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Practicing what I call Reflection Leadership helps us, as leaders, to be able take the time to reflect on what’s going on around us. By taking this time to reflect, we are able to rise above the clatter of everyday issues to recognize those things that are most important. This reflection also allows us see with greater clarity what needs to be done in any give situation.
But where do we start? Reflection Leadership isn’t about locking our office door so that we can contemplate our navel lint. The whole purpose of the reflection is to do help us to better understand what is going on so that we can lead more effectively. What we discover through our reflection needs to be useful in our leadership practice or we won’t do it. The time we spend reflecting needs to be productive.
Below I’ve listed the four steps needed to make Reflection Leadership a productive part of your current leadership practice.
4 Steps to Practicing Reflection Leadership
1. Stop. This is the step that is most crucial. If you can’t find the time to stop running from issue to issue, you will never be able to reflect in a meaningful way about what is going on. You know that you haven’t been taking the time to stop when you constantly feel harried and overwhelmed because there is too much to do.
2. Develop a Reflection Practice. Reflection Leadership is not something you do once or twice, or only when you have time, or only when the going gets tough (or when things are easiest). It needs to be practiced regularly in order help you be an effective leader. You need to create a practice that is done on a regular basis. The more you do it on a regular basis, the sooner it will become habit and the sooner it will be engrained into your everyday work.
3. Act upon your reflections. A reflection practice cannot be about sitting around and contemplating your navel lint. In fact, taking the time to stop and reflect really does become a waste of time if you don’t do anything with what you discover through your reflection. Your reflection should lead to some sort of action; a change in your perspective, a change in how you relate to others or a change in how you relate to the world around you.
4. Go back and reflect again. Just like any typical feedback system, Reflection Leadership requires ongoing reflection. Many times the changes that we make create unforeseen results and additional reflection is needed to determine if the changes we have made were beneficial and sufficient.
Just like anything new, the first hard part is getting started. So commit today to finding a way to practice Reflection Leadership. But more important is getting past the second hard part and that is sustaining the practice. Your results will not be immediate, so you’ll need to have patience and continue working at it. But if you follow these steps and continue to make Reflection Leadership an ongoing part everyday experience overtime it will help you to become a more effective leader.
How do you incorporate reflection time into your daily leadership practice? What results have you seen?
