January 22, 2024

5 Strategies for Building a Strong Professional Development Leadership Brand

Professional development and a life of learning

The ultimate value of life depends upon awareness and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival ~ Aristotle

Leadership Mirror

– What are your leadership values and how do you hold them in your work?

– How do others perceive your leadership competencies?

– How much of our leadership impact do others see or experience?

– What do you see when you look at your leadership mirror?

What has this got to do with professional development?

I pursued a 360° leadership assessment using the Leadership Circle Profile tool (hereafter, LCP). It was a transformational experience and enabled me to process a deeper awareness of how my behaviours and attitude are enabling or constraining my intended leadership impact and business performance. 

A total of 12 people from 10 different organisations kindly offered their time and energy to help provide meaningful feedback. It felt like I was a child slowly opening wrapped gifts and reading the beautiful cards attached to each gift with a special message. 

The perspectives from all the rich graphical insights and the written feedback from the people that evaluated my leadership competencies, and shared what my strengths and limitations were, have made a positive impact to my leadership awareness: personally working with organisations and in my other roles in life too (I won’t bore you with the details).

From Awkwardness To Meaningful Feedback

Mr Bean

The process of undertaking the LCP assessment has served as a gentle reminder of how uncomfortable I found the idea of asking for feedback in the early part of my working life. I’ve found it a mystery and at times I’ve even discounted its value several years ago. In the past, I would embrace it with awkwardness and fear, and at times avoiding it completely as it made the process of receiving or sharing feedback an unbearable one. I also experienced several situations where feedback was uninvited too, which further withdrew me to request feedback.

Today, feedback from trusted people in my personal and professional networks provide meaningful information and it adds value to looking deeper at my leadership intent and impact. 

It’s easy to say the word “feedback” out loud or in a conversation when describing it at a high-level. The feedback from the folks that I’ve worked with was a long-awaited gift for me personally. It felt like that moment you experience watching an intense part of a movie scene where the mini-stories and events begin to weave together and the narrative becomes clearer for you and the audience.

My Leadership Brand

The results showed that others see the following competencies as my top 10 leadership strengths, and these serve as my leadership brand. They all fall within the top half of the circle, the ‘Creative’ dimension of the LCP:

My Leadership Brand

So What?

I noticed that six out of 10 of the leadership competencies I assessed as my top strengths were reflected in the top 10 list of how others viewed my leadership strengths. This means that four leadership competencies that I considered in my top strengths were reflected lower in the perspective of others relative to other leadership qualities.

It highlighted the biases we have as leaders about our own styles and how differently others experience our leadership impact when working with them. Some of the questions the assessment evoked for me include:

– What are the gaps between how others evaluate us and how we see our selves?

– What new insights have helped challenge our assumptions about our leadership intent and impact?

– Are we unlocking our true leadership potential when engaging with organisations and clients? 

Creative Dimension

Creative Dimension – Leadership Circle Profile

The top half of the circle visualises ‘Creative’ Competencies that contribute to a leader’s effectiveness. They measure key leadership behaviours and internal assumptions that lead to high fulfilment and high achievement leadership.

The feedback showed that others evaluated me higher in the ‘Creative’ dimensions and this correlates to high levels of leadership effectiveness and business performance. It means that people view me as someone that lives, relates, and learns largely from a creative orientation. In the complex spaces of change and transformations, I find the creative elements of being a leader a key ingredient and feel it’s essential in being imaginative when helping others grow and navigate the organisation meanders when they engage with their work. 

Upon reflection, I can appreciate that my energy tends to focus on exploring better ways to co-create healthy relationships. It shows up in the interactions I have with people with a wider intent to co-generate an increased level of trust, leverage openness, create safety, and invite imagination when I work with different groups of people: individuals, teams, managers, and leadership teams. 

Relationship Dimension 

The ‘Relationship-Task Balance’ measures the degree of balance between relationship competencies and the achievement competencies. 

When reflecting on the graphical views, what stood out for me most was how people score me higher on ‘Relating’ and ‘Self-awareness’ when evaluating my ‘Relationship’ dimension. On the ‘Task’ dimension they scored me higher in ‘Systems Thinker’ and ‘Purposeful Visionary’. 

Overall, the visualised scores presented a balanced distribution across this space, although with a slight edge towards the ‘Relationship’ dimension. Seeing the variances between the competencies was a fascinating graphic for me. It enabled me to see patterns, think deeply about the connections between the leadership competencies, and appreciate how the behaviours and my actions are reflected by others and me.

Now what?

Naran, Kaghan Valley

I’m passionate about working with people and I’ve a particular focus on change, transformation, working with other coaches and consultants, teams, managers, and leadership teams. From the feedback and insights of my LCP assessment I’ve gained a new love of focussing on refining my leadership qualities and learning how to embrace my leadership brand and notice what is lower on my leadership impact relative to the other strengths too.

The LCP process feels like a mountain trek when the map becomes clearer with feedback from the terrain we encounter.

Since undertaking the LCP, I find myself zoning in and out of my own leadership journey. I may hear a voice in my mind suggesting that ‘I’m lost and need to find the space where I need to go next in my leadership journey’. I feel this is a positive thing as it enables me to recalibrate my leadership compass and get creative. 

Gifts

Gifts are generally unanticipated, they’re moments of surprise, and often times embodied with joyful memories. However, in other cases, we may experience something terrible, horrifying, or simply opposite to the wonderful gifts we often imagine gifts to be.

A follow up session with Adrian Hall (PCC) as part of my LCP assessment was the icing on the cake: an engaging coaching session where the rich content from visualised graphics, written feedback from people, and open questions provided an enhanced series of re-awakening moments. One of the most memorable of these was the realisation of how my leadership influences and values in life developed much earlier than I thought and it made me feel grateful about the gifts that our families, friends, and colleagues share with us throughout our lives. 

Here are a few reflective coaching questions about the gifts we receive from others in our lives:

– What can we value when we experience the not so great moments and events in our lives and see them as gifts of a different kind?

– What gifts have you received from others?

– What gifts have you received from the organisations you work with?

– What gifts have you shared with others?

Experiments for 2024 and Beyond

My key experiments for the journey ahead include:

– being more succinct and decisive in high stake conversations with clients by leveraging my ‘Relationship’ strength

– “tell it how it is” more openly and pursue this with a deeper conviction when I express an opinion, observation, share recommendations, or give advice

– and build my own personal approach and unique style when navigating traditional hierarchical environments where I’m aware that the structures, processes, and behaviours in the organisation may go against my leadership values and raison d’etre.

As I wind down for this year and reflect on the gifts that have been shared with me throughout my life, I feel highly motivated about the possibilities my leadership impact can support people from all walks of life.

References

– Aristotle 

– Leadership Circle Profile

– Mr Bean

– Adrian Hall

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