This text is taken from the original draft manuscript of Influential Leadership: A Leader’s Guide to Getting Things Done and is provided here to enrich your learning on the Strategic Influencer Programme.
You need to define your purpose in a manner which is appropriate for you. What is right for you will depend on many factors including your experience, age, values, position, responsibilities, capability and ambition. To make the most of the contents of this book, your purpose needs to be sufficiently stretching to mean that you will be stepping out of your comfort zone. It will need to be something which will force you to think differently either about your current role, or take you into uncharted waters entirely.
You will need to take a sensible view on what to focus on right now while also adding a little stretch to challenge yourself.
Leadership Arenas
Because leadership is all about getting things done, you first have to decide where you want to get things done, or rather, where you feel motivated to create some sizeable change from the way things are at the moment. This will be your Leadership Arena where you want to exercise your potential as a leader. Here are some of the potential arenas you could choose from:
- Your Job: This is the most obvious. Assuming you are in a leadership position, have a team and result to achieve, you can immediately start to define your vision around the mission you have been tasked with. This could include changing the way the rest of your organisation utilises your services; or it may be launching your products into a brand new market. Provided you have the opportunity to be visionary, change hearts and minds and get others involved, this could be the ideal place to start.
- Your Organisation: You don’t have to be leading the whole organisation, leaders exist in many places and the most influential among them will be able to drive things forward across the whole organisation. Creating substantive change in your organisation could be a great place to focus, particularly if you are career orientated right now and there is a distinct lack of leadership being displayed. There are many different types of organisation and a good place to begin exercising greater influencing with where you work. It doesn’t have to be the whole organisation, you might choose to focus on your division. Alternatively, if you wish to focus on other types of organisations such as charities, clubs, political parties or religious groups, everything in this book will apply just as well.
- Your Society. Beyond formal organisations, you have a wide variety of societal groups which you may be involved with. Often with these there is no formal leadership, nobody given the job of being the leader. They are much more open to ambitious and caring people to take on the leadership role and help the group move in a different direction. Potential groups vary greatly in terms of size and complexity, from local communities to the largest of all, the world. Providing the group you wish to apply leadership in contains a reasonable level of complexity, you will gain a great deal from this book.
- Your Industry: Surpassing your company, perhaps you want to become a leading figure in your sector or industry. Becoming a thought-leader, spokesperson and shaper of a whole industry can be very rewarding and also, beneficial to the whole community. The semi-informal nature of this type of structure will make the ideas in this book not only fascinating, but also extremely useful as you work out how to make progress towards your purpose.
- Your Profession: The only different between this arena and the previous one is the source of the group members – they will come from many different industries. If your profession is mature there will be several formal organisations already established to serve different functions, but there will also be a range of much more fluid groupings which you can apply your focus to.
There are many other possible arenas and what is important is that you make a decision about which one you want to make some leadership progress in. At this point, it would be worth pausing and making a list of all the possible arenas that you are (or could be) connected with and might be candidates for you to become an Influential Leader within.
Selecting your Leadership Arena
Now you have a list, apply a little more thought to it and see if you can select just one to focus on as you move on through the book. Here are some questions to consider as you review your list of potential arenas.
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Which arena:
- Contains the greatest need for change?
- Has a desperate lack of leadership?
- Is facing the greatest challenges?
- Present the greatest potential rewards, not only for you, but also for the people in the arena?
- Do you care most about?
- Has the greatest degree of turmoil?
Try to decide which you would most like to become an Influential Leader in. You don’t have to make a final decision right now, but at least decide which to focus on for the time being. Usually ideas and interest change as people become more skilled at capabilities presented in this book. When this happens to you, just come back here and repeat the process.
Analysing Your Arena
Once you’ve decided which one to work with you need to go into a great deal more detail about what is actually going on there. While it would be tempting to rely upon your own knowledge and assumptions, I strongly advise you to involve others in building your understanding, especially if the arena you have selected is large and/or complex.
Here are some questions to help you do your analysis:
- Where is your organisation/society/group going wrong?
- What significant problems and challenges is it facing?
- How does external factors influence what is happening within the arena?
- What are the trends or changes taking place there?
- How do views about the challenges vary between key players?
- How are the politics affecting the current situation?
- What are the key beliefs and values which shape the way things work?
Make sure and answer these as thoroughly as you can. You don’t have to do this immediately, take your time, this is important work. As well as talking to others connected with your chosen arena, make sure and also find written evidence such as articles, reports and newspaper comments. If you are to be an Influential Leader in this arena, you will have to become an expert in it, so don’t skimp on your work. Generally, the bigger and more complex the arena is, the more research you need to do.
In Chapter 5, I will show you how to deepen the analysis of your arena in order for you to determine specific plans of action to influence those within it more effectively.
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Ever felt overlooked, unheard, or stuck in office politics? You’re not alone. The Gautrey Influence Blog breaks down the real-world strategies behind leadership, influence, and power—giving you the tools to be heard, respected, and successful. Join 35,000+ professionals getting ahead the smart way—subscribe now..
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