Daily Leap Career Video of the Week: Be a Great Leader

Each week we present our Daily Leap Career Video of the Week. The video we share presents news or advice related to career and life development, searching for a job, the economy and employment, and other career-related topics.

The video below from Harvard Business Review discusses the qualities of a great leader, including humility and intense professional will. Check out the video to learn more.

High 5 Weekly Career Transitions Roundup: The Best Time to Ask for a Promotion

This is our weekly roundup of some of the best career-related articles, interviews, blogs, etc., we've read during the week. We share them so you have some great resources to prepare you for the coming week. Enjoy!

• Here is the Best Time to Ask for a Promotion: "
  Visier discovered the ideal times, and circumstances, to receive a promotion. 
  If you’re waiting for cooler weather to ask for a promotion, think again. The research showed summer was the best season to ask for one
  ."

• 4 Steps Women Should Take When Considering a Career Transition: "Take stock of your skill set and what sets you apart. Be brutally honest with yourself about what you do well and where you have previously failed. Ask for feedback."

• Why You're Probably Networking Wrong (and what to do instead): "these tools automatically sync your communication history with your contacts across a variety of networks, and remind you when it's about time to reach out and rekindle those relationships."

• Do This One Thing During Vacation to Come Back Recharged: "When we are on vacation and feel some sense of distance from the hustle and bustle of our daily routine, Kadoch says, life feels good again and gives us the chance to come back to work with more energy and focus."
• 4 Things Leaders Bring With Them Every Day: "Humility opens the door to learning. It also allows you to defer to the person with the greatest subject matter expertise and context about the problem so it gets solved the best way possible."

Five Unconventional Traits of Successful People

Many of us picture successful people as the loud, outspoken, overly confident guy in the dark suit. He arrives to every gathering in a fancy car and is a bit obnoxious. He’s successful and he knows it.

However, successful people often have traits that run counter to this image and involve having a humble approach to life, along with a real talent for connecting with other people. Below are five traits to cultivate for success.

Be quick to listen and slow to speak. A successful person understands the important of listening and really hearing what others are going through and what their needs are. This enables them to be empathic to others and also to come up with creative ideas and solutions to real problems and issues facing their community and customers.

Be humble. True success and joy in your career path comes from an honest and humble assessment of your skills and victories. It’s necessary to realize that success is usually achieved in collaboration with others. Humility does not mean that we denigrate our successes or think lowly of ourselves but, instead, that we have a true and honest view of ourselves and others, and recognize that our achievements depend on the contributions of other talented individuals. And often even involve some luck.

Spread the credit for success around. Good leaders are sure to recognize the accomplishments of the team and make certain that the contributions of others are appreciated. They are quick to praise others and celebrate the strengths of those around them.

Help others succeed. Successful people are not in it for themselves. They actually seek to encourage and support the accomplishments of others, and aren’t afraid to work on a project or task that might seem “beneath” them or their position. The successful person humbly knows that success and happiness is not finite and they don’t need to “win” at the expense of others.

Generously mentor others. Successful people are curious and continuously learn, and then seek to share their knowledge with others. They do not fear sharing their secrets or “hacks” for success and productivity. They actively seek to mentor and pass on their knowledge and experience to others.

Seek to build and emulate these five traits of successful people.

5 Ways to Get Back Up and Benefit from Failure in Your Life and Career

If you succeed long enough in life you're going to fail. A lot. In fact, you might turn that around: if you fail long enough in life you're going to succeed. It is in our failures that we learn how to succeed if we are willing to take those failures and do something constructive with them.

When you fail, and you will, consider the following five ways to benefit from failure in a way that sets you up to succeed.

1. Increase gratitude. When we go through difficult times of failure, such as an unexpected job loss, it can help us recognize and be more grateful for the successes and good things we experience in our lives and careers. The most successful individuals are those that make a daily practice of expressing gratitude and recognizing the beauty in their lives.

2. Clarify and deepen support systems. We learn who we can trust and depend on during times of stress and difficulty. Our close friendships and relationships with colleagues are deepened and made more whole as we vulnerably share with them our experiences of failure and these people become our greatest support as we move toward new challenges and successes.

3. Develop humility. Sometimes success makes us forget who we are, disassociates us from our values, or leads us to treat others as inferior. Failure can be just the antidote we need to deal with an inflated ego and return us to reality, helping us understand anew the good we want to accomplish with others in our personal and work lives.

4. Take time to reflect. Failure often affords us the opportunity to take some time away, to reflect on and understand the reasons behind our failure, and to reset our lives and careers, and renew our focus on our vision and purpose.  

5. Build strength and resilience. If we let it, failure can be a great source of strength, building our willpower and determination to success, and helping us develop the resources to recover more quickly from future setbacks.

Yes, you can do this.

As the Japanese proverb says: fall seven times, stand up eight.

5 Things to Do When You're the New Person at the Office

Starting a new job can produce feelings of fear, excitement, anxiety, and a combination of other emotions. You want to start out well and make a good impression, right? Well how do you go about this?

Here are a few tips:

1. Accept your emotions. No matter how you're feeling understand that it is fine to experience some fear or anxiety when starting a new job. If you don't accept these emotions you can end up being too harsh on yourself, further increasing your anxieties or fears and causing you to struggle longer in the job.

2. Seek out a mentor. This doesn't have to be your direct supervisor, but find someone who can mentor you through your initial period of adjustment. Maybe it's someone who's been at the company a long time and can help you understand the company culture and power dynamics specific to the company or your particular area or division.

3. Get to know a wide variety of people. Don't eat lunch alone. Take the initiative to invite others for a coffee or out to lunch, and get to know people from all areas of the company, and people with differing areas of expertise and levels of seniority. This will help you better understand the job and your place in the company, increasing your comfort level.

4. Be humble and ask questions. This is often the easiest time in your career to ask questions and learn. There are no expectations that you know everything about the job so do what you can to learn as much as you can about the work you're doing. Don't be afraid of looking like you don't have all the answers; you don't and you just started. And that is fine.

5. Volunteer to help out. Offering to help others provides a great opportunity to get to know your colleagues and increases your understanding of your work.

5 Characteristics of a Great Employee

Sometimes it feels like being a good employee simply requires us to keep our head down, plug along, mind our own business, and get the work done.

However, that might have been true years ago but today's great employees take initiative and bring a passionate approach to their work.

Below are five additional characteristics of a great employee.

1. Team player. Great employees know that to be successful others on the team need to be successful and so she works well with others in the company, helping them to achieve their goals.

2. Curiosity. To be a great employee one must be curious about the company you work at, curious about all the divisions and areas within the company. curious about the company's competitors, and curious about how to make the company better and more effective.

3. Humility. Instead of glorying in success and taking credit, great employees will deflect praise in humility, understanding that successes require a team.

4. Communicates effectively. Great employees understand the importance of (and practice) good communication. In addition to excellent verbal communication skills, good employees know that effective written skills are important, too. Good communication also means avoiding gossip, and speaking positively about your job and company.

5. Takes responsibility. Every employee will experience some failure in the workplace at some point but it is the great employee who will get back up without blaming anyone else, take responsibility for the failure, and move forward to make things right.

What other characteristics does a great employee have?

3 Attitude Adjustments to Improve Your Career

There are times for each of us when we're feeling stressed or bored at work or in our career and we find it difficult to stay positive and motivated to do a good job.

It is at these times when we might simply benefit from a slight tweak or attitude adjustment to set us back on the right career path.

Here then are three attitude adjustments to make to improve our career and help us better enjoy our job:

1. Gratitude. There is plenty of research to suggest that your well-being goes up when you express gratitude. Why not take some time today to be grateful that you have a job, that you enjoy your co-workers, or that you have a good boss? 

2. Serve. Instead of thinking about you and what you need to get done, turn your attention to your customers and your colleagues. Having an attitude of service to others will enable you to focus on solutions and actions, and will likely have the added benefit of increasing your motivation at work.

3. Humility. Come to work with new eyes. No, I don't mean new glasses, but try taking a look at your work from a new perspective. A perspective of humility. Realize that you don't know everything and that you might just learn something new, even from that know-it-all in the cubicle next door.

Sometimes, instead of changing jobs or getting a promotion, a simple attitude adjustment is all we need to enjoy our work more.  

5 Ways to be a Success in Your Career (and Life)

There have been many books and articles written about how to be successful in your career. You could spend the next few years reading through them all but if you put into practice the following principals you'll be well on your way to career and life success.

1. Control your speech. In other words, learn to avoid speaking to others when you are angry or

frustrated. If you receive an email that is hurtful or offensive take some time before crafting your response. It can be very difficult to repair a relationship that has been damaged by careless words.

2. Be humble. Few people want to work for, or spend time with, a boastful individual. Let your accomplishments and successes stand on their own and speak for you. This does not mean that you keep silent about them. They should be noted on your resume and personal web site and you can discuss your successes and strengths with anyone you seek to humbly lead, serve, and support.

3. Acknowledge others. You did not arrive at your successes on your own. Be sure to recognize those who help and support you in your work and life.

4. Be kind. Similar to what has been mentioned so far, kindness toward others will strengthen relationships and enable you to lead effectively. For some encouragement in this watch George Saunders' remarks about kindness at Syracuse University.

5. Make others a success. If you apply your strengths and skills to making those around you successful then you will achieve great things and others will seek you out. You will likely discover that you have many more opportunities than you imagined and others will take note that you work on successful projects. This also applies to your friends and family. Work to make others successful and you will be a great success in life and in your career.

6 Qualities of Effective Leaders

Leadership is a highly discussed topic, with many good books published each year on the subject. But for those who don't have time to read all those leadership books we've identified six of the top qualities you should strive to cultivate if you want to be a good and effective leader.

1. Effective leaders listen more than they speak. Leadership is not about making great speeches or
telling everyone else how to get the work done. A great leader spends much of his or her time listening to others in an attempt to better understand both the situation at hand and the people involved.

2. Effective leaders praise others instead of themselves. A good leader knows that others are the key to success and praises the members of his team rather than making himself look good. An effective leader is humble and doesn't waste time trying to impress others by constantly promoting his own "individual" successes. Very few successes are "individual."

3. Effective leaders take responsibility instead of passing blame. When things go wrong, as they inevitably will, great leaders take responsibility and acknowledge the mistakes rather than blaming them on others.

4. Effective leaders serve others. Leaders who focus on others, on the team, and work to serve the needs of the team and of customers will generate greater trust and respect. Leadership is about serving others and serving well.

5. Effective leaders lead by example. A good leader knows that she must do the hard work and not simply expect or demand others to work hard. Effective leaders work hard, demonstrate appropriate work-life balance, and show the appropriate way to communicate and treat clients, co-workers, and customers.

6. Effective leaders never stop learning. A great leader understands that he does not possess all knowledge and continues to learn. He or she is curious about the world and about others and strives to continue to learn more about being a better person and a more effective leader.

5 Steps for Rebuilding Your Reputation and Your Career

Your reputation is everything. It defines you and influences how others view you and respond to you. If you do something to harm your work reputation--throw frequent temper tantrums, get drunk at the company picnic, cheat--it can have long-lasting and far-reaching consequences for your career.

How do you rebuild your reputation when you've harmed it in the workplace?

Consider the following 5 steps to begin the rebuilding process.

1. Understand and recognize the problem. The first thing you need to do is recognize and take
responsibility for what happened without blaming others. You alone are responsible for your behavior and actions. You also need to understand the problem. Do you have an anger management issue? Or do you have a drinking problem? Or difficulties responding to authority?

2. Seek help. Once you've identified the problem you need to seek out support and help. This might come in the form of professional therapy, a self-help group, or through a mentoring relationship.

3. Make amends. Seek out those you might have offended or hurt by your behavior and apologize and seek to restore the relationship.

4. Demonstrate humility. It might take some time before you are able to return to the level you were previously at in your career. You might take a pay cut or work in a position with fewer responsibilities. You need to humbly accept the position you now find yourself in and strive to use it to make you more effective and better in your work and career.

5. Do great work. Finally, you must do your very best work and demonstrate excellence in everything you do. Others will respond to the humble way you go about your work and the great job you do. This recognition will begin to turn around your reputation.

It is not easy to rebuild your reputation but with some patience, humility, and hard work, you can restore the successful career you once had.