The 360 Degree Leader Workbook

Developing Your Influence from Anywhere in the Organization

John C. Maxwell

• Publisher: HarperChristian Resources
• Year: 2006
• Print ISBN: 9780785260950
• eBook ISBN: 9781418566333
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Management
• Index: Business

The 360 Degree Leader Workbook will equip you with the skills you need to begin making a difference in your organization, career, and life, today—with or without the promotion.

Ninety-nine percent of all leadership occurs not from the top but from the middle of an organization. Usually, an organization has only one person who is the leader. So what do you do if you are not that one person?

In The 360 Degree Leader Workbook, Maxwell addresses that very question and takes the discussion even further. You don't have to be the main leader to make a significant impact in your organization. Good leaders are not only capable of leading their followers but are also adept at leading their superiors and their peers.

Debunking myths and shedding light on the challenges, John Maxwell offers specific principles for Leading Down, Leading Up, and Leading Across. 360-Degree Leaders can lead effectively, regardless of their position in an organization. By applying Maxwell's principles from this workbook and accompanying book, you will expand your influence and ultimately be a more valuable team member.

SECTION III

THE PRINCIPLES 360-DEGREE LEADERS PRACTICE TO LEAD UP

“Follow me; I’m right behind you.”

Leading up is the 360-Degree Leader’s greatest challenge. Most leaders want to lead, not be led. But most leaders also want to have value added to them. If you take the approach of wanting to add value to those above you, you have the best chance of influencing them.

Influencing your leader isn’t something you can make happen in a day. In fact, since you have no control over the people above you on the organizational chart, they may refuse to be influenced by you or anyone under their authority. So there’s a possibility that you may never be able to lead up with them. But you can greatly increase the odds of success if you practice the principles in this section of the workbook.

Your underlying strategy should be to support your leader, add value to the organization, and distinguish yourself from the rest of the pack by doing your work with excellence. If you do these things consistently, then in time the leader above you may learn to trust you, rely on you, and look to you for advice. With each step, your influence will increase, and you will have more and more opportunities to lead up.

Lead-Up Principle #1

LEAD YOURSELF EXCEPTIONALLY WELL

Every now and then at a conference, sharp young kids will come up to me and tell me how much they want to become great leaders and how hard they’re working to learn and grow. But then they’ll lament, “I don’t have anyone to lead yet.”

My response is to tell them, “Lead yourself. That’s where it all starts. Besides, if you wouldn’t follow yourself, why should anyone else?”

The key to leading yourself well is to learn self-management. I have observed that most people put too much emphasis on decision making and too little on decision managing. As a result, they lack focus, discipline, intentionality, and purpose.

I believe this so firmly that I wrote an entire book on it called Today Matters. The thesis of the book is that successful people make right decisions early and manage those decisions daily. We often think that self-leadership is about making good decisions every day, when the reality is that we need to make a few critical decisions in major areas of life and then manage those decisions day to day.

Nothing will make a better impression on your leader than your ability to manage yourself. If your leader must continually expend energy managing you, then you will be perceived as someone who drains time and energy. If you manage yourself well, however, your boss will see you as someone who maximizes opportunities and leverages personal strengths. That will make you someone your leader turns to when the heat is on.

WHAT A LEADER MUST SELF-MANAGE

In Today Matters I reference the dozen things that people who desire to be successful should do. But here I want to focus on leadership alone. So if you want to gain credibility with your boss and others, focus on taking care of business in these seven areas:

1. MANAGE YOUR EMOTIONS

It’s important for everybody to manage emotions. Nobody likes to spend time around an emotional time bomb who may “go off” at any moment. But it’s especially critical for leaders to control their emotions, because whatever they do affects many other people.

Good leaders know when to display emotions and when to delay them. Sometimes they show them so that their people can feel what they’re feeling. It stirs them up. Is that manipulative? I don’t think so, as long as the leaders are doing it for the good of the team and not for their own gain. Because leaders see more than others and ahead of others, they often experience the emotions first. By letting the team know what you’re feeling, you’re helping them to see what you’re seeing.

Other times leaders have to hold their feelings in check and maybe delay them for a while. When I say that leaders should delay their emotions, I’m not suggesting that they deny them or bury them. The bottom line in managing your emotions is that you should put others—not yourself—first in how you handle and process them.

How often do you express your emotions to your team? Do you usually express it to make you feel better, or does it in some way benefit your team? Explain.

[Your Response Here]

Whether you delay or display your emotions should not be for your own gratification. You should ask yourself, What does the team need? not, What will make me feel better? Consider a current team task, project, or goal—do you need to stir up emotion with your team or keep your emotions private? Why?

[Your Response Here]

2. MANAGE YOUR TIME

Time-management issues are especially tough for people in the middle. Leaders at the top can delegate. Workers at the bottom usually get paid an hourly wage, and they do what they can while they’re on the clock. Middle leaders, meanwhile, feel the Tension Challenge, and they are encouraged—and are often expected—to put in long hours to get work done.

Time is valuable. Psychiatrist and author M. Scott Peck said: “Until you value yourself, you won’t value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it.” In What to Do Between Birth and Death, Charles Spezzano says that people don’t pay for things with money; they pay for them with time.

If you say to yourself, In five years, I’ll have put away enough to buy that vacation house, then what you are really saying is that the house will cost you five years—one-twelfth of your adult life. “The phrase spending your time is not a metaphor,” said Spezzano. “It’s how life works.”

Instead of thinking about what you do and what you buy in terms of money, think about them in terms of time. Seeing your work in that light just may change the way you manage your time. Think about it. What is worth spending your life on?

[Your Response Here]

3. MANAGE YOUR PRIORITIES

The best 360-Degree Leaders are generalists. They know a lot about a lot of things. They often have no choice because of the Multi-Hat Challenge. But at the same time, the old proverb is true: If you chase two rabbits, both will escape.

What is a leader in the middle to do? Since you are not the top leader, you don’t have control over your list of responsibilities or your schedule. You should still try to get yourself to the point where you can manage your priorities and focus your time in this way:

80 percent of the time—work where you are strongest

15 percent of the time—work where you are learning

5 percent of the time—work in other necessary areas

This may not be easy to achieve, but it is what you should strive for. If you have people working for you, try to give them the things you aren’t good at, but they are. Or if possible, trade some duties with your colleagues so that each of you is playing to your strength. Remember, the only way to move up from the middle is to gradually shift from generalist to specialist, from someone who does many things well to someone who focuses on a few things she does exceptionally well.

You must be ruthless in your judgment of what you should not do. Just because you like doing something doesn’t mean it should stay on your to-do list. If it is a strength, do it. If it helps you grow, do it. If your leader says you must handle it personally, do it. Anything else is a candidate for your “stop-doing” list.

List your priorities according to the 80/15/5 principle. What strengths should occupy 80 percent of your time? What growth should occupy 15 percent of your time? What other required tasks should take 5 percent of your time?

80% ____________

15% ____________

5% _____________

What needs to change in order to accomplish this?

[Your Response Here]

4. MANAGE YOUR ENERGY

Some people have to ra...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Ebook Instructions
• Contents
• Section I: The Myths of Leading from the Middle of an Organization
• Section II: The Challenges 360-Degree Leaders Face
• Section III: The Principles 360-Degree Leaders Practice to Lead Up
• Section IV: The Principles 360-Degree Leaders Practice to Lead Across
• Section V: The Principles 360-Degree Leaders Practice to Lead Down
• Conclusion
• Notes
• About the Author