Few people would argue that leadership is something that is needed in every aspect of public life.  For some people, the important concepts of leadership can often be difficult to grasp. Perhaps it is a lack of mentoring or modeling that causes hesitancy in people to act in a leadership capacity.  Another problem could be simply not having the understanding of what is expected of a leader in business or organizations.  Here are seven key concepts every effective leader must capture to be most influential. 

1. Effective behavior: As stated above a lack of role models acting in a leadership role in communities, business and organizations is a problem for many people. A leader is willing to behave in a manner that exemplifies the values purported by the mission statement of the organization. This behavior should be consistent over time and promote high ethical standards for others in the organization to model. 

2. Stand for Something. A leader makes his or her choices obvious to those around them.  That is, the leader stands for something.  The old saying is that if you don’t stand for something, you fall for anything.  By standing for choices with a solid foundation, a leader demonstrates how to maintain standards and how to come to a good decision. 

3. Works With Others.  A leader must be able to work with everyone including the person with the worse personality or the person that never speaks up in a meeting.  Leaders lead so others are inspired to be better.  Without the ability to get along with others, organizational goals will be hindered.  A leader gets past petty surface issues and deals with people at all levels in ways that bring about, and maintain, harmony. 

4. Unites others.  Not only do leaders work well with other but they inspire others to work well with each other. Leaders have the ability to unite colleagues around a common vision.  That means having the ability to communicate so diverse listening audiences understand what the future of an organization will look like and have the desire to be a part of that future by uniting their talents with others. 

5. Influences Stakeholders. Organization stakeholders are people that have some type of vested interest in the success of an organization.  An effective leader is responsible to ensure that stakeholders understand the operating direction of the organization and they are supportive of the activities within the organization.  That means sharing the vision, mission, goals and priorities with the stakeholders so they can be a part of the organizations movement.   

6. Stays Committed. A leader grows in levels of trust and respect by those they influence by being committed to stated goals, no matter the cost. This commitment is to organization goals, to the people the leader leads, to getting through difficulties, and from not backing down from challenges.  Leaders are not blame-throwers.  When something goes wrong they are willing to face the difficulties and shoulder the blame as needed while working continually to find a solution to the problem. By being committed, the leader inspires commitment from others. 

7.  Futurists.  Leaders are the ultimate futurists. Never satisfied to stay in the status quo, the leader can see a better future then makes strategic plans to reach it with the backing of loyal followers. A leader is not complacent.  They capture an innate creativity that lets them form plans to move forward, never being totally satisfied with a situation at hand while a problem still exists. 

While these seven practices are not all encompassing to leadership, they provide a good frame for what to expect of a leader.  If you are a leader in your organization or business, expect to be a life-long learner of people and organizations.  Others will expect you to boldly take a stand so they can feel confident to follow where you lead.

If you are a leader in business or an organization, take a new look at what you might have always perceived as failure. What if you could learn why you should look forward to failure, and how it can help you ultimately get where you want to go? For instance, when you read this statement, what’s your reaction?

“There is no such thing as failure.”  

Do you think it’s true? Maybe it makes sense to others but not to you. But what if you learned that you have the power to decide whether or not something is indeed, a “failure” or not, changing your whole idea about failure?  In fact, some highly successful people have already learned to look at the word failure in a very different way than others.  Let’s talk about why.

Why Others Watch a Leader Handle Failure 

Doing something that seems to be a failure shows the fact that you are only human. People watch how a person of stature handles a mistake and how that person recovers from it. Watching isn’t to be cruel, but it gives others hope that they too could recover from a mistake. 

Mistake making takes on a whole new form when a person sees how a leader faces and overcomes a problem. Everyone can have a failure or a setback but not everyone knows what to do about it. Making a successful comeback after a failure can increase your reputation, build confidence and show you as a person of integrity. The comeback doesn’t even have to be huge or earth shaking. It just has to happen. 

When “Failure” is Feedback 

What if starting today, the idea of failure took a radical change in your vocabulary? What if failure really meant a form of success? How could you acknowledge your success, even as you speak the word “failure”? Well, you can point out these ideas:  

• That everything you learned in the process of getting to where you are now is not going to get thrown out — you learned good things to keep along with the stuff that didn’t work.
• That simply being able to recognize everything hasn’t gone according to plan, or achieved the desired outcome (i.e. “failed”), is in itself a positive outcome
• That even if the specific method you used this time around wasn’t the right one for this situation, you can surely use bits and pieces and parts from what you learned in another project or idea.
• That you can eliminate and not repeat the same behaviors the next time a similar situation arises. Failing to achieve a goal in one way just increases your creative understanding of what works for a situation, project, or idea or what doesn’t.
• That you’ll know to do things differently in the future. You will create in a new way to approach a problem and your creating will be quicker and more confident as a result of knowing what not to do? 
• That the experience has enabled you to grow in some way. Adversities, set backs, failures, hard times — all of these things only make you a stronger and more confident person. 

Failure can simply be a great way to get you to pause in the midst of your process, and get some critical information to indicate that you may need to change directions, try something new, continue your learning, or shift your focus. 

Imagine what would happen if you didn’t get that feedback, and continued endlessly along the wrong path, towards the wrong goal, or without ever learning a new approach? It not a pretty thought. Therefore, make time to rethink the idea of failure. Failure can really be seen as positive feedback, providing information that gets you back on the right track! Without feedback you would surely be lost. The key is to quickly identify what isn’t working so you can change direction, try something new, or shift your focus. 

How would thinking of failure as a welcome invitation to understanding a better way to pursue you life dream change your thinking? Here are some tips: 

• Always have a clear idea of where you want to go and continue to re-evaluate it as you move forward
• Identify specific milestones or markers along the way, to let you know you’re on the right track and celebrate each success
• If something doesn’t appear to be working, or working fast enough, don’t hesitate to try something new
• Continually learn from others. These can be people you work with, experts in your field, mentors, or leaders that have travelled a similar road.

Remember, no one has to stay in the same place in life. If things are not working in the direction you are headed, stop and go another way. If you tried something one way, make a change in your activity until you find out what really works. Life is a series of starts and stops. Just think of how much experience you have in different areas of life when you try something and learn new things from that experience.

Keep trying new things; never plan to stop learning, trying, experimenting, and creating. This gives a leader the confidence needed to succeed. Consider the idea of rethinking failure as a way to reach success and strengthen your leadership skills instead of a way to set you back. You will take more risks, try more challenges and increase your overall successes.

Tomorrow never comes; once tomorrow gets here it’s today. Waiting for tomorrow to do what you should have started long ago is only going to keep you from ever succeeding.

It’s so easy to get into the habit of saying “Wait” or “I’ll do that later” instead of taking up the mantel of responsibility and just getting on with living life fully today. This isn’t saying you have to ignore the facts:

• Yes, the timing must be right to pursue your dreams.
• Yes, you have to get the right obligations out of the way, like taking care of family, children, elderly parents, if that’s what you are supposed to do.
• Yes, you may have to finish the fight on the hard challenge that have come your way.

But once those have gone and you know the time is now, you have to get started on living the true purpose of your life.

• Do you ever wonder why certain people have a yearning in the heart to do something big?
• Do you think this is a universal yearning or do you think some people are content to be where they are in life?

It seems that for some the yearning is stronger or more real than others. I believe everyone is born with a purpose to fulfill in life that will leave the world a better place as a result. That task may be small or only touch one single life. But touching that life will cause a ripple effect that will reach out to places unknown.

I also believe that some people refuse to do what is on their heart. Knowing that there is a great thing to do, they refuse to answer that life calling and ignore it until life is over for them.

• You know in your heart that you are supposed to be doing more.
• You know you are supposed to be doing greater things.

I believe a life purpose is set in the heart of every person at birth. When you refuse to heed the persistence of that life calling, you live a life unfulfilled.

• Are you denying the call of your life purpose?
• Are you letting the past, or your fears, or unforgiveness, or confusion keep you from identifying what is great about you so you can start sharing it with the world?

I’ve been in settings where the most unlikely person got up and made a presentation that changed the direction of everyone in the room. Through very simple words or a brief exercise or by sharing a piece of art or playing a simple arpeggio, lives were changed.

What are you supposed to be doing with your life? When will you start doing it?