Can Changing my Habits Make Me a Better Leader?

One of the most important things that I’ve realized about habits is that so often people are looking for that magical one-size-fits-all solution – “if I could only figure out the right way to change habits” or “the right way for other people to behave then all of our problems will be solved” and what I found is there is no right way or wrong way. 

There are a lot of different ways that people do things that work for them and the secret for managing ourselves is to understand ourselves and set up our circumstances in a way that will allow us to succeed, and when we’re working with other people or managing other people to think about, well, what’s true for them? Because what works for them, the way that they’re at their most creative and most productive, might be different from the way that we work. For instance, if you’re a night person you’re not going to be creative and productive and energetic first thing of the day. That’s just not realistic for you, so if there’s something important that you need to get done, you’re probably going to want to put it later in the day. 

But, if you’re working with someone who’s a morning person they might really be fighting with you on that because they’re going to be like “oh this is really important to us, let’s do it first thing when we’re at our peak”. Well, you’re not at your peak, and so it’s really important to think about what’s true for me, what’s true for someone else, and how can we set up circumstances that are going to allow all of us to do our best. Because it’s not a matter of who’s doing it right and who’s doing it wrong, but how do we all succeed. 

I think it’s essential for women and for anyone to think about how they can lead, because we all have different natures, we all have different temperaments, we all have different interests, we all have different ways that we like to engage with other people and I think that the more that we understand ourselves, the more we can understand and lead others. The more that we can engage with them, the more that we could persuade them, the more that we can be ourselves in a way that will allow other people to follow us.