Self-leadership is crucial for many reasons, but I wonder if we truly grasp its effects and the significant impact it has on our lives.
Self-Awareness:
The more self-aware we are, the better we understand what does and doesn’t work for us, our behaviours and triggers, strengths and weaknesses, motivations and values. All this allows us to lead more authentic lives and make better informed decisions. When you understand yourself you can more easily set yourself up for success by creating your ideal work environment.
Improved Emotional Intelligence:
Becoming better at leading yourself also means becoming better at leading others. Improved self-awareness leads to increased self-regulation, which improves your emotional intelligence. This can help you regulate your emotional responses to any given situation and better understand why others act and react in the ways they do.
Increased Accountability & Responsibility:
When you lead yourself, you are more liable to take accountability and responsibility for your actions and behaviour – this sets expectations both within yourself and for your team, who will follow your example. Increased accountability also makes it easier to get into the cycle of setting and completing goals.
Greater Resilience & Adaptability:
When you have an understanding of your environment and its mutual influence, you become more resilient and adaptable to sudden changes, equipping yourself with the tools and knowledge needed to overcome setbacks and challenges.
Setting Goals:
People with great self-leadership always have a clear vision of what they want to achieve and how they plan on doing it. Understanding yourself, your tools, and your environment, means you can better set goals and plan ahead.
Increased Credibility & Trust:
When practicing self-leadership, you demonstrate integrity and consistency in your actions – because you have a clear vision, goals, and accountability. This enables you to lead by example by holding yourself to a higher standard, inspiring others to naturally follow suit.
Enhanced Problem-Solving Skills:
Tying in to improve resilience and adaptability, self-leadership lends itself to self-reflection and introspection, which in turn lead to increased critical thinking and problem-solving abilities. Spending time on self-reflection means constantly evaluating and re-evaluating your work and understanding why things panned out in the way they did – “Why did ‘A’ work?”, “Why did ‘B’ fail and how do I prevent this from happening again?”, etcetera.
Empowerment of Others:
Self-leadership is a form of self-empowerment which better helps you to empower others. Increased emotional intelligence allows you to understand why others behave the way they do, which builds empathy. Because an empathic leader is one that people are more inclined to follow and listen to, you naturally lead by example, implicitly setting higher standards for others to meet.
Improved Stress Management:
Self-awareness, resilience, and accountability all come together to breed mindfulness, better self-care and improved time management. Alongside better managing your time, self-care and mindfulness aid in reducing overall stress levels and managing your stress during difficult times
Improved Consistency & Reliability:
Self-leaders are individuals who consistently deliver on their promises and meet deadlines, earning the appreciation of those around them.
By practicing self-leadership, people can develop their skills and master themselves, enabling personal growth and positively influencing others.
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