Editor’s note: Meet Noah Blumenthal. His super skill is heroic leadership. Noah is the author of the nationally bestselling book, Be the Hero: Three Powerful Ways to Overcome Challenges in Work and Life and was named by Leadership Excellence Magazine as one of the world’s “Top 100 Minds in Personal Development.”

I asked Noah for a guest post after reading Be the Hero, because I liked his approach. Be the Hero is a simple framework for effectiveness.

Here’s a lens you can use to lower your anxiety and lead yourself and others more effectively.  It’s balancing connection and conviction.  It’s a good, simple model, with a lot of depth behind it.
The key is to be able to take a thoughtful position while staying connected to others who disagree.  I learned this model a few years back during my Doing Leadership @ Microsoft training.  While I liked the model right from the start, I came to appreciate it more, as I put it into practice.  It’s also a …

My manager shared Colin Powell’s lessons in leadership with our team today. I had seen Powell’s leadership lessons before, but it was a great refresher and a perfect reminder that some leadership practices never go out of style. In fact, I would argue that Powell’s leadership lessons are actually timeless principles. The beauty is that you can take his core principles and adapt them to your own situation.

How can you become a leader in your field?  A colleague shared a link to How to Be a Leader, which I found interesting.  In the article,  Philip E. Agre presents a six step recipe for becoming a leader in your field:

Step 1. Pick an issue.
Step 2. Having chosen your issue, start a project to study it.
Step 3. Find relevant people and talk to them.
Step 4. Pull together what you’ve heard.
Step 5. Circulate the result.
Step 6. Build on your work.

I think the key takeaway is that to be a leader …

During my Influencer training, one of the key concepts we drilled into was “clarify meaningful results.” What are meaningful results? Well, before you waste time on the “how”, clarify the “what” you want, the “why” you want it, and the “when” you want it.

The six sources of influence model is a powerful model for change. I first learned about the Six Sources of Influence from my Influencer Training at Microsoft. The Influencer Training is based on the book, Influencer: The Power to Change Anything , by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler. The more I walk through the model, the more I appreciate it.

This is a follow up to my previous post, Influencer Training Day 1. These are my notes from day 2 of Influencer training. It turned out to be way tougher to write up than I expected. I had a lot of notes and we covered a lot of material and I wanted to boil it down as simply as possible. This is actually my third variation and I think it’s the cleanest so far. Why would I spend so much time trying to get this right? Because I think it’s some of the most powerful information for changing you, your environment, your team, your work, or the world.

I have the privilege of taking some extreme training on influence. It’s a pilot class based on the book, Influencer: The Power to Change Anything. Influence is about changing hearts, minds, and behavior to produce meaningful, sustainable results. The beauty of the model is that it scales up and down from personal life style changes, such as losing weight, to global changes, such as eliminating diseases. I like it because it’s a simple lens to look at those persistent problems where change seems impossible. Rather than bump your head against a glass ceiling or spin your wheels without traction, it’s a systematic approach to diagnose and implement change.

What’s your story? No, not once upon a time … what’s your story of who you are, where you’ve been, and where you’re going? Your stories package and share your experience. They help you stand out if you share the right things. What are the right things? Share your unique experiences, your values, and your strengths … and even relevant flaws. Your human after all and everybody has flaws. It’s not what happens to you, but how you respond and you’re the author of your life. Choose your adventures. Write your stories with might. Lead yourself first and use your stories to guide yourself and others.

As a leader, you need to tell 3 stories: 1) your personal story, 2) a group story, and 3) the dream story. Your personal story communicates your beliefs and values. The group story helps create a shared sense of destiny. The dream story inspires people to a better future. Whether you’re a leader of a small team or large group, have these stories under your belt. If you lead a family, you can use the 3 stories too. If you just need to lead yourself, then have a personal story and dream story to remind yourself who you are and to inspire yourself to where you want to be.

One of my favorite training sessions this past year was called “Why Should Anyone Be Lead By You?” One of our exercises was to figure out our unique differentiators by looking at our life experiences. In other words, what unique skills or experiences do we bring to the table, that are relevant for this particular situation? Everybody has a story–hopes, dreams, wins, losses, and lessons learned. We write our stories a page at a time. Ultimately, it’s not how the stories end, but what we carry forward that matters.

One of the keys to effectiveness is to know and show yourself enough. If you know yourself well enough, you can share relevant information to improve communication and connect with others. One tool to help you with this is the Johari Window. I first learned about the Johari Window in one of my leadership training sessions and it peaked my interest. It’s a simple model for interpersonal awareness. If you’ve ever struggled with TMI (too much information) or self-disclosure, the Johari Window is your friend. The Johari Window was originally created by Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham in 1955 as a tool to help people understand their interpersonal communication and relationships.

It’s hard to live your values if you don’t know what they are. My dictionary defines a value as “something (as a principle or quality) intrinsically valuable or desirable.” That sounds about right. Clarifying your values is one of the first steps towards knowing yourself. You would think you know yourself after all these years, but a lot of things get in the way. For example, maybe you never took the time to write down your top five values. Or maybe, you got caught up in what you think you “should” value or what other people scripted for you. Either way, now’s the time to figure out your values.

How do you get the people on your side or inspire a vision or change the world? First win the heart. I’m blogging on this because it’s a lesson I’ve learned that shows up in so many ways, time and again. I see it in thought leaders. I see it in people leaders. I see it in everyday, conversational exchange. This is one of those ah-ha’s that when it sinks in, you find opportunities to apply it every day to improve your effectiveness.

Twenty-five years of business in 32 countries has honed my understanding of what sets successful business people apart from those whom success is an elusive quest. Five characteristics persist in leaders I have been honored to know. Although there are more than five characteristics, these five characteristics top the list.

I found an interesting article about contextual decision making. It’s “A Leader’s Framework for Decision Making,” an article in Harvard Business Review. The idea is about tailoring your decision making approach based on the context. You can use the Cynefin Framework to figure out which context you’re operating in, so you can choose the most effective response. The five contexts are simple, complicated, complex, chaotic, and disorder. The key is to determine whether to categorize, analyze, probe or act.

How do you figure out what your organization or business is really about? It’s one thing to know it intuitively. It’s another to be able to share it or have meaningful dialogue. This is extremely important in an economy that’s contracting. Obviously, it’s important when the economy is expanding too, but when the economy is contracting, it forces you to take a really good look at why the business exists. Why do people fund you? What’s the value? What’s the intrinsic value of what you do versus what’s the market value? Have you found the right efficiencies or does it cost you a $5 to produce that item that nobody will pay you more than $1 for? Here’s the tests I use to quickly know what a team, organization, or business is really about

One leadership style doesn’t fit all. According to the Situational Leadership II model, the leadership style depends on the development levels within the team. Some people might need more motivation while others need more capability. A quick cutting question to ask is, “do they want to do it?” Another question to ask is, “do they know how to do it?” These two questions can very quickly help you figure out the right approach.

When you find yourself in a situation that isn’t working for you, analyze it. You can use a simple frame for analysis: adapt, adjust or avoid. This frame can help you improve your effectiveness for any situation. For any situation that isn’t working, determine whether to adapt, adjust or avoid that situation. When you analyze, also look for the patterns. Chances are, you’ll find that you behave similarly in similar situations. Once you know the pattern and what to look for, you can spot these situations faster and improve your effectiveness.

If you coach others or you need to encourage change or if you need to change yourself, the key is to use questions. Lead others to their own insight or your advice may fall on deaf ears. You know the saying, “you can lead the horse to water, but you can’t make them drink.” Part of the reason is, asking questions puts people into a more receptive state. When people have their own “ah has” it actually creates an emotional link. This helps the insight stick. The key of course is to ask the right questions.