Apps as the first building block to improve your leadership abilities. Apps can help you easily keep track of the details while keeping yourself on track. These tools have proven great for making sure that we can stay focused and productive in our daily routines!
Some useful outcomes of using these types of tools include simplifying routines, systems, and processes. We all need to be able to do our best at simplifying each process we go through every day. It can become easy for us to get bogged down by unnecessary details or information overload from time to time.
In our ABC Leadership process, we will go into great detail on how Apps help us to be more efficient. Which Apps are available for teamwork and collaboration as well, which can improve leadership ability. Apps also provide easy access to information. Being able to use the apps on your phone or tablet is another way that you can connect with people at any time of the day anywhere in the world.
Apps are easy to use. They can let you take photos and videos. You can also go on Instagram, which is an app. People can stay connected with one another at all times of day everywhere in the world because of apps. Using a variety of apps can and will save time by letting you do things on your schedule. Go ahead and customize them to your own personal needs and those of a group as well.
Another benefit in using apps is it can help people who don’t have the same abilities as others. Using these tools levels the playing field as you build into your leadership. Apps can help us keep our routines on track so we do not forget anything.
These reasons and examples have been why I feel Apps were useful for my leadership.
B is for Books
I am an avid reader. I love to read! If you are not reading at least one book a month, then there is no way that you will be able to improve your leadership ability. There are two categories of books that I recommend to improve your leadership abilities: personal development and business management. Both of these have helped me tremendously over the years in my journey as a leader. Many people think they don’t have time for this, but once you get into your routine, it becomes second nature—you won’t even notice how much more productive you become by simply taking 30 minutes out of each day to learn something new or further develop yourself through reading.
There are several books that I have read in the past year or so, and they have helped me to be a better leader.
For example:
– The ONE Thing – Gary Keller
This book helps you focus on what is truly important by clearly defining your ‘One thing’. This is not about multitasking; it’s about making sure that we spend our time doing things that matter most with excellence! A great simple read for anyone looking to improve their leadership ability through focusing on the key tasks at hand and working towards goals perfectly.
– The Success Principles – Jack Canfield
By reading this book, you will learn how to lead yourself first before leading others because you can’t lead others where you aren’t willing to go yourself.
– The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen R. Covey
This book focuses on your ability as a leader and how to develop the habits that will make you more successful in life, including at work . It is a classic leadership guidebook!
These are just three books out of many great reads available for leadership development for anyone looking to improve their own leadership abilities or those they work with too! I hope this helps you get started right away by either getting into an app routine or learning about some new read options from my list above 🙂
C is for Coaching
Finally, coaching is awesome for personal leadership development and is our final tool in ABC Leadership. We have the opportunity to grow in so many aspects of our lives, and sometimes we need a little bit of help from others who are more experienced or know what they’re doing. Coaching can be expensive, but it doesn’t have to be! There are great coaches available at all different price points—you just have to determine how much you want to invest in yourself today by getting one-on-one coaching with someone who understands your needs and knows how to develop you as a leader.
A great coach can help you with your self-esteem, communication skills (both written and verbal), time management, goal setting, focus on priorities…
I hope this blog post helped to give some ideas of how leaders are developed.
There are many ways in which leaders continue to grow! What has worked for me may not work for everyone but I highly recommend giving these tools a try if they seem interesting or helpful! If you’re ready to take the next step in growing yourself as a leader then reach out anytime 🙂 Thank you so much for reading my blog post today – it means more than words will ever say!!