Me too! I am an adventurous soul and I love journeying alongside leaders with similar passions.

Ernest Shackleton has long been a hero of mine and I have always been inspired by the advert he posted for volunteers to come with him to Antarctica. Well I am not going to Antarctica (not just yet at least) but adventure and success are definitely on the menu.

“Through endurance we conquer.”

Ernest Shackleton (author of South)

How to develop as an adventurous leader

I am a great believer in coaching and mentoring of leaders, but coaching based in the context of experience, challenge and adventure. I have various leadership commitments of my own and I see raising up other leaders as part of my key responsibilities of being a leader.

Due to my other commitments, and my approach to coaching and mentoring, I only do one-to-one coaching for a maximum of 10 individuals at any one time. I also only coach people who are equally dedicated. People’s mind-sets and motivations mean more to me than seniority, sector or any other factor. Unlike with the Shackleton advert, you don’t have to be a man in order to apply!

I do now have a couple of coaching slots free so please do contact me if you, or someone you know, fits this bill:

• Do you have an adventurous mind-set?
• Do you want to be challenged?
• Do you want to develop as a leader?
• Do you want to unlock your creativity?
• Do you want to make better decisions?
• Do you want to achieve better balance across all aspects of life?

If the answer is yes to all the questions above please do drop me a line and we can talk further. Looking forward to hearing from you!

If you would like to understand more about my approach to coaching then please read An Introduction to Coaching.

“Difficulties are just things to overcome, after all.”

Ernest Shackleton (author of South)

Nick Chatrath is an entrepreneur, Managing Director and Master Executive Coach. He has worked for McKinsey and Company, been a business founder and a CEO. Nick has a DPhil from Oxford University and has co-authored a best-selling leadership book. He has coached MBA students, politicians, special forces soldiers and CEOs. In other words, he knows what he is talking about!

Apart from being a serial over-achiever, he is also my coach and friend! Here are some key lessons that I have learned from my discussions and coaching with Nick.

Leaders need to take time to reflect

When you speak to Nick you realise that being is at least as important as doing. In other words, thinking, working out your values, and your approach to life (not just work) are as important – if not more important – than your goals or your achievements.

Being this self-aware requires time. Time to reflect upon who we are and why we do things. Coaching plays a large part in creating time for reflection for leaders, and that creative process is one of the things that motivates Nick as a coach. I have seen first-hand the importance of this for myself and the leaders I coach.

One fascinating tool that Nick employs to encourage this sort of contemplation is ‘The Labyrinth’.

The Labyrinth

The Labyrinth is a reflective tool that takes clients on a journey to explore spiritual intelligence. The idea is based upon the labyrinths designed into old cathedrals, such as Chartres Cathedral in France. The labyrinth is a physical path or a track you follow, with stop-off points to allow reflection. The inspiration at each station could be a piece of text, an object, some music, or anything else that engages the senses and triggers the imagination. In this process, people can start to connect their ‘being’ to their ‘doing’ and deeply consider vital themes and ideas.

The Labyrinth effectively creates a mindful walk, which is something I have found one can replicate (if only in part) by being more mindful on a walk, no matter where you are. If you are anything like me, then generally you like to stride out and make progress when you walk. Taking time to pause can be almost physically painful! Therefore, it has become a discipline to stop, and use my senses on these types of walk.

If you want to try and do the same, you can try this. Go for a wander, it does not matter where, as long as you can avoid interruptions and choose some good places to stop and think. For example, to help you could:

• Pick up or touch a small object such as a pebble or leaf. How does it feel? How was it made, or how did it get there? What role does it play in the larger environment? Answer the same questions for yourself.
• Smell a blossom or fresh-cut grass. What memory does it invoke? What were you like then? How have you changed?
• Listen to the wind or some flowing water. How does that make you feel? Do you feel better or worse? How do you want to feel?

There are of course many other questions you could ask; these are just examples. You can be very specific if you want and use objects to think about an issue that is on your mind. On the other hand, sometimes the best results come from just meditating on the object and letting the thoughts come on their own.

Find a leadership model that works for you

“All models are wrong, but some are useful.”

George E P Box

No model or approach is perfect, but they can be instructive. Therefore, find a leadership model that works for you – relevant to your experience – and then apply it.

One leadership approach that Nick favours is ‘Healthy Leadership’. Healthy leadership is a model based on work by Keller and Price (of McKinsey and Company, and authors of Beyond Performance) to maximise organisational performance and health.

Healthy leadership looks to keep a balance between the performance needs of the company and supporting the needs of the individual within the organisation. By contrast, an unhealthy organisation has these things out of balance and will start to fail.

Leaders help others to flourish

When things are in balance, organisations succeed, and people flourish. So, good leaders maintain the balance and help people flourish. This approach to leadership – one that promotes human flourishing – is motivated by wanting to help others.

Leadership is not just about executing a vision; it’s about fostering an environment where others can do their finest thinking and finest work. A coaching, less directive approach to leadership, gives the opportunity to help people flourish and have an impact, as a leader, through the success of others. You don’t have to be a professional coach to take this sort of approach. You just need to care about the people you lead and truly want them to succeed in life and work.

One simple way to start is by asking more questions. The next time you see a colleague or employee don’t make a statement, ask a question instead. And I don’t mean a pointed question such as ‘where is the work I asked for?’ or ‘why didn’t you do what I asked?’ I mean questions that build empathy and understanding such as ‘what are you working on?’ or ‘what challenges are you facing today?’

Acts of leadership are more important than leadership roles

Here is a challenging thought: Perhaps there are no leaders, just acts of leadership.

We often think about leadership as a role, but this misses out on large aspects of what leadership really is.

Thinking about leadership as what we do and how we do it (rather than just the role we fulfil) is a releasing concept, as it empowers us all. We can all be leaders in this sense, no matter how many people are following us when we look over our shoulder.

Don’t worry about the official number of people that you directly manage, or at least don’t make that your primary measure. If you are a pioneer, you may not have any people follow you immediately. Equally, in your situation, you may just be leading yourself. That is not a problem as leading yourself effectively is foundational to leading others well.

What matters is what you do and how you do it. Whatever your measure of influence, use it well. Take responsibility for your actions and make a positive impact.

Leadership is impact

Why are leadership acts more important than leadership roles? Because leadership is impact. It is the difference you make in people and in the world.

This impact is manifest in various spheres for example:

• Self or an individual
• A team, or community
• In a larger organisation, network, or society

We all have some level of influence in these different spheres. What you do with that influence is more important than how much power you think you have.

Leaders are servants (but not slaves)

Serving others can be counter-cultural. Western culture can be very individualist and self-absorbed. Leadership in this setting can be expressed as a cult, centred on an individual. We all know of famous sports coaches hired to magically turn a team around, or celebrity CEOs, parachuted in to boost the share price. Leaders trying to emulate this type of model can wrongly try to be the hero or the saviour in their situation.

This misses the point that leadership is service. Good leaders value the people they lead. It is about valuing the whole person – which in turn comes back to the idea of leaders ensuring that people flourish.

“Serve to Lead”

Motto of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst

The paradox of servant leadership is that good servant leaders nurture themselves as well as others. They are not slaves to other’s needs or whims. It’s also not selfish to lead yourself well. You need to lead yourself effectively if you are going to lead others.

For example, if you put in long hours, just because you think you should, you will miss out on rest, exercise, and proper food. That will soon reduce your energy levels and emotional resilience. This in turn will reduce your ability to make decisions and reduce your effectiveness as a leader. Serving others may be about sacrifice at times but it is not about being a pointless martyr.

Leaders create the right environment 

Leaders create an environment where people thrive. Research has shown that this is a place of emotional safety. A place where people feel secure and supported.

The Thinking Environment is a way to create this sort of environment. The approach was pioneered by Nancy Kline (author of Time to Think) and is based on the premise that the quality of our decisions and our actions is driven by the quality of our thinking.

Leaders can negatively affect thinking and they often do. For example, they can interrupt. How many times have you been interrupted by a manager or senior in a meeting? How many times have you been that person, cutting in on someone you lead?

Don’t Interrupt

Research has shown that interruptions increase adrenaline and a fight or flight response. If we are reacting to a threat, we do not have the space to do our best thinking.

Creativity and innovation come from creating an environment where people can think and share, without fear of being shot down. We should all be fascinated by what others have to say (rather than just trying to put our points across). This is even more important as leaders.

This is counter-cultural though and therefore it takes courage for leaders to create this sort of environment.

One classic example is in meetings, as mentioned earlier. People make the mistake of interrupting because they want to get things done but ironically, letting people speak can save time as people are understood and heard without needing to repeat themselves. If being succinct is also agreed as a ground-rule, then you can transform the productivity of meetings.

Leaders often think they need to be the hero in the situation and save people with their insight or contribution. It takes humility to realise this is not the most effective way to operate. People are also much more motivated when they own the idea or the way to execute a task. Every coach knows this.

Real leadership stories are as important as theoretical leadership models

Stories are key to learning. We share experiences with each other (exactly as I am doing now) so we can gain from other peoples’ know-how and insights, even their mistakes. This practice is especially important for leaders and can often be forgotten when people are chasing after the next great leadership approach or theory. Leadership models are useful, but mostly because they help us investigate and understand the actions of ourselves and others.

The models themselves are generally born out of experience and practice, and this can be seen in the book Musings on Leadership. Nick is co-author of this best-selling book with Tor Mesoy. It is an anthology of short stories and anecdotes, real-life experiences and lessons from different domains of life and leadership. I can attest to the fact that it is a very enjoyable and accessible book; the sort of thing you can easily dip into and read a chapter on a commute.

Leaders are good at prioritisation and time management

One lesson that Nick shares in Musing on Leadership about how to prioritise and manage your time well. These skills are key to any leader and come back to the point that we need to manage ourselves well before we manage others. Nick shares some simple process and tactics for setting priorities and managing time.

Managing your to-do list

For example, if you are creating a to-do list then follow these steps:

• Make your long list of tasks
  • Then make a shortlist of what you are going to achieve the next day and
  • Next, assign time windows to each task
  • Then put it in your diary

It is important that you follow all these steps because unless you set aside the time, you are likely to never get things done. Or, you could miss the most important things, which brings us on to the next productivity hack.

The secret of prioritisation

The secret of prioritisation is simple: do the most important thing first.

That means don’t check your email or your phone until you have achieved that task! If you set your priorities in this way, it means you are much less likely to be distracted and however the rest of the day goes, you will have done the most important thing.

This concept is sometimes called ‘Be More Steve’ after Steve Jobs who advised that you should always focus on the one thing you can do, on any given day, that takes you closer to success. That task may not always be something you want to do. Hence the phrase ‘Eat that Frog’ coined by leadership guru Brian Tracy.

If you would like the interview I recorded with Nick then check out this podcast episode from The Right Questions Podcast.

I am an introvert. But people often mistake me for an extrovert because I am a leader, confident at public speaking and can be gregarious at gatherings.

The thing is I have learned to be confident and sociable. It did not all come naturally. I am more inclined to listen than to speak, to watch from the back than to step up to the front. I had to teach myself to be more outgoing and self-confident.

And that is an important fact. You can teach yourself to be more outgoing and to actually enjoy presentations and public speaking. I regularly have to speak to large groups of people – often in their hundreds – and I have learned to love it. Yes, you heard me right; love it!

You don’t need to lose your introvert superpowers; embrace them but also draw on extrovert strengths to give yourself an extra boost.

Overcoming stage fright

I first had to grapple with stage-fright in primary school. I was very self-conscious if I was called out in class or had to stand up in front of people. In these situations, I would immediately feel the panic rise and would blush, get confused, or clam up. When it came to the fight, flight or freeze stress response I would be the bunny in the headlights.

But then came The School Play.

I loved playing make-believe and (like any other kid) desperately wanted to be popular. The thought of being in the school play was both alluring and terrifying in equal measure. At this point, I must give full credit to one of my teachers. They had obviously spotted something of this conflicted dynamic in me and they cast me as the crocodile in the school production of Peter Pan.

Enter the crocodile

The crocodile? Surely that is a non-speaking part I hear you think (as an introvert you did not voice your objection out loud). But that was the point. I did not have to remember any words, I just had to play a character. Even better, I was dressed head to toe in a costume that meant that no one could recognise me.

The result was revolutionary. I was free to inhabit the stage and have fun. My stomach still tried to exit my mouth before going on, but the mask was enough to help me push through this and get onto the stage.

Then came the applause. Oh, the applause! As any introvert will know, we are just as much in need of praise as extroverts, if not more so because we are all so darned self-deprecating. The acclaim of an audience was intoxicating. I wanted more.

In terms of changing my habit loop, I had found my new reward. Now all I needed to do was link back the new confident routine to the cue of being in front of a crowd.

I can hear you musing again. You are wondering what the point of all this is. Am I expecting you to dress up as a crocodile for every public engagement?

Engage your alter-ego

The good news is no, you don’t need a crocodile suit every time you are speaking in public. Although come to think of it, it could be fun.

The real point here is that being someone else can be releasing. That is why so many famous actors are introverts. The ranks of the gloriously introverted include Tom Hanks, Harrison Ford, Gwyneth Paltrow and Julia Roberts, to name just a few. As an actor, you can be someone else. Method acting, where you continue to embody a character even when off stage or camera, is the extreme version of this.

Our fear is based on our negative assumptions of ourselves. This is the negative side of introverted humility. But you don’t need to be someone else entirely, you just need to put yourself into a different frame of mind. You need to be the best version of yourself; your mega alter-ego.

Engage your mind

So how do you make the change? You cannot always put on a mask but even getting into certain clothes or having a certain item can help prompt this switch. It is all about associating yourself with the feelings and persona you want to embody. You envision yourself as charming, funny and confident. That envisioning process can be aided by a totemic item, such as a photo of you smiling and exuding confidence. Some actors use a similar device to get into character but it is not essential.

By clearly picturing yourself as that person, on the stage, at the party or wherever your mind will start to build constructive associations. The more senses you can engage in this process – imagining the sights, sounds and affirmative feelings of that moment – the more securely you will anchor yourself to that positive projection of the confident you.

By preparing your mind in this way you are literally prepping the synapses, so they start to fire the right way, for when you step out before the crowd.

Engage your body

Your psychology is hard-wired to your physiology. In other words, what you do with your body affects your frame of mind. Having the right posture and body language can immediately change the way you feel and improve the quality of your public speaking.

Walking confidently towards an audience, looking directly at them with a smile and an open posture will set you off on the right start (even if you are not feeling necessarily confident and happy inside).

By holding our bodies in a certain way and projecting openness and confidence, not only do we reassure the audience, but we also calm ourselves. Simply put, the physical signals from our body start to tell our brain that everything is ok, and you start to overcome the freeze, fight or flight response.

Don’t think like a prey animal faced by a group of predators. When you take the stage, you become the alpha; the animal at the top of the food chain. You pursue them, not the other way around; so, don’t hide behind a lectern!

When you are up on show you want to avoid negative body language and posture. This includes:

• Folding arms (can appear defensive)
• Wringing hands or fidgeting (appears nervous)
• Avoiding eye contact (appears nervous or untrustworthy)
• Not keeping still (appears anxious and projects avoidance)
• Face and eyes downcast (appears unhappy, reduces energy and volume)

This takes practice and self-awareness but there is a simple hack to help start in the right way. I find it really useful and regularly employ the technique before I go in front of an audience. I learned this trick from psychologist Amy Cuddy and found it so helpful that I now teach to the people I coach.

Before I go onto a stage or in front of a crowd, I find somewhere quiet (this is often the restroom) and then look in the mirror and punch my arms into the air in the same way an athlete does when they win a race, or a fan does when their team scores a goal. This is the body language of success. Do this and smile, say ‘yes!’ out loud, and you will immediately transform your frame of mind. Your body language and tone will immediately be better when you step out.

You might need to do it a few times to get over being self-conscious and start to really mean it. While you do it envision that amazing version of yourself and let the transformation begin.

Engage your empathy

Empathy is another superpower of extroverts so use it. When you are in front of a crowd you are already equipped to assess their thoughts and feelings. Use your emotional intelligence to adapt your message, body language and tone, and communicate more effectively.

This does not mean homing in on your negative assumptions of what you think people are feeling. People may be tired, bored, or defensive, but it is very unlikely (especially if you have just stepped up to speak) that you are the cause of this.

Remember, every audience is just made up of people, like you. It does not matter how important or famous they are; they have many of the same cares, worries, fears and challenges as you. You have so much in common.

And you can assist them. You have a unique contribution. Even just by being positive, or being honest about your feelings, you can help them.

The experts at this are professional comedians so I recommend you study them. They know how to gauge the temperature of a room and adapt their routine accordingly. We may not all become stand-up comedians, but this is homework that we can all at least enjoy!

Exit, pursued by a bear

I cannot promise that overnight you are going to turn into Tony Robbins or Michelle Obama. Nor can I promise that you won’t feel awful before having to speak in public. But I can, both from my experience and the wonders of psychology, say that by applying these techniques and principles you can be better at public speaking.

My last bit of advice? As with any skill, start small and practice. Use these techniques before your next family gathering, rather than waiting until your first TED talk.

Public speaking is an art. But apply the science to the art and then your introverted nature will follow.

“This is an art,

Which does mend nature, change it rather, but,

The art itself is nature.”

Shakespeare, A Winter’s Tale

What do you most want to achieve in life? Which is your biggest personal goal? Do you know what you need to do in order to succeed? Would you like some good coaching questions to help you?

Don’t worry, help is here! In the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee you can work through the coaching questions in this post and have a much better plan for achieving your life goals.

As a coach, I spend a lot of time helping people think through their life goals and how to achieve them. I ask questions to help them through their decision-making process and then to outline an action plan that they can follow.

Self-coaching using coaching questions

You cannot beat going through this process with a professional coach (yes, I am biased, but evidence supports this claim) but there is a lot you can achieve on your own. I have produced this list of questions so that you can coach yourself through setting and achieving your goals.

The idea of the question process is to capture those big life dreams and break them down until you know exactly what the first step towards success is. To do this the questions are used in order, to explore your desires, delve into the motivations behind them, look at options for achieving your goals and then develop a plan for succeeding in that aim. By the end of the process, the questions lead to working out exactly what needs to be done, when, and who can help with your plan.

Answer the questions in the order they are written down here. You can answer these questions in a journal, on your device or even a scrap of paper, but I recommend you keep your answers. Recording your answers means that you have an action plan that you can refer to and refine.

“A goal without a plan is just a wish.”

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

20 self-coaching questions to set and achieve your life goals

What next?

Well done! Even just taking the time to think and work through these questions means that you are closer to achieving your goals. The next thing to do is to commit to that first step. Put it in your diary straight away. It might also help to tell someone else about what you plan to do – it is easier to commit to a plan if you have shared it.

Then, as soon as you have succeeded in that first task, plan for the next one. Then the next. It is those little steps that lead to achieving big goals.

“Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together.”

Vincent Van Gogh