The issues in leadership are pretty much universal, whether you lead a department or a global enterprise. The contexts are different, their complexities are different, but the issues we’re able to relate to practically.

When you talk to people about leadership, everyone has their own idea, or their own confusion about it. I wanted to do something simple and practical, something you can take to work with you tomorrow. So, by analyzing how the brain works, I've broken down leadership in a process of five steps.

Links Mentioned in This Episode

Takeaways from this Episode

Dr. Henry Cloud's 5 Buckets of Leadership

Realize what the desired future is.  It’s the vision, a really clear picture of where it is you want to go, the desired future.

Engage the talent that will get it there. The brain puts a team together. A leader realizes early on that there’s got to be a selection and gathering, and an engagement to pull it off.

Have a strategy or plan and executing that. Execute a plan. How are you going to get there? It gets a plan so it knows how to get from here to there.

Measure how you’re doing. You've got to know where you are in the process and hold yourself accountable to that.

Fix and adapt along the way to what you find. Evaluate where change needs to be made.

Quotes from Dr. Cloud 

Sometimes you’ve got to ask, "Where’s the pain?" And when you being to see that, it gives you a door to walk through. 

Am I result or a cause? Leadership is about a cause. If you're a cause you ask, “What does my vision need today?” If it’s clear, you need to measure it. 

Accountability is about the future. Why are we looking at where we are? So we know if we’re getting there. 

Subscribe to The Leadership University Podcast

Every Tuesday we release an this podcast as an entertaining and informative way of sharing practical advice about the fundamental and most needed competencies that every leader must develop. Think of this podcast as an easy way to move a few steps further down the path to realizing your leadership goals.

Join Dr. Henry Cloud and an exciting new guest expert each week by subscribing to iTunes or checking us out on Sound Cloud.