Leaders know how to apply the rules of changes and what to stop doing now.
In the book, ‘What Got You Here Won’t Get You there, Marshell Goldsmith informed us that a successful person should know what to do and what to stop to continue the journey of his success. He describes about 20 attitudes we need to stop to perform as a good leader. While going through below mentioned habits, take a deep breath and note down those habits which stops your progress. The beauty of doing what to stop is – it brings neutrality and it is easy. It makes you smarter. The higher we climb in a corporate ladder, the more we need interpersonal/behavioral skills. It makes a big difference in your organizational and leadership skills. When we move up in the ladder of success, the most significant changes that we can make are behavioral changes. The person who have good behavioral skills can constantly win in their career. People will do something only if they understand that it will create value to them. Change your attitude to add value to yourself. Congratulate yourself to stop your bad behavior and thank God for your courage.
Habit No. 1 : Winning Too Much. Winning too much is a behavioral problem for most people. This is because, most people have an inborn tendency to position them above others. This turns someone into a critique, someone to withhold information from others. This also turns someone to play favoritism in a group to show them better than others. Based on experience, a trainer can say that people will become more successful and create great relationships with friends and spouses after they conquer this attitude.
Habit No. 2 : Adding Too Much Value : When others talk, stop interrupting the conversation by adding value to that by using words and phrases such as …It, However, But etc. This is one of the bad habits which can interrupt the flow of conversation or it stops the outflow of ideas. Sometimes it may bring confusion to the speaker. In this situation one should show confidence and stick to his expertise.
Habit No. 3 : Passing Judgement : Grading the opinion of others in a meeting is not a good habit. This make others hesitant and defensive. Accepting the opinion of people gathered in a meeting without comments (i.e say “good idea, great idea etc. ) is the best method to avoid passing judgement. When some judgmental comments come from others, we must just say “Thank You”. This will avoid confrontation and people will think that you are an agreeable person.
Habit No. 4 : Making Destructive Comments : Any remarks which intend to injure the feelings of others create damage in the receiver. Once you throw out, You cannot take it back. Apology does not work here, because the remark will stay in another person’s memory. Destructive comments damage teamwork. Take a deep breath and ask yourself , is this comment is necessary?
Habit No. 5 : Starting With “No”, “But”, “However” : When you start sentence or interrupt in conversations with No, But or However, no matter how friendly your conversation or you fill your sentences with expressions to accept others, the message you convey to other person is “You Are Wrong”. Keep a scorecard to find out how many times we use such words in our conversation. Then, reduce it gradually till you can avoid it completely.
Habit No. 6 Telling The World How Smart We Are : If you express that you are smart or if you boast about yourself, it explains that you are an Idiot . Otherwise, you try to insult others unconsciously through such statements. You should stop informing the universe how smart you are. Before starting this kind of conversation, you must ask yourselves, is the conversation worth it?. Never tell the world how smart you are.
Habit No. 7. Speaking When Angry : Getting angry does not improve the situation. Getting angry loses your reputation. Stop speaking when you become angry. If you keep quiet , nobody knows how you really feels about the situation. You should remember or meditate about the past moments which create anger in your life. Find out, who creates the situation to make you angry? Most of the time the answer may point out that the root of your anger is in “You”.
Habit No.8. Negativity, or “Let me explain why that won’t work.” Negativity or spreading negative messages about situations or circumstances is a serious defect in character. Monitor your speech pattern. What you speak should not be the same as what others think about you. Pay attention to what we say, because it may encourage or turn off people.
Habit No.9 : Sharing Information : Give priority to sharing information with your subordinates. This attitude reveals that you give care to your subordinates and what they think and act matters to you. Moreover, this attitude improves our communication skills as well.
Habit No. 10. Give proper recognition. Giving recognition to peers and subordinates is one of the deliberate acts that we should do in our life. This shifts the focus of a person from himself to others. Attitude of giving recognition makes a leader great.
Habit No. 11. Claiming credit that we don’t deserve. Claiming (Holding) credit that we don’t deserve is a theft. As a leader, we should show mercy to share the credit of success with our team members.
Habit No.12. Making excuses. Making excuses and limiting ourselves by the expectations, beliefs and suggestions of others, stops us from being excellent in life. So, stop excusing ourselves based on information or comments from others. Work smart to get better in everything which we select.
Habit No. 13. Cling to the past. Blaming others for the wrong choices that we made in the past, comparing your childhood with your children’s childhood, highlighting your success by comparing with failures of other people etc., will damage your future. It might bringing negativity to our thoughts. We cannot rewrite our past. Only thing we can do is to accept it and move on.
Habit No. 14. Playing favorites. As a Human, we have a nature to favor those who favor us. A good leader has to admit it and stop the attitude of favoritism.
Habit No. 15. Refusing to express regret. The habit of apologizing is one of the important attitudes a leader should keep. Expressing regret or apology for the mistakes would force others to forgive it. It reveals our care towards them and would improve the relationship between two people.
Habit No. 16. Not Listening. Paying attention to others creates a special place in their heart. Listen while others speak.
Habit No. 17. Express Gratitude. ‘Thank you’ is one of the most beautiful words in the English language. It never disturbs others, instead, it improves interpersonal relationships. Say ‘thank you’ as a response even if we don’t know what to say in a particular situation. Expressing gratitude is a skill.
Habit No. 18. Punishing the messenger. Say Thank You to someone who offers advice, support etc. to us. Moreover, we should stop attitudes which holds gratitude, credits and recognition etc. to others. Making destructive comments towards our well-wishers hurt them and make them defensive. This would add pain to their emotions.
Habit No. 19. Passing The Buck : Stop attitudes such as blaming others and trying to find scapegoats to escape from your faults. A leader should avoid such behavioral elements from his/her attitude.
Habit No. 20. An Excessive need to be ‘Me’ : Avoid fake and pointless notions about yourselves. Find out how you can become beneficial for others, Instead of thinking ‘you’ as important. Change the definition about yourselves by keeping the element ‘I’ with less importance. Change starts from the moment where you should keep ‘I’ with less important.
Habit No. 21. Goal Obsession: If a person claims credit for every success which happens in his organization or life , even though he/she did not deserve it, is a theft. Working hard to achieve success and forgetting those people who need our support (fruit of our hard work) is a failure . You must understand how much success /money /possessions required to you to lead a successful life. Do not end your life miserable by asking ‘What have I achieved?’, even after doing all the hard works. Finally, a successful leader should understand how to lead a meaningful life. This made their life beautiful and convert them from near great to great.