Since the dawn of mankind, we’ve always wondered what makes us the apex creature on this planet. We have yearned for the answers for so long but don’t really have a clear answer just yet. However one of the areas is what it takes to be a leader. We are pack animals, we are naturally going to be social and want to live in communities. It’s not just about safety in numbers but the fact that we have some things in common. We’re struggling together and we triumph as well. Without leaders we are aimless animals without a clear picture of what we should and need to do. For the life of us, we have tried to understand the mind of someone with leadership qualities. They’re not like the rest, they have a different outlook on life and they behave differently. One thing is for sure, one of the most powerful tools for any person that is taking the brunt of the responsibility, experience is priceless. So what if you have life experience, you’ve been through the trials and tribulations, how can that help you in your career and professional work life?
Seen and done it before
Young leaders in the professional world will tell you, they were petrified when they had their first day in charge. They were riddled with self-doubt, they were panicking over things they took in their stride before, they didn’t know how to deal with different personalities and they were hesitating on the decisions they made. This is a constant that you’ll see all throughout the world, no matter what culture and nation. It’s normal actually, to feel like you’re just lost and don’t know what to do to make things right or better. Usually, people who are perhaps not right for the job will take on the ‘caretaker’ role by simply not making things worse. But being a mediocre leader can only get you so far.
Managerial positions in businesses are open to people with not just experience in their craft and industry, but those with life experience. Why is this so? Well, when things get messy such as work rates falling behind in the manufacturing facility, the young and green manager might flip out and start shouting at the workers. They will get their point across but they won’t motivate them, in fact, they might end up making the employees resentful. A cool, calm and collected leader who knows he or she cannot control the world but merely react to it, will get the workers on their side and explain to them why it’s so urgent that production rapidly increases. They have seen it and done it before in their own personal lives. They take those experiences and manage the people as well as they manage their emotions.
The gain of others
Some people just want to be leaders because they are hungry for power, purely for the sake of power. They don’t have vision, care or concern about much else and sooner or later it does and will show. It’s something that many experts in psychology have written about extensively, the wannabe boy kings, who feel entitled to a position of power. These kinds of people you meet all the time in your everyday life. They will say anything to get what they want and if it means holding their tongue and not exposing the truth to defend someone else who they see as their rival, they have no problem watching them fall. This is where someone with life experience shows how well they are at maintaining their own ego and working for the gain of others.
If you are such a person with these kinds of qualities and this particular mindset, then you can be a number of things in any industry. Many people with this kind of attitude to their profession end up as senior advisors to C-rank employees. For example, a CEO might ask his or her personal advisor on what they should do about a dispute among employees. Without injecting any emotion or siding with anyone, the advisor can sum up the best traits of each person involved. Then advise the CEO on what course of action would be best for the business. Another role can be the director of a department which is one of the most senior hands-on approach roles of any business. You’re in charge of many people and you run the day to day idea creating and problem solving.
Finally getting on track
Living a normal healthy life isn’t easy and it doesn’t come naturally to everyone. Most people that enter their 20s won’t know much about living. They have always been in their parents home and or they have just been living in accommodation at their university. Most of the young professionals in their early 20s haven’t lived a life on their own. So managing money is not their strong suit. Managing people is tougher than handling money so in this department too, they are sadly lacking. But when you are older and you have finally got your life on track then you have a quality of controlling your life that some others don’t. This in itself is a leadership quality because if you can’t manage your personal life, then do you really have any business running an important part of a company?
Organizational experience comes through just living life and knowing what you need to do, when to do it by and how. Yet, you do still need some kind of silver plaque that shows you have such qualities in a professional sense. You merely apply them in your learning process. Check out the Christian degrees that offer Organizational Leadership. It’s 100% online and flexible and usually, it only takes around 6 weeks to complete. The modules of the course will be covering the principles of management, effective personal and organizational communication, research analysis using statistics and social psychology to name a few. If you have a brilliantly organized life, this kind of degree will be a breeze because you already understand the basic and advanced nuances.
You can see it coming
Business negotiations can be some of the most tense events that one can ever go through. A lot of money might be at stake, countless jobs, a potentially industry-shaking situation and many personal and professional futures on the line. You can see many things will be occurring like clockwork, it doesn’t take a psychic to see that both parties will start out with an ambitious position. Over time, however, when the details begin to flesh out and more and more of each other’s capabilities are shown the light of day, things can change. Sometimes you have the footing other times you begin to slip and the opposing party take the lead in the negotiations.
Life experience shows you that if some things don’t look right, having blind optimism can actually be your downfall. In the beginning, when we’re young we think that there is good in every person, but the harshness of life shows us that this isn’t true. Some people cannot change their stripes and spots, they are who they are. There is such an occupation as a professional negotiator that you may want to consider if this is something you would like to get involved with. Business negotiations are hardly ever done by the CEO and other C-rank employees alone. They involve many senior industry experts, advisors and experts in the art of negotiation. Every single one of those three need to have a lot of life experience. When you’re young you allow you happy go lucky attitude to swamp you mind, but the older you get the wiser you get and prudent planning becomes you modus operandi. If you think you have the art of persuasion down also, you can become a negotiator on behalf of small businesses and work your way up to corporate status.
Passing on knowledge
So many young children and teenagers are lacking role models but they have a lot of ambition to be successful. Small business enterprises are the domain of the young and hopefuls of the future, it’s where new ideas are being thought of and being brought forward to the masses. They lack the life experience that you need to make wise decisions that will see their businesses last into the future. You can be a mentor for them and pass down knowledge of your own industry and professional life. Even the things like balancing their social and work life can be taught to them and helping them to manage pressure from being successful at a young age.
Life experience is in itself a currency, something that you can only accumulate through hard work and literally just living life. You get to know more about yourself and see where you’re falling short of the mark. It can also be used to be one of the best traits to become an advisor to CEOs, you can use it to learn the art of negotiations, you can also help young entrepreneurs organize their lives better.
