Speed is everything in business today. Everything moves so rapidly we feel the pressure to be faster and faster than anyone or everyone. One of my executive clients said this is a must for not only thriving but in fact for survival. We are the verge of creating a culture of speed, but at what cost? Let’s look at the other side of the coin. The benefits and values of slowing down a bit here and there in leadership.
YOU AS LEADER HAVE TO SLOW DOWN IN ORDER TO…..
- speed up. Why? Because you may miss (out) a lot if you don’t do it.
- be able to listen to your people, to your customers, to the market, to all your stakeholders. There is lot of noise out there, you won’t hear what you need to hear if you don’t stop to listen. If you want to listen with the intention to understand you have to slow down a bit. (CRAFT Leadership)
- see the bigger picture. You cannot capture the bigger picture when you are in rushing mode, you can only get fragmented pieces of the big picture and you can easily miss pieces in the speed. (CRAFT & Transformational Leadership)
- be able to strategize. Strategizing require reflection, seeing things from various perspectives, thinking in scenarios. This cannot be achieved when you jumping from one topic to another and so on. You need reflection and thinking time. (Transformational Leadership)
- detach yourself from doing. Today leaders have developed strong action bias. In fact, today world made leaders and everyone action biased. If you think of only the multitasking you get the point. Leaders need to realize that less is more. Look for the 20 % which brings you 80% result. It cannot be achieved without detaching yourself from perpetual doing mode. (CRAFT Leadership)
- reflect. You cannot become a quality leader if you don’t reflect. Heightened self-awareness requires daily reflection from every leader. (CRAFT leadership)
- recalibrate yourself time-to-time. Marshall Goldsmith said “What got you here, won’t get you there.” This is true and in fact it is more relevant than ever. The only difference is you must recalibrate yourself more frequently in order to fit for the today’s fast-changing turbulent world and for the future, which I am afraid, won’t be any different. (Transformational Leadership)
- take a stock and express gratitude. See your progress on the journey and not only the achieved goals are important to everyday fulfilment. To see and appreciate what you got and how far you got and whom helped you along the way and whom are with you currently, help you center yourself. (CRAFT Leadership)
- re-charge your battery daily. Someone told me that “we are sprinting on a marathon nowadays”. Every training and even agile methodology have recovery sessions between sprints, that true for you as a leader. You cannot run long distance marathons in sprints if you don’t slow down and take care of yourself. Sooner or later, you will burn out. (CRAFT Leadership)
- center yourself to be grounded. To know what makes you grounded, what your corner and center stones are essentials. We tend to compromise a lot under the umbrella of flexibility until we recognize we lost something fundamental. Check your values monthly. Are you still nurture them, live by them or started trading them off? (CRAFT & Transformational Leadership)
- build relationship. It takes time to build relationship. Business is human to human fundamentally. People follow you because you care for them, you help them succeed, you trust and respect them. Trusted relationships don’t happen overnight. (CRAFT Leadership)
- communicate. Great leaders communicate a lot. Their role is to create clarity through their communication. There are two types of communication required from a leader. Firstly, there is the transparent communication. You must be transparent about the vision, the strategic directions and what required to achieve that vision. Secondly, on the road to the vision is full of changes and transformations where customized communication is required from the leader. You have to understanding what helps people move to the next stage without scaring them with too much information. (Transformational Leadership)
- enjoy the here and now. You only have one life if you are always in a future mode (which is a must for every leader), live only by your goals, never enjoy the here and now, you miss your life and many joys from the present. (CRAFT Leadership)
“I’ve learned that sometimes we need to slow down to speed up. Busy and faster doesn’t always lead to bigger and better.” Robin Sharma
Are there any speed limits on the road of success? Are we really ready to trade off everything for the fast speed of today world?
There are many reasons to slow down. What is your reason? Where and what can you gain more from slowing down right now?
Above you can see in what areas and with which executive solutions (CRAFT & Transformational Leadership) I support leaders to make a leader-shift. Should you wish to learn more about these executive solutions feel free to contact me at beata@beatakalamar.com .