I was chatting with a great leader the other day. They hold a senior executive role within a tourism business. He’s passionate, amazing with people, and with great technical skills. However… here’s the big BUT coming. He is SO caught up in the day-to-day that he can’t step away and be strategic, plan or focus on the bigger picture.
If caught up in the day-to-day – we call that The Firefighter…. Constantly working on the fires, the here and the now, today mostly. Perhaps next week. Might be very operational. Trapped in the ‘doing’.
If you’re caught up looking after people all day – we call that The Parent… trying to keep everyone happy, maybe placating, adjudicating or negotiating… depending on how well or not the kids are behaving 😉 It also depends on whether you’re leading toddlers, teens, young or mature adults. And this has nothing to do with age. It’s all about attitude!
If you feel like every day is a battle and you need legs, arms, and a head of steel – we call that The Warrior… you come home exhausted because you’ve spent all day being STRONG, putting on a brave front, leading the way, going into battle, taking charge, sometimes it’s in a great way and sometimes less so.
We choose roles, we sometimes inherit roles and we sometimes do roles unconsciously, without realising. It’s got nothing to do with titles. It’s about how we show up every day and how we handle our day-to-day, week-to-week, month-to-month, and year-to-year.
There are a few more roles we could talk about: The Teacher or The Professor, The Rockstar, The King or Queen… you might already have a vibe on where you tend to default to. It’s not so much about which role you play, it’s more about whether it’s working for you, the team, and the business. And perhaps if it’s not, give it a rethink.
Which role would you like to be doing less of or doing more of?
Genevieve
P.S Whenever you’re ready… here are 4 ways I can help you develop and work on your business leadership capabilities:
- Grab a free copy of Smash Indecision and Overwhelm, 4 Steps for Better Business Leadership E-book
It’s the road map to overcoming doubt and indecision, how to deal with “overwhelm” to improve your business leadership capabilities. — Click Here
- Join the Tourism Business Leader’s Facebook group and connect with like-minded leaders focused on building highly effective teams
It’s our Facebook community where smart leaders get to learn more about creativity, leadership, and performance for tourism business success. —Click Here
- Join our Tourism Pro-Team Program
Helping tourism business leaders develop their skills to improve engagement, accountability, and performance of the team. If you’d like to work with me so you can stop being reactive, have the difficult conversations, and drive performance to get the results you want and know the business need then…message PRO to me here and I’ll get you all the details.
- Let’s get the Whole Team Together
Would you like a different perspective and someone else at the front of the room or on zoom/teams to lead regular and consistent team building, accountability, and engaging learning experiences, that drive results and outcomes for individuals, teams, and the business? If you feel a little challenged with everything going on, maybe sounding like a cracked recorded saying things repeatedly, or actually not 100% how to motivate and inspire the team, given the current nature of business, it may be useful for us to chat. Message TEAM to me here… and tell me a little about the business, your team, and what you’d like to work on together.
