As a leader, I am regularly called upon to make clear, focused decisions. I am also called upon to constantly survey new information to determine if anything might call recent decisions into question. I bet you find yourself in the same situation. Leaders have to learn how to live in this space.
Inside Outside Leadership
You can’t thrive in a constant state of questioning. Questioning every decision. Every road taken. But neither can you cut yourself off to insights that reveal new opportunities. One way to strike a balance here is to use Inside Outside Leadership. Use Outside insights and information to help you form your Inside convictions—which lead to decisions. And once you make your decisions, you need to carry them out with conviction—while also being ready to go in a new direction if you get hit with new information. The more comfortable you get with this, the better leader you will be. Mostly because it will be easier to follow someone who has learned to live in this awkward space.
Here are a few examples of ways you can gather powerful Outside information:
- Have talent assessments done on your entire sales team to learn more about their strengths.
- Conduct a Manager 360 to help managers see things they are missing.
- Do a survey of customers to determine where you excel and to uncover opportunities.
- Have someone from the outside perform a sales diagnostic to spot areas of opportunity.
Benefits of an Inside Outside Approach
You never know what insights you might get from the Outside—that will be most important to your Inside decision-making. You might learn something that causes you to make some changes in account assignments or maybe changes in your staffing. Or maybe you’ll conclude you have the right team and the right account assignments, but you need to measure new leading indicators or possibly pursue different opportunities.
Don’t be too arrogant or just too busy to get the Outside information and don’t be afraid to weigh the evidence and form your Inside convictions. Learn to be comfortable as the Inside Outside Leader.
Learn more about our sales diagnostic process and how it has helped others improve performance by clicking below.
