When it comes to an activity or sport, there are usually 2 types of people, leaders and followers. Leaders are the people that guide and give directions. The President, your teacher, even your parents would count as leaders. Followers are the people that rely on leaders to give them guidance and direction. The people of America, students in a classroom, even yourself count as followers. If you’re a little older, there’s a good chance you’ve been both a leader and a follower. Now, I’m not saying being a leader is easy. Sometimes it can be easy, but other times it can be difficult. Knowing that 1, 2, maybe even 100 people that rely on you can be stressful. Making the right and best decision(s) for everyone can be difficult and often times stressful. But knowing these (insert number here) tips can be helpful in your leadership.
- Be humble
Being a good leader also means being humble. You don’t want to be all showy and braggy about being the leader. That’ll probably make your team and others around you not want to be around you. When you are being humble, your team and others will feel more comfortable around you. You will also appear more friendly than if you’re braggy and showy.
- Build trust
You can’t be a good leader, or even a leader at all, if you don’t have a team. Building trust with your team is very important. You can’t just expect your team to openly trust you on day 1. You have to take time to build trust with them. I suggest hosting a hang out at your house or somewhere else fun. Maybe have lunch like pizza or tacos at your hang out time. During this hang out time, get to know more about your team. You can work a lot better if you know which person in your team is good at what. For example: Let’s say that you’ve been put in charge of hosting a field trip for 20 Kindergarteners and are given a team of 4 people, Ashley, Doug, James, Connor, and yourself. During your ‘hang out’ you find out that Ashley is good at coming up with games, Doug is good at rounding up the kids when they get too wild, James is good at bringing snacks, and Connor is good at stepping in wherever he needs to. Thanks to your hang out, you know more about your team and are able to place them in the spot they’re best suited for.
- Know your limits
Being a good leader also means knowing your and your team’s limits. You don’t want to bite off more than you can chew. If you don’t know your limits, it is highly likely you will end up in very stressful situations. Basically, knowing your limits means 2 things. 1: Don’t take on more than you can. It can be very stressful for you and your team to accomplish so many things when you only have so much time. 2: Don’t take on a huge project you know is probably not going to get done. Let’s say you and your team have a research project that is due the next day. You look at your group chat and realize you guys haven’t done any talk or any work on your research project, which is worth 70% of your grade. If you wait to the night before, it becomes a big weight on your and your team’s shoulders.
- Learn from your mistakes
If you want to be a good leader, then you need to learn from your mistakes. Let’s say the week before, you accidentally told your team to arrive at an activity 2 hours later than they were supposed to. By learning from your mistake, you start to keep track of dates and times more accurately. If you don’t learn from your mistakes, it is more likely you can repeat the same mistakes. And trust me, no one wants that.
- Learn the difference between work and fun
It’s good to have fun but having fun while you’re working is probably not the best idea. I mean, it’s ok to make your work fun. To be a good leader, you need to know the difference between fun and work. Work is boring, no doubt about it. But knowing the difference between work fun and fun fun is very important. Let’s say you and your team have been assigned to move some haybales inside before it starts to rain in 1 hour. Do have fun picking out the straws in the bales and throw them at each other and completely forget about the project? Or do you make the work a game, ‘Who can move the most haybales in 1 hour?’ See? To be a good leader, you need to learn the difference of the 2 types of fun. Work fun. And fun fun.