Habits of Effective Leaders

I attended a panel discussion where several leaders shared about habits that help them become successful.

(1) It’s a People business —

It’s not just about what you do, but how you do it

Whether you like it or not, working for a large company means you need to collaborate with others to make things happen, and this often includes talking to several groups or teams to socialize your ideas in order to get their blessings on what you want to do.

One of the panelists shared some tips on how to get people’s ideas and consensus on your proposal,

• Seeking other people’s perspectives instead of seeking other people’s understandings to arrive at mutually beneficial solutions
• It’s usually better to discuss over a zoom call than writing lengthy emails to get people’s thoughts and ideas

(2) When feeling overwhelmed at work,

• don’t respond to emails with your first thought — take some time to gather your thoughts and compose the responds to avoid more back and forth through several emails
• step away for 20 minutes to neutralize yourself so that you are responding to others emails with a clear head

(3) The best advice you’ve ever got

• the power of positive thinking — there will be many ups and downs through life, but with positive thinking you will be able to power through those difficulties
• listen and learn every day — everyone still has something to learn no matter what stage they are in their careers, so keep your mind open and continue to listen and learn from others
• Use “tell me more about that” to encourage people to say more, and encourage yourself to listen — you can continue to learn if you show you truly care about other people’s perspectives
• Use “Whose role do you want to take?” to cultivate your career path to get there — it may be hard to come up with a career plan if you don’t know what you want to do 5 to 10 years from now or where you want to head to; look around and ask yourself whose role you’re most interested in taking in the next 5 to 10 years would help answer that question
• Telling people verbally “what you want to do” is very powerful; don’t keep it to yourself — you would be surprised by the help and resources you receive if you start being open and honest about what you want to achieve

(4) How to maintain work-life balance

• be present where you are — no need to check emails during the weekend
• be thoughtful about how you want to live your life, and take actions that would help achieve your best life