Be A Leader

Anyone Can Do It

I read a great article by Roy H. Williams this week in his Monday Morning Memo. (If you do not subscribe, please do at http://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/ it's free and will be worth the read every week). The subject this week was Leaders vs. Managers. Being good at one does not make you good at the other. Read the memo.

It has inspired me to discuss the role of leaders and how anyone in an organization can be a leader. It can be at work, in the community with your friends or among family. A leader by definition is a person who influences a group of people towards the achievement of a goal.

Leaders do things and people choose to follow or make changes toward the goal based on the actions of the leader. I have been amazed at how many people have told me over the past several months that I have inspired them to get fit after they saw the results that I have gotten. I didn't even mean to effect anyone else, it just happened.

The great leaders in history were the ones out front putting themselves at risk. From the Monday Morning Memo this week:

Alexander the Great was always the first over the wall of an enemy city. Whether his men followed him was up to them. Alexander was a true leader. “I’m going in, boys!”

Geronimo, the famous Apache leader, was not a tribal chief but a spiritual advisor, a historian of the people and a protector of their beliefs. He said, "I have something I need to do." And when the other Apaches saw what he was doing, they decided to help him.

It doesn't need to be quite as dramatic as Alexander the Great or Geronimo, but what area of your life or career can you be a leader. What can you do to influence others to do it better? Is it physical fitness, better spending habits, quit smoking, making more follow up phone calls, hand writing notes to customers? Up to you.

One word of caution. Leaders are not always POSITIVE influences. Sometimes, a leader can take people in the opposite direction. The negative direction. This happens in any situation that has a void of positive leadership. In the definition, I say that a leader influences towards a goal. That goal is not always a good thing.

What can you do today on your first step towards being a positive leader in your life and or career? Drop me an email at rcovert@gpmnow.com and let me know!