You Are An Emerging Leader If:

1. You want it! The best leaders want the job. They know they need the lead job, because they know they need the power of it to do the things they care passionately about. They can’t be as effective from the sidelines and they want the best chance they can get for success. That means they want first chair. Always.
2. You know that what happens to people is the most important outcome. Your focus on the bottom line has to be measured with what happens to your people. Without the ability to walk with kings–nor lose the common touch,” you will march your company and its people simply to the bottom.
3. You say “yes,” with enthusiasm, when you’re asked to lead. A reluctant leader is a dangerous thing. If you feel someone else should be at the helm, use the power of your position to make sure that person gets a key position on high-profile initiatives. Then make sure to give credit where due. Your supporters will then have confidence in the new leader for future opportunities.
4. You see solutions that others don’t. This kind of “second sight” is an exceptional talent, and it indicates that you are ready to lead your own ideas. Look for and be willing to fight for opportunities to step up and put your ideas into practice.
5. You are willing to stand up for your boss by standing up to the boss. I believe that many of the CEOs on the ousted list were coddled by well-meaning subordinates who knew better, but would not risk challenging their bosses.
6. You are the go-to person in your family and community. A family that has invested in the maturation of a black MBA was supporting you for many years before you received your degree. They’ve been encouraging your leadership since your birth and they deserve the benefits of your service as much or more as your employer. Step up with your management skills and help lead your family’s business… whether they want you to or not.
7. You see the long game. You are thirsty to understand how short-term activity will influence future outcomes and you have strong opinions about what those outcomes ought to be.
8. You know in your gut when you have made a mistake and you enlist the help of others to correct it. Everybody learns when a leader is growing. A chief lesson is how to change your mind and say just that. “I’ve changed my mind. Let’s look at other solutions.”
9. You see a vital role for yourself beyond the office of your job. Many leaders don’t reach their full maturity because they are not willing to move on. Don’t get stuck. Be bold. Look around to see where you’re needed, and where opportunity lies. Why not help take an existing nonprofit organization to the next level? Why not start your own organization to address problems you know need attention? Why not provide the world with a fresh, agile new initiative of your own?

Sandra Finley is president, CEO and chair of the board of the League of Black Women.

First impressions are often lasting impressions, so it’s important to get a winning start in your new job. This means starting to produce useful results quickly while being helpful to co-workers. It also means adapting fast to the workplace culture.

A study by Leadership IQ, a Washington, D.C., employment consulting firm, indicates that a startling 46 percent of newly hired employees will fail within 18 months. A similar study of newly hired managers by Right Management Consultants, a Philadelphia-based leadership development firm, is only slightly less alarming in its finding that more than one-third quit or are asked to leave within 18 months.

“Starting a new job is a time of great opportunity,” says Milo Sindell, co-author of “Sink or Swim: New Job. New Boss. 12 Weeks to Get It Right,” and co-founder of the employee consulting firm Hit the Ground Running. Continue Reading

Amidst restructurings, mergers, acquisitions, and global sourcing, many senior careerists now find themselves in the predicament of having to look for employment. Let’s face it, times can be a bit challenging. But there may be a silver lining in all of this. This can be a time for you to reflect on your life, your goals, and the dreams you have swept under the carpet – a time to revisit a change of careers. Are you with me? Let’s take a look at a few tips you will need to keep in mind.

Create a Vision

What is your fantasy career? Musician? Corporate raider? Supreme Court Justice? Back paddle a few strokes to reality. Now move up. This mental exercise will help you create a vision for your next career move from a list of the implausible and the plausible. It enables you to identify what you are passionate about. As you begin to revisit your dreams, you may find some that you have outgrown and others that you have a curiosity about. On your route to seeking a new career, you may find that there are other outlets for you to express some of these dreams.

Explore Opportunities

Talk to friends and friends of friends about what they are doing. Read career profiles of various individuals in magazines and other media. If it sounds like something you might want to do, then get more information on the subject. There are several career sites on the Web that provide this type of information.

What do you have to offer?

Conduct a self-assessment. This is a critical step in any career planning. Conduct an inventory of your strengths and areas for improvement. Think past your current or last job to talents you have demonstrated in other venues – the community, professional organizations, church, home, school, etc. List your strengths and how you have applied them. List any feedback you have received on development needs. You also should list the things you value, are interested in, and want to avoid. It might be revealing to take a personality inventory (e.g., Myers-Briggs) to get a sense of your temperament, style of communication, and how this meshes with various careers. There are numerous career planning assessment tools available. Descriptions of many of these (like the Strong Interest Inventory, which measures your interests in a broad range of occupations, work activities, leisure activities, and academic subjects) can be found at http://www.career-lifeskills.com.

What does your desired role require?

Next, identify the competencies required for the role you are interested in. You may need to do some research to complete this list. Speak to professionals in the role. Look up the job requirements in the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (which provides descriptions of more than 12,000 job titles). Talk to executive recruiters, who specialize in filling these roles, about employers’ expectations. You can find executive search firms by specialty in the Kennedy Guide to Recruiting Firms and other directories.

Analyze the bridges and gaps.

Now look for the points of connection, as well as the gaps between where you are relative to where you need to be. When there is a significant difference between what you are doing now and what you would like to do, you will often find that your connection points are based on broad, transportable skills such as communication, problem solving, or knowledge of a particular industry. The gaps that surface may be based on more specialized areas, such as certification or educational requirements.

In your gap analysis, you may surface the need to go back to school. You may view this as a longer-term strategy, but it may actually help you connect with others in the field you are choosing. Professors may be able to provide you with leads. Alumni may have opportunities for internships. If you don’t think you have time to go to school, think again. Many universities offer weekend and online degree programs.

Write a detailed career action plan.

Write a strategy for how you will get from your current role to your desired role. This strategy should include short-term, long-term, and contingency plans. You may want to enlist the assistance of a career coach at this stage. Your plan should specify individuals or networks that can help you reach your goal. You should also spell out what you are willing and able to give up to reach your goal — for example, a 20 percent decrease in salary, a status/title change, etc.

“But I have no experience. Who’s going to hire me?”

Dip your foot in the pool or at least get it wet. In most cases, you would be absolutely right in your assumption that experience gets the job. But the job is not the only way to get the experience. You may be able to develop the skills you need in other settings while you are in your current position.

For example:

• Volunteer your services to a community, civic, or social organization.
• Conduct committee work within a professional organization.
• Serve on a non-profit board of advisors or directors.

One tactic you may opt to use if your skill set is close but your experience level is off, is to negotiate a trial period with a potential employer in which they leverage your services for less than full salary. How much less will depend on your financial situation. “Try me out with less pay” should only be used if you believe you can come into an organization and quickly add value. Your manager and co-workers will be watching your every move.

Another tactic you will want to use to get your foot in the door is to make yourself visible in forums where professionals in your desired field congregate. This sends the subtle message that you are “one of them.” This includes joining professional organizations and attending conferences. It also includes arranging to make presentations in these forums on topics about which you are knowledgeable and can generalize to your audience’s interest. Writing for magazines or other publications that the target group reads is a related tactic.

Changing careers is a challenging endeavor that requires reflection, direction and persistence. Much of it breaks down to the fine art of networking, image building, and competence. The more your name is known in your desired arena, the higher the odds of you connecting with someone who is willing to give you that first chance.

Everyone who has ever earned an MBA has at least one thing in common: an expectation that the MBA would help on the road to success.

But something often happens along the way. Some people shoot ahead, earning all the awards, acclaim, and admiration as they move to the top — and then they seem to hit a brick wall. Others falter and flounder and never get off the ground at all, though they proudly use the MBA letters to indicate their education.

No matter which way it happens, the result is the same: a sense of getting stuck. The important thing is to get unstuck and move away from the chance of failing!

Everyone who has ever succeeded at anything has tasted failure’s disappointment. I know I have. When I lost my job in radio, I went out searching and searching for work — but nobody would hire me. When I bought my mother a home and then lost it, I was embarrassed. When my television show was canceled, people would ask me if I was still Les Brown; how mortifying!

But in each of those instances, I had to decide how I wanted to view the failures. Sure, I had met disappointment, and no, things didn’t go as I planned, but I could either let that stop me or let it propel me forward.

I chose to let it propel me forward. I chose to see each failure as a tiny brick in the life I was constructing. The result has been wonderful and fulfilling work that has produced a positive impact, international acclaim, and financial independence.

The difference between those who succeed and those who fall by the wayside is in how they view failure. Losers view failure as the end of their hopes. Winners view failure as a building block to their success. I often quote a story about Thomas Edison. When he went to a press conference to show off his light bulb invention, he told reporters it had taken him more than 10,000 tries to get it right. A reporter asked how he was able to continue in the face of all that failure. Edison replied that he hadn’t failed. He simply eliminated 10,000 options that did not work. You notice that he did not get stuck with failing all of those times; he kept moving.

How do you view failure? Do you view it as the elimination of an option that did not work, or do you view it as your end, your defeat? I hope you’ll choose to be like Edison. Even if your life hasn’t been exactly as you wanted or envisioned it, even with your MBA, that doesn’t mean you are a failure. It simply means you are eliminating options that don’t work. Your getting downsized at work doesn’t have to be a failure. Maybe that job wasn’t the right one for you. Seeing your business get off to a rocky start doesn’t mean you are a failure. Perhaps you must tweak your plan and choose a different way to reach your goal. Even the fact that your finances may not be thriving as you’d like doesn’t mean you are a failure. Perhaps that, too, means you must review what you are doing.

Failure is nothing more than an opportunity to give success another try. It just doesn’t matter if you are among those whose star quickly rose and now seems to be burning out, or if you are one who never quite got going. Your success is within your grasp. It’s all in how you look at it.

If you view your failures as the end of your chance to make something of your life, then that indeed is what they are. But if you view your failures as simply additional chances to seek even greater success, you will indeed find that is true.

Your belief in yourself and your abilities is the key to your success. In my last column in this space, I shared with you some ways to optimize your success by building quality, strategic relationships. It is imperative that you build a network of resourceful people who are there to help you along the way. Remember, though, that no matter how successful those around you are, the drive for success must come from within.

There is an old African proverb that I love because of its simple truth. It says, “If there is no enemy within, the enemy outside can do us no harm.” If you are not your own enemy, you will find your success. You must believe in your ability to make your way in this world. You must believe that your path will take you to untold success. You must believe.

Yet so many people don’t believe in their success. Benjamin Franklin said something that I am convinced is true: “Most people die by the time they are 25, but they are not buried until they are 75.” These people allow disappointments to beat the life out of them early on. So they coast through life, going to jobs that don’t excite them, listlessly letting one day melt into the next. They are alive, but they sure aren’t living.

If you recognize yourself in this, I challenge you here: What are you going to do about it? Will you continue coasting through life, letting all your MBA hopes lie dormant – dead – within your being? Or will you acknowledge your disappointments and choose to go forward anyway? Will you become a dead man – or woman – walking? Or will you choose to view your failures and disappointments as the stepping-stones to wild success that gives your life meaning?

Be among the few who do achieve their dreams. No matter how far off-course you may be, you can get back on track. Here is how:

1. Commit to the commitment. Renew your interest in your goal, whatever it is. If the goal needs to be tweaked, then tweak it. Write down your success plan.
2. Make a contract with yourself. Write down your new goal, with the affirmation that you will accomplish it. Sign and date this contract.
3. Gain accountability. Share your dream with someone. Better yet, give that person a copy of the contract you signed with yourself, asking him or her to sign it also. When we add accountability to the equation, we increase our likelihood for success.
4. Fortify your mind. As I told you last time: You must cultivate your mind. Plant powerful motivational messages there. Read books to broaden your thinking and to educate yourself about your chosen path and ways to attain success. Join groups and organizations of like-minded individuals. Attend training seminars related to your goal and interests, so you gain new knowledge to move yourself forward.
5. Schedule a review. Pull out your calendar or PDA or whatever you use for schedule-keeping, and set a date three months from now to review your progress. Then set a date three months from that date, and another three months from there, then another. These reviews can help you see your progress and also will show you where you need to adjust.

Stick with this plan and you will find that even when you hit a stumbling block, unless you view it as a dead end, you can keep going. And that will keep you moving toward your success.

Les Brown is an internationally known author, speaker, television and radio host. Learn more at http://lesbrown.com or e-mail Les at les@lesbrown.com.

Quantifying the return on investment when it comes to your career can be as straightforward as punching numbers into a calculator. But numbers are not enough, says Lisa Whaley, a former IBM vice president who turned her B.S. from the Hampton Institute (now Hampton University) into a lucrative 22-year career with the technology giant. She said she was successful, in part, because she made regular common sense assessments along the way.

“The original plan was to work for a few years then go to law school or get my MBA,” said Whaley, author of Reclaiming My Soul From The Lost and Found a story of her journey from a successful executive to a woman in despair trying to find happiness. “Every time I’d get to that point – where I thought I needed more training or such – I would get a promotion or I was working on some great project. So I never did it, but I still did well. I realized that had I stopped to get the MBA, it would not have brought me anything at the company.” Continue Reading

Longevity. Staying power. There are senior managers in corporate America who achieve these feats despite turns in the economy and regardless of what administration is in office. They embody a class that has demonstrated commitment to their professions and each among them has managed to climb steadily to the top and remain there. How do they endure? Their strategies have been chronicled in numerous resources. One is the book “Staying Power : 30 Secrets Invincible Executives Use for Getting to the Top – and Staying There” by Thomas A. Schweich. He bases the book on interviews with more than 35 successful top executives, including Earl G. Graves, J.W. “Bill” Marriott, Jr., Janet Reno and a host of others. He cleverly recaps 30 “rules” associated with “The Invincible Career Path,” “The Invincible Personality,” and “The Invincible Management Style.” Here are a few samples:

• Discover your talents early, and discard your fantasies immediately
• When you suffer a set-back, come clean and bounce back
• Work is a member of the family
• Find a job that you look forward to every day
• Harness your fear to sharpen your professional judgment
• Value loyalty, but do not depend on it
• Wield a spiritual shield, but not a spiritual sword
• Take the high ground and never give it up
• Intimidation chases away talent, opportunity, and creativity
• Spend more time on information inflow than information outflow
• Wring the emotion out of risk analysis

Do these rules resonate with African-American executives? In talking to three senior careerists, it appears that there is some common ground between philosophies. William McKnight Farrow, III, Joleen Spencer, and Moses Brewer personify staying power within their industries. Farrow is the chief information officer for the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT). Spencer is senior vice president of marketing with Shore Bank. Brewer leads marketing and sales for Coors Brewing Company. Continue Reading

You read success stories everyday. You hear about people who have accomplished goals against the odds and come back bigger and more powerful and people who have persevered on a path and now are viewed as pioneers in their own right. These people exist in all walks of life and many have made their marks as leaders in the corporate arena.

When you read about people such as Kenneth Chenault, Franklin Raines, and Sylvia Rhone, you may ponder: What do they have? Who did they know? Is there a special formula that worked for them? Is ability inborn or something that I can learn? Will I learn these skills in business school? Each of these questions is relevant, particularly when one considers current economic and business conditions. The answers make for a worthy discussion, given the history of African Americans as power brokers in roles that influence how business is run, what partnerships are established, and how and what communities are developed.

A Few Facts

With all the press on these African-American pioneers, it may appear that African Americans have made significant progress in climbing the corporate ladder. Accounts of individuals such as Chenault and others are, at minimum, inspirational. These individuals are truly unique for they make up less than 1 percent of positions for chief executive officers, chairpersons, and presidents of Fortune 1000 companies.

African Americans are slightly better represented in senior management posts within the not-for-profit and public sectors. But don’t let the statistics dissuade you from corporate ranks. The success stories that do exist clearly show senior management positions are attainable. So what will it take? What sacrifices are involved and what is the payoff?

Is the secret to senior management about who you are, the people you know, or what you do? According to many leaders who have entered this domain, it is about all of these things. It’s also about what you feel. Passion, fervor, and determination have all been linked to success and credibility.

What are the critical components to consider? For what obstacles should one prepare? How should one benchmark readiness for this journey?

Continue Reading

The corporate world is in constant flux. The economy gets more global every day. Business is more competitive. Technology quickens the pace of change. Corporations are forced to adapt, to morph, to be agile. That pressure is passed on to employees. “The implications for individuals is that they must bring an ability to be agile, to be flexible, not with who they are, but with what is going on in the market and how it impacts business and business needs,” says Juan Johnson, president of the Diversity Leadership Academy in Atlanta. Add to the mix an anemic economy and it makes for a challenging situation for African Americans.

“When America gets a cold, African Americans get pneumonia. We are the last hired, and first fired. While we’ve maintained our numbers in some corporate downsizing, in others our numbers dwindled,” says Price Cobb, a psychiatrist, executive coach, expert on corporate diversity and co-author with Judith Turnock of  Cracking the Corporate Code: The Revealing Success Stories of 32 African-American Executives.

Without question, African Americans have seen progress. A decade ago there weren’t African-American CEOs at Fortune 500 companies. Though there are only a handful – there are a handful! Over a quarter of a million African Americans are firmly entrenched in managerial and executive positions at companies that are household names. Diversity is on the radar. Continue Reading