I am all about leadership and analyzing strategies that will help me in my leadership but also what will help other leaders in their leadership. In fact, I am downright passionate about it because I think high performing leaders will change the world. They will do this through inspiring one person at a time to step up to their passion and their calling. People need people. They need to hear that they are doing a good job. They need to know what to do next. They need support. They need community. Leaders do all of that for people. The best part of leadership is that they empower others to become leaders. So yes, leadership is one of the keys to other people’s as well as your own fulfillment and happiness and that is why I am so passionate about leadership.
I am going to get off the soapbox now and start to dig into the downside of leadership that so many people feel when they are in this position. Leadership can feel downright exhausting, scary, and extremely overwhelming. Loneliness can also play a huge part in leadership and the idea that you have to do it all. Fair enough. We all know there is always a flip side, pros and cons, and grass is greener syndrome. However, the thing that we miss sometimes is that sometimes we are our own worst enemy. We put the obstacles up because of the story we tell ourselves or how we set up our leadership strategy.
We need to take back our time. We have to figure out what matters most and where we will spend our time. That means we need to go back to our roots and find out three things that are the most important to us as leaders and hold tight to those touch trees so that the pros far outweigh the cons and we become happier and more fulfilled leaders. This type of a leader will inspire the people they lead and will help them to find their own roots.
There are three things in my life that are extremely important drivers of why I do what I do, even when things are tough. One, freedom. This surfaced for me when I went back to the roots to find my touch trees. I wanted my freedom back. I wanted the freedom to lead how I felt most impacted my community. Freedom to make mistakes and learn from them. Freedom for the community I was leading to contribute their ideas and to decide what mattered to them as far as professional development went. Time freedom was also important. Freedom so that I could not work a thousand hours in a day but actually go home and enjoy my family. It’s important to me because I want to be the one in charge of my time and how I spend it. I want to be able to spend time with the people I love when I want, doing the things that I want to do with them. Because this freedom touch tree was so important, I had to figure out how to lead so that I had these things. That was the only thing that was going to sustain my happiness and fulfillment as a leader. I dug deep into developing a system that gave me back my freedom. I developed a Leadership Edit system that became the driver for how I lead. It is a system for leaders to solve problems efficiently and then to teach it to their teachers so they could also solve problems. But then it went a step further, it taught teachers how to coach and share their expertise with each other and get them contributing. It allows for a powerful way to delegate with support, empower and grow other leaders, and automate things so I could have more freedom and so could the teachers. This Leadership Edit system came to life because I went to my roots and found the touch tree that mattered. It is not always pretty but it has lit a fire in how I lead as well as how the teachers lead and solve problems.
The second thing that I found that became a touch tree for my leadership was fulfillment or impact. The longer I’ve been a leader, the more this has become a driving force for me: I believe we are all on this earth to do big things and to make an impact. So being able to make an impact in the lives of others, helping them achieve fulfillment in their own lives, this matters to me deeply. I knew that relationship with the community that you lead was one of the most important things to learn in leadership, however, I didn’t go deeper than that. I just brushed the surface and thought about it as getting people to like me, however, it was so much more than that. It is about getting people to feel empowered and that what they were doing mattered. It was about getting them to contribute their ideas, challenge me and others, reflect on feedback, celebrate their wins, and believe in their own ability to make an impact on the world. It was more than just about helping them to teach better or follow my lead. It was about learning about how to solve problems that come up, how to follow your passions, how to take action, how to inspire each other and learn from each other, how to make the learning visible to the students. I could go on and on about what I learned as clung tightly to this touch tree. It became less about getting them to like me and more about making an impact and building in fulfillment for myself and for the community I lead. I started to develop a system here as well. I created a system for how I went into classrooms and observed. I developed a four phase visibility system that became a huge part of how I supported and empowered teachers to contribute their ideas and celebrate the work that they do. I changed my idea of striving to become a master leader to wanting to become more of a master learner who learns alongside the teachers right in front of the students. We began using their classrooms as a root of professional development rather than just waiting until the next PD day to learn as adults. Game changer.
The third touch tree that I considered was my 10% edge. What was it about me that set me apart for them to believe in me as a leader? What did I know a lot about that I could use to be a huge part of my leadership messaging? What am I willing to do that other leaders might not? What content can I provide the teachers that has my edge sprinkled in so I can do it with confidence. Once I found that I used that to become a part of everything that I did. That was the place where I put all of my energy into learning more about. For me, I knew my edge was in assessment for learning and my ability to develop systems to solve problems. I got hyper clear about how I could use those actions to bring fulfillment, find more ways to automate so that my freedom surfaced, and how I could use the actions to impact teachers in the classrooms.
By realizing your 10% edge, it helps to validate and drive your messaging. You are already passionate about it and so that passion transpires into your messaging. We all know that passion drives so many things and can also inspire others because you are setting your own example of how following your passion can bring renewal and rejuvenation. Find your passion and run with it. As the old saying goes, “Boring will put you out of business.” Nobody wants boring, including the person who is leading. So find that passion. Find your edge and see what happens.
Build your leadership and your life around your touch trees. In fact, build a moat around it! Set an intention to build everything around that and develop a system so that they become the drivers of your leadership and purpose. I think you will find that things become more clear and you feel more sure of how you spend your time and what your messaging is. I challenge you to do some thinking about what your touch trees might be for your leadership. You might find that they are exactly the same as mine or perhaps different. Whatever they are, they matter and they will change your life.
I have a guide that might help you with figuring out your touch trees. It is all about finding your vision using a three bucket system.
And speaking of community, have you joined our private facebook group called Principals and Leadership yet?
And…
Check out my website for more info on leadership!
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