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3 ways to unlock your leadership potential using Self-Reflection

3 ways to unlock your leadership

Summary: If you do not reflect on your leadership style and the techniques you use, how will you know if they are working or not? You need to see what works and what doesn’t and give yourself the honest feedback you deserve about your progress.

Become the best self. Know yourself more and pace your life in a way to achieve the most number of learnings from one single experience. So, pause, breathe, smile and read on to discover the power of self-reflection. 

Deepak Chopra, one of the leading alternative medicine spokespeople who has published many influencing books, says, “People who become great leaders are those who take time to reflect every day on the big questions: Who am I? What is my purpose? Who are my influencers? What are my unique talents, and how do I express them? This Indian-American author also ranks executives and their companies in terms of just business practices to promote economic justice. Through his journey, he realized the importance of self-reflection for a leader. He states the essence of the personal discovery of a leader starts with self-reflection.

So what are 3 things that you can do to practice self-reflection?

Look within yourself

Reflection starts from looking at one’s behavior pattern, thought process, experiences, strengths, weaknesses and how to influence others as a leader. You need to ask yourself questions. It could be about what went well in a meeting, your top 3 takeaways from the week, or what you would do differently if you had the chance to do something again. These prompts will help you become a well-rounded leader, making you more thankful for the small things in your life.

Journal entry

Reflection is a muscle that you need to exercise daily. At the end of the day, before you leave your desk, schedule 10 minutes to reflect on your day. Pay attention to what worked for you and also to what did not work. Choose to look at every situation with gratitude. Going this extra mile will help you become an effective leader.

Narrate your experiences to yourself

When trying to reflect, be sure to be as descriptive as possible. It is essential to trace the emotions and the feelings to understand yourself. When you narrate the incidents to yourself, you get a different perspective. Doing so will enable you to comprehend your strengths in a detailed manner. Be honest with yourself as you write about your experiences, the wins, the misses, the uncomfortable, and the joyful. You need not have great structure, just write.

Impact on leadership

Reflection on the best leadership moment will give you a burst of positive feelings. Research indicates that reflection of this sort will increase your engagement with your team about your long-term goals and vision.


Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States of America, starts his day with gratitude for his previous day and reflects on what he could have done better and what his achievements were during the year. But as a leader, you can learn something new every day and every week if you reflect just like Obama does.

Star Mindset

Do you want to leave your office feeling satisfied and return knowing you can do something better the next day? Becoming the better leader who leaves a graceful impact on your stakeholders is a mindset. You can employ this mindset through intentional reflection and gratitude.

3 Immediately Applicable Action Steps

  1. After every meeting, make your team stay for 5 minutes and make everyone tell what they liked and what they didn’t. Reflection starts from you and spreads to your team.
  2. On the last day of the week, note down your plans for the next week, depending on the goals achieved in the current week.
  3. Structure your reflections well. Reflect, report, respond, relate, reason, and reconstruct.

References

  1. Don’t Underestimate the Power of Self-Reflection. (2022, March 21). Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2022/03/dont-underestimate-the-power-of-self-reflection 
  2. Jennings, R. E., Lanaj, K., Koopman, J., & McNamara, G. (2021). Reflecting on one’s best possible self as a leader: Implications for professional employees at work. Personnel Psychology, 75(1), 69–90. https://doi.org/10.1111/peps.12447 
  3. Neale, P. (2021a, September 9). Self-reflection in leadership – Part 1: Ambitions, Values and Personality. Unabridged Leadership. Retrieved 2022, from https://unabridgedleadership.com/self-reflection-in-leadership/ 
  4. Neale, P., PhD. (2021b, December 23). Seven Tips For Designing A Leadership Self-Reflection Practice. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2021/12/22/seven-tips-for-designing-a-leadership-self-reflection-practice/?sh=575452c21ea0 

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