CONTROL YOURSELF AS A LEADER

"If you want to quickly fail as leader, simply start losing your cool"

Becoming an  irritated Person:

You would become very irritated if your oven had no temperature control and

would randomly leave your food under- or over-cooked, just as you would he

frustrated if vour fridge had a broken thermostat leaving you with rotten fond

one day and solid and frozen milk the next. We feel the same when a col-

leaque has no self-control, and it's even worse when it's the leader because

anything they say or do can have a large impact on SO many people.

I spoke about the importance of self-leadership

and a key aspect of this is how well you control yourself. This is sometimes

referred to as self-management, which forms part of your emotional intel-

ligence (EQ), a concept I explained in chapter 33. Successful leaders know

that excellent self-management is essential. Without it, you risk making all

kinds of horrible and sometimes repetitive mistakes that can have all kinds

of consequences:

Consequences Of Not Managing Self-Management:

•You repeatedly lose your temper about trivial and small mistakes made by

your  team, and some of your team members may become so upset by your

reaction that they resign.

•You have a couple of drinks and make inappropriate comments about a

work colleague, and as a result you're investigated by your HR department

and risk losing your job.

• You become upset by an email from a client who is blaming your team for

poor performance and you reply with a strong and very emotional email.

•During a management meeting, in response to someone challenging you,

you become angry and start a heated argument, causing one colleague to

say they're tired of having to work with you.