Leaders Are Problem Solvers (WT718)

Leaders Are Problem Solvers (WT718)

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by Shirley Dalton | 29 Mar, 2024 | Blog, Leadership

WT 718 Leaders are Problem Solvers

I’ve got a question for you.

Do you think being a leader is innate or a learned skill?

I had an interesting discussion recently with a new client on this very topic.

He confidently told me that being a leader is innate. You are born with it.

I could feel my eyebrows lift.

He expanded on his reasons why this was so.

During his career, he had often been promoted to leadership and management roles.

He had had no formal training and had performed well.

“Well, I think we’re going to disagree on this”, I said.

“I teach leadership skills.”

“Oh”, he replied.

“If you think about what you told me about how you were promoted, much of it was because you solved problems. You didn’t wait to be asked. You just got in and did it.”

He agreed.

Leaders are problem solvers.

And I agree, some people do this naturally, but that doesn’t mean that people can’t learn to become leaders or improve their leadership skills.

It comes back to The 4 Stages of Learning. We don’t know what we don’t know (Consciously Incompetent).

If you’ve never had the opportunity to solve problems or you didn’t know that that was one of the criteria for leadership, how could you demonstrate leadership skills?

Once you do become of aware of it, you can now start solving problems.

No-one is fighting you for the leadership role.

We all want leaders.

We want people to take charge; to make us feel safe; to take responsibility; to hold us accountable.

In our Leadership experiences, we have a particular activity that demonstrates this very well. During this activity the group of individuals become a team.

Someone steps up as leader and often it’s the person who doesn’t see themselves as a natural leader. It’s the person who has little confidence in their ability to lead.

As we debrief the activity, they are genuinely surprised (and a bit proud) of what they achieved. This one activity helps them transform their identity to accept that they are indeed, a leader.

Leaders behave differently to followers.

Leaders can learn communication skills. How to say things so that they land well for the listener.

Leaders can learn to understand their people better.

Would you consider yourself to be a leader?

Are you a problem solver?

If you’d like to know more, check out some of the skills that are included in our Leadership Fundamentals experience. Conduct a little audit for yourself. Click here to find out.

If you celebrate Easter, I wish you a very happy Easter. If not, happy holidays.

P. S. Invite your friends to get the Weekly Thoughts delivered directly to their inbox. Go to https://shirleydalton.com/weekly-thoughts.

P.P.S. Our next LIVE online Leadership Fundamentals experience starts Tuesday 14th May, 2024. Click here for more information. Early Bird promotion where you pay for Silver and receive Gold finishes on Sunday 14th April, 2024 so be quick.

Watch Out For The But (WT717)

Watch Out For The But (WT717)

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by Shirley Dalton | 22 Mar, 2024 | Blog, Communication Skills

WT 717 Watch out for the But

“I don’t want to throw you under the bus but ….”

What do you think when you hear that?

For me, I think you know what you’re about to say won’t be well received, so you qualify it first.

It’s like looking for approval for being the bearer of bad news or feedback.

Here’s the thing about using the word “but”.

When you join sentences with “but”, you negate the first sentence.

“I really like your new hairstyle but I prefer you blonde.”

“I think you did a good job but you missed this section of the garden.”

If you want to join sentences, use the word “and”.

“I really like your new hairstyle and I prefer you blonde.”

“I think you did a good job and you missed this section of the garden.”

If we don’t use the word “and”, the first sentence is ignored, so you may as well not say it.

Using “but” can also be a habit. I understand that.

I am constantly correcting myself.

If I hear myself say “but”, and I am aware of it, I immediately correct myself by saying “and”.

How about you?

My encouragement this week is to stop and think about what you are about to say, before you say it.

Think of the consequences.

Hear it from the receiver’s point of view before you speak.

“I’m hopeful that you’ve understood the message this week and I would love it if you practised.”

Watch out for the “but”.

Don’t throw yourself or anyone else under the bus.

And if you happen to be on the receiving end of the “but”, politely ask the speaker to clarify the message. Is the first sentence in addition to, or instead of, what follows?

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When You’re Short On Time (WT716)

When You’re Short On Time (WT716)

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by Shirley Dalton | 15 Mar, 2024 | Blog, Mindset

WT 716 When you're short on time

I’m always looking to grow and develop and of course share what I learn with you.

This week I learned two things which I think will benefit you.

The first is a concept called “Power Pocket Rehearsals” by Lisa Pezik.

Lisa attended “World’s Greatest Speaker” training with Brendan Burchard, Bo Eeson and Roger Love.

She enrolled with all three for their coaching programs.

Bo encouraged the group and asked, “What if you could achieve your 10 year goal in one year?”

Lisa didn’t really think this was possible, however she did the work and created her own vision board, by sketching it and then set about sharing her goal and working towards it.

Lisa wanted to write a play and star in the play in live theatre as a one woman actor.

She achieved her goal in just less than one year. Amazing!

She shared her strategy – “Power Pocket Rehearsals”.

Instead of scrolling on Facebook for 20 minutes of a night, she rehearsed.

If she only had 7 minutes between meetings, she practised her voice warm up exercises.

Lisa found the pockets of time that previously she felt she wasted.

How often do we do that?   Waste time on something that isn’t “essential” when we could be doing something towards manifesting our dreams.     

The second thing is “Learn To Love It”.

In my coaching session I wanted to know how to get myself to take the action I know I need to take.

Mentor, Cham Tang replied, “Learn To Love It”.

I was puzzled.

He explained, we find the time to do the things we love, so learn to love the things you need to do and yet don’t do that are good for you.

When Cham was younger he enrolled in acting classes. He and another student had to practise their roles.  The other student enthusiastically said, “Oh, I just love practising. I’ve been away from acting for a while and I just love it.”

At the time Cham didn’t love the practise and yet he continued to the point where he did start to like it and eventually love it.

What’s something you are putting off that is good for you or will take you to where you want to go and yet you can’t get yourself to do the work?

Can you find some power pocket rehearsal times or practise enough until you learn to love it?

In fact, the only reason I got to hear Lisa’s presentation was because we turned off the nightly television shows and decided to watch something that was good for us.

What is it for you?

Reply and let me know.

Regards Shirley

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You Don’t Have To Point It Out (WT715)

You Don’t Have To Point It Out (WT715)

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by Shirley Dalton | 8 Mar, 2024 | Blog, Mindset

WT 715 You don't have to point it out

This week I observed something that triggered me.

I was watching a recording of a training video and I noticed that the presenter had spelled one of the words incorrectly on the flipchart.

I couldn’t see the message that he received, however he stopped his presentation to address the person who had pointed out the spelling error.

Whilst he said “thank you” for pointing it out, he also mentioned that he was dyslexic and didn’t learn to read until he was in his mid twenties.

As a result, he spells differently to the rest of us. (A bit of humour.)

This triggered me because I didn’t think it was necessary to point out the error.

If you see a spelling mistake and you know how to spell the word correctly, in my opinion, just write it down correctly.

As a presenter, I can sometimes get words mixed up on the whiteboard and I’ve felt the embarrassment of someone pointing it out, especially when the word looks similar to the correct spelling, for example, “recieve”.

It might be spelt incorrectly, but it’s clear what the word is.

In fact, studies have shown that we really only need a few letters of words to actually work out the word.

Anyway, my point – there are times when being right can quickly turn into being righteous.

As Denis Waitley says, “If you have the choice, and you always do, to be kind or to be right, choose kind.”

One way you can be kind and correct a mistake is if you see that a date is incorrect.

Thank you to Bec for taking the time to let me know that the landing page for people to sign up for next Tuesday’s free training, 3 Steps to Reclaim Freedom in Business had the wrong day but correct  date in the form. The correct day is Tuesday 12th March.

I didn’t pick up the error and I didn’t know how to change it on the web and my developer is away at a conference. A couple of reminders there for me:

  1. Be more thorough with my reviews
  2. Don’t leave things until the last minute.

And lucky for me, my developer was kind enough to fix it within a few minutes of my request.  Thank you Paul.

I’m curious, what would you do? Would you point out the spelling mistake?

Would you take the time to provide feedback when the day and date don’t match the calendar? As the reader you won’t know which is correct and which is incorrect? It could be either the day or the date.

Or am I making a big deal over nothing?

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That’s Not What I Value (WT714)

That’s Not What I Value (WT714)

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by Shirley Dalton | 1 Mar, 2024 | Blog, Mindset

WT 714 That's not what I value

Have you ever been shopping and had your mind set on buying a particular thing and the sales assistant appeared to be doing everything they could to talk you out of it?

It’s a curious thing.

It comes down to what we value.

For example, if you’re a salesperson and you want the cheapest price when you buy something, it’s highly likely that you will expect that your clients have the same value.

Often they do not.

Here’s an example from one of my colleagues.

My colleague values his time and efficiency.

He went to the hairdresser to get his haircut.

The hairdresser thought that the longer she took and the more she fussed over the cut, the happier her clients would be.

This didn’t suit my colleague. He valued his time, not the cost of the haircut or how much the hairdresser fussed.

To the hairdresser, he said, “I will pay you double if you can cut my hair in half the time?”

This shocked the hairdresser because she couldn’t comprehend that someone would pay more for less time.

So, for you this week, I encourage you to have a look at your values and see if you might be unconsciously trying to impose them on others.

Allow others to value what they value.

If you are serving customers, please take the time to listen, really listen to what they want and as best as you can, give it to them.

They will love you for it.

P. S. Invite your friends to get the Weekly Thoughts delivered directly to their inbox. Go to https://shirleydalton.com/weekly-thoughts.

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