Habits can be a trap for people in leadership positions, whether they are in business, politics or another field.
As leaders, they should provide a compelling vision that inspires those around them. Instead, many of them lapse into automatic and mindless thinking. And that can affect every decision they makeāand the actions of the people who report to them.
āToo often, we donāt come up with imaginative solutions because we let ourselves be ruled by routine and by preconceived notions,ā says Rob-Jan de Jong, a behavioral strategist and author of Anticipate: The Art of Leading By Looking Ahead.
āWe think we know ahead of time what will and wonāt work, which makes us quick to dismiss ideas that sound too āout there.ā The people who answer to you learn the lesson that creative thinking is frowned upon, even if thatās not the lesson you wanted to teach.ā
Simply making a New Yearās resolution to have a more open mind in 2016 likely wonāt be enough to turn things around. But de Jong says there are behaviors and practices that, through repetition and perseverance, can help leaders and anyone else develop a mindset thatās open to imaginative and better ideas. Follow his advice:
Formulate powerful questions
Generating ideas starts with asking the right questions and the best questions are thought-provoking. They challenge underlying assumptions and invite creativity. āThey also give us energy, making us aware of the fact that there is something to explore that we hadnāt fully grasped before,ā de Jong says.
Train yourself to catch poorly designed questions, asked by you or someone else, and reformulate them. Questions that begin with āwhy,ā āwhatā and āhowā are best because they require more thoughtful responses than those that begin with āwho,ā āwhen,ā āwhereā and āwhich.ā Especially avoid questions that can be answered with a āyesā or āno.ā
Expand your sphere of influence
āWe are strongly influenced, for better or worse, by the small group of people we have direct contact with,ā de Jong says. āSince we tend to hang out with people who are fairly similar to ourselves, chances are we are limiting our perspectives.ā He recommends making a deliberate effort to encounter people and ideas that are āprofoundly different from the usual suspects you hang out with.ā Visit a conference of a different profession, hang out with skaters, join an arts club or buy a magazine randomly off the shelf.
Break your patterns
You can increase your chances of seeing things differently if you deliberately break your normal pattern of working, communicating, thinking, reacting and responding, de Jong says. Take a different route to work. Change where you sit in meetings. If you are normally the first to volunteer, hold back.
Learn to listen
āWeāve all been taught the importance of being good listeners,ā de Jong says. āThe problem is most of us struggle to actually do it.ā Often when people are ālistening,ā they really are waiting for the first opportunity to share their story, their opinion or their experience. De Jong suggests training yourself to engage in three pure listening conversations a week. They donāt need to be longer than 15 to 20 minutes, they can be formal or informal, and the other person doesnāt need to know what youāre doing. Vow that you wonāt try to take over the conversation no matter how much you want to. āJust keep asking questions and donāt dismiss anything the other person says,ā de Jong says. After the conversation, reflect on what you learned. Donāt dismiss any ideas or views that donāt align with yours. āDare to challenge your own assumptions and reframe your beliefs if need be,ā he says.
āSome of these practices may take people outside their comfort zones, and everyone might not be ready to try all of these at once,ā de Jong says.Ā āBut if you start to put them into practice, youāll be able to grow into a more mindful, visionary leader one step at a time.ā
Rob-Jan de Jong, author of Anticipate: The Art of Leading By Looking Ahead, is an international speaker, writer and consultant on strategy and leadership themes. He serves as an expert lecturer at various leading business schools such as the Wharton Business School (USA), Thunderbird School of Global Management (USA), Nyenrode Business University (The Netherlands), and Sabanci Business University (Turkey).
As a behavioral strategist, he speaks, teaches and consults on executive subjects such as visionary leadership, influence, strategic decision-making, and innovation.
In Bud to Boss, we’ll help you become a more successful leader right from the start – when habits are often created. Set habits that will set you up for SUCCESS. Learn more here.
Photo Credit:Ā http://www.freeimages.com/photo/the-road-ahead-1196457
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