2015 New Years Goals

Development Goals for Leaders

For many leaders, it’s a time to reflect on accomplishments for the year and establish goals for the upcoming New Year. It’s also a good time to set leadership development goals, either as part of a formal development planning process, or just because it’s a proven way to continuously improve as a leader.

While leadership development goals should always be specific and relevant to the individual leader and linked to the organisational context, there are most likely a few common ones that most any leader could benefit from.

Here’s a list to choose from.

While all of them are worthy goals, it’s best to focus on the 1-3. Then, once sufficient progress is made, you can always go back and select a new goal or goals.

You may also find that many of the goals are related to each other, which is often the case.

The key is to pick the one that seems to be at the root cause.

Goals for the 2015:

1. Delegate more. Unwillingness or inability to let go causes people to work long hours, preventing them from having the time to be more strategic, and is retarding the development of teams. Do some serious self-reflection, or work with a coach or mentor, to figure out what’s causing me not to delegate. Is it my own ego? Is it a lack of confidence in my team? Once you get to the root cause, you can create a list of everything you do and make hard decisions on what to delegate, who to delegate to, how to do it, and by when.
2. Be more strategic. Improve your ability to see the big picture and take a longer range, broader business perspective. Learn to step back from the day-to-day tactical details of business and focus on the why‚ π, not just the what‚ π and how‚ π.
3. Be a better listener. Learn to pay attention and demonstrate to others that that you value what they have to say. Use active listening, open-ended questions, body language, and eliminate distractions that get in the way of your ability to listen.
4. Micromanage less (or not at all!). No one likes to think of themselves as a micro-manager‚ π. Delegating more will be important to give your team the freedom to do it their own way, without you breathing down their necks.
5. Improve my financial acumen. Learn how to understand, interpret, and use the numbers‚ π to improve your business.
6. Take action on chronic under performers. Allowing 1-2 C player‚ π employees to get away with under performance for way too long affects an organisation, your own performance, the morale of the rest of my team, and you are not doing these under performers any favors by covering up for them.
7. Be a better coach. For the rest of the team (the B and C players), spend more time coaching and developing them. Shift your leadership style away from always directing and telling and learn to guide and develop direct reports.
8. Improve work-life balance. Your insanely long hours are having an impact on your performance, health, personal relationships, and you are setting a terrible example for your employees. Delegating more will help, as well as micromanaging less. Get a handle on where you are wasting time and shift your focus to more value-added activities. Learn ways to work more efficiently and prioritize.
9. Create your own succession plan. You’ll never get the promotion you want if you are too indispensable‚ π in your current role.
10. Improve collaboration. Improve relationships with peers. Be a better partner, strive to understand their goals and needs, and learn to work together to help achieve each other’s goals. If one of them is under performing or struggling, offer your help.