5 Key Things Aspiring Leaders Need To Understand  

Many would-be new leaders or managers energetically ensure they put in the hours to make certain they’re up-to-the-minute with know-how in order to be considered worthy of promotion.  Having done that, the first move into a leadership or management position is possibly the biggest and most daunting step any employee will take.

But there’s an extra layer of understanding that will be key to success, and influences how you’re perceived when being considered for that step up the ladder: in a field of candidates sharing similar qualifications and experience, what will bolster your application for your first promoted role?

Here are five points crucial to success in making that all-important first move into a senior role:

1.  Your signature character strengths

Being able to articulate your skills at work is one thing, but actually understanding your character strengths, and putting them into action on a daily basis, will help you to feel more confident.

According to the website Action for Happiness, a 2011 UK study showed that people who knew their character strengths and used them daily experienced “more positive emotion, greater vitality and self esteem.” This resulting energy and confidence can help to provide the spark that sets you apart from others.

The field of positive psychology has identified 24 universal character strengths; to understand this concept more, have a look at the VIA Institute On Character website, which provides a free online character strengths test to get you started.

2.  Your weaknesses

On the flip side, understanding your weaknesses can help to build a helpful immunity to unsolicited feedback.  As you move up the career ladder, you’ll be more visible — and with that visibility comes a vulnerability, since you’ll be more open to criticism from colleagues, both above and below you in the organizational hierarchy.

Often, feedback can be ignored even when it contains nuggets of truth, or dwelt on too much when it’s unhelpful to do so. Knowing your weaknesses – in a candid, non-judgmental way — allows you to view criticism or feedback objectively, allowing you to take action if there’s something you need to change, or to dismiss the criticism if it’s truly unfounded.  Learning to tell the difference is crucial.

Understanding both your strengths and weaknesses also allows you to begin to build a team around you that complements both. “I know that I can’t be great at everything,” Jo Cox-Brown, the CEO Of The Malt Cross trust told me in a recent interview. “I make sure that on my team I have a mix of people who complement my strengths and weaknesses. I’m a strategist and innovator, but hate the detail so I have someone else whose real strength is the details. He’d be horrified if he was asked to come up with new ideas. We’re a perfect team!”

3.  How to build rapport

Mary Kay Ash, the founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics, once said, “Imagine everyone you meet has a sign around their neck saying make me feel important.” This encapsulates the need for building rapport when leading others, which in turn builds trust, cooperation and understanding.

It also hints at one way of achieving rapport, so think about what you would do in order to make someone feel as though they matter? The chances are, you’d give them your full attention, make appropriate eye contact, listen and smile – i.e. the basics.

The bottom line is, having a good rapport with another person makes everything easier: conversation, influence, persuasion and achieving results. Rapport happens naturally when people like each other; being able to consciously create it and be aware of its power is a useful tool. As Maya Angelou once said, “People may forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

4.  Your network

An engaged network is a valuable asset. Heather Townsend, author The Financial Times Guide to Networking, says that “Networking is the most effective way to build awareness, get found and generate opportunities.”

Regarding networking: think ‘what’, ‘who’ and ‘how’. So — have you got the connections you need in order to advance your career, remembering that a network is a two-way street? Survey your current group of connections, and ask yourself: who is included? What matters to them? How can you be of help to those in your current network, and keep in contact with them? Who’s missing from the spread of people you know, and how can you connect with them? Become known as someone who is generous with their time and connections. At its heart, a network is about developing a set of relationships.  Take time to ponder: how good are mine?

5.  How to be visible

Without understanding how to be visible, you’ll be your organization or industry’s best kept secret – not necessarily a good thing! Being great at your job simply isn’t good enough — you need to tell people. This is something many women struggle with.

The key is to find ways to do this that feel natural and comfortable. Watch colleagues closely — who has good visibility? What do they do? On a scale of 1 – 10, how far would their strategies suit you? Consider your strengths and skills. If you’re confident and good with words, consider giving presentations or talks. If the written word is your asset, white papers and industry articles will raise your profile.

Understanding these five key pieces of information will set you apart from the competition and get you off to a flying start in your new, gratifying leadership role.