How to chart your leadership journey

The global statistics for women’s representation in the workforce are on an upswing. As of 2020, women hold 29 percent of senior management roles and 87 percent of global mid-market companies have at least one woman in a senior management role. Organizations are setting bold targets to increase women representation at senior-level roles and making efforts to partner with them in their leadership journey.

It’s no different in India. If you are a working woman, there could be no better time than now to develop your executive presence and work toward becoming a leader of tomorrow. Besides being in sync with your organization’s overall objectives, being purposeful in this journey makes it more engaging and rewarding.

Here are three things to keep in mind as you transition from being a manager to a leader:

Being clear on your short-term and long-term goals brings about clarity of thought and action. Breaking down these goals into short time-bound milestones ensures that you remain motivated to progress on your leadership journey. Another positive of being on top of your goal path is that course correction becomes easy.

Finding your own purpose and attaching it to your leadership goals brings about higher focus. For instance, if sustainability and environment consciousness is the purpose that resonates with you, then as a leader and subsequently a decision maker in your organization, your actions will be in accordance with your purpose. As a team leader, you will guide your team on best practices for sustainability like paperless meetings, ways of reducing individual carbon footprint, or even pledging for volunteering work to help the cause.

Purposeful leadership is a carefully planned process. Watch the video—it will guide you through the process of establishing executive presence and forging ahead in your leadership journey.

There will always be an image attached to your persona. Work toward it. Think about how you would like to be known in your organization, among your peers and your team members. For instance, you could choose to tend toward being an assertive leader or display a higher affinity toward being an empathetic one.

Your way of working and behavior are the most prominent contributors to your personal brand. Softer aspects like the way you dress, your digital presence and informal communication with others also help in creating and strengthening your personal brand.

Consider these action points as small steps toward your ultimate big goal. It is easy to slip into the inertia of your routine work and put your larger goals on the back burner. However, being aware of the same helps you put in conscious effort toward improvement. So, keep at it!