This book moves beyond the conventional leadership mantra of building on one's traditional strengths through introspection and demonstrates the need for personal growth based on real-life experiences.
In brief, INSEAD Professor Ibarra's advice is "act first, and then change your way of thinking."
Making the transition
Ibarra recognises that it's easy to get stuck in the "competency trap" - you get promoted because you do good work but then find you don't have time to do the work of delivering the key points of leadership: building bridges between the team and others; honing and explaining your vision of the future; engaging people in change; and “embodying that change".
So how do you change when you also need to lead?
"Outsight"
In contrast to conventional thinking, Ibarra puts forward the concept of what she calls "outsight" as a key principle for leadership. Outsight is the fresh, external perspective you can get when you do new and different things – plunge into new projects and activities, interact with different kinds of people, and experiment with new ways of getting things done – and then observe the results of your actions. It’s the opposite of learning by self-reflection, in which we seek insight in our past behaviours. Outsight often surprises us, paving the way for radically new patterns of thought and action.
Things you can do to apply this approach
- Challenge your habitual identity by trying on new ways of acting, pushing the boundaries of your 'authentic' self to include what feels new and uncomfortable.
- Make the gap between where you are now and where you want to be create the motivation and courage to make changes and try out new ways of behaving.
- Sign up for one new project or extracurricular professional activity that takes you outside your usual area of expertise.
- Reach out to people you don't know and ask them for coffee.
- Identify two people whose leadership you admire and start watching them closely. What do they do especially well? Then adopt some of what they do.
Start acting and thinking like a leader now
Stretch yourself to take action now, and recognise that you may not see at first how all the dots connect as you start branching out beyond your comfort work zone, habitual networks and historical ways of defining yourself. Then slowly but surely a more central and enduring leader identity will emerge and take root.
"A man has as many selves as the roles he takes on."William James