After attending “The Leadership Imperative (At Home & In The Workplace)”, a seminar conducted by Anthony and Maricel Laxa-Pangilinan last 28^th Nov 2014 at YMCA Singapore, there were two words which left a last impressing with me.  The funny thing is both words started with the letter “I” and these words influenced to go and look them up online just to make sure I got it correctly.

The first “I” is Imperative, which can be found in the seminar title, is defined by Merriam-Webster defines as a command, rule, duty, etc., that is very important or necessary.

The second “I” is Incumbent, defined by Merriam-Webster as necessary for (someone) as a duty or responsibility.  This word was captured in one slide:  We need to take leadership; it is incumbent upon us. – Anthony Pangilinan

That night I had a few key take aways:

1) In this fast paced world, everyone is getting disconnected. We shouldn’t give up on being disconnected. In fact, the more that we should be actively engaged.  We should and must engage.

A classic example of this is people having dinner and all are busy with their own gadgets, whether it be a smart phone or tablet, and nobody is actually talking to one another.  I remember in one restaurant I went to before I had to laugh because it was encouraging the diners to talk to each other with a sign similar to this:

Can you imagine going on a date and the whole night your date is just texting or surfing on his phone?  Confirmed, it is going to be the first and last date hahaha….

2) There are 2 issues in leadership:

• Are you growing your ability?
• Where are you going?

We are all leaders.  We don’t need to have that title of manager to be a leader.  We need to keep on learning and improving our leadership skills.  We owe it to ourselves, to our peers and to our families.  Whether we like it or not, we are all leaders.  It can be in your house, in the family, in your project (no matter how big or small the project is; but this is more critical if it is a project that is cutting across different departments and processes), in your business, in your life.  You are the leader or captain of your life.

3) ABFx3:Accept the Brutal Facts + Act with Bold Faith = Anticipate a Brighter Future!

• Accept the Brutal Facts – Don’t avoid the bad news. Face it head on.  Be grounded, accept the current reality and then move on.

• Anticipate a Brighter Future – Define your vision, your goal. Look at the positive.  A positive attitude will not guarantee success but a negative attitude will prevent success.

• Act with Bold Faith – As Nike advertises, “Just do it.” Take the first step.  They talked about exercise and how we have so many excuses in not pursuing exercise.  But they said a statement that really struck me hard, “Your body is the vehicle that will bring you to your dreams.  So why not take care of your body?”

This had made me think and reflect about how I am consciously doing my retirement planning and this is evident in my dream board but the ironic thing is there is nothing in my dream board to capture the importance of my health and body.  I need to take a more proactive approach to take care of my health through diet and exercise.

4) Lastly, a doctor checks his patient by asking how he is, checking his breathing, blood pressure, tonsil, ear, nose, temperature, etc. in order to know what is wrong with him and prescribe to him the correct medicine.

In the same way, a leader needs to understand and know his team members, what makes them tick, what keeps them motivated so he will know how to lead them, motivate them.

Every individual is different.  It’s like being a parent to many kids.  No matter how a parent tries to be fair and treat the kids in the same way, the kids will behave differently depending on their personality, belief, values, perception, etc.

So are you ready to take on the challenge to be a parent, aka a leader? 🙂