Season #2 - Episode #01 – The Self-Aware Leader By John Maxwell

Hello, Self Developers and welcome to The Patrick Kelly Podcast for Self-Development, where I will be reviewing  audible books on Self-Development that can change your life for the better this year, and years to come. It is said that if we keep on doing what we always did, we will keep on getting what we always got. In other words, to change our output, we first have to change our input.

Happy New Year Everybody, Today is January 02, 2022, and This is Episode 1 of Season 2, and today we will be reviewing the audible book “The Self-Aware Leader, Play To Your Strengths and Unleash Your Team By John Maxwell. This audible book teach you how to become a better Leader in the year 2022 by first growing your self-awareness. What sabotages more leadership efforts? Holds back more good teams and, derails more leader’s careers than anything else? The answer = Lack of self-awareness.

Chapter 1: Become Good At Leading Yourself: Leaders undermine their own effectiveness when they are unable to self-evaluate their own leadership abilities. The hardest person you will ever lead in your lifetime will always be, yourself. In order to lead others, you first have to learn how to lead yourself. Only a Leader who has followed well, will be able to lead others well. To be a good leader, you have to develop self-discipline. To be The King of your Castle, you must first learn to reign over yourself.

Chapter 2: Know and Work Within Your Strengths: Find out what you can do well, and then keep on doing it. The more you know your strengths and work within them, the more successful you will be. You will not be called to something that you have no talent for. Only your best will add value to others which will in turn, encourage others to do their best. Ask yourself “what am I doing well?”. People who reach their potential, spend less time asking “what am I doing right?” and more time asking “what am I doing well?”. If you don’t have a competitive advantage, don’t compete. Discover your uniqueness and then discipline yourself to develop it. While you are developing your own strengths, help others to develop theirs. Practice does not make perfect. But it will make permanent.

Chapter 3: Put Your Team Ahead Of Your Own Career Advancement: Leadership is relational more than positional. Helping the Team win is much more important than winning personally. People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care. Value the Team. If you want to become an effective Leader, you must take responsibility for helping your Team win. Put the Team ahead of your own personal gain. Be a connector and not a climber. A connector focuses on helping their Team win and climbers are only focused on themselves winning.

Chapter 4: Look At Yourself When People Quit: The 3 kind of Leaders that cause people to quit.

1. People quit Leaders who devalue them. Look for people’s value and express your appreciation for them.
2. People quit Leaders who are untrustworthy. People want to be led by people that they can believe in. When Leaders break trust with their people, it is like shattering a mirror that cannot be put together again.
3. People quit Leaders who are insecure. People will not follow a person who is only focused on holding on to their title and position. When the Leader is secure, the people will perform their best.

Chapter 5: Listen More Than Talk: It is always better to listen first and then, talk later. When we hear without really listening, our leadership is bound to suffer. We should listen, learn and then, lead.  Leaders touch a heart before they ask for a hand. You cannot connect with a person who you do not understand. Listening is the best way to learn. When we fail to listen, we shut off much of our learning potential. If you are going to learn, you must do it by listening. Listening can keep problems from escalating.  A deaf ear is the first symptom of a closed mind. And having a closed mind is a sure-fire way to hurt your leadership. Listening establishes trust. When Leaders listen, the Organization gets better.

Chapter 6: Handle Criticism With Grace: If you want to be a Leader, you have to get use to criticism. Whether you fail or succeed, you will be criticized. Criticism is the only thing that can be easily avoided by saying nothing, doing nothing and being nothing. If you get criticism and defend yourself from it and deny your weaknesses, you will decrease your self-awareness and stop your growth, as a Leader. Whether the criticism is legitimate or not, what determines your growth as a Leader is your attitude toward receiving it. Being who you really are is the first step in becoming better, than you are. Accept what you can do and who you are. Accepting yourself is a sign of maturity. Don’t have more confidence in other people’s opinion about you, than the opinion you have of yourself.  

Chapter 7: Admit Your Mistakes and Learn From Them: The biggest mistake you can make, is to not ask what mistakes you are making. In order to become a better Leader, you need to constantly improve and change. Make mistakes and then learn from them. When you make mistakes, admit them and then move on. The first step towards anticipating mistakes and learning from the ones you do make, is to take a realistic look at yourself, and admit your weaknesses. You can’t improve as a Leader if you are always trying to pretend that you are perfect. Accept mistakes as the price of progress. If you want to move forward, you are going to make mistakes. Those who learn from their failures, never have to repeat them again. We gain wisdom from failure. Fear of making a mistake, will keep you from reaching your true potential. Making mistakes will not make you a bad Leader, but failing to admit your mistakes will. Only if you look for mistakes, admit mistakes, learn from mistakes, and anticipate mistakes, will you and your Team improve.

Closing Thoughts: On scale of 1 to 5, I would give this audible book, a super solid 5, for teaching valuable lessons on how to become a self-aware Leader.

 *To find out more about this audible book, Go To: www.audible.com and download this audible book, or go to www.johnmaxwell.com to find out more information about the Author.

*Remember To Subscribe to this Podcast on Your favorite Podcast Platform, so You do not miss an Episode, and also remember to share this Episode via text or email with Friends and Family and other People that You care about. If you have a question. and you wish to contact me, contact me at pkellypodcast@gmail.com

*For More Episodes of The Patrick Kelly Podcast for Self-Development and a free, did I say free, yes free 30-day trial of audible plus; Go To: www.thepatrickkellypodcast.com to sign up today.

*If You would like to donate a dollar or more to the support of this Podcast, click the donate button at www.thepatrickkellypodcast.com or go to $patrickkellypodcast on cash app and I will be sure to thank You on the next Episode.