All this month, we’ve been talking about healthy habits of leaders in our free Facebook group, the Thought Leaders Think Tank. We’ve discussed reading and community, and for the final week of the month, we selected the hardest habit of all: asking for help.
It’s something leaders resist like the plague. Asking for help? Doesn’t that mean we’re weak? That we’re not capable?
No, actually. If we aren’t asking for help, we aren’t truly stepping into our leadership role. Here’s why.
(I recorded a previous video, 12 minutes long, that had NO sound — and I wasn’t getting notifications. So if you see some references to tech glitches, that’s what that’s all about!)
Skip around:
0:00 – 1:23: Welcome + housekeeping about what’s next
1:23 – 2:35: Introduction of today’s topic of asking for help
2:35 – 3:52: Storytime! We didn’t ask our first VA for ANY help
3:52 – 10:39: Storytime! We didn’t ask our mentor for help, either!
10:39 – 13:00: How do you know WHAT to ask for help with?
13:00 – 16:40: Why is it so hard for leaders to ask for help?
16:40 – 20:25: The benefits of asking for help
20:25 – 26:06: Storytime! That time I asked for help and felt dirty about it
26:06 – 35:05: How do you overcome your objections to asking for help?
35:05 – 39:19: What is the true mark of a leader? {It ain’t a title or position!}
39:19 – 41:17: My challenge to you!
Don’t have time to watch the video? Here are the main takeaways:
This episode dives into the importance of asking for help for leaders. Don’t have time to watch the whole video? Here are the main points.
One question you can use to ask for help (5:02, 11:48):
Recently, we asked our mentor, “What missing opportunities are you seeing from your perspective that I’m not seeing?” The answer legit changed the way we show up for our business.
This is a powerful question to ask, but bear in mind you have to be ready to hear and receive the answer. It might be big. It might be a gamechanger. And that might be scary.
The box is bulls*** (6:30):
When we put the people around us into boxes (the coach box, the ad strategist box, the copywriter box), we limit their potential. And we limit our own! The box is bulls***.
Leaders and their love affair with control (13:00):
As leaders, we sometimes feel like OUR way of doing things is the BEST way (and sometimes, we’re just ignorant to other ways of doing things). Regardless, when we adopt this mindset, we stifle the creativity, empowerment, and growth of people around us, and we ultimately hurt ourselves and our relationships with others.
There’s also a fair amount of ego involved for many leaders, which happens when we consider leadership a POSITION instead of a MINDSET. If we let go of control, we step into our fuller purpose as visionaries while empowering the people under us to have autonomy and creative design over their work… which increases their passion for what they’re doing, and their satisfaction.
Deep-down, we all want to contribute (17:06):
We want to make the world a better place, and we want to contribute to that process. When we empower other people by asking them to help us, we help them live into this deep desire. When we ask for help, we cultivate a better world.
How do we come down from our control power trip? (26:32)
Lots of ways! Here are two.
- Commit to a mindset shift around the BEST way to do something. It’s not necessarily OUR way. You can ask someone to do something, but don’t micromanage HOW to do it.
- Acknowledge that our way of doing things is, by nature, limited. It comes from our past experiences, our feelings, etc. We have a limited view of the world, and when we ask for help, we’re able to widen our limited view.
- Leave your ego at the door and commit to lifelong learning.
