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2. Accurately understand and appreciate your skills and limitations.
Knowing what he does well and then doing it well are among a proactive leader’s strongest assets. What you need to know is he will make a point of learning what you do well so you too spend most of your time in the strength of your game. He understands his team cannot excel unless all team members spend most of their time doing what they do best.
There is another side of this strategy that is equally important though. a proactive leader knows his limitations and will come to know yours. The team is then developed in part by filling in the identified limitations with people who are strong in those areas. Beyond this, a proactive leader is making a personal point. His limitations keep him from achieving his mission. He does not have the skills, know-how, and resources to get there by himself. For a proactive leader, you are not just a follower, a member of the winning team. You are critical to his success.
3. Be well-organized.
Organization is among the few absolutely critical characteristics of a successful leader. a proactive leader’s special brand of organization goes far beyond the day to day need to keep track of things and activities though. He has an organized mind. a proactive leader can and does think about things in an unusually organized way, has at his mental fingertips a huge range of relevant information and concepts, and routinely demonstrates his special ability to mentally organize complex problems and issues.
a proactive leader’s level of mental organization sets him apart from merely competent leaders. He fully understands what needs to be understood. This by itself is impressive. The truly amazing thing though, is a proactive leader maintains this level of organization over time, as circumstances change, as what is important shifts, as information serves its purpose and is replaced with new information. Among other benefits for the team, a proactive leader’s exceptional mental organization lets him see problems before they are problems, opportunities before they are opportunities, and solutions before others recognize there is an issue. By the time something needs done, he has already done it. His master touch is he makes it look easy. Unless you observe closely, you may never know anything exceptional is happening, right before your eyes.