Initiative

by | Jul 3, 2012 | Exercises, Leaders

Many companies use a rating system for employees in performance appraisals that puts them in classes like A,B,C or 1,2,3. The As and 1s are reserved for the very best employees or as it is frequently put, those whose work exceeds expectations. The Bs or 2s are for people whose work meets expectations and the Cs or 3s are for those whose work does not meet expectations. Simple eh? The problem is that no on knows what Meets Expectations means when compared with Exceeds Expectations. Many employees think that when they are doing their job very well as described in their job description, they’ll get an Exceeds Expectations. Sorry, doesn’t happen.

The difference between Meeting Expectations and Exceeding them is Initiative

The secret to being an A employee, a 1, or an Exceeds Expectations and thereby getting a promotion, raise or bigger bonus means doing more than what was expected of you at work. That means you must do more than what was in your job description. If someone tells you to do something and you do it, even if you do it very well, you are still only Meeting Expectations. That is because you are expected to do what you are asked to do and you are expected to do it very well or you wouldn’t be working there very much longer.

To do more than what was expected of you at work, you need to use initiative. That means you must find something important that needs to be done and is not part of your regular job and do it. That’s all the difference between an A and a B, initiative.

Try this at work:

Find some small thing that people recognize is a problem and fix it. It could be as simple as finding a better way to deal with contact information, a better way to keep track of projects, a better way to get approval for expenditures.

Once you have picked this thing to improve, then fix it and let everyone know what you have done and why. This communication is not for tooting your own horn but to make sure the change is implemented by everyone. You might have to remind them several times.

After you’ve tried out this initiative once, keep doing it. Find something else to fix or start and start it. Keep doing small things that are outside the scope of your job and then start making those things bigger. Work up to major projects and pretty soon you’ll be noted for your initiative.

 

Virginia Rometty – Self Confidence

by | Jun 27, 2012 | Leaders, Leadership Development

On January 1st, Virginia Rometty became IBM’s first female CEO.  She graduated as an engineer in 1979 and joined IBM in 1981 at a time when women were coming to enter the business world in droves. Along with the requisite skill, and emotional intelligence, one of the things that Rometty credits for her rise to the top is self confidence.

As reported in the New York Times: “The age group of women becoming C.E.O.’s started their careers in the early ’80s, when the huge tsunami of women were really building professional lives,” said Ilene H. Lang, chief executive of Catalyst, a research firm on women and business.”

“Yet the fact that Ms. Rometty’s gender remains newsworthy also exposes the lengths that businesses still need to go to before women who invest their careers in companies have a shot at the corner office, or even equal representation. Early in her career, Virginia M. Rometty, IBM’s next chief executive, was offered a big job, but she felt she did not have enough experience. So she told the recruiter she needed time to think about it.”

“That night, her husband asked her, “Do you think a man would have ever answered that question that way?” “What it taught me was you have to be very confident, even though you’re so self-critical inside about what it is you may or may not know, and that, to me, leads to taking risks.”

Self Confidence

by | Jun 25, 2012 | Emotional Intelligence, Exercises, Leadership Development

“Confidence is a plant of slow growth in an aged bosom.”

William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, 1766

You probably don’t even notice it happening. Do you remember the first time you tried to dive off a very high diving board? Do you remember the feeling? The hesitation, the butterflies. Now do you remember the second dive off the same high diving board, the third, the tenth, the 100th? Your changed feelings are the result of building confidence.

One day, you face a new situation, full of dread, nervous anticipation and excitement. The next you are treating the situation as old hat, developing confidence with every step.

Self confidence is one of the keys to successful leadership.

Can you imagine following a nervous leader, one who lacks self confidence? It doesn’t work does it. So, if you want to be a good leader, you need to develop a well justified aura of self confidence. Developing it is all about practice. Doing something time and time again (eventually successfully) will build your self confidence.

 

Try this at work:

Find some small thing in which you feel that you lack self confidence. Don’t make it something huge like speaking to a group of 100 people if that is one of your fears. Make it something small, perhaps like having a conversation with someone who is very senior to you, saying no to an unreasonable request, meeting new people at a networking event, or voicing your opinion at a meeting.

Once you have picked this thing to work on, set yourself an objective of repeating the behaviour ten times. Yes that’s right, ten times.

Let’s say you want to become more self confident about speaking up in a meeting. The next time you go to a meeting, make it an objective to speak up sometime in the meeting to voice your opinion. Write down how you felt before voicing your opinion and how you felt after that. Note also what happenned. Did anyone hit you, yell at you, belittle you or did they just hear your opinion and move on? Now do that nine more times, writing down your feelings and the results of the experiment.

After you have completed the experiment ask your self, do you feel more self confident? Chances are you have developed a useful technique to overcome fears.