Higher Standard

     Being a leader means you will be held accountable to a higher standard. This makes your world a little more complicated, but unfortunately that’s the price of leadership. To some of you, being held to a higher standard may come easy to you, for others, it may be a challenge. The objective is to realize that you will be held to a higher standard and rightfully so.      
          This means that everyone around you—your employees, vendors, bosses, potential candidates, etc. are evaluating your every move. This is normal and understandable. Why shouldn’t others evaluate you? If you happen to be on the forefront of your department or organization than that’s the responsibility you take on. The point being, you have to be aware that this takes place so you understand that you have to hold yourself to a higher standard first. By holding yourself accountable to the leadership principles that you believe in and know are critical to being a successful leader, then when others evaluate you, there is a higher probability that you are doing right and your critics will be few.
     The other side is that as a leader, you know you live in a world of higher standards so you cannot be soft skinned. There will be those people who will attempt to find holes and they will point them out whether right or wrong. It will happen and it is never enjoyable. However, how you respond to these types of criticisms will have a bigger determining factor on what type of a leader you are versus the mistakes you make. John Maxwell in his book Today Matters quoted Walt Emerson who said, “What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”
     Reality is that as leaders we are not perfect. We have to learn and make mistakes like everyone else. We also have to have the ability to admit when we make mistakes and do our best to apologize, learn from them, and move forward. Because the bottom line is—in one way or another, you were put in the position of leadership. So accept your role and lead to a higher standard!