How to Get Your First Leadership Position: Four Strategies
When planning their careers, many professionals develop strategies to secure their first leadership position . Being a leader may not be in everyone’s plans, but it is a sign of professional growth and can open doors and offer new benefits.
Therefore, many seek to understand the hierarchy of the companies where they work, or even already have an idea of the type of position they intend to achieve, and plan their steps based on that.
The first leadership position is a big step, as it takes the professional from the position of having autonomy to carry out their own work, to the position of managing other people.
What many people may not realize in this process is that, to reach a position like this, you need to show talent and develop behavioral skills.
What is the role of a leader?
It is still common to have a somewhat outdated view of what it means to be a leader. However, contrary to the image we have of a boss who only gives orders and has little involvement with the team or is a centralizer, the leader must be, above all, a reference for the team.
The way he behaves reflects on the team, so if the professional chooses not to have a good dialogue, dismisses the ideas and proposals of others and does not attempt to understand their needs and suggestions, he will probably demotivate his team.
Therefore, one of the main characteristics of leadership is being able to inspire people to be like him: proactive, capable of organizing and carrying out their own tasks and focused on results.
Your day-to-day performance involves two important factors: analytical and observation skills. The first is more market-oriented, while the second is aimed at relationships with employees. Let’s understand each one better:
Analytical capacity
The leader needs to have a large view of the marketplace, as he or she will make many selections on a every day foundation. To do this, he or she wishes to be aware of tendencies, are trying to find new know-how, create a community of contacts to change thoughts and facts, and be able to expect feasible scenarios primarily based on the actions taken with the aid of the crew.
With this, he becomes more capable of developing strategies that lead the team to meet the goals established by the organization.
Observation skills
This perspective is focused on the team, and requires the leader to be attentive to everyone’s performance, maintaining open communication and observing how employees behave and in which situations they prosper or decline.
This helps to encourage them to seek new knowledge and delegate tasks according to their core competencies. It also strengthens teamwork and creates a team that is able to trust each other and their boss.
How to land your first leadership role
Achieving this position, then, involves developing the skills that allow for this analytical and observant performance. Here’s how:
1 – Evaluate and improve your performance
Promoting an employee is a multi-dimensional decision and performance surely is the foremost consideration. So it is essential to know how to self-evaluate and know whether you are meeting the objectives of that particular role and the expectations of the company in order to have a clear vision of the situation you are operating in.
If need be, request feedback from superiors as well as peers, but also develop the ability to gauge your strong and weak areas to either leverage them or work on them to be effective in your role.
2 – Improve your communication
The biggest obstacle that can hinder the professional development of someone with high performance is their behavioral skills. If an employee presents great results, but is always in conflict with other people, cannot work as part of a team, and does not have good communication skills in general, whether speaking in meetings or in everyday conversations, decision-makers will think twice.
Therefore, look for ways to communicate more effectively, listen to your colleagues and have empathy, treating them with respect and, if you have difficulty speaking in public, look for courses and training to deal with this block.
This also means improving interpersonal relationships. You don’t have to be fake with anyone, but try to be friendly with everyone, contributing to a good organizational climate.
3 – Support your team
As we have said, leadership roles require a keen eye on the performance of each professional, providing support and encouragement when necessary. This can be done even without having become a leader.
Talk to your colleagues, offer help and see how you can contribute to their work, whether by teaching them what you know or proposing new ideas so that they can also become better professionals.
4 – Take leadership training
Some companies even develop workshops and lectures when their staff is large. But there are other ways to understand the technical and behavioral skills needed to be a leader, and studying this in depth makes a difference.