The 6 Worst, Career-Crushing, Mistakes Any Leader Can Make

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The 6 Worst, Career-Crushing, Mistakes Any Leader Can Make

By Todd Nordstrom | Forbes Magazine | December 8, 2023

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As a leader, your job is to help people become the best, most productive version of themselves at work.  This can be possible by improving wellbeing of the people.  Improved wellbeing improves everything. Think about this in your own life and career. When you feel physically good, you accomplish more. When you feel emotionally good, you accomplish more. When your relationships are good, you accomplish more. When your finances are good, you accomplish more. Wellbeing is the foundation of everything…including your job as a leader—which means elevating all those you lead to become the best versions of themselves.  How do you elevate those people?  One way could be by avoiding 6 career-crushing mistakes today.  Don’t:

1. Stop Thinking: Just because you’ve diagnosed the problem, doesn’t mean your research is over.   We all must continue thinking, and analyzing, the things that may be causing the problems rather than just trying to solve the problems themselves.
2. Stop Caring: People have lives outside of your professional relationship with them. And, if you seek to help them become the best version of themselves at work, you must also care about the best version of themselves outside of work.  Caring is critical—both your employees and customers see it and feel it.
3. Stop Sharing: Here’s where we get to the straight-up “Good Leader” stuff. If you want to be good, you need to get good at sharing both wins and losses. When your team accomplishes something great, you need to share credit. When your team suffers a loss, you need to share blame. You are the leader. Ultimately, wins and losses fall on your shoulders. And, when your team understands that you share, they’re much more likely to follow.
4. Stop Improving: A well-oiled machine today might be a well-oiled antique tomorrow. Products, processes, and people strategies must continue to improve or they simply become relics of the past.  If you’re not improving, the world is improving around you, and you’re dying.
5. Stop Developing: Look at how Oracle is focusing on their future—by focusing on their college recruiting. Look at how Pfizer is developing by focusing on people and teams. Developing your people, and creating learning opportunities for employees at all stages, shows that you’re not only committed to their success but that you actually care about their future as well.
6. Stop Dreaming:   Someone has to dream big, right? Maybe your dreams don’t include solving some of the world’s or country’s biggest issues. But that doesn’t mean you should stop. Push forward. Solve something for someone. Dreaming to add value to someone else’s life is never too big. And, as a leader, that could add value to one of your employee’s lives.

2 key takeaways from the article

1. As a leader, your job is to help people become the best, most productive version of themselves at work.  This can be possible by improving wellbeing of the people.  
2. One way could be by avoiding 6 career-crushing mistakes today.  Don’t Stop Thinking: Just because you’ve diagnosed the problem, doesn’t mean your research is over.  Don’t Stop Caring about the lives of your people outside of your professional relationship.  Don’t Stop Improving:  If you’re not improving, the world is improving around you, and you’re dying.  Don’t Stop Developing: Developing your people, and creating learning opportunities for employees at all stages, shows that you’re not only committed to their success but that you actually care about their future as well.  Don’t Stop Dreaming: Dreaming to add value to someone else’s life is never too big. And, as a leader, that could add value to one of your employee’s lives.

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Topics:  Leadership, Career, Decision-making, Problem-solving