The Febuary issue of the Leadership Wired Newsletter from John Maxwell, had an great article “Questions I Ask Myself” that focuses on the following questions that leaders should be asking themselves:

1. Am I investing in myself? This is a personal growth question.
2. Am I Genuinely Interested In Others?  This is a motive question.
3. Am I Doing What I Love and Loving What I Do? – This is a passion question. You will never fulfill your destiny doing work you despise. You are nothing unless it comes from your heart.
4. Am I Investing My Time with the Right People?  – This is a relationship question. Most people can trace their successes and failures to the relationships in their lives. Be selective about who you join with on the leadership journey. Choose companions with a commitment to personal growth, a healthy attitude, and high potential.
5. Am I Staying in My Strength Zone? – This is an effectiveness question. Effective leaders stop working on their weaknesses and diligently develop their strengths.
6. Am I Taking Others to a Higher Level? – This is a mission question. My success is determined by the seeds I sow, not the harvest I reap.  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said it best: “Life’s most urgent question is: what are you doing for others?”
7. Am I Taking Care of Today? - This is a success question. The secret of your success is determined by your daily agenda. Are the habits in your life steering your toward success or simply frittering away your time? Be serious about making each day count.
8. Am I Taking Time To Think? – This is a leadership question. A minute of thought is greater than an hour of talk. Author your own life by clearing your schedule for thinking.
9. Am I Developing Leaders? – This is a legacy question. “The ultimate test for a leader is not whether he or she makes smart decisions and takes decisive action, but whether he or she teaches others to be leaders and builds an organization that can sustain its success even when he or she is not around. True leaders put ego aside and strive to create successors who go beyond them.” ~ Lorin Woolfe
10. Am I Pleasing God? -  This is an eternity question. As the Roman general, Maximus, exhorts his men in Gladiator, “What we do in life echoes in eternity.”

A great list of question that are worth considering….!

Related posts:

1. 7 Purposeful Questions
2. Shape Your Communication by Asking Questions

With the increasing complexity the roles and behaviours of leaders need to change to suite a complex environment. The Dannemiller Tyson Associates discusses three new rules for leaders in the 21st Century:

Old Rule #1: The leader’s job is to know, and to serve as a final authority in important decisions.

New Rule: The leader’s job (in the 21st Century) is to call people together whom we have typically kept apart, and to find ways to uncover and connect the collective wisdom of our people. When leaders follow this rule, we’ve seen that this shared wisdom emerges most effectively people are invited to come together and share “one-brain, one heart.” Here everyone in the organization, through accepting each others’ views, comes to see that we all know the same thing (“one brain”), and we are all connected around the same yearnings and vision of a preferred future for the organization (“one heart”).

Old Rule #2: The leader’s job is to control-information, people, risk, the future. The effective leader is in charge of everything that’s going on, both inside and outside the organization. The leader’s job is to ensure that people in the organization obey the rules, and people in the organization look to the leader to keep them safe (e.g., “If I obey, then I’ll have a job, and the company will survive).

New Rule: The leader’s job is to ask questions and facilitate conversations at ALL levels of the organization. An organization can achieve its goals quickly and successfully only when people’s energy is aligned and their commitment is focused, and we believe that this requires a leader to engage people at all levels of the organization in connected discussion.

Old Rule #3: The leader’s job is to drive and monitor organization performance by focusing on what is going wrong, and punishing mistakes.

New Rule: The leader’s job is to build and sustain high performance by noticing and appreciating when people do things right-especially when they act with courage, integrity, and accountability. Reinforcing courageous, right-minded action, especially when it turns out to be a mistake, is the only way to encourage people to take risks, and leaders who follow this rule typically build organizations with spirit and pride.

Technorati Tags: Leadership, Management, Business, Collaboration

Related posts:

1. 10 Rules for Innovators
2. Bob Parsons Rules to Live By…
3. Jack Welch’s Six Rules For Success

I found these 7 questions used to identify your purpose……

1. What do you do that brings you the greatest joy?
2. Joy is often a barometer, an indicator to guide how you invest your time and effort.
3. What are your gifts and talents?
4. What gives you joy and excites your will?
5. What would you do with your life if you had all the money you needed?
6. What do you do that causes you to forget what time it is and to not notice that you’re hungry?
7. What compliments have you heard regularly that surprise you?
8. What is your life-defining passage of Scripture or wisdom literature?

Via: [John Stanko]

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