Category Archives: Quotes

Worrying

Worrying: The Pointless and Painful Abuse of Fear

Health and Fitness, Leadership, Quotes

Worrying:  Fear is a healthy emotion.  However, when we turn our fears over and over in our mind, we experience pain with no purpose.

Things That Worry Me

I am a risk taker.  I stepped out of a secure career in the consumer products industry to start my own business.  At the time, I had no formal training or experience in running a business.

Four years after starting my business, I decided to move from Houston to Sacramento.  In making this move, I did not have any experience in moving a business.  Furthermore, I didn’t even know of anyone who had made that kind of business move.

I was excited about the move, but I was anxious to get to my new home and get busy working again.

For my business to succeed, I continually had to develop new clients and fulfill the terms of my contracts.  At any time, I could easily begin to worry about the outcomes of my work. Additionally, the relocation created a period of greater uncertainty.

My success always depended on the results of my efforts.  However, focusing on the results instead of focusing on doing the things that had always made me successful was painful and pointless.  For me, focusing on results just leads to worrying.

In most cases, I worried about failed outcomes of projects that were successful.

However, I wanted to reach out into the future and create certainty.  But I couldn’t.

If my clients were puppets, I would have been able to end risks.  I could control everything that everyone did.  I would have been able to control results.  However, my clients were not puppets.  I could only control what I did.

Therefore, during the period of uncertainty from my moving my business, I also focused on building tools for managing worrying.

What Worrying Looks Like to Me

When I worry, I hook onto a scary thought.  Then I roll the thought over in my mind.  Instead of finding a solution, I end in a loop of scary thinking that has no ending until the scary event has passed.  And sometimes, in long-term or permanent situations, those scary thoughts never pass.

Things that Worrying Does Do

Worrying is a thief.  It freezes our minds and robs us of the ability to make the decisions that lead to success.

No amount of worrying is going to make problems go away.  Furthermore, worrying about problems distracts us from finding solutions to our problems.

How I Deal with Worrying

Instead of focusing on what might happen in the future, I focus on doing excellent work today.

The future will happen.  I can plan for it.  Furthermore, I can do things that created success in the past.  Beyond that, I can work with people who can help me focus on solutions and options that help me become more successful.

I can itemize the right steps to complete a project.  Instead of worrying, I can focus on completing those steps and only think about the things that create success.

Solutions 2

Solutions: How Successful People See the World

Interviewing, Leadership, Quotes

Solutions: Viewing the world as a series of problems is discouraging, even scary.  How can we change our outlook for greater success?

People who see solutions do not view the world as a series of problems. ~ www.jaywren.com

My Story

When I was a Navy bridge officer on a carrier, I had a commanding officer who required that all the bridge officers recognize the times when we needed to let him know about a problem. Sometimes, urgency required that we tell him before we had a solution. However, he also demanded that we bridge officers give him a solution when we could develop one.  Furthermore, he asked that we give him more than one solution.  He asked that we give him options.

His requirements for dealing with problems taught us to see more than the problems we met.  We learned to think tactically.  We developed skills to find solutions.  This growth experience in problem solving prepared us to manage greater responsibility.

Perspective

Recognizing problems when they are real is a practical view of the world.  Acting to solve problems is also practical.  This action reduces our anxiety and clears our mind to make better decisions.

Resources

In many cases, we have what we need to deal with problems, if in fact, they ever happen.  For example, there are solutions to reducing stage fright.  When we fear speaking in front of other people, we are focusing is on how other people will judge us.

However, none of us can control how other people will judge us.  On the other hand, what all of us can do is to stay in the present moment and prepare for interviews and presentations.  When we know our material, and when we can present it with confidence in front of a mirror, giving our presentation to an audience becomes easier.

Solutions

When we see a problem ahead, we should always tell our supervisor long before the problem happens.  Doing so gives them the time to find solutions.

Furthermore, we should not wait to find a solution to every problem before notifying our supervisor.

However, we can let supervisors know that we are working on a solution or that we have a recommended solution.

Problem Solvers Gain Respect

People who live with a head full of anxiety lack confidence.  Expressing anxiety to a supervisor or team members weakens the confidence that these people have in us.

However, people who show others have how to solve problems gain respect and emerge as leaders.

Stress

Stress: 7 Steps to a Smarter Way of Living

Health and Fitness, Quotes

Stress

Dealing with stress is simple, but it is not always easy. ~ www.jaywren.com

Life’s challenges create pressure.  I can’t always control the world around me.   However, I can reduce stress with my actions.  Here are seven things I do.

I Fight Procrastination.

I feel tremendous stress when I put things off.

Also, thinking about doing a large project from start to finish is often overwhelming.  To reduce stress, I break projects down into multiple, simple steps.

For example, when I am stuck and can’t write an article, I start with writing a title.  I might write one paragraph.  I save what I have written as a draft.   After a few days, I may not come back to work on this draft.  Sometimes, I never come back to finish the article.

That’s okay, because following this method gives me a start to every article I write.

I Write Things Down.

When something is bothering me, I can write it down.  Writing takes the sting out of stress.

If I have something that I need to do but can’t do now, I can write it down.  Having it on my calendar clears my mind for the things I need to do now.

Furthermore, having a plan of action helps me become more productive.  When I become more productive, I have a sense of accomplishment.  I feel less stress.

I Try to Eat Healthy Food First.

When hunger makes me anxious between meals, a snack cuts my anxiety until mealtime.

Although I try, I don’t always snack on the healthiest things.  I must make choices for my snacks.  One of my favorite snacks (not just for desserts!) is ice cream.  Also, I love chocolate-covered peanuts.  One of my favorite snacks is chips and salsa.  It looks like a healthy choice.

But sugary and starchy snacks make me hungrier.  From what I have read, the carbs in sugar and starch, when eaten alone, over stimulate the pancreas to produce a surge of insulin.  The excess insulin drops blood sugar so that I am hungry even though I have just eaten.

Therefore, I try to keep more satisfying snacks handy.  Nuts and peanut butter are calorically dense, but are low in net carbs.  A couple of tablespoons of peanut butter (190 calories, 7 grams of carbs) kills my appetite better than a cup of ice cream (220 calories, 28 grams of carbs).

A slice of Havarti cheese has 80 calories and zero grams of carbs.

I use MyFitnessPal to track my nutrition.  (This is not a paid endorsement.)

Furthermore, I am not a nutritionist, but low-carb, high-fat foods satiate my appetite.  You may find that the same thing works for you.

I Take Breaks!

Being tired creates stress.

No one can run wind sprints all day long.  Breaks make us more productive.  I find that working alone in a virtual office, I can easily forget to take breaks.

To remind myself to move each hour, I have notifications on my calendar to leave my desk and move around.  Simply walking for a few minutes reduces my feeling anxious.

I get plenty of sleep.

Not only do I take breaks. I try to get plenty of sleep.  Allowing my brain to rest enables me to make better decisions. Better decisions increase success and cut stress.

Note: Not taking breaks from work or not getting enough sleep creates stress that can lead to burnout.  We reach a point where overdoing our job cripples us in ways that we can no longer do our job.

I Try to Keep It Real.

It is so easy for me to want to control national or international events.  Thinking that I can control these things is completely fruitless and painfully stressful.

People in forums say things that annoy me.  Correcting them is pointless.  I can’t police the Internet!

Likewise, I can easily believe that I can change other people.  There are things that I can do that affect how other people react.  However, just changing my own behavior is not always easy.  Believing that I can change other people is often impractical.

Frustration over the things I can’t change creates stress.  I try to keep it real about the things that I can change and not change.

I Talk with Friends.

Just having friends helps me beat stress.  Talking to friends gets me out of my own head and into the present moment.  Furthermore, in talking with friends, I get practical information on dealing with challenges in my life, thereby increasing success and reducing stress.

Clear from Anger

Anger: Managing Your Emotions for a More Powerful Mind

Health and Fitness, Leadership, Quotes

Anger gives us the energy to avoid or overcome danger.  However, managed incorrectly, anger can destroy relationships, ruin careers, and linger forever.

Success starts with a clear mind that is free from anger. ~ www.jaywren.com

Why I Wrote This Article About Anger

I am not a professional mental therapist.  Nor am I qualified to give advice on dealing with emotions.

The reason I wrote this article is that I want to grow emotionally as well as mentally.  I work on building the skills to redirect my anger in ways that are effective and productive.

Although these skills are effective, using them is a conscious daily effort.

All Emotions are Healthy

There are no bad emotions. There are only bad uses of emotions. ~ www.jaywren.com

How I manage my emotions affects how successfully I interact with other people.  If I take my anger out on other people, I build a wall of resentments between the people around me and myself.

Furthermore, if I hang on to negative emotions too long, they can become mental states.  Recovering from negative mental states can take a tremendous amount of effort.  Just recognizing that we are living in a negative state of mind sometimes needs professional attention.

Here are Some of the Things I Do.

I studied Transcendental Meditation™.  Daily, I practice the meditation methods that I learned from my TM™ studies.

I also practice mindfulness meditation.  Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese monk and peace activist during the Vietnam War, brought the practice of mindfulness meditation to the United States.  Mindfulness is a method of focusing on breathing.  I find that just remembering to take a slow breath in and out reduces stress.

Eckhart Tolle is a native German who became a Canadian citizen.  In his book The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment , he teaches how to live mentally in the present moment.  When I start sliding into negative thoughts, I stop and look around. I realize that the things that are bothering me are in my mind.  However, the world is in front of me and around me.  Taking a moment to become aware of the present moment is a very powerful way to find peace and increase focus.

Additionally, I move.  I go for a walk or go into the yard and do a couple of chores.  Exercising helps. I do a few planks, squats, and push-ups. Every hour, I do something to move.  Motion brings me back into the present moment.

These things help me to create a space between my anger and my action.  Doing these things, I can find peace and achieve success with a clear mind that is free from anger.

Persuasive Presentations: 10 Powerful Steps to Success

Negotiation, Quotes

Giving successful persuasive presentations takes more than showing up. ~ www.jaywren.com

Persuasive Presentations

What are the things that make persuasive presentations successful? How can you persuade your audience to accept your proposal?

Here are 10 powerful steps for giving a persuasive presentation.  Whether you are in an salary negotiation, business meeting, or sales call, these steps will make your presentations more powerful.

Do Your Homework

Before you go to a meeting, do your homework on the people in your meeting.  Persuasive presentations must show audience recognition.

In live performances, entertainers give a shout out to the audience.  Something like, “Hello, Cleveland!”

However, there is nothing more annoying than presenters not knowing their audience.

Picture the rock star who says “Hello, Cleveland!” when they are in fact in Cincinnati.

Know the Information that Will Rock Your Audience

Know what types of information will interest the people you are meeting. If they hate dealing with a lot of data, don’t burden them with graphs and charts that will turn them off.

Persuasive presentations don’t reflect your interests.  They reflect the audience’s interests.

If the customers only want beef, don’t give them mashed potatoes.

Know the Goals of Your Audience

Know the goals of the people you are meeting. For example, do they want to increase sales, even at the expense of low margins? Then create a presentation that will show how your product has large consumer appeal to low price shoppers.

Do they want a sales campaign that shows how their store sells quality products? Then show how your product or service excels in consumer satisfaction.

Know the Decision-Making Process

Can your audience give you a decision on the spot?  If so, prepare to answer questions and handle objections to close the sale.

On the other hand, if you are selling to buyers who will need to present your information to a committee for a decision, you must not only prepare a presentation that is simple, compelling, and easy to understand.  You must ask your buyers what else the buying committee needs to know.  Furthermore, you must ensure that your buyers can give a persuasive presentation of your material to their buying committee.

Plan for the Size of Your Audience

Prepare your presentation for the size of your meeting. If your audience is small, you must hand everyone a copy of your information. If your meeting is in a large room with a large audience, a screen presentation may work better to show the key points of your presentation.

Also, the larger the audience, the larger your gestures must be. Large expansive gestures to a large audience signal that you are including everyone in the room.

Know What, When, and Where

Your presentation must show that you understand who does what, when and where on your side and on the buyer’s side.

Before leaving the presentation, you must know that you and the buyer both know who does what, when, and where.  Deals fall apart and future relationships fall apart when mistakes happen for a lack of understanding on either side of how the process works.

Keep It Simple

Keep your presentation simple. Have a key phrase that will deliver the benefits of your message. In presenting the iPod presentation, Steve Jobs focused on the ease and convenience of the iPod by saying, “A thousand tunes in your pocket.”

Be Positive

Going negative doesn’t increase the power of your persuasive presentations.

Keep it positive.  Don’t trash your competitor.  Handle objections in a way that shows you understand the buyer’s concerns.  Focus on the benefits of your idea. You audience will want to buy when they see what they gain from accepting your proposal.

Rehearse

If you don’t have experience with your material, rehearse with another person.  If you don’t have anyone to help you, rehearse your presentation in front of a mirror.

Persuasive presentations don’t always come easy.

The most successful presenters go over their presentation before stepping in front of the audience. Just as performers rehearse before a paid audience, give your audience, no matter the size of the audience, the presentation that will engage and convince them of the value of what you are offering.

I recently saw a famous entertainer perform in person. During his presentation, he said how hard he rehearsed every minute to prepare for his performances every performance before each show.

Persuasive Presentations:  The Close

End with a call to action.  For example, ask this type of question. “Should we begin on the first or second week of the month?”

In some cases, the buyer may buy before you get through your material.

If not, use trial closes to know where your buyer stands.

15 Leadership Soft Skills that Create Greatness

15 Leadership Soft Skills that Create Greatness

Job Skills, Leadership, Quotes

Leadership soft skills: What are the leadership soft skills that create great employees and successful companies. How can you develop these skills?

The most successful leaders not only develop technical skills; they also develop powerful leadership soft skills.
~ www.jaywren.com

15 Leadership Soft Skills that Create Greatness

“That some achieve great success is proof to all that others can achieve it as well.” ~ Abraham Lincoln

There are countless leadership qualities that lead to success.  Throughout my career as a recruiter, I have made notes on leaders I admire.  These leaders have these soft skills.

1. Confidence During Periods of Uncertainty

The ability to build trust is the single most important leadership soft skill.  Furthermore, without trust, morale fails, engagement and commitment fail, and turnover rises.

Maintaining confidence in periods of uncertainty takes personal courage.  Furthermore, leaders must focus on their mental and emotional balance to restore their own confidence in periods of uncertainty.  This leadership soft skill takes maintenance as well as continued growth.

2. Integrity that Creates Trust

Without Integrity, leadership fails.  Relationships fail.  For example, integrity in water tightness keeps ships afloat.  Structural integrity in a bridge is makes bridges safe to cross.  Personal integrity among the people in an organization builds trust in working for an organization.

Furthermore, ensuring integrity takes honest appraisal. In the case of structures, it takes regular inspections. In the case of an organization, integrity is part of regular reviews.

3. Skills to Create Greatness in Others

Leadership is not about creating personal greatness.  What good is a leader if that leader can’t create greatness in the members of the team?  A lack of this ability to create greatness in the others undermines the long-term future of an organization.

4. Command Skills to Lead

There are many ways people can take over a group.  Charisma, boldness, persuasiveness, dominance are just three characteristics that people use to take command.  However, without commands skills, leaders cannot exert control.

With command skills, the actor can become the director.  Likewise, the secretary can become the office manager.  The vice president can become the CEO.

Command skills are leadership soft skills you can develop.

5. Enthusiasm to Inspire Energy in Others

Being around people without enthusiasm can turn optimism drain the energy from the entire team.  On the other hand, people with enthusiasm can create energy in the people without them.  Sometimes somethings as a smile can inspire energy in others.

6. Ability to Walk the Talk

Insisting that workers arrive on time while the leader is unpredictable about the time they arrive to work creates resentment in the workplace.

Furthermore, any instance where leaders don’t follow the rules harms employee morale and trust.

7. Realistic Optimism to Accept Change and Avoid Costly Mistakes

Being optimistic about the direction of an organization is important to motivating employees.  However, not being realistic about a failed project wastes time and money.  People who are unrealistic about the need to change are like people swimming out to sea.  If they have optimism, but keep the right perspective of the practicality of an idea or a project, their realistic optimism gives them perspective on what will work and what will not work.

9. Open-mindedness to Listen to Others

Some leaders just can’t listen.  They don’t understand the proverb that two heads are better than on. In so doing, they do not gain the collective wisdom of the team. The best leaders hire people who can expand the intelligence of the company.  Furthermore, these leaders listen to people who can make the company smarter.

10. Stamina to Endure Extended Periods of Demanding Work

For some people, stamina seems to come naturally, especially for young people.  However, people who do healthy things can increase their stamina. These people reduce or cut alcohol and tobacco from their lives. The eat foods that help them store energy.  They exercise.

Furthermore, they take breaks to rest to restore cover their energy.

11. Instincts to Know When to Trust Their Inner Voice

This inner voice exists in most people.  Additionally, learning to listen is a skill most people can develop.  Many top-level executive have said that their inner voice guides them through decision-making better than analytical thinking.  They can make bolder steps and continue to have confidence when they have listened to their inner voice.

12. Emotional and Mental Maturity to Keep Perspective

“The sky is falling” mentality is dangerous.  This mentality of thinking of is the theme in the famous children’s folk story, “Chicken Little.”

There are many versions of the story. According to one version of this folk story, a nut falls on Chicken Little’s head. The chick becomes hysterical and goes on a quest to alert others and gather followers on his trip to notify the king. In this version, a fox joins the group, leads them to his den, and eats them.

Hysteria leads to panic.  From there, panic incinerate the clear thinking to handle problems in perspective.

13. Courage to Speak Out

The captain might become disturbed to know that the ship is leaking.  Having to disturb the captain, especially an intimidating captain, takes courage.  However, the consequences of not telling the captain that the ship is leaking has catastrophic consequences.

14. Humility to Give Credit to Others.

Having to work for leaders who selfishly takes credit for everyone’s work becomes quickly annoying, even demoralizing.

In his book Good to Great, Jim Collins discusses the results of studying 1,435 good companies. From those companies, Mr. Collins and his team of researchers selected 11 companies that had gone from Good to Great over a 40 year-year period.

In the end, Jim Collins and his team of researchers found that humility is critical for successful leadership.

15. Flexibility to Work with Others

People who can’t work with other people have no value as a leader.  Some people play important roles in a company without working with others.  However, these people can’t lead teams.

Internet Trolls

Internet Trolls: How to Steal Their Power

Quotes

Internet Trolls:  A personal story about killing the power of an Internet troll by not responding to them.  This method might work for you.

When we troll the Internet trolls, we only give them more power. On the Internet, criticism is attention, and Internet trolls love attention. Take away their power by ignoring them.  ~ www.jaywren.com

Today, I had to have a talk with my Internet troll.

I was reading an article online and came across an ugly description of one of my friends.  The physical description was demeaning and inaccurate.  The description of my friend’s behavior was completely out of character.  The wording of the article revealed the bias and hurt feelings the writer had for my friend.

The writer described how he had gone nose-to-nose with my friend.  He said that he had talked down to him, physically and verbally.  By physically, the man told how my friend was the shorter of the two and that he looked down his nose while delivering a lecture on my friend’s shortcomings.

Knowing the fact that my friend was a college football player, I wonder whether the author’s hard feelings lead him to dramatize the encounter inaccurately.

Encounter in Front of Congress

The author went on to describe how the two had crossed paths later.  This time my friend appeared before a congressional hearing.  President Ronald Reagan had appointed my friend to serve as a U.S. Assistant Secretary for Defense.  The author of the article described how he had the satisfaction of a congressional member pressing my friend on his ability to work with congressional staff.  My friend passed the hearings and received the appointment.

The author then implied that my friend’s career simply evaporated, and he disappeared into obscurity.

Internet Trolls are Examples of Bias over Reality

In fact, my friend retired from federal service and went on to become president of a Fortune 500 company.  A few years later, President George W. Bush appointed my friend to serve as vice president in the office of the University of California to oversee the management of the federal research labs. In this responsibility, my friend corrected the security issues in a system with over 12,000 employees and billions of dollars in annual budget.

There’s is No Winning Against a Troll

The author of the article is a journalistic Internet troll.

Instead of going after this writer, I redirected my anger to write an article about my feelings in reading the article.

My inner troll said told me to rant to correct the inaccuracies of the article.  Then it occurred to me that by correcting this person online, I would only be promoting the very article and the very person who detracted from my friend.  Thus, I have vented my inner troll here without mentioning the name of the author or the article.  I will not use my resources to empower an author I don’t like.

Trust: The Most Important Trait of Leadership

Leadership, Quotes

Trust: What makes this trait so valuable to leaders? What is the role of this trait in the relationship between leaders and their teams?

Building trust can take years; losing trust can happen in an instant. ~ jaywren.com

Creating Trust

There several traits that make leaders great.   Intelligence.  Emotional maturity.  High energy.  Decisiveness.  But the foundation of leadership sits atop the confidence between leaders and their teams. Leaders must have confidence in their teams. Team members must have confidence in their leader. Furthermore, team members must have confidence in each other.  Through training and direction, leaders can help team members build relationships based on trust.

The Benefits

Confidence in leadership strengthens a team.  Every organization has periods of greater challenge.  These periods create uncertainty.  Furthermore, periods of uncertainty create stress.  However, people will tolerate greater uncertainty and pressure in an organization where there is confidence in the reliability of leadership.

The Pillars of Trust

Guidelines

For people to trust their leader, they must know what leaders expect them to do.  Furthermore, they need to know how to do their job.  They must know the deadlines and what methods to use.  Guidelines must be specific and clear.  Furthermore, guidelines help team members engage and trust the process for completing their work.  The clarity of guidelines creates confidence that team members are doing the things leaders expect of them.

Relationships

Relationships in management run uphill and downhill.  It is not enough that team members have confidence in their leader.  Great leaders must have confidence in all the members of their team.  Furthermore, these leaders must remove team members who are not trustworthy.

A Safe Open Door

Team members must know that they are safe in giving feedback that is vital to the operation of the team.  Furthermore, team members must know that the door to management is open.

The guidelines must specify which things team members take to the team leader.

Confidential and Personal
This is the way that I treat confidential and personal information: 1) Qualified to know. 2) Need to know. For someone to receive information, they not only must have the qualifications to know. They must have a need to know. These requirements reduce the risk of leaders saying things that necessarily exposes their confidentiality between themselves and their employers. Compromising the trust of employees over confidential or personal information can undermine the stability of an organization.

Composure

Composure: How to Overcome Meeting Anxiety

Interviewing, Leadership, Quotes

Composure: Whether they make mistakes or simply must deal with intimidating people, everyone has stressful moments in meetings. How can you stay composed?

Composure creates poise under pressure. ~ www.jaywren.com

Composure: How to Overcome Meeting Anxiety

Anxiety in meetings can be a problem for anyone.  However, whether you have natural poise or suffer social anxiety, you can stay composed for success.

Breathe

You don’t have to stop for a 20-minute mindfulness meditation to use breathing to gather composure.  Anxiety can suppress our breathing.  A lack of oxygen creates even more anxiety.  However, replenishing oxygen with a breath can reduce anxiety.

Breath in slowly and quietly.  Mentally focus on your breath.  The process will give your body the oxygen to burn the adrenaline from anxiety.  Furthermore, focusing on your breathing redirects your thinking from your anxiety to a calming breath and allows you to become spontaneous.  You will appear poised and gain composure.

Listen with a Purpose

Focus on what people are saying.  Ask yourself why they are saying those things.  Think of how the contributions of other people is useful to you.  Seeing the benefits in another person’s message takes your focus off your insecurities and creates positive feelings about what you are learning.

Practice Intelligent Silence

Intelligent silence is powerful.

Attending meetings and never speaking decreases your value to the meeting.  However, people who listen and speak when they have something meaningful to say strengthen the power of their contributions.

Additionally, allowing yourself to be silent and think before you speak will increase your composure.

Bring an Agenda

Come to meetings with a list of things that you want to know and things you want to say.  This approach is especially helpful when you are attending a job interview.

Become the Facilitator

Giving your support to other meeting attendees takes your focus off your insecurities and makes you valuable to the success of the meeting.

Developing the skills of a facilitator helps you as a public speaker, helps you in building professional relationships, and helps you in becoming a better friend or family member.  Furthermore, becoming the facilitator gives you leadership power in a meeting.

Great leaders not only excel in creating great results. They surround themselves with great people and open the door for those people to achieve great results as well. ~ www.jaywren.com

Great Leaders: 7 Steps to Creating Greatness in Others

Leadership, Popular Posts, Quotes

Great Leaders: Some leaders are not only great themselves, but also inspire others to become great.  What do they do differently?

Great leaders do more than achieve success. They create greatness in others. ~ www.jaywren.com

Great Leaders: 7 Steps to Creating Greatness in Others

Some leaders have command presence.  Colin Powell is an example of a person whose outward behavior or bearing commanded respect.  Other leaders have charisma.  President John Kennedy had the magnetic ability to draw attention by merely entering a room.  Then there are leaders like Winston Churchill who can shape the language to persuade and inspire nations.

These leaders in their own ways achieved personal and professional greatness.  But what are the traits that of leaders who inspire greatness in others?  

1. Give Credit

Leaders who have the humility to give credit gain support from their people.  They allow others to take the center stage.
They step back from the urge to say, “I did this.”  They step up to say when the team or a member of the team created success.

Furthermore, they encourage positive behavior with positive reinforcement.  Inspirational leaders are not afraid to say, “You did an excellent job.”

Giving credit increases bonds and reduces turnover.

2. Use Criticism to Train

It is easy to criticize people.  However. great leaders do more than find fault.  They give solutions.  Furthermore, they train their people the correct way to do things in the future.

3. Build the Skills and Knowledge of the Team.

It takes time and patience to train team members.  Leaders who invest this time to show team members new and better ways of doing things increase the success of the individual members of the team and increase the success of the entire team.

4. Delegate Authority as Well as Responsibility.

As soon as he was given the proper support and appropriate work for his strengths, he grew less apathetic and at least gave a good day’s effort. Teaching people their responsibilities is one thing.  Giving people the authority to make decisions on their responsibilities is another.  Great leaders delegate authority as well as responsibility.

Delegating authority empowers people to make the team more powerful.  Furthermore, it engages the team to be more effective.

Lastly, it creates ownership and builds the self-esteem of team members.

5. Focus on the Big Picture

Great leaders don’t let small frustrations to become major distractions.  They adjust.  At times of distraction, that refocus themselves and the team on the goal.  However, they don’t let these frustrations waste their time.

6. Practice Integrity and Honesty

Successful leaders keep commitments.  Their people can trust them in every area.  They make meetings on time.  They deliver on promotions and pay raises.

Their people can trust them to manage confidential discussions discretely and to tell them.  On the other hand, great leaders are transparent to ensure integrity.

Through integrity and honesty, great leaders inspire commitment from the people they lead.

7. Avoid Leadership Resentment

For leaders to develop respect from their people, leaders can’t tell their people to be frugal while the leaders are extravagant.  Successful leaders can’t press their people to work hard when the leaders themselves are out the door early for personal activities.

Telling people to act one way while the leader abuses authority to act another, creates resentment towards leadership and towards the leaders themselves.  Great leaders avoid leadership resentment through their own example.