How Chief Executives Can Improve Their Performance with Personal Reflection

Wise experienced leaders from all walks of life tell me
that personal reflection is one their most valuable tools
for remaining effective and ahead of the game.

When I seek to pass this advice on to my clients, I often
get this question “How does one effectively reflect?”

Reflection is the point of maximum learning from one’s
experiences.  Whilst experience is learning, reflection
about the experience provides even more learning.

To maximise the learning opportunity from reflection,
create a simple process that enables you to think clearly
and record your reflections.

Here are some tips you can adapt to suit yourself.

1. Choose a regular time to reflect, say 20 minutes early
in the morning or at a quiet time in the evening.

2. Choose a quiet place with no disturbances such as phones
or TV.

3. Keep a reflection journal to record insights, thoughts
or decisions you make.

4. Play soft music – 60 beat per minute works well, or
baroque music.

5. Choose a specific experience; event; time block; or
relationship for reflection.

6. Ask yourself a series of questions that stimulates
deeper and improved insights about the topic of reflection.

7. Here are a series of questions you can build upon or
adapt to suit yourself: -

a. What are your current dominant impressions about the
subject? 
b. What might lie behind the matter (or between the lines),
without making uncheckable assumptions? 
c. If you were to go through the experience again, what
would you do differently? 
d. Is there another way of looking at this subject? 
e. Who else could I discuss this subject with to get
another valuable view? 
f. What might I be avoiding in connection with this
subject? 
g. What’s really important about this subject? 
h. What action could I best take in connection with this
reflection?

Additionally, here are some topics chief executives could
reflect upon: -

1. Do you really understand your direct reports – their
feelings, concerns, pressures, needs, aims, strengths,
weaknesses and future?

2. How are you designing the best possible future for your
organisation?

3. How are you consistently communicating the values and
vision of the organisation to all your people?

4. Do all your people have absolute clarity about their
roles tasks and responsibilities in achieving the current
goals and vision of the organisation?

5. If there is a noticeable trend for HR professionals to
assume the functions that traditionally belong to the
leader, why do you think that might be?

6. Are you unwilling to participate in development/training
initiatives together with and at the same as your people,
or do you prefer to do that alone or with peers?   If so
why is that?

7. Do you have a coach or coaches?

8. Are you more of a leader or more of a high end project
manager?

9. If you just discovered your company will run out of
funds in five years, what would you do now?

10. Are you willing to plan now to use alternative fuels
and alternative technology?

11. How do you personally attract talent to your
organisation and then how do you personally act to retain
and develop them?

12. What is your personal ratio of leadership functions to
management functions?

13. If the ideal leadership/management ratio is different
to the actual, what are you doing about it?

14. Which is more important, effectively engaged employees
or delighted shareholders?

15. To what extent have you become isolated or insulated
from your people?

16. Do you have a team of well-chosen people from each area
of your business, whose task it is to reduce and streamline
the ever growing bureaucracy?

17. What is the truth about your relationship with your
board of directors?

18. Do you know how to make your organisation an employer
of choice with a waiting list of talented people?

19. Do you know the relationship between being an employer
of choice and your bottom lines?

20. If you died tonight, would your company know who to
replace you with?

21. If you discovered you were going to die in a year’s
time what would become your three top workplace priorities
and what would be your three top personal priorities?

Reflecting in solitude is really useful.  Other times
reflecting with a group of trusted people whose values you
share, is also very useful.

Chief executives often find themselves isolated.

I encourage and support them to form non-competitive and
secure self mentoring groups, where they can feel connected
and free to discuss issues and help one another grow and
improve.

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David Deane-Spread coaches board directors and CEOs. He
developed the training method for Attitudinal Competence
and authored the system “Master the Power of Your
Attitudes”. An ex-Army officer, covert operations
specialist and director and CEO of both private and public
companies, David works with his clients’ senior leadership
team to deliver excessive ROI (returns on investment).
Visit David at http://www.daviddeane-spread.com