Power Your Person
A common aspect of the New Year is a plan of self-improvement. Many of us hope to become better or make changes in various parts of our lives. It’s the perfect time to start over, wipe the slate clean, renew our commitments, refresh our agendas, take charge of our future and plan our ascent to the next level.
So who or what are we working on? Let’s start with the person and emphasize discovery before improvement. Have you ever thought about how many versions of a person exist? Here are a couple of ways to think about this question:
The Original Person – How you came at birth before being influenced, developed, tarnished, weathered or accomplished.
The Ordinary Person – How you are today and every day in the moments as you wake up and fall asleep.
The Armored Person – How you are when you suit up for a role, task or performance.
The Machiavellian Person – How you are at your worst.
The Authentic Person – Possibly a combination of the four people listed above.
The Best Person – An elusive, evolving mystery and lifelong quest/journey.
If you’re leading an examined life, and you’re being honest about the various versions of yourself that show up on a given day, you are on the journey of discovery. If you don’t like this message, keep reading.
For most of us, this is awkward work. Who has the time, right? Often, the more you rise in the ranks to become a leader of people, projects or processes, the less likely you may be to perform such an examination. You may feel you don’t have time to do it or, worse, you may not even notice you’ve stopped the process of discovery (i.e., getting stuck in Armored Person).
Busy people with lots of responsibilities learn to be efficient sometimes at the expense of being relational because time is precious and things need to get done. Often, although we are aware of this, we don’t always address this and struggle with sustainable transformation. Slowly, or not so slowly, we risk losing our audience!
Discover your stressors/triggers and know what stress looks like on you. Leaders often exhibit stress with behaviors that look like leadership, which confuses others and leads to feeling more stressed. Often stress behavior is thought of as underdoing and shutting off or shutting down. But just as often, it can involve speeding up, taking on more, becoming more aggressive, being more decisive, possibly more dismissive, firmer in tone and looking for allies who appear, think and act just like ourselves — Yikes! Guilty!
Creating space and dedicating time to discover the various aspects of ourselves before acting takes discipline and focus — preferably away from where we currently spend our time — with guided assistance. This process can be more rewarding and satisfying if we bring an open and curious mindset to the work and know the outcome belongs to us and is linked to our investment in the process.
If you leave thinking I got nothing out of this work, you either didn’t show up or closed your eyes to who showed up and what was possible — either way, you missed out.
Some ideas to help with discovery and improvement:
Seek 360 feedback
Take diagnostic assessments
Participate in leadership development training
Find a mentor
Hire a coach
Become a beginner again — somewhere in your life — and rediscover learning
Create a written development plan and find a way to hold yourself accountable
Research your options and take action. Knowing who you are is more important than knowing who you want to be and being who you want to be is rooted in knowing who you are. Explore in 2021 and power your person!