Want to Take Your Business to the Next Level?

From the very core of our existence, we were created with certain personal powers that either benefit those of us who use them or impede those of us who ignore their significance. I have learned from both my personal and professional experience that these certain personal powers usually define the qualities of effective leadership, and effective leadership is absolutely essential to the success of any organization.

If you really want to take your business to the next level, you must take the time to master the 4 personal powers. Let's take a closer look at the 1st personal power.

THE POWER OF CHOICE

This may seem like a simple observation, but effective leaders usually make good choices. Those choices have a cumulative and creative positive impact on the organizations effective leaders serve. Your choices, whether good ones or bad ones, define you.

How many choices do you think you make everyday — 50? 100? The reality is that you make 1,000's of choices every single day! Moment by moment you choose your perspectives, perceptions, attitudes, and actions. There are three choices that you must make daily to experience growth as a business leader: the choice of attitude, the choice of action, and the choice of accountability.

How will these choices translate into growth for my organization?

Let's think of these choices as action steps that you must take to see growth in your business. Each action step will take you one step closer to a mindset that makes better choices daily and facilitates a better environment for growth.

ACTION STEP #1 — You MUST have a positive attitude!

Some dismiss positive attitude as fluff or a motivational gimmick, but it is a key indicator of the quality of your future and the degree of your success. In my interviews with effective leaders, the one consistent theme I hear is the power of their positive expectations. I almost never find effective leaders who have achieved above their own expectations. I may hear them attempt to downplay their achievements, but at the gut level, they all expected to achieve.

Bottom line: if you have a positive attitude, you are choosing a path to success. Your attitude becomes prophetic of your future and acts as a magnet ... you actually set up self-fulfilling prophecies regarding your future. You attract the circumstances that fulfill your expectations.

The first step in attitude development is to make a personal commitment to assume 100% responsibility for your attitudes and behaviors. The circumstances of life will always be a mix of good and bad, but your responses to life must always be positive and productive. Attitude is truly a choice that holds significant personal power for you.
ACTION STEP #2 — You MUST take ACTION!

What I want you to remember about action is that action is a choice, not a smokescreen. It is not how much you do, but the effectiveness of what you do that counts. Sometimes I see people use a great deal of activity as a smokescreen to avoid doing what is most effective. Many top leaders are very busy, but their actions are void of the most critical measure: effectiveness!

The late Peter Drucker defined effectiveness as: "The process of doing more of what works, abandoning what doesn't, and knowing the difference."

Just because your calendar is full and you feel busy, don't assume that you are being effective. If you can look busy and avoid the measure of results, you can psychologically feel secure in your comfort zone of no mistakes and no measurement. The effective leader consistently chooses effective actions as opposed to comfortable activity.

Effective actions require courage because measurable actions are not always comfortable. The normal human response to uncomfortable or fearful actions is to fill the day with more comfortable activities and avoid the uncomfortable effective actions. Instead, make a personal commitment today to never use comfortable activity as a smokescreen in order to avoid effective actions. Begin to apply the critical measure of effectiveness to EVERY action you take.

ACTION STEP #3 — You MUST practice ACCOUNTABILITY

Let's just get this out there right now — accountability is not comfortable. That is probably the reason many top leaders resist tracking their daily activity ... it holds them accountable to effective actions. If you want your life to be filled with abundance and significance, never allow yourself the comfort of an excuse. Accountability eliminates all excuses; accountability is truly a choice, not a crutch.

As a football coach at the college level coaching high-potential athletes, I learned one of my most significant leadership lessons. Natural talent, such as size, speed, strength, and intelligence, is nothing more than untapped potential, and there is one ingredient required of the gifted athlete in order to develop that potential ... accountability.

The high-potential athlete must come to accept 100% responsibility for developing and using his or her talents as an effective member of the team. When a gifted athlete matures to a level of personal accountability, he or she becomes a champion.

This same potential lies within you! However, to reach that reserve, you must overcome your self-imposed limitations. The very essence of life is the passionate commitment to strive for a better tomorrow. That means never allowing yourself the comfort of an excuse. Accountability eliminates all excuses; accountability is truly a choice, not a crutch.

Potential represents an endless reserve, and that potential always lies just beyond your comfort zone. Ask yourself these two questions regarding your role as a business owner:

A) Do I settle for what is?

B) Or do I push toward what could be?

Effective change begins with awareness, and awareness always leads to choice. You cannot sidestep the issue of choice. Your choices regarding attitude, action, and accountability will determine the quality of your life and leadership. You must choose, so choose wisely.