5 Practical Tips for Growing Your Leadership Skills

Practical Tips for Growing Your Leadership Skills - featured image

Becoming a leader is going to be a priority if you are trying to find success as a business owner.

You have a whole team of people relying on you to ensure that your business is a successful one, you need to step up and raise your standards. You want to be described as someone who is a natural leader and develop an ability to inspire others and make tough business decisions.

Influential people and leaders know how to get the best from their teams, work toward common goals, and foster seamless communication. You need people to trust you and for that, you need self-accountability and engagement in continuous skill development.

From taking on the Ph.D. & EDD Organizational Leadership course to asking your team what you need to be doing differently, you have to explore various strategies and evaluate your progress to ensure that you and your team are on the right path.

 

Here are the top tips to grow your leadership skills:

1. Capitalize on your strengths, and work around your weaknesses

You may be the leader of a team on paper, but that doesn’t mean that your team will always have your back. Understanding your strengths and weaknesses can help you come up with a leadership style that suits your personality.

There are plenty of courses and questionnaires you can take to figure out where you have the most potential, and what are the areas where you need extra help. For example, you might be detail oriented, but miss out on important social cues from your teammates.

One of the best ways to learn more about yourself is through taking the Strengths Finder test. For just a couple of dollars, you can go through an elaborate questionnaire, and quickly realize what are your natural strengths and how to use them effectively in your organization.

a young woman leader speaking to her team

It pays to look sharp and project an aura of self-confidence. But ultimately, it’s what on the inside that matters the most.

2. Determine your leadership style

There are many leadership styles, so you must figure out which one is best for you. Some leaders are extroverted and like the hands-on approach and constant communication, while others prefer a more low-key approach, asynchronous communication, and careful planning.

Similarly, you may like to give your team plenty of freedom or you might lead with an authoritative style. No matter what you do, you need to determine which style is right for you and your team and build your organization accordingly.

 

3. Improve specific leadership skills

If you want to improve who you are as a leader, you need to choose to develop specific skills. You can target them and set a goal to develop skills one by one. Developing a plan that will help you to monitor and meet your progress is a great idea. For example, if you determine to work on one skill each month, within a year you’ll vastly improve your leadership skills repertoire. Some of the top skills you should develop as a leader include:

Interpersonal Skills

Decision-making and Problem-solving

Emotional Intelligence

Team Management

Strategic Vision

Influence and Inspiration

Adaptability and Learning

Ethical Conduct and Integrity

Cultural Intelligence

a graphic symbolizing online networking

Attending and hosting online conferences and interactive webinars is one of the best ways to work on your communication and hone your leadership abilities.

4. Develop your professional network

Expanding your network, getting to know professionals in your arena, and ensuring that you have contacts is vital if you want your leadership abilities to improve. You can solve more problems and make better decisions with a wider network because it gives you more resources to draw upon when needed.

Networking is going to be best achieved during industry events and interacting with peers in your field during webinars and informal online meetups. From here, you can build a huge network of people there to support and guide you.

 

5. Become an insatiable reader and learner

Effective leaders continuously expand their knowledge and you can do that by curating your reading list and resolving to read for at least 30 minutes per day. If you keep up this pace, you’ll read around one book per week, so within one year, you’ll have a vast pool of knowledge to draw on to make better decisions as a leader.

Taking online classes, investing in yourself, and ensuring that you are keeping up with a range of leadership topics are vital for long-term success.

 

Final thoughts

As a leader, you need to keep an open mind to new possibilities and avoid getting stuck in an inflexible mode of thinking. What worked yesterday, will not necessarily work today, especially in today’s environment where new technologies disrupt age-old industry on a daily basis.

Find out what your strengths are, develop an inclusive leadership style, and constantly think about how to improve your business operations. Keep evolving, work on your creativity, and you’ll crush it regardless of market conditions.

Rafal Reyzer

Hey there, welcome to my blog! I'm a full-time blogger, educator, digital marketer, freelance writer, editor and content manager with 10+ years of experience. I started RafalReyzer.com to provide you with great tools and strategies you can use to achieve freedom from 9 to 5 through online creativity. My site is a one-stop-shop for freelance writers, bloggers, publishers, content enthusiasts who want to be independent, earn more money and create beautiful things. Feel free to learn more about me here.