Leaders don’t have to be born. You can develop your leadership and become a leader using these guidelines.

When a previous article on “change your life, find friends“, I developed the idea that you need to emphasize your persuasion skills to interact better with people, and by doing this, you can be more social. Now, in this article, the focus is not so much making friends, but how to become the leader on that team or a group. The ideas I’m going to share, are based on the book “how to Win friends and influence people”, by Dale Carnegie.

Idea 4 to Become Leader: Leadership: Giving Criticism & Driving Improvement

- Begin with praise and honest appreciation.
To become a leader, you need to motivate people. Praising is a way to open the communication channel with others. It is easier to take criticism after some praise. For example, look for things done well before calling attention to failings. A leader is present not only in bad times, but rewards the good job.

- Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person.
One great way to talk to people, is to give own examples of your experiences, rather than criticize.Telling a story, instead of giving the recipe, is fantastic to let people grow by themselves, for example, you can tell the story of how and event change your life. Also, the burden of criticism is easier to bear when shared. So, share your experience, even bad ones, with people to make a connection.

- Call attention to people’s errors indirectly.
Direct, harsh criticism can destroy incentive to improve. So you need to point out mistakes, using alternative communication. For example, instead of saying a product is too difficult to use, a leader can say “How user-friendly will this feature will be?” Also, by focusing on the environment or situation, instead of a flaw idea, can I allow for better communication.

- Let the other person save face.
When you give up that comment about someone, in front of a group of people, you are making this person not only look bad, but feel bad. If you need to make a comment, try to make it private, even when others are talking about it. That is the role of a leader.

- Make the fault seem easy to correct. Use encouragement.
By giving a positive reinforcement, that problems are easy to fix, you are motivating your people to work on them, without making excuses. So, make faults seem easy to correct and new skills easy to learn.

- Praise the slightest improvement and every improvement.
Remember a leader is always giving motivation. So when you are the leader of your group, you need to be someone who praises a lot. Praise reinforces the development of a desired behavior. And the motivation becomes stronger, when you praise specific situations or tasks.

- Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to.
This is a theory of expectations, of organizational behavior. If you tell someone you expect something from him or her, you are making him or her work harder on the project. So building a reputation of your team or group of people, will persuade them to act to the objective.

Idea 5 to Become Leader: Leadership: Motivating Others

- Ask questions instead of giving direct orders.
This is a remarkable characteristic of a leader. Instead of giving orders, as a boss, the leader tries questioning. This is a great tool of persuasion, and it’s very helpful not only for leaders, but for members of a group or team.

- Try to make the other person happy about doing things you suggest.
Make others feel too important for tasks you don’t want them to do. For example, give out titles and authority: make others happy contributors.

- Step by Step Guide to motivating others to do tasks:
In a group of friends, coworkers or family, sometimes there are, and projects. For example, having a party, developing a company’s project, or having a birthday. They have problems in this before, because many people don’t like to do anything at all. So here are six steps to get them working:

1. Be Sincere. Don’t promise what you can’t do or deliver.
2. Know preciesly what it is you want the other person to do.
3. Be Empathetic. Try to understand what others want.
4. Focus on any benefits the other person might receive.
5. Explain how those benefits match the other person’s wants.
6. Frame requests to communicate that the other person will personally benefit.

Been a leader is not difficult or a job our boss has to do. You can become leader of your group of friends, your family, your team or your community. It is a very important social role, which most people don’t want to be, because they believe it is too hard or impossible. By changing your mind and following few of the previous ideas, you can change your life. You don’t even have to do all of them, with just a few that you will notice a difference.

P.D. Send an email to Phil if you want to share a story of leadership, we would like to know you better and share it in the change stories.

image credit:puroticorico

About the Author

Anton Cela is a self development author and consultant. Phillip Cela is a recognized university teacher and speaker on motivation, leadership and self help. Find more about their work on “The Change Your Life Phenomenon”, a world-wide-movement to help people change their lifes at Change Your Life Phenomenon.com You can send us an email or follow “The CHYL Phenomenon” on Twitter.