What is self-awareness and how important is it in leadership?

Self-awareness is probably the most powerful tool for effective leadership and personal development, says Guy Shackleton of Positive Development.

He writes:

As an NLP Practitioner, I often consider why I make the choices I do and I enjoy helping clients reveal how their current thinking influences their results. Self-awareness is the capacity for introspection and the ability to recognise oneself as an individual separate from the environment and other individuals. It is the ability to notice your thoughts, your behaviours, and your habits.

Understanding how your thoughts impact the choices you make gives you a massive advantage when it comes to leading yourself and others because it enables you to…

  • Optimise your responses to challenging people and events.
  • Capitalise on your strengths and work around your weaknesses.
  • Appreciate different perspectives and choose optimal ways to achieve your goals.

Self-awareness allows us to recognise how past experiences have affected us. Unpleasant experiences in the past or what we consider failures always have a significant impact on our future choices, actions and results. For example, imagine how being made redundant from your dream job would affect your self-esteem and choices about your next career move.

Being self-aware allows you to recognise how past experiences are influencing your decisions today and gives you the opportunity to choose more positive action in future.

You are doing great and probably aren’t giving yourself credit for what you’ve already achieved. If you want help developing your self-awareness to continue excelling in future, NLP coaching is ideal because it reveals what underpins your current thinking and allows you to choose more productive behaviours and responses. Feel free to contact us for a free consultation, I am happy to help you take the next step! 



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