See Video at end of post.
In this post, I want to share with you Nature’s inside secret about “leadership”. More specifically, how effective leaders in Her world rise to their positions and are able to influence others to willingly do what they ask, regardless of the situation.
I’ve talked in other posts about the Four Personality Archetypes that exist across the Animal World, including humans, and how those archetypes gravitate naturally into an organized and efficient hierarchy, with leaders, middle management and staff. Check out my blog post, “Nature’s 4 Personality Archetypes”.
As I’ve shared with you, each Personality Archetype comes with its own, distinctive Action Style. In the case of 4-legged animals, Personality Archetype and Action Style invariably go together. Who they are is what they do. In other words, a Scaredy-Cat Archetype will always behave with a Scaredy-Cat Action Style – afraid to get too close or make a decision, easily worried, and pretty much nervous about everything all the time. Scaredy-Cats do not rise to top positions in Nature’s hierarchy, primarily because their actions are not those of Leaders. The Leader positions of Top Dog, Boss Cow or Lead Horse, etc. go to the Bessy-Boss Personality Archetype with its related Bessy-Boss Action Style: Calm, focused, determined, and in complete control of their emotions in their leadership roles. Anything less than action consistent with Nature’s favored “leader archetype”, is considered the behavior of a subordinate, not a leader. This means that animals that act with uncertainty, emotional reactivity, passivity or excessive yielding to others, in Nature’s world, are rejected as unfit or unworthy to lead.
With this in mind, it might be interesting to take a look at your own Action Style, because for many of us women — regardless of our qualifications, education or abilities — our actions can sabotage our leadership without us even realizing it! It is how we behave with others that can lie at the heart of pushback from our employees and staff or disrespect from our children at home. A short fuse, emotional reactivity, or uncertainty, changing our mind, avoiding tough conversations or trying to be everybody’s friend — even though these actions may come naturally to our true personality — they are not the actions of Nature’s leaders. These behaviors can sabotage any attempts to lead and influence others at work or at home because even your employees and children dance to the tune of their Inner Animal.
So, what’s the solution? Well, I have good news! Turns out we human animals can separate our personality from our actions! Unlike our 4-legged cousins, we have the unique ability to override the urges of our natural personality and act in any manner we choose. We can resist the urge to get angry and we can force ourselves to do the uncomfortable, and so on. (By the way, the reverse situation is also true, in that subordinates who act like Bessy-Boss will also face problems. More on that in a future post!)
To summarize, if you want to be an effective Leader, regardless of your natural personality, choose the Action Style of Nature’s leaders :
- Stay calm and focused on the matter at hand.
- Don’t over-react.
- Believe you are the leader and act with dignity.
- Make your rules clear and consistent.
- Enforce them without apology.
- Don’t fidget, be wishy-washy or act uncertain.
- Be nice, while still being the boss.
- Accept that not everyone will be happy with what you do, but know that you will have their respect if you follow these rules.
So, there you have it. Nature’s wisdom for today’s woman! Go forth and lead.
