I attended a leadership training recently and one of the exercises we did was to create our own personal leadership philosophy. I found going through the steps really helpful in solidifying what I valued and what my expectations were for myself and my organization. So here are the steps:
- Define your purpose or mission, consider major responsibilities, final products, customers.
- Understand your true personal values. Your core values are those that are intrinsically valuable these contribute to your total person, family, hobbies, competence etc.
- List your fundamental leadership beliefs about people and organizations. These could include your beliefs on whether or not people inherently want to do a good job, what climate an organization should have, how things get done.
- Determine your vision “what kind of reputation do you want to create with your actions in your personal and work life” what do you want to be? You can start with “My vision is creating/inspiring/enabling and environment.” From there, add action words such as is, will, facilitates, enables, allows, etc. Then add your description and reflect. An example: Allows every individual to contribute to their maximum capability.
- Establish Leadership Goals- Should be achievements of characteristics you want to accomplish (the ends), and inspire deliberate action (the means). First, picture what you want to do and the work environment you want to have in a realistic, achievable picture 2 years from now. What ingredients are needed for your picture? What goals do you need to set to achieve this? An example: I will always look for improvement in areas I affect.
- Compare your values with those of your organization- do they mesh?
Organize all of this into a strategy – it should be easily understood, desirable to read, achievable, positive, and energized. It can be in a paragraph, a chart, a cartoon- whatever fits your style
I found following the steps and really thinking about each allowed me to create a picture for myself and those I lead. I am sharing my first draft of my vision and I will continue to edit as it evolves, but for now, it gives us a direction and focus. I chose a graphic depiction, basically a house built on a foundation of values. This is, of course, is specific to my organization, but it gives you the idea. I hope this is helpful and good luck on your leadership journey!
~ Submitted by Lorie Vega, Secretary