12 Questions You Need to Ask to Walk Your Leadership Talk

You simply cannot call yourself a leader unless you’re cultivating self-leadership.

Self-leadership requires you to establish a personal direction, then stay motivated and committed enough to keep working in that direction. Like everything in life, you get the best results with a daily practice. Yes, a daily practice.

Naturally, there are two symbiotic aspects to self-leadership: the mental and the physical.

Mentally, self-leadership involves self-examination and self-talk. Can you question your own beliefs and assumptions? Can you call out, then evaluate, your own thought patterns, invisible scripts, and habits?

Physically, self-leadership involves modifying your efforts and behaviors. It’s the way you actually respond to your self-examination. Can you change your habits? Can you update your modus operandi and rewire your tendencies into something more intentional?

Here are some of my favorite questions that help engage me mentally and drive me physically:

1. Did I bring my best energy to my work and home?

2. Did I choose to show up with a positive leadership presence?

3. How did my actions model behavior and build trust?

4. Was I effective at serving others?

5. Did I recognize others for their contributions and efforts?

6. How did I authentically listen and demonstrate empathy and understanding?

7. Did I lead change?

8. How did I honor or build strategy?

9. Did I solve (even a piece of) a complex problem?

10. Did I make a big decision?

11. What did I try that was new or challenged myself in a new way?

12. Was there deliberate action toward a goal?

Again, this should be a daily practice. And, yes, it is going to take a little time out of your day. And, yes, at first, you may feel weird. Even a little self-conscious.

That’s the point.

Shake things up. Invest in yourself. Reap the deepening benefits of growth, influence, and happiness every day.PS Here are five more great self-leadership resources. There’s sure to be one to fit your style.

1. Tony Robbins’s “Morning Questions: Use the Power of Questions to Change Your Life” (Note: He’s got Evening Power Questions too in Awaken the Giant Within.)

2. Josh Kaufman’s “49 Questions to Improve Your Results”

3. Marshall Goldsmith’s “Self-Questioning”

4. Tara Mohr’s Playing Big

5. Whitney Johnson’s Disrupt Yourself

P.P.S. Somebody recently asked me, “Isn’t self-leadership just a trendy word for professional or personal development?” Sure. You say to-may-toe, I say to-mah-toe.

The point isn’t to get caught up in semantics. The point is to cultivate a self-leadership practice that’s meaningful and valuable to you. Call it whatever you like. Then commit to doing the work.