Planning to Be a Successful Leader

"Spectacular achievement is always preceded by unspectacular preparation." –Robert H. Schuller

Let’s finish the trilogy of articles on preparing to lead an organization by discussing planning for a successful year.

If you’ve taken on a leadership role in an organization, you probably have some specific things you want to achieve. You may even find yourself becoming overwhelmed while trying to keep track of them all. Don’t worry, this is normal. It’s also why you need to start writing these things down now. I recommend getting yourself a small, portable notebook that you can carry in your purse, pocket or car. The closer you keep it, the better because good ideas will strike suddenly. If you don’t capture them on paper, they are often lost forever. Success tip number one: capture ideas for your plan by writing them in a small notebook that you carry with you constantly.

Writing ideas down is an excellent start to your planning process, but organizing them is even better. As more ideas occur to you, it becomes crucial. To craft your leadership strategy, start by identifying major organizational sub-areas where you want to improve or define strategy. You will use these sub-areas as “Chapters” in your notebook. Before you do that, label the first page as the “Goals” Chapter. Don’t write anything in there yet – we’ll return to that Chapter later. Skip a few pages and title it with the first sub-area – this will be the second Chapter. When I created my notebook, my chapters included four functional areas of the organization I was leading along with Chapters for Projects, the Organization’s Newsletter and so forth. The Chapters I used are not important to you, however; you need to identify which Chapters are relevant to your role as leader! Success tip number two: create a hierarchy of “Chapters” or sub-areas in your idea notebook to help organize your ideas.

With your Chapters in place, you are ready to capture all those precious ideas which will make up the core of your plan. Write every idea you have in your notebook. Don’t worry if the ideas seem too big or small or crazy. You’re basically creating a one-person brainstorming session with your notebook to help you. Even an idea that is totally absurd may lead to another idea that is very good. Writing the crazy idea down gets it out of your head and frees your mind to come up with other, better ideas. You may wonder when you should stop doing this. I didn’t stop until my leadership term was halfway over! That notebook was my constant companion and the ideas in it were the mainspring of my plan. Success tip number three: write every idea down in your organizational notebook without judging it.

As you continue to enter your ideas, you will notice groups of ideas start repeating. You may find yourself starting new Chapters in your notebook and abandoning Chapters you thought were important. This is good! You are beginning to organize your plan. We each have particular talents, skills and abilities that make us uniquely qualified for specific tasks. Your notebook will help you find tasks where your energy is well spent and tasks where it is best for you to delegate. That’s good planning! Success tip number four: as you commit ideas to paper, organize your plan by separating areas where you can best focus your energy from areas that are best delegated.

You’ll notice I haven’t said anything about goals yet. Organizational goals will be revealed by the emergence of strong areas in your notebook of ideas. Once you have identified these areas, you can then begin to create goals that will use your ideas in the most effective way. This is why you should leave the Goals Chapter blank until you have identified your other Chapters. Of course, if you know certain goals from the outset, you can write them down in the Goals Chapter after the first draft of Chapters is complete. Just don’t get stuck on those goals because you may find they are inadequate as you generate new ideas and want to create new ones. Note that there is a very specific way to write an effective goal. To learn how to do this, see the success tips article on writing effective goals. Success tip number five: Let your goals for the organization grow from the material you write in your book.

Now you may be wondering why we’ve gotten to the last tip without discussing the formal organizational plan. Isn’t the organizational plan important? Of course it is! However, I believe it is best for you to create this plan with your leadership team. This unifies your team by giving everyone buy-in; people will commit to what they help create. Your planning time is much better spent generating the ideas in your notebook. As you become excited about your ideas (and you will), your ideas will become exciting. Discussing them will inspire your team. While you’ve been writing these ideas down, you’ve unconsciously begun formulating a leadership plan which will guide you during the creation of the formal organizational plan. Success tip number six: as you work on your ideas, your ideas work on you, helping you create an effective formal leadership plan.

Have a great month!