The Leading Edge:
Are you a Professional Leader?

By Mike Harbour, a certified John Maxwell Team coach, speaker, and trainer.

I always wanted to be “the” leader. I wanted to be the one in charge. I worked hard to get to a position of leadership. I was always going to out hustle everyone else, even to the risk of injury because I wanted to lead by example.

On the sports field, I was not the biggest or strongest, but I was often the loudest – especially when it came to losing vs. winning. I would often let others know how important I was to the win and how important they were to the loss.

I’m not proud of some of my actions and behaviors from those days and I have made some apologies along the way. What I have come to learn is that leadership is not a position a title or anything else. Leadership, instead, is a profession.

When I was in the U.S. Army and was promoted to lead others, I had some great leaders around me, and one who said “Mike, you have the potential to lead, and your assertiveness is what got you here, but you need to grow into a leader who can gain respect and influence and not rely on fear and authority.” He gave me two books to read, one was 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey and the other was John Maxwell’s Developing the Leader Within You.

This began my journey of leadership growth. Up to that point in my life, I had never read a full book. I wanted the Cliff’s Notes. I wanted the easy way to do things. I wanted to find the quickest way to master leadership.

In the profession of leadership there are no shortcuts.

Leadership, like any other profession, means that your position doesn’t make you the best. Those who never stop learning and growing and adapting become the real pros. Doctors are constantly training and learning new techniques and medical advances to help their patients. Lawyers are constantly studying so they can perform better for their clients. Soldiers are always training and preparing for the call they may get in the middle of the night when danger comes.

Are you a professional leader or are you a positional leader?

I do not intend to generalize with this statement, but many leaders I now work with as a professional coach and trainer are not professionals. They have been promoted along their career path due to experience, technical skill or tenure, and they have been put in charge of others’ lives as a leader. However, they are often leading from both their technical skills and their position as an expert in their field.

Excellent technical skills do not make anyone an expert leader.

Professional leaders need to develop these 5 qualities:

Character – WHO you are. Your values as a leader and how you treat people. This is the most important quality to develop. Who you are determines how you lead!

Communication – The most dangerous thing for a leader is to think communication has occurred. Always be developing this skill. Everyone on the team needs to hear from you.

Collaboration – John Maxwell’s Law of Significance tells us that “one is too small a number to achieve greatness.” In today’s world, working with others is a must to get everything done and done well.

Coaching – Great leaders are great coaches. Great leaders are not tellers or managers, but coaches who can pull more out of their employees than they think is possible.

Creator – As a leader you are either a thermometer or a thermostat. One controls temperature, the other tells the temperature. You are the creator of your culture and environment. Do not leave it to chance.

As Summer is winding down football Fall training camps have opened for professional football players all across the country. So why do they need a camp if they are pros? Because professional leaders understand that they can never stop learning and growing.

Just like in football, a professional leader can’t rely on yesterday’s skills to lead today’s workforce.

Bio
Mike believes leadership is a difference maker and a deal breaker. It’s how we grow organizations. It’s how we impact lives. Leadership cannot be an idea we simply talk about. Leadership is an action we must live out.

Mike’s depth of leadership experience has tested his ideas and philosophies while serving in the United States Army as a US Army Soldier/Officer and the healthcare industry. Building on this experience and success, Mike has become a leading Founding Partner on the world renowned John C. Maxwell Team as a Certified Coach, Trainer, and Speaker.

Because of his action-oriented style, Mike is sought out to lead projects and teams for the John Maxwell Team where he is a leader on the President’s Advisory Council and A Peer Teaching Partner, sharing his experience with thousands of leaders around the globe. He is also a leader for the John Maxwell Leadership Award where hundreds of leaders have been nominated and interviewed for this coveted award.

He is a highly sought speaker for events, teams and organizations seeking results and change in the way their leaders lead. Mike has spent the last 20 years helping companies build teams that drive results! Find Mike: www.harbourresources.com