Mid-career crisis? Leadership is an option.

So you want to break out of the mid-career crisis?

OK, lets have a look at how you can add to your leadership skills and do just that.

Many companies struggle with expansion due to an insufficient supply of leaders. At anything below the top levels, having to recruit from outside is a sure indicator of a failure to grow the talent internally.

This is your opportunity!

Don't wait for someone else to take the initiative. Step up and "own your future"

When you start to add performance coaching skills to your management toolkit, you cease to be directive. You no longer take the position of being the functional expert who solves everyone’s problems.

Instead you acquire skills that enable you to develop the thinking and skills of your direct reports and get them to start solving their own problems.

The distinct benefits to doing this are immediately obvious in terms of saving your time. You are freed up to be the more strategic thinker that your organization needs.

Your people develop and perform well and you have identified development plans for those with the potential to be your next generation of leaders.

And there is more to it than that.

As you are no longer positioning yourself as the functional expert, you focus more on how to build a high performing team around you. The expertise lies with them, not you. You can even find yourself developing them to where they become even more expert than you used to be!

So stop and think. If you are now a leader of people, valuing different work and doing different things, why do you need to be limited to your previous functional area. You have the ability to move to any function within an organization, put teams together, develop performance and produce results though others.

You become a much more valuable asset to your organization, able to move around the organization as needed, taking up new challenges on the way.

And, should worst come to worst, you become more valuable in the market.

Many global companies require leaders to perform at C level in at least three functional areas before they can become CEO of a subsidiary. Becoming a Leader of People is how a CEO learns to be a CEO.

By making the transition you will transform your career options. No more crisis!

Look out for future articles as I cover the key skills of a Leader of People or grab an introductory subscription to TheCoachingApp to have access to ALL of my Profitable Leadership training.

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