September 2017

Dear Society Member,

It’s officially September, and for most of you, that means the fall semester is underway. As you adjust to a new schedule and make headway in the 2017-2018 academic year, I want to take a moment to discuss how effective leaders navigate difficult times.

Between classes, work, internships and extracurriculars, it’s easy to fall into survival mode with so much going on. However, when you’re in a leadership position, it’s important to maintain a safe and secure environment for your team when challenges arise.

Great leaders are those who are constantly reinventing themselves and able to adapt to the unexpected. Instead of panicking and resorting to survival mode, exemplary leaders maintain their composure and are capable of taking a step back to survey the situation. Then they swiftly detect the causes of adversity and solve them immediately.

During periods of uncertainty, adversity, and crisis, it is pertinent for leaders to appear prepared. Here are a few ways to show leadership composure in high-pressure situations:

· Take Extreme Ownership: Hold yourself accountable and take responsibility for yourself and your team. If you are delegating tasks and one of your team members misunderstood instructions, take the time to review expectations with them once more so the goals you set forth as a team are achieved. As the leader, it is important to maintain an open dialogue and ensure your guidance is being understood. Likewise, if you are in class and don’t understand an assignment, it is your responsibility to seek out your professor for an explanation early on, rather than displacing the accountability onto others. One way to put extreme ownership into practice is by making a list of the number of times you placed the blame on another person or on an external circumstance. Then determine and take note of how you could have solved the problem.

· Maintain a Positive Attitude: As a leader, your team can be positively or negatively impacted by your behavior, action, and overall demeanor. This is especially true during challenging times. Staying strong, being encouraging and smiling often are physical cues that reassure and inspires your team to remain optimistic. In order to maintain positivity, you must learn to recognize and anticipate negative situations before they arise. Use each negative situation that comes your way as an opportunity to grow. Instead of channeling a negative reaction to the situation, do the opposite with a controlled response. Finding something positive in an adverse circumstance will only improve the situation, not worsen it.

· Be Decisive and Believe: Being decisive in your words and actions is a must when trying to rally the support of your team. The first step is being fully invested in it yourself. The worst thing you could do is give your team the impression that you don’t approve of or aren’t fully invested in the course of action. Before you can sell it to your team, you must be sold on it yourself. Even if you inherited a project or plan of execution from a higher up, ask questions and create a list of the benefits and reasoning for that particular course of action. Then use that list of selling points when delivering the plan to your team, stay positive and prove that you are completely sold on the method.

It’s easy to lose composure during challenging and uncertain times. The best leaders maintain composure in times of adversity, enabling them to pause and critically evaluate what’s in front of them in order to face and resolve problems head-on. The next time a problem arises, challenge yourself as a leader to demonstrate a strong and dynamic sense of composure to motivate your team towards success.

I wish you all positive thoughts and actions as you navigate your fall semester.

Best wishes,