Rebuild your leadership momentum by doing a mental checkup.
As the July heat smolders, you realize that the year is half over. And what is happening with your momentum? You know - that feeling that you have the wind at your back.
With momentum, you feel strong and exhilarated. You are making significant progress, and you are unrestrained. Nothing can stop you now, right?
Perhaps you fit the description, or maybe you, like many, are just not feeling it right now. Perhaps you are stalled. Possibly you feel like you are standing still or falling behind rather than moving forward with vigor.
The path to momentum can be complicated. However, crucial to reclaiming it is aligning how you allot your time and energy with the aspects of your life and work most meaningful to you.
How to Build Momentum: Reflect and Learn
As you stop and reflect on your current priorities, you may find what you truly want from your life, work, and leadership has shifted over the past couple of crisis-ridden years. Maybe your actions haven’t kept up.
To reclaim momentum, take a time-out to ponder whether your efforts are still aligned with your deepest desires.
Here are three steps to get you started.
Step #1 Review Your Current Life and Work Priorities
When your time and energy commitments are out of line with what you consider to be your highest priorities, you are very likely to feel some discontent. The restlessness you experience can depress your momentum.
You may not even realize why you are edgy. High-achiever leaders tend to put their heads down and do the work before them without pausing to ask themselves whether it is worth the effort.
As you think about where you are spending the most time and energy at work, ask yourself these questions:
Is this work worth doing?
Are the goals you are working towards the right ones for our times? The pandemic led to significant shifts in our world and our work. Have you examined your plans for continuing relevance?
Is this work right for you?
Do you still believe in the importance of what you are doing? Does it align with your values? Your desires? Your strengths?
Have you achieved a balance you can live with?
As you examine your top life priorities, consider whether your work or some other aspect of your life is taking over and drowning out other priorities.
Momentum grows with alignment and balance.
Step #2 Clarify the Contribution You Wish to Make
Maybe you are already clear on how to contribute and what impact you desire through your leadership. However, some leaders fail to consider these critical decisions. They take for granted their responsibility to fulfill the role they play within the parameters handed to them.
Perhaps. However, most find their enthusiasm for their work rides on whether they experience it as meaningful.
You bring personal purpose, strengths, and aspirations to your work. A disconnect between what you want and what you do can depress your motivation and satisfaction.
Of course, you may feel constrained by personal responsibilities tying you to your role, even if it isn't a good fit with what you desire. But don’t accept these constraints too quickly.
Clarify the impact you crave and consider how to modify your role to increase it. Talk with your colleagues, team, and manager to explore possibilities.
And if you come out empty-handed, consider looking for a role that will provide more of what you are looking for.
Momentum is more significant when you work at something meaningful to you.
Step #3 Explore New Ways of Leading
For many years, corporations took for granted that companies should organize into a hierarchy. Furthermore, most assumed power should flow from official roles of authority. Few questioned a command and control form of leadership.
Yet over time, research showed this traditional leadership style wasn’t working well. A recent Inc. Magazine headline proclaimed, “Command and Control Leadership is Dead.” The article said this outdated type of leadership leads to dissatisfied employees and is unsuitable for innovation.
The call for more collaborative leadership picked up steam during the pandemic. Turbulent and uncertain times call for an increased emphasis on trust. And collaborative leadership builds it.
Now is the time to reconsider carefully your framework for leading. The workplace and workforce changed as a result of past and present crises.
In our fast-paced and turbulent times, leaders and companies must be agile and flexible - characteristics conflicting with hierarchical organizations and command and control leadership.
What does this mean for you? Now is the time to consider whether your leadership framework is still effective.
Try out some fresh ways of leading. You may discover you have been running up against leadership limits you weren’t aware were dampening your effectiveness.
So where does this fast, challenging, and changing world leave you as you search for a way to rebuild momentum?
If your energy is flagging, take a timeout to raise your self-awareness. Reboot if you discover your habits, beliefs, and actions are limiting motivation and effectiveness.
In an article in the New York Times, columnist David Brooks suggests that as the world changes, everyone must learn “how to reorganize your mind, and see with new eyes.” Wise words for regaining your momentum.
