my favorite part of my "job":

What I love about my position as a team lead is that I get to grow other leaders. I have only wanted to move into leadership to help others achieve their goals, and I didn’t care what profession I was doing it under. I’ve had the pleasure of promoting two people in the one year that I have been team lead (a bit of a humblebrag, I know). There’s something about the moment that someone confides in you their goals and aspirations that makes you, as a leader, jump for joy because you know you have something positive to help another work towards. There’s a lot about being a team lead, supervisor, etc. that is just the minutiae of working with people and no leader enjoys having those conversations. However, the moments when you are telling someone that they are on track toward their goals or have met their goals is so rewarding for everyone.

It helps that both of these people came on to my team telling me immediately they had goals to become team leads. They are both quite ambitious and I can appreciate those characteristics because I have always been the same way. In my past, I have had the pleasure of working under bosses that have not been leaders. When I introduced my goals and aspirations to them they seemed to take it as a personal challenge to ensure that I did not reach those goals. It was a constant battle of receiving feedback, understanding the path I needed to take, or running directly into brick walls built by them. This did not stop me in the least bit. This became my motivation to work harder towards my goal so that I could become the leader that others needed. I learned from these bosses what a leader was and was not so that I could apply that once I took on the same role. It has been my mission to ensure that others, such as the two on my team that have moved up, reap the benefits of my past lessons.

These are the types of lessons that I have learned that I want to share with others. It’s not so much a “how-to” but more of a way to show that not everything is a situation that these things just come to you. It’s hard work, it’s a lot of being told no and having bosses that are not leaders, and it’s about voicing what you want. I want you all to know that you’re not alone so I’m sharing what I’ve learned in my journey and what I do to show my people how they are important and can achieve whatever they set their mind to. For now, this is just me being excited about getting to tell someone they have reached their goal, later I will share how I go about mentoring my employees to get there. Keep an eye out!

much love,

B

image borrowed from @paul_