Now you may be thinking I have a typo of some sort, or maybe I am just trying to write a fancy headline to capture your attention (I confess the latter does have some truth).  But the reality is that great followership skills are needed for any successful team!  Want to have great Leadership skills? Learn to be a great follower!

The idea of being labeled a follower has a stigma attached to it.  For example – they are passive, weak people who only do what they are told.  This could not be further from the truth.  Followership is role, just like leadership is.  Both are critical to the success of a team. not everyone can lead at the same time.

Leadership is a fluid role.  When you think about it – everyone at some point in time is a follower.

The formal definition of Followership is the capacity or willingness to follow a leader (Merriam-Webster).  When you think about capacity to follow, it extends beyond following instructions or being able to follow what someone tells you to do.

A good follower brings to the table their integrity, ability to contribute and share ideas, their skills, knowledge and ability to work with others.  Hmmmmm very similar to a leader.

Good Followers are active and can think for themselves.  It’s not about doing what you are told to do.  It is about working with a team to accomplish success of a common goal / vision.

How does this all apply to Network Marketing?

• We all have an upline or a mentor to learn from and grow with.  We take on a followership role in this instance
• Having good followership skills helps us to keep ourselves open to new thoughts and ideas.  Sometimes when we lock ourselves into the “Expert” role, we are not as open to new and fresh ideas from those who may have less experience.  We narrow our vision and limit success in this manner
• We model for our team members success strategies
• It puts us in the position of working collaboratively and place focus on helping others.
  

Below is a great video “The Art of Followership: How Great Followers create great leaders & Organizations

The ability to follow is a indeed a necessary Leadership Skill including the network marketing industry.

If you would like more insight on how you can develop as a leader in network marketing, download Success in 10 steps.  It is free and exemplifies what is needed to have real network marketing success.

To Your Success

Cheryl Lydston

I came across a very interesting report done by IBM called “Capitalizing on Complexity, Insights from the Global Chief Executive Officer Study” More that 1500 Chief Executive Officers world wide were interviewed for this study.

With today’s economy and high competition, the report indicates that CEO’s face a great deal of complexity like never before.

Creativity is the Leadership Characteristic that the CEOs in this study highlighted as one of the most important aspects of being able to deal with the complexity of the business challenges today.

So how does this apply to the business of network marketing?
Like all other business, Network marketing deals with the current economic state and the competition in the field.  While there are a large number of benefits to this industry, it is not isolated from the rest of the world.  Complexity surrounds us all! It is vital for companies within the industry to be creative in their approaches to building business.

This requires the leadership characteristic of Creativity.  So how do you  develop creativity in your network marketing business:

• Keep an open mind.  In my opinion, this is critical to creativity.  There are many ways of building a network marketing business.  Many of the traditional approaches have been replaced.

• Be flexible and willing to look at new ideas and ways of doing business.  If you have been in the MLM industry a while, you may be resistant to some of the new approaches.  If your business is not where it should be or used to be, consider looking at some innovative ideas.

• Re-examine past practices and toss them out if they are outdated.  Does making a list of 100+ or buying leads really help your business to grow?  Area you alienating your friends? Is it time to stop wasting your time and money on some of these practices?  Really think about this to see if it is still effective for you today.

• Interacting with your fellow team mates including those individuals who are new to the team.  Network marketing is about relationships.  What better way to learn, grow and come up with creative solutions than to interact with those in your business.  Even the new folks can shed a new perspective on a complexity you are facing.

• Finding out what your customer wants / needs.  Developing a relationship with them.  This can lead to creative ways of better serving them.  Having a happy customer is essential.  Think of the impact it will have if they see you are implementing one of their suggestions!

These are just a few insights on the Leadership Characteristic of creativity.  You have it within you and your team, be open to using it!

If you are looking for new ways of doing business that may differ from what you are currently doing now, I encourage you to look at the free report Success in 10 steps. It is free and offers an effective approach that can help your business grow.

To Your Success

Cheryl Lydston

Merriam Webster defines Courage as the “mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear or difficulty.  It takes courage to build a business.  It really is an important Leadership Characteristic that one must possess in network marketing.

My goal is to share with you my thoughts on Courage and how it can affect your Network Marketing business

Courage does not always roar.  Sometimes courage is the little voice at the the end of the day that says I’ll try again tomorrow. ~ Mary Ann Radmacher

When I think of courage, the things that often come to mind are the acts of the brave fire fighters, police officers, and soldiers. Yes they truly are heroes and give a lot of themselves to help protect us. But Courage does exist in our lives more often than we realize.

Think of your day to day life.  Then take a look as some of the following examples of courage:

• Express your thoughts and opinions
• Stand up for what you believe in
• Go out of your comfort zone
• Start a new business
• Change careers
• Learn or try something new
• Make new friends
• Make amends
• Be open to others’ thoughts and views

In Network Marketing, courage is very much part of the business.  It is evident that a growing number of people are aware of using the Internet to build their business. But still for many, the first thing that comes to mind is making a large list of people, contacting all your friends and family, making cold calls to people you don’t know or getting 100 “No” responses, please rest assured this is very much unnecessary.

Courage is needed to go out of your comfort zone and develop relationships with those who are interested in the business.  It may be to learn skills necessary to grow a successful business.  It can be a shift in thinking, being open to new ways of doing things or possibly just taking an honest assessment of how you are doing. It can be as simple as committing to take consistent daily action regardless of the time spent.  Courage to believe in yourself.

Courage in business does not always involve a huge visible risk.  It is the small steps we take and the courage that goes a long with it that counts.  It is an essential Leadership Characteristic in building your business.

Courage is being afraid but going a head anyways ~ Dan Rather

]]> http://attractionmarketingleadership.com/blog/leadership-characteristic-of-courage/feed/ 3 http://attractionmarketingleadership.com/blog/handling-criticism-is-an-important-leadership-skill/ http://attractionmarketingleadership.com/blog/handling-criticism-is-an-important-leadership-skill/#comments Mon, 05 Jul 2010 23:45:01 +0000 Cheryl http://attractionmarketingleadership.com/blog/?p=360

Dealing with criticism is an essential Leadership Skill. I have just read another brilliant post by John Maxwell regarding this subject –  “When you Get Kicked in the Rear, You Know You’re Out in Front”  Maxwell indicates that criticism is a part of leadership and good leaders must know how to handle it.

He covers 5 key areas for dealing effectively with criticism:

• Know yourself
• Know the criticism and the critics
• Stay Open to Change
• Accept Yourself
• Forget Yourself
  

I highly recommend reading this article.  You can easily access by Clicking Here.  Handling criticism is an important Leadership Skill.

John Maxwell is an amazing leader.  I appreciate his work and find great value in what he has to offer.  His work is a must for anyone wishing to improve their leadership abilities.

Two Free Effective Marketing Tools for Network Marketers are Google Alerts and Google Reader.  It is essential to keep up on your niche, the network marketing business and anything else that may be related to your business. These are some of the best tools for the job!

Google Alerts: Google Alerts is a wonderful way to search the Web and have the results sent to your email account.  If you use a Google email account, you also will have the ability to manage them.  You can choose the type of content you wish to receive, the frequency and the number of results.  It also allows you to set up several alerts.  You can utilize different search terms based on your interests.

I have alerts sent to my email account on a daily basis.  It gives me an opportunity to see the latest news in my areas of interest.  I also have discovered some wonderful blogs related to my niche.  It is much easier than doing searches on my own.

Google Reader: Once you have located some great blogs, you may want to consider subscribing to them. Google Reader is fantastic for organizing all of your blogs. You can place the blogs in different categories (i.e. Network Marketing, Internet Marketing, Leadership)

There is no better way to keep up with all of the material and information.  Google Reader allows you to easily skip over articles that do not interest you and focus on the posts you want to read.  Google reader also gives you the option of sharing content with others.

Benefits: There are huge benefits to reading other’s content.  Obviously you will educate yourself on what is going on in your niche and with the network marketing industry.  It will also give you an opportunity to connect with others who share similar interests.  By reading other blogs and sharing your thoughts, you are opening yourself up to new business connections and positive relationships.

Some of the most effective Marketing Tools are free!  Google Alerts and Google Reader are two great examples!

A wonderful article was recently posted on the Trump Blog on the proper use of Facebook . I highly recommend people who want to use Facebook as a form of social media marketing to read the article Wall to (Facebook) Wall Marketing for Investors and Entrepreneurs.

The article highlights the right and wrong ways to market your business without alienating others.

The author is Koz Khosravani, an Internet expert, computer analyst  and a top speaker who has worked with the best! (such as UCLA, Harvard, Microsoft, Anthony Robbins and of course Trump).

I really enjoy reading the blog posts from the Trump Initiative.  The authors do an excellent job presenting valuable information.

There are a lot of Internet Marketing gurus and trainers. Choosing effective Marketing training can quite frankly be a bit overwhelming. Before spending your hard earned money, you may want to consider the following:

Check out Free Training Offered:
This is important. You will get a sense of what someone has to offer, their training style, ability to communicate, and ability to teach. Pay close attention to this. I believe that people learn differently. Know what works for you.

I had once spent a great deal of time and money on a membership training site. I did learn a lot, but still did not grasp the whole concept of the Internet marketing. It was not until I took a free training course, where I actually was able to put all the pieces together (to this day one of the best trainings I ever received)

Was the other training course bad? No, I believe that it just did not suit my learning style. Other people were experiencing a great deal of success using the training. I just had to find something that suited me.

Resist the Pressure to Buy It All
Ahhh the Marketing Funnel – the offer – The call to Action. Important aspects of Internet marketing. I have learned over time to resist the temptation to buy every training course encountered. And there are a lot of great courses out there!

It is easy to loose focus when you are bombarded with offers that seem way to good to pass up. I was caught in this trap and as a result wasted a lot of time. I have learned that there will continue to be great courses offered in the future.

You may want to think about what you are trying to achieve and what your goals are when choosing a course. I actually pulled back from it all so that I could gain perspective on what it was I wanted to achieve. I wanted to focus on building my network marketing company. I was getting pulled into too many directions.

Other Factors:
Do you trust the trainer? How does their style and personality jive with yours? Is the information taught something that can be easily shared with your team (Duplication!), does it appear that the the training is just a way of selling products to your downline?

I ended up choosing courses because there was no high pressure to join anything. I believed the trainer remembered that I was a customer and was accessible and believe or not, because he said Thank You – and it was sincere.  The training was clear and easy to understand.

Effective Marketing Training can help you build your network marketing business. Just remember your goals and your main focus – building your network marketing team!

If you are at a loss of where to begin, there are two excellent resources.

• Network Marketing Specific: I highly recommend that if you are in network marketing obtaining a free copy of “Success in 10 steps”. It is an excellent resource that brought a lot of clarity to what I was doing.  This will also give you access to free training calls which will give you additional  skills to build your business. Click Here for your Free Copy

• General Internet Marketing Training: In relation to general Internet marketing, consider Ed Dales’ The Challenge. It is free.  While the focus is not on network marketing, it will give you an excellent foundation on using the Internet to build a business.

To your success!
Cheryl Lydston

Quiz: Name a leader in the internet marketing arena who 1) Offers an extraordinary amount of high quality, easy to understand training,  2) Offers it for Free,  3) does not sell anything during the training, and get this – 4) Will do this on an annual basis and constantly seek on improving things from year to year?

Answer: Ed Dale is an extraordinary leader who gives so much value.  Ed and his team have been Doing the famous “30 Day Challenge” for several years. It is pretty amazing how much he and his team contributes.  I credit the 30 day challenge for finally helping me to put all the pieces together and understanding how this business works!

The exciting news is that this year, starting July 1, 2010, the 30 Day Challenge has been revised.  It will be known as the challenge.  Take a look at the video and see what’s in store! And to quote Ed Dale “There’s no charge for awesomeness” The training remains free!

CLICK HERE to access and register for Ed Dale’s Challenge!

This post from John Maxwell’s blog is quite powerful.  He inspires us to keep going and teaches us why it is best not to make decisions when you are struggling.   I really like John Maxwell a lot.  He has contributed a wealth of information, wisdom and insight on leadership.  CLICK HERE to read his post.  It is well worth it!

It has been a while since my last post.  Okay, It has been a long while since my last post!   I really took  time to take a step back and reflect on what I really want to accomplish.  During this process, It has been very clear to me the power of focus for your Network Marketing Success.

It is sooo easy to loose focus on what you want to accomplish.  If you are working on-line with any type of business, you know how easy it is to get distracted.

There’s the fun, social stuff (i.e on-line farming, on-line poker).  I think these are great things.  I have read posts from others stating that these are time wasters or that it is not the professional thing to do.  I have connected and made new friends – so to me it is worth it.  Everything in moderation.  I usually do these  things after I accomplish what I set out for the day.  Do what is right for you!

Then there are the launches, promotions, trainings etc.  It is so easy to get drawn into these offers.  Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot of great information and training by some amazing people.  You just really need to be focused on what you want to accomplish and if the timing is right.  Believe me – I have been pulled through the marketing funnels and have been on information overload.  I have become much more selective in how I spend my money on training and where I focus my energy.  You can also find some amazing free training.

Focusing on one stream of income!  Okay, I know the big thing in Internet Network marketing is focusing on multiple streams of income.  I found myself getting more and more into affiliate marketing and internet marketing as opposed to network marketing!  I think there is absolutely nothing wrong with affiliate and internet marketing.  I do have one affiliate product on my website.  I also have some pretty amazing friends who are doing this and doing this quite well!  If I make a sale – that’s okay.  If I don’t – that’s okay too.  My focus is on building my MLM.

I have decided that my primary focus is on Network Marketing Success by first and foremost helping others to build their business.   This to me involves building relationships and providing free, high quality training and resources.

You will find ONE affiliate item on my site because I actually use the product and believe in it.  I do earn money from this product if you decide to purchase it, but you are welcome to buy it from any other resource!

To your success!