Take Time to Develop Yourself

Posted by: Rod Kurtz on August 10, 2009

Working on your own ability to lead makes great business sense. Without developing yourself from time to time, those familiar tactics and strategies you used to succeed earlier in your career become liabilities in a top job. When you hit major transition points—job changes, failures, meltdowns, or simply surprisingly frank feedback—spend time and resources to work on developing yourself. Get a mentor or coach, enter a fitness program, adjust your work-life balance, study, work on psychological or spiritual self-development—whatever intuitively seems to be the best thing for you to do. While the positive impact of your efforts at self-development isn’t on any balance sheet, the healthier, more insightful choices you make will go directly to your bottom line. To practice, prepare answers to the following self-coaching questions:

a. What gaps in how I operate and live can I address to be a better leader?

b. What feels intuitively correct as an approach to take on these gaps and develop myself?

c. A year from now, what would have to be true for me to know these efforts have positively impacted my life, career, and bottom line?

David Peck
Executive Coach and President
Leadership Unleashed
Palm Springs, Calif.