When You Are Too Casual About ____, You’ll Become a Casualty in Leadership

Many leaders have crashed and burned because they got too casual in their leadership and lost their intentionality and focus on the “main things”. Evaluate if you have a strategy to keep these areas top of mind.

• If you are too casual in about self-care, you’ll become a casualty. Constantly living in overdrive starts to burn out your engine. Assure that you have adequate down-time to recharge your batteries and stay at the top of your game.
• If you are too casual about recognition, you’ll become a casualty. I have never met an employee who was full and overflowing with too much affirmation and encouragement! Make a plan to give 50% more affirmation than you are now and watch how it lights your team up.
• If you are too casual about accountability, you’ll become a casualty. Hoping people will get their act together and produce the results you are looking for–is not a strategy. Set up a feedback loop for direct reports to report in on their goals and progress.
• If you are too casual about being a positive role model, you’ll become a casualty. Your people are always watching you, especially how you handle stress and change. By always being professional and taking the high road, you stay followable.
• If you are too casual about communication, you’ll become a casualty. If you are tempted to stop meeting as a team, or cancelling your internal newsletter or 1-to-1’s, think again of the impact. The more transparent you are, the more your direct reports trust you. And the more collaboration you can facilitate, the more likely the best ideas and buy-in occur.
• If you are too casual about being visible, you’ll become a casualty. People tend to mistrust or see-as-irrelevant those leaders who they never see. Consider calendaring walkarounds to stop by your frontline workers to see how they are doing and to answer any questions. Network both internally and externally to increase your influence–relationships you might need someday.
• If you are too casual about how you use your time, you’ll become a casualty. Time is something you can never get back, which means it must be maximized each day. Plug in your most significant tasks into your schedule the night before so that you hit the ground running tomorrow. And honor those commitments to yourself.

Replace “casual” with “intentional” in your self-care, recognition, accountability, being a positive role model, communication, visibility, and time management to keep Growing Forward.  Visit my web site www.paulcasey.org for more tips, tools, quotes, and blogs for your leadership development.