How To Be Seen As a Leader - At Any Point in Your Career

But many people know intuitively that’s not how it works….maybe because they’ve worked for someone who is in that leader job, but who they don’t regard as a leader!

And that’s been observation as well: there are appointed leaders and  there are accepted leaders – and being the first doesn’t guarantee that you’ll be the second.

Fortunately, you can start working on being someone who people will accept as a leader long before you’re appointed to lead.  Think of a leader, in the simplest terms, as someone whom others trust to influence and guide them. With that in mind, here are 3 things to think about and do in order to begin to develop yourself as a leader, no matter what your current title or position:

Understand your business. This is your starting point for leadership. If you don’t understand how your business works – how the business provides value to its customers, how the parts operate together, what the competitive landscape looks like – it’s unlikely anyone is going to look to you for guidance or insight.  Too often I see people who have a very limited view of their business – generally they over-focus on their particular part of it – who think they have great insights and don’t understand why they’re not viewed as leaders.  Sometimes these are very senior people.

If you want to find out whether or not you understand your business, start by asking yourself these questions: How does our product or service get created – that is, what’s the process it goes through from idea to execution?  How do we let customers know what we have and why it’s valuable? How do we interact with customers, and who’s responsible for that? What are our company’s most important goals – and what are we doing to achieve them? If you don’t know the answers to those questions, get curious; start exploring.

Demonstrate your support for your colleagues’ success. Good leaders are focused primarily on the good of the group.  When you show, through your words and deeds, that you have others’ best interests at heart, those people will see you as supportive of the group as a whole (vs. only on your own success), and they will begin to trust you to influence and guide them.  This is something you can start doing right now:  If someone raises an idea in a meeting that you think is good, say so. If a co-worker asks for your help, help them if it’s at all possible.  If someone has a problem and you can see a solution, offer it.

Figure out how you can contribute more to the success of the business.  Too often, people who want to be leaders focus mainly on how to get promoted – they think, as I said earlier, that getting a ‘leader job’ will make them a leader. I’ve noticed, though, that people who focus mainly on how they can provide the greatest value to the business are much more likely to be seen as leaders.  And then, when those folks ask for a promotion, they’re much more likely to get it. In my experience, most bosses want to reward employees who are making the boss’ life easier (e.g., doing valuable work that needs doing and helps the business).

If others see you as understanding the business, supporting their success, and doing your best to provide value to the organization, they are much more likely to see you as someone to rely on and turn to; they are much more likely to open themselves to your influence and insight; they are much more likely to trust you and align with you.  And that’s the essence of leadership, where ever you are in your career.