An opportunity to lead arose.
You knew you had tons to offer. You raised your hand. You stood up. You risked people judging you. You put yourself on the line. You took a shot and . . . . . you knocked it out of the park!
Now people are eager to follow you. They want to see what you’re going to do next. They’ve raised the bar. They want to see if you are legit and can repeat the magic. And they want to be a part of the magic, if you can.
Oh, what is a leader of today to do?
Repeating the magic – high potential leaders struggle with this challenge every day. And believe me, I’ve noticed throughout my career, that leaders who have the true capability to transform their expertise into ultra-achieving results are in VERY short supply.
High potential leaders who are the most successful are the ones who are able to discover a way to intrigue their followers by wowing them with the opportunity of tackling a problem vs leading with the problem itself. As marketing experts say, “lead with the sizzle vs the steak.”
When you lead with the problem and have no immediate options, it turns many people off. They have enough problems to solve. They hunger for answers. And they want to know if you have any potential answers of interest.
This is why it is important for leaders to learn how to best “Position Possibilities”, the 2nd step of The E.P.I.C. Method, a leadership framework that increases your ability to execute differentiated leadership (using what ALREADY makes you outstanding in the world to effectively influence others).
Position Possibilities involves communicating compelling, win-win options to problems, from which your audience is expected choose the one they like best. It can be as easy as a sentence or two that clearly defines the problem you are setting out to solve for your audience and why your solution is a compelling, viable alternative.
Technology has revolutionized the way we live. The type of leaders organizations need today are ones that can lead others to find options which cannot be found on Google.
Remaining in your box, being inflexible, and not being agile is now the kiss of death. We now reward individuals who find a way to make a difference. We celebrate leaders who make innovative contributions. We are now seeking out people who are being unique, raising the bar, or challenging the status quo.
That is what today’s successful high potential leaders do.
The question I have for you is – how are you doing that?
Are you doing that?
Are you afraid to show your brilliance? And if so, how are you overcoming it?
I’ll be the first to admit that being a strong, differentiated leader is not easy. If it was, we’d have a world of billions of them.
We all need help sometimes to find our own path to improving our leadership capability. And we sometimes need to also find help for others on our team.
Helping high performing leaders like yourself is why I come to work everyday. Don’t think for a moment that you don’t possess an inner ability to change the world!
P.S. If you liked this post, I have a sneaky suspicion that you may be interested in joining our community of career-savvy ultra-achievers!
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Karan Ferrell-Rhodes is the Founder of Shockingly Different Leadership, a leadership development consultancy that develops both in-house and external leadership programs which transform high potential leaders into “ultra-achievers” in their organization. Don’t forget to ask about our coaching packages, assessments, mentoring programs, and leadership labs! @ShockinglyD
