Horrible things happen to all of us, things beyond our control. But developing winning traits can change the questions we ask when we meet challenges. We stop asking, “Why me?” Instead, we ask, “What steps can I take today to make things better?” ~ www.jaywren.com
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“There are a lot of ways to do things. Some are more fun than others.” S.R. Foley, Jr., Adm, USN
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Great leaders have things in common. They also have different ways to find their individual greatness.
Here are eight ways you can find your own individual greatness.
Find the beat of your own drum and march to it.
It is so easy for me to get distracted and off course when I look at what other people are doing and imitate those people. What I often find is that the direction that those people are going is completely off track from where I want to be. If I can just trust the beat of my drum, I can stay on task, trust my instincts, and create work that is original and produces fantastic results.
Be happy today.
“Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared. ” Buddha
Happiness is an inside job. When I feel sad, I acknowledge that I am sad. I do not focus on the things that I believe are making me sad. Often my feelings come along and I seem to find ideas to hang them on. I admit that I am sad, I experience the feeling of sadness, and I let it pass on its way. If I do not attach ideas to my feelings, most of the time my feelings only hang around for a minute or two, and I get a fresh, often invigorating sense of my world.
Focus on doing things accurately.
My baseball coaches said see the ball and hit the ball. In football, the coaches said see the ball and catch the ball. Watch the baseball all the way into your bat. Watch the football all the way into your hands and arms.
Create new things instead of perfecting old things.
I have worked drafts of articles so many times that I have lost track of what I had in mind when I started writing the article. I have found that the best way to work on any project and carry it forward to the finish is to write a statement of what I want to do. Second, I create an outline of the things that I need to do to do the task. Third, I fill in the details of completing the task. Whether I am washing my car or writing an article, the process of the same.
Keep projects simple.
The steps are pretty much the same for each project
| Wash Car | Write Article |
| Tools: bucket, soap, sponge, towels, water hose | Tools: Laptop |
| Spray the car. | List paragraph headings |
| Sponge wash car. | Write material to match
headings. |
| Rinse the car. | Proofread the article. |
| Dry the car. | Post the article on my website. |
Finding Your Individual Greatness through Personal Growth
Emphasize the things that are working and build on those things.
Sometimes it is easy for me to get off track, discouraged, and lose my sense of direction. When this happens, I can focus on the things that I did when things were working and simply repeat those things.
Keep an open mind to new ideas to simplify and make your life easier.
I see new, simple, even free ways to do the same things that have been a struggle. I created the table above in Microsoft Word. For anyone who has ever tried to insert a table in a website, you will know that tables make some material easier to read and the table can be a challenge to create and support through editing.
Take criticism as suggestions that can help you.
I remember working with an applicant on her resume. She told me that the things that I told her she had already covered with other recruiters and had even had her resume written professionally. I said simply that I understood and that the only thing that mattered is that she manages her resume in the way that she feels will be most effective for getting her interview.
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What makes a teacher great? Here are traits that you should consider if you want to become a great teacher.
A great teacher can communicate clearly and effectively with their students, colleagues, and parents. They can explain complex concepts in simple ways, listen actively to feedback and questions, and use various modes of communication to suit different situations.
A great teacher can adapt to changing circumstances, such as new curriculum standards, diverse student needs, or unexpected challenges. They can modify their teaching methods and strategies to fit different learning styles, goals, and contexts.
A great teacher can empathize with their students and understand their feelings, perspectives, and experiences. They can create a safe and supportive learning environment where students feel valued, respected, and cared for. They can also show compassion and kindness to their students and help them overcome difficulties.
A great teacher has a deep and broad knowledge of their subject matter and pedagogy. They are well-versed in the content, skills, and standards that they teach, and they keep up to date with the latest research and developments in their field. They are also lifelong learners who seek to improve their own knowledge and skills through professional development, collaboration, and reflection.
A great teacher has a passion for their subject matter and for teaching itself. They are enthusiastic, energetic, and motivated to share their love of learning with their students. They inspire curiosity, interest, and excitement in their students, and they demonstrate their own passion through their actions and words.
A great teacher can use creativity to design engaging and effective lessons, activities, and assessments that cater to different student needs, interests, and abilities. They can also encourage creativity in their students by providing them with opportunities to explore, discover, and express themselves.
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Authenticity and self-honesty are critical to success. You can’t solve a problem until you admit that that you have a problem. However much it may hurt, the first step to bouncing back from a mistake is to be honest, with absolutely no excuses, that you made a mistake
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Difficult managers use crisis as a management tool. Everything is serious. Everything is urgent. They shake everybody up.
https://www.jaywren.com/leadership-so-when-does-the-crisis-start/
Focusing on a negative can distract people from the positive side of doing their job.
I love fruitcake. Like everything else, fruitcake has people who love it and people who do not. Nearly two million fruitcakes are sold each year. I doubt that many people eat an entire fruitcake, since most fruitcakes have a very dense texture and are about a foot in diameter and four inches high less that plug missing in the middle. However, I think that given a week, I could eat an entire fruitcake.
I read an article online the other day that was very critical of fruitcakes. Fruitcakes seem to have a public polarity rarely seen outside of politics. It baffles me how people can be so serious about fruitcakes. On the other hand, these people must feel baffled about how much I love fruitcakes.
What caught my attention is how negative this person was about fruitcakes. The author put a negative opinion out there. I felt on the defensive. The negativity was polarizing. Moreover, the subject of the article was not about fruitcakes. The article was promoting a company’s product by drawing a negative contrast between their products and other products.
They drew my attention away from their products and focused my attention on defending fruitcakes! They didn’t sell me on their products. Instead, their negativity cluttered my mind and I lost interest in their products.
Some of the best things I have done for myself involved helping other people. Giving my time to help other people in turn benefited me mentally and emotionally. Helping other people increased my self-esteem as a person of value. I had activities to plan and anticipate. I got to know as many new people as I did in high school. This work introduced me to professionals outside my specialty. My personal network expanded to include friends in medicine, law, education, technology, broadcast media, politics, religion, and so on across the spectrum of professions. I was able to use the leadership skills I develop as a Navy officer and as a businessman. Then, from my experience in volunteering, I learned from other people how to create new programs and build volunteer teams. Moreover, I had the positive feeling that I was making life more fun and rewarding for other people.
Here are places where I had so many personal benefits from helping other people. Perhaps my experience can benefit you.
If you have kids in school, you may find that volunteering in your kids’ schools has many benefits.
In Sacramento public schools, my wife and I created a program to increase school safety in a way that benefited the faculty and students.
I had the privilege of working with education experts in understanding and creating a forum for communicating across different cultures and ideologies.
With my wife’s support, I started the High School Safety Summit, a district-wide program to introduce students, parents, teachers, staff, administrators, and members of the community to programs for higher student engagement and higher graduation rates. To create pride in students for the school my own kids attended, I created the annual Cornell West Distinguished Award. In the first year, one of the school’s alumni, Dr. Cornel West, returned to speak to 700 students on the John F. Kennedy campus in Sacramento. Using this program, the school continued in future years to honor influential alumni.
At the request of a high school administrator, I worked with the school district’s facilities manager and a cell phone company to build lighting for on-campus nighttime football games.
Never an elite athlete, I did enjoy playing adult softball and soccer. At first, I played on teams that friends organized through city parks and recreation. Overtime, my wife and I worked with the City of Sacramento to create new adult softball and soccer teams.
One of the most rewarding experiences I had was coaching my second daughter’s teen soccer team. I recruited two adults to help me with training the team skills and stunts.
One of the most important things that I did was to hold a parent meeting before the beginning of the season. Given the freedom, at youth soccer matches, parents will set their lawn chairs along the touch line and yell instructions at and criticize the players. I instructed the parents to set up their chairs ten yards away from the field. Additionally, I told them not to speak to individual players directly during the game. No one could raise their voice or criticize one of my players. However, I did encourage cheering.
Personally, I never yelled coaching instructions or criticized my players during a play. I used the games to learn the things I needed to teach the players in the next game.
My method of coaching is not for everyone. However, from a personal point of view, I found it distracting when coaches yelled at me during a game. My focus went from the game to the person yelling. I didn’t want my players to have that distraction.
At halftime, I did make adjustments and helped my players see how they could take advantage of the weaknesses of their opponents.
More on personal growth:
Hiring the Best People and Empowering Them to Excel: How do great leaders build great companies? Here are some of the things great leaders say.
“I hire people brighter than me, and I get out of their way.”
“The competition to hire the best will increase in the years ahead. Companies that give extra flexibility to their employees will have the edge in this area.”
“I noticed that the dynamic range between what an average person could accomplish and what the best person could accomplish was 50 or 100 to 1. Given that, you’re well advised to go after the cream of the cream. A small team of A+ players can run circles around a giant team of B and C players.”
- “Great vision without great people is irrelevant.”
- “The moment you feel the need to tightly manage someone, you’ve made a hiring mistake. The best people don’t need to be managed. Guided, taught, led–yes. But not tightly managed.”
“Often the best solution to a management problem is the right person.”
“As a business owner or manager, you know that hiring the wrong person is the most costly mistake you can make.”
“A great person attracts great people and knows how to hold them together.”
“The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.”
“Never hire someone who knows less than you do about what he’s hired to do.”
“Hire people who are better than you are, then leave them to get on with it. Look for people who will aim for the remarkable, who will not settle for the routine.”
“When I find an employee who turns out to be wrong for a job, I feel it is my fault because I made the decision to hire him.”
“Somebody once said that in looking for people to hire, you look for three qualities: integrity, intelligence, and energy. And if you don’t have the first, the other two will kill you.”
“Development can help great people be even better–but if I had a dollar to spend, I’d spend 70 cents getting the right person in the door.”
“If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.”
“I don’t pay good wages because I have a lot of money; I have a lot of money because I pay good wages.”
Career Strategy: Where do you start in creating a strategic plan that is tailored for you? What do you need to know about adjusting your plan to an ever-changing job market?
A career plan creates a check-off list. Through this check-off list, you will create focus and direction. Your intuition can emerge to see options that might somehow never have come to you.
Identify your career options. Develop a refined list of options by examining your interests, skills, and values through self-assessment. researching companies, and talking to professionals in the field. You can further narrow your list when you take part in experiences such as shadowing or working alongside a company employee, volunteering, or internships.
Next, list all the things you need to do to accomplish your career goals.
Here are questions to ask to create a strategy for you career.
It’s not enough to list options. You must prioritize them. What are your top skills? What interests you the most? What’s most important to you? Whether it’s intellectually challenging work, security and benefits, the right location, or a big paycheck, you must know your priorities.
Compare one answer against the other in terms of importance. Reshuffle the order to match your priorities. Additionally, notice how your limits on any priority affects opportunities on your other priorities. Preferences on location can range from your home to one neighborhood to one city or to anywhere across the country. If you are open to living anywhere, your opportunities will increase for other priorities. For example, if you are open to relocation, your potential for promotions will increase to locations where a company has needs for managers. Additionally, your opportunities for security may increase with your willingness to change location.
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