Written by: Leah Tomlin, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Life and leadership go hand in hand. We must never excel in one, to the detriment or demise of the other. Both should nurture and nourish the other. Transforming your life and leadership can happen from any professional or personal perspective. In fact, the greatest of transformations often happen from the lowest of points.
Transformational learning is about creating a profound shift in thinking and behaviour. It is taking the learning beyond simply knowing something. Neuroscience has long informed us of the brain’s remarkable capacity to reorganise its neuronal connections in response to stimuli. The level to which this neuroplasticity occurs is variable from one individual to another, and within any one individual's lifetime. Transformational change is about dreaming the future that once seemed impossible to achieve, setting goals, shifting mindsets and strategically making change happen.
Start your life and leadership transformation today:
1. Get clarity on your values
Don’t pay lip service to your values. They are the powerhouse for your life and leadership. The ‘Values In Action- Institute on Character’ provides a free template for assessing your values and determining strengths and areas for development.
Once you are clear on your values, make sure they:
Resonate with your professional and life passions
Align with your organisation's values
Dictate your vision and mission
Drive everything you do
Determine who you engage with
2. Get clarity on your goals
Write down your life and leadership goals, make them visible and make sure they dictate your daily actions. Assess what’s missing from your life and leadership and plug the gaps. This may require learning new skills or gaining new experiences. People who have goals are more likely to succeed. I keep a planner notebook with my goals clearly displayed on the inside cover. Here they are accessible and can inform my daily action diary- all as one ongoing log of planning, action and reflection. The goals are the end-results you want to achieve. Your mission and actions are how you’Il get there; one step at a time.
3. Visualise your future successful self and rehearse the thoughts, feelings and behaviours of that new life
Once you know where and who you want to be, you should start to rehearse life and leadership from that position. Even thinking about the thoughts, behaviours and feelings involved from that perspective, will initiate re-wiring of your neural networks in preparation for the real deal. This is where the transformation begins to take hold in our brains. Observe your thought patterns and interrupt any beliefs that might limit your progress. Replace them with those that align with the person you are becoming, and the leadership traits that the new you will one-day effortlessly exhibit. Think, feel, breathe, stand and behave like the most successful version of you that is evolving.
4. Step outside your comfort zone and learn to enjoy it there
Our brains are hard-wired to avoid stressful or anxiety-inducing activities. This once served us well, when deadly predators roamed amongst us, and we had to be perpetually on-guard to save our lives. Thankfully, today life is somewhat different, but the neurological make-up of our mid-brains, and our stress response, remains much the same. We can feel immense fear at the simple possibility of stepping outside our comfort zones. Recognise that fear, absorb the anxiety and put it into perspective (as a function of your brain trying to protect you where it’s no longer required to). Feel the calm that follows and jump head first (without over-thinking) into that public speaking event or that team-talk you’ve been avoiding. Imagine the feeling once you’ve achieved it.
5. Raise your productivity
Block out time in your week. Look at your calendar and set time aside for your leadership and your life goals. Which part of the week will you reserve for meeting-free time? When will your business strategy or marketing time be? When does it serve you and your mission best to take a break? Neuroscience studies show us that we learn more profoundly when we take a break directly following a significant learning period. The neurons create new connections more readily during the sleep that follows intense learning than during the learning activity itself. Breaks and quality sleep are fundamental to great leadership, transformational learning and longevity.
Block out time in your day and make sure you factor-in time for significant projects that really propel you towards those goals. This might include writing a report, creating a funding proposal, a business plan or a presentation. Keep firm boundaries around these non-negotiable times. You might do this by using an old-fashioned timer (avoiding the timer on your phone, as a device with all its notifications may simply serve as a distraction). Blocking an hour or two out every day where you focus on un-interrupted big actions, and breaks, is key to creating transformational change.
Do 5 things every day to achieve your goals. Write down these 5 actions in the notebook that becomes your daily planner. Discard those long lists that merely serve to pre-empt our failure. Nobody has time to get through 30 significant actions in a day, and if they do they must question who or what it is that’s missing in their lives.
6. Get out in nature, or get creative
However you recharge your batteries, allow the calm and balance to settle back into your mind, with something creative or spiritual. This doesn’t happen on its own, and I know this only too well, as it used to be the first thing I’d allow to slip before I reassessed my priorities. We need to take time for our mental, emotional, physical and social wellbeing. A creative hobby or a few moments to appreciate the beauty of the world can be immensely productive in terms of our goal achievement.
7. Take time for gratitude
Taking time for gratitude in the world, and for what we have within it, has a neurological benefit. The neuromodulator Dopamine is powerful in determining our energy and mindset. The amount of baseline Dopamine that we have acting on our brains, determines precisely how focused, energised and motivated we are, and how much pleasure we gain from our activities. When we are excited, energised and motivated about our lives it’s because we have higher baseline Dopamine. It is precisely this increase in the powerful neuromodulator that determines our ability to pursue and achieve our goals. Conversely, if dopamine is low, this leads to depression and lethargy. We can increase our dopamine in many ways, but a great way to do this is gratitude journaling, taking time to appreciate activities deeply, finding pleasure in the world around us and thinking positively about the activities we engage in, on a professional and personal level.
8. Get a coach
Coaching is increasingly recognised to offer a powerful model for transformational development for executives, their leadership competency, for organisational change, as well as monetary benefits such as increased return on investment. However, coaching is an unregulated industry, so do your homework before employing a coach. Make sure they have a recognised Executive or Leadership Coaching qualification, with significant business or senior leadership experience, and that they are aligned with your values and your mission. Relationships are pivotal to the success of coaching, so make sure you trust them to help you get results and that you feel a rapport. This fit for working together must be tried and tested before you commit to the ongoing support of a coach.
9. Get Networking
Don’t underestimate the power of your network in escalating your transformation. Make sure your working network contains a rich supply of:
Supporters- People who are on your side, lift you up and boost you.
Role models- People you admire and respect and wish to emulate. They may be a mentor or an expert leader.
Consultants- People who have the information, skills or influence to help you achieve your goals.
If any of these people are missing from your network, seek them out, befriend them and offer them something of value. Nurture these relationships and they will later serve you well. Positive close relationships increase our levels of the hormone, Oxytocin. This in turn leads to increased dopamine, with the benefit of increasing motivation, pleasure and focus.
10. Reflect
At the end of every day/ week, reflect on what went well and decide what you will do tomorrow/ next week. Keep this reflection in your daily planner and allow the next stage to be informed by it. This step is the one that I see clients most reluctant to carry out, but it is an often under-estimated and crucial step in deep transformational learning.
Remember, the road to success is convoluted, with dips, highs and unexpected turns. The transformational journey will involve planning, success, failure and adaptability, along with a range of changing emotions. These emotions should remind you that you’re alive and harness great potential. With application of the right actions, consistency and resilience to setbacks, you will absolutely transform your life and leadership.
Leah Tomlin, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Leah coaches professional women for transformation in leadership and life. She holds an exceptional range of qualifications and skills as a certified Executive Coach, business owner, published Neuroscientist and qualified Head Teacher. Her understanding of the brain, and how people learn, ensures she inspires transformational, life-long positive impact for leaders and their organisations. Her scientific background allows her to employ evidence-based brain and coaching methodologies that achieve success.
Leah is passionate about gender equality, helping propel more women to the top and seeing them succeed as incredible leaders. She empowers women to understand how their brains can help and hinder them, enabling them to develop greater self-awareness, confidence and a dare-to-dream vision. Her clients love the way she coaches with emotional intelligence and warmth, focused on improving their leadership competency and helping them develop new and effective professional behaviours and habits. Working with Leah, leaders achieve greater success for themselves and their teams, as well as creating supportive cultures of excellence in their workplaces.
Leah lives in Bristol, England, as a single mum to her three young children. She is passionate about wellbeing and takes time to enjoy her hobbies, including music, film, reading, art and design, yoga and dog-walking.
