By Michael Gidlewski

Last week, I touched on Personal Leadership Mastery, but what does it really mean?

“Leadership is the lifting of a man’s vision to higher sights, the raising of a man’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a man’s personality beyond its normal limitations,” said Peter Drucker.

To be effective, doing the right things, is the job of the leader. Neither the strength of authority nor the persuasiveness of charisma will solve the problem. Only the development of the internal attributes of personal leadership can supply the strong, confident individuals needed to exert public leadership.

My mentor, Paul J. Meyer, the founder of Leadership Management International, said: “Personal leadership is the self-confident ability to crystallize your thinking so that you are able to establish an exact direction for your own life, to commit yourself to moving in that direction, and then to take determined action to acquire, accomplish, or become whatever you identify as the ultimate goal for your life.”

What is your goal for your life? Do you know? Are you passionate about it? Does it motivate you?

Traditionally, we view people as great leaders when they are successful in terms of wealth, prestige, and popularity. But if these are the only criteria you use, you are unable to account for the vast number of people who live rewarding, satisfying lives without achieving worldwide acclaim or great wealth. Their commitment to what is important to them constitutes winning behavior and success and demonstrates the reality of personal leadership.

Personal leadership is an inside-out job. You cannot wait for someone else to push you; you must motivate yourself through goal-setting. In As a Man Thinketh, author James Allen compares the mind to a garden that “may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild: but whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will, bring forth. If no useful seeds are put into it, then an abundance of useless seeds will fall therein, and will continue to produce their kind.”

Your job is to continually plant seeds that will help you become a great leader.

In his book, Good to Great, Jim Collins discusses Level 5 leadership. A Level 5 leader builds enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will.

“Level 5 leaders channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal of building a great company,” he wrote.

As you continue your journey toward Personal Leadership Mastery, you will discover that the greatest leaders serve a purpose that reaches much farther than their own self-interest. These leaders do not influence others by wielding control over them, but by serving the common good. By focusing on the needs of your people and your customers, you can improve their lives, and they will help you achieve your goals.

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Michael Gidlewski is President of West Chester-based Achievement Unlimited, Inc., as well as a growth catalyst and motivational speaker. He works with motivated business owners and entrepreneurs to clearly define the elements of what they dearly want their businesses and lives to look like, then helps them connect all the moving parts that make up those visions to consistent action and habits. Michael can be reached at 610-793-6609 or via e-mail at michael@achievable.com.

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