Learning new techniques takes time, practice, and patience to reach a point of mastery.
When first learning a new musical instrument, it will feel very awkward to the musician and the resulting sound may seem non-pleasing to the listener. It will take time, practice, and patience to learn how to create beautiful music. Learning how to better lead also requires time, practice and patience.
The graphic above illustrates the growing role of a leader as one progresses within an organization.
It is located in Chapter 2, Heighten Performance on page 54 within the book (the second page of Chapter 2 in the eBook).
Great leaders are continually seeking ways to enhance their skills and abilities to develop strength and heighten performance.
Developing leadership strengths is a lifelong pursuit and is never fully completed. A leader can always be more… more aware, more effective, more empowering, more inclusive, more mindful, and more caring. The growth steps may get incrementally smaller as the leader progresses in growth, but the steps never end, and we should never stop trying to take the next step.
This book can be an amazing next step in your leadership growth. It has been very carefully written to make it equally suitable for leaders at all levels, and at all points in a career. The dozens of assessments, activities, worksheets, guides, and self-reflections have been utilized by both individual contributors who are earlier in their career, and as senior leaders who are late in their careers, and both of these groups (and everyone in between) have experienced amazing growth through utilizing the content.
A key theme of the book is that great leadership is great leadership, regardless of level in an organization.
And leadership greatness can be realized by utilizing the book to reach the next growth step in your development. The book can be utilized for individual learning, 1-on-1 learning, and group learning.
Learning Leadership
Individual Learning
The book is written for individuals to gain a deeper understanding of self and others, and how to apply that knowledge within your daily leadership activities in both the workplace, and within the personal areas of life.
The book is not one that you simply read through. It requires dedicated time to complete the dozens of assessments, activities, and self-reflections that will deepen your awareness and increase your abilities in applying the skills that are learned.
A suggestion is to focus on one chapter at a time, going through the sub-sections and exploring the topics that hold the most meaning for you.
After completing the initial reading of the book, it is intended to be held closely as an ongoing reference source. The tools will be useful in most any people-leadership situation that you will find yourself in. The hope is that over-time the pages will be worn from use, as the book becomes an old friend that you turn to often.
1-on-1 Learning
The book serves as an amazing coaching tool for use by leaders who are coaching their team-members to become the best that they can be. By providing the book to a team-member, it can then be referenced during 1-on-1 meetings and development conversations.
It is also ideal for mentoring relationships, where the mentor can use the information within the book to help the mentee develop in areas that they want to work to strengthen.
The book is also designed to be used by professional coaches with their coaching clients. This is simply done by having your clients read sections and complete the self-reflections to increase awareness, complete the assessments to determine preferences and style differences, and use the guides and worksheets to learn and practice new skills.
Coaching Certification is available for professional coaches who desire to gain deeper understanding and stronger skills in utilizing the book in their coaching engagements (contact Brian for information). Certification is not required to utilize the book in this way, but would add to your strengths in the application, and would also provide additional professional credibility.
Group Learning
The book is ideal to use as a workbook for group learning. This can be informal, as in a book-club, or in a formalized learning environment in both an in-person and/or virtual setting.
Book Clubs will find the book to be an amazing source for a deep, ongoing study that could last over many months, and even up to a year or more. By having the members read whole chapters, or even sub-sections within chapters, between the meetings, it will provide for an amazing depth of conversation when the club meets. The members can choose to share about their many self-reflection activities (many of which suggest drawing/illustrating to provide a visual to share) which will enhance the discussion even further. At the end of chapters is a listing of five self-reflection questions that can be used as a common frame for the discussions held within the group.
Formalized learning facilitators and trainers will find the book the be an invaluable resource for providing group instruction. The content is designed for each chapter to serve as a stand-alone class, which can be provided in sequence as a series of classes within an organization.
Facilitation Certification is available for professional facilitators, trainers, HR professionals and other leaders who would like to lead sessions using the book as the content (contact Brian for information). While certification is not required it can best prepare you for leading the sessions, and you will find many supporting resources provided within the certification process (slides, facilitator notes, and handouts).
Developmental Activities
The graphic to the left details many of the developmental activities that a person can participate in to develop strength as a leader. It is located on page 286 in Chapter 7, Nurture Growth within the book (2/3 of the way into Chapter 7 in the eBook). The Venn Diagram displays the items that can be provided by each of the three entities within an organization.
You, as an individual, are in charge of your development and can drive your career path through mindful developmental planning. This book provides you the tools to plan this path.
The manager within an organization can support your development by providing the activities listed within the Manager circle.
The company/organization itself should supply access to many programs to develop the employees.
The overlapping areas of the Venn display where two or all three of the entities can take the lead in providing that developmental opportunity.
The Harmonic Leadership Book can be used as a primary tool in many of items listed. Specifically, the following areas can utilize the book as a reference tool: Independent Study, Reflection Time, Training, Assessments, Certifications, Mentoring, Coaching, Special Projects, Idea-Generation, Collaboration, and within Resource Groups.
The key is to map out your development, and remain motivated to follow the plan to reach your goals. Within the book on pages 290-294, you will find a detailed development planning form that can serve as your map for your developmental journey.