How To Ensure That Your Boss Recognises Your Leadership Potential

On my blog I often discuss issues relating to leadership and management

, and these articles are mostly from the point of view of a management. If you will, I assume that my readers are either executives, senior management, or middle management. However, I also appreciate that many readers of my blog are simply employees who aspire to be leaders. These are people with great ambitions and the determination to thoroughly research leadership skills and help boost their chances of being picked out for a promotion.

It's for these aspirational leaders that I write this article. I don't care whether you're flipping burgers in McDonalds or cleaning toliets at the Hilton, this article will hopefully help you in making the right decisions that will lead to a leadership role in the future.

How long it will take you to ascend to a leadership position will depend on your genuine and natural leadership ability, it will also rely upon your confidence. It will be affected by how well you are able to take lessons on board (such as this one) and translate advice into behaviour. Finally, it will depend upon the nature of your industry. Some professions, such as accountancy, law and finance focus on fast promotion to retain employees. However other industries such as retail are happy keeping their shop floor workers as just that,; shop floor workers for as long as the employee is happy. This brings me to my first point:

1.Alert your superiors to your desire to move up within the company.

This point is a vital step towards achieving the title of leader. In many companies, employees wrongly assume that promotions are a nature and inevitable process. They simply aren't. You could easily stay in the same role for 5 years, while a collegue may be promoted within 2. The key is making it clear to management that you seek a promotion, and that you would be unhappy remaining in your current position.

Doing this puts the ball in their court. If they see you as an important member of staff who is worth keeping (which I hope you are!) they will be now looking at ways to retain you. Managers often take good staff for granted until it's too late and the disgruntled employee leaves. Don't let this happen - have an informal conversation (that's all it needs to be) with your manager and give them the chance to act to keep you within the company. Managers who previously took you for granted may suddenly begin acting far more in your career's interest when they fear losing you.

2.Demonstrate an 'edge' on your employees through a few select opportunities.

When working in a company of any size, opportunities will present themselves to you that will allow you to demonstrate a keen leadership ability to your superiors. If you don't believe these opportunities aren't coming along, then you're either not looking, or you're not being proactive enough. An opportunity to step up may not be as easy as a manager asking you to cover the shop while they run an errand. Sometimes you will have to suggest this solution when you realise that they have to run the errand, before they are able to draft someone else in instead.

3. Understand That Promotions Are Just One Step

As fantastic a promotion is, the quickest path to success in leadership is to become immersed in continuous personal and professional development. This means never getting comfortable at where you are. If you've become a regional manager - intend to become a national manager. This is the mentality which will continue to see you push up the ladder, rather than 'settling down' too soon and becoming 'stuck' in a middle-ranking position.

I wish you every success in achieving the rank of 'leader'.

by: matthew Anderson

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