Lead with learning

It takes a lot of courage for a leader to stand up and say “I don’t know the answers, but I’m going to figure it out.” The best leaders start with learning. They build a culture of continual growth and learning.

Imagine the CTO who learns cockroachDB in her spare time to help her team stay innovative. Or the CEO who enrolls in altMBA to improve his leadership skills. Or the Latin teacher who picks up coding to teach her students a new skill.

How would the posture of these organizations change?

When the leader stands up and says, “I’m not perfect, but I can get better” a tone is set. Perfection isn’t the expectation, continual improvement is. An organization where people focus on getting better every day is one that will reap the benefits of compound growth. A firm that isn’t afraid of making mistakes is one that will be able to innovate and push new boundaries.

And we learn best when we learn together. Taking on the unknown together strengthens a team’s bond. Group learning creates social pressure that helps us push through when things gets hard. (when things get hard which is precisely where growth happens).

Great things can happen when you lead with learning…