A founding father of the US, Benjamin Franklin said, “Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.”

A noted polymath was old Franklin which means he had a great deal of knowledge about a wide range of topics. He was known for his considered opinion, his wisdom, his diplomacy and his natural ability to lead and to inspire others. I’m guessing he meant it then, when he also said, “When you’re finished changing, you’re finished.”

In metaphysics there’s a law called ‘the law of perpetual transmutation’. It means that all things physical and non-physical exist in a constantly state of change – expanding, reducing, evolving. There’s never nothing happening. Nothing stays the same. The universe’s default is transformation.

The most successful leaders, managing directors, CEOs on the planet know all about this law. You’d never hear them say ‘I’m complete; all the things on my list are ticked; we’ve reached every goal I ever had for myself, the company, the customers, the systems, the employees and the products & services… so, yeah. We’re done’.

Because, too right they’d be ‘done’! Done gathering new ideas; done sensing what’s next for the marketplace; done navigating the company’s best talent towards unearthing new opportunities.

There IS no ‘done’ in the life-cycle of successful leaders within progressive organisations. Personal growth & progress = greater team achievements = product & service improvements  = ongoing business success; just like Franklin said it would.

Every individual leader is called to be creative and to lead and expand themselves and their business in a way that’s unique to them. There are no co-incidences in any man or woman’s rise to the helm of a notable corporate company to pioneer a new chapter for its tribe. Directors who actively develop integrity, respect, wisdom, a sense of themselves, and a healthy relationship with risk will thrive.

Lifelong learning is a commitment. There are no right or wrong ways to go about it – study a formal course, hire an executive coach, read, listen, watch, blog, join a mastermind – your style, your choice. But it is a conscious decision to walk this path – you cannot inherit leadership success. The results show in each of us to a depth and effectiveness equal to the hours invested in developing the craft.

I leave you with an Irish saying which is up there, in my opinion, with the wisdom of Mr Franklin: “You’ve got to do your own growing, no matter how tall your grandfather was.”

I’ve spoken to directors who were designers, managers who were mechanics, and leaders who were lifeguards – all of whom have progressed far enough in their careers that the activity that made them stand out  in the first place has been downsized to almost zero and replaced with leadership responsibilities primarily comprising of strategy and motivating others.

It’s not entirely a bad thing. And it could easily be called ‘natural career progression’. If it describes you then know this; stepping forward into leadership is best when:

• you’re still involved with people who are doing the thing you loved – and you can inspire them
• the knowledge you acquired developing the skill-set of your passion can continue to be shared
• by doing so, you discover something more about yourself that you couldn’t have aspired to at the outset of your career journey

I don’t know any career newbees who when asked ‘what would you like to be’, they answer ‘A leader’, ‘A CEO’, or ‘A board director’. Instead they aspire to be architects, clothes designers, marine engineers, environmental scientist, flower importers – you know? Things that directly link them to the product or service they want to offer to others.

My question is this: if leadership is naturally what we all progress towards then how come we don’t:

• talk about it to our students and new starts to prepare them for going beyond their ‘first stage’ career
• equip our directors with a full leadership skill set in as much detail as we would a doctor
• support leaders constantly so that in their rising to the top of our organisations, they continue to exude the creativity and innovation that we know they inherently own because we saw it displayed in their ‘stage 1′ passion

When a company’s leaders are disciplined and successful, but not 100% passionate about the role they’ve progressed to, not only does the organisation lose their return on investment in that person, they also haemorrhage possibility, opportunity and competitive edge.

No one would drive a car with a leak in the petrol tank – it limits the speed and potential of you getting from A to B. So why do we accept a reduced performance in our most valued and invested-in employees?

To get way out in front in 2012, here’s where I believe the treasure lies:

• FOCUS on your key 10-20 performers and, especially if they’re outstanding, invest further in them (coaching, mentoring, enabling)
• CREATE (or access) a platform which brings together leaders from different, non-competitive disciplines and companies to share stories that inspire and prompt radical, new thinking and stimulating possibilities (the TED.com theory: ideas worth sharing)
• TALK! If you’re an HR Director or Talent Manager, get out there and do the rounds with your board members and fellow directors – find out the development they’d most value.
• TALK! If you’re a director or leader in your business, go and find your Learning & Development contact and ask them what the possibilities are for you to actively evolve yourself and your results this year
• TALK! If you’re from an organisation where you know there’s a valuable conversation to be had with a counterpart in a non-competitive organisations, pick up the phone, call him/her and get the revolution started.

• Would you know your answer?
• Would you smile with excitement and be able to rattle off the details?
• And are the people who’re going to support you in those changes already briefed and onside?

If the answer to those 3 points is ‘yes’, then congratulations, you can save yourself 2 minutes by skipping the rest of this blog and going back to your joyous state of clarity & attracting the dream!

For those who aren’t clear about what you’d like to see manifest before December 2012, that’s ok, welcome to the tribe!

Forward planning doesn’t have to be a laborious, drawn out kind of process, however, if you want a significantly improved version of this year though, trust me the 30 minutes you invest in this little exercise will be the most precious time you’ve spent … ever. Here’s the strategy:

• Book a 30 minute meeting with yourself within the next 7 days and write it into your diary (because if it’s in there and you treat yourself with the respect you treat other people, you’ll stick to it!)
• Go somewhere quiet whether it’s in the office or in the house, or out to a favorite hide away in a library or a coffee shop (and put your I’m-serious-don’t-bother-me face on so that people know to keep their distance)
• Ask What Do I Want? …. and with your blank paper and pen at the ready, let this simplest and most powerful question in the world sink beyond your intellect and into your heart & soul … just wait … then
• Write your thoughts down, and if it helps use these 8 headings: Career; Finances; Relationship; Friends & Family; Health; Recreation; Personal Growth; Service to Others (if you’re not that structured, just let all the ideas in your mind find their own words and form on the page)
• Hold the mindset of ‘I’m guaranteed to succeed’ - and write from that place of trusting (because for sure your sub-conscious has a field day during these tasks with ‘but … well you can’t because … what will people say … how are you qualified … who’s going to listen … it’s never been done’). Be courageous with the intentions of your future.

When you’re finished the excercise – that’s round 1 done. Congratulations!

Round 2 happens over the next 5 days, when once a day for 10 minutes you re-read your vision and check in with yourself how that feels. Picture yourself living the reality that you’ve created for yourself and remind yourself ‘I’m guaranteed to succeed!’.

The trick with all of this mindset mastery is to keep away from the ‘how’. It’s counter-intuitive I know, but when we learn the skill of holding intentions without limiting the outcomes by leading with our intellect, that’s when we tap into ‘success with soul’, infinite possibility and extraordinary & speedy results.

Round 3 happens by paying attention to how the thoughts you think and the actions you take over the rest of this month are subtly reframed and purposeful. Regularly read and meditate on your 2012 plan throughout December and on through the beginning of the new year. Relax about how it’s going to play out.

It IS going to play out.

If any of this sounds familiar to you, you’re not alone!. I’ve had some extraordinary conversations this week with successful directors in choice corporate positions. Some of the cultural assumptions I’m hearing include:

• I don’t have a choice really, that’s where the company’s headed, everyone’s in the same boat
• Although I dread work sometimes, I’m lucky really … loads of people I know would love to have this job
• I couldn’t set up on my own – it would take years to match this salary and my family are depending on me
• If I stepped up to a more senior role I’d be more accountable and that means more hours
• Noone has conversations about ‘purpose’ or ‘meaning’ here – it’s just not done – I’d be laughed at

Without transparent conversation everyone thinks they’re the only one who’s not living the dream, the only one who’s compromising and the only one who’s frustrated that today is SO predictably similar to yesterday and, god forbid, tomorrow too! The truth is that most of your colleagues are aspiring to evolve, to have real conversations about real things and to start to live as authentically in their place of work as they do outside.

So where do you start with something as significant as playing a bigger game? It’s a step-at-a-time kind of process, but start today and you’ll be telling some entirely different stories in a short month’s time. Here are some suggestions:

• Once a day, say something genuine (a compliment, an observation, a personal thought) that stretches you out of your comfort zone: ‘I liked the way you spoke to that client. You’re very sincere. I find it challenging to shift my mind away from corporate targets and relate so openly.’
• Ask at least 1 question (beyond ‘how are you, fine?’!!) of each person you speak with in a day that’s not work-related
• Genuinely listen to what’s being said and ask yourself (and others) – ‘how could we add more meaning to this’
• Talk to your customers, readers, viewers, listeners and ask them how what’s good could be better
• Commit to personal & professional mastery and do one thing each day that makes your life richer

Ultimately a company is as successful as those who are leading it, holding the vision, and connecting the purpose of their culture, product & service to the relevance of their customers lives. When you step out of the intellect and engage with ‘meaning’ you let go the effort of up-stream and start to move with the current.

When you say ‘I messed up’,it’s real & people can relate. When you say ‘I don’t know, can we figure it out together’ there’s shared purpose. When you speak out that ‘Let’s hold an intention that in 6 months time we’ll all be working less, earning more and in our freed up time be doing more sport, playing more music and hanging out more with our partners … let’s make that happen’, you’re tapping into an energy that has the power to engage massive creativity & solutions.

Playing BIG is an arena where justifications are replace by opportunities. Only YOU know your heart (and if you’re not 100% clear, then 2 hours in a quiet room with a blank piece of paper and this question ‘What do I really want’ – work, romance, finances, health, recreation, family & friends, personal growth, service to others – will get you significantly closer to your answer). Only YOU know how this part of your career fits with your biggest purpose.

Playing BIG is not rocket science. You DO have to separate yourself from the ‘nay sayers’. You DO have to develop a process of conscious observation of your own limited thinking. You DO have to be bold, say yes … and leap.

The opposite of courage is not cowardice, it’s conformity!

It’s a positive trait, and one where I can take the opportunity to further explore a leader’s strategies: “How did you do it?”, “What were your biggest challenges”, “what kept you motivated”.

For some it was the right timing, for others they brought the right team around them, and for others still they acted ‘consciously’ as much as possible, constantly refining their vision and leadership until the point of breakthrough. Without exception though every successful leader I speak to hasdeveloped methods of belief and persistence and they’ve invested time… A LOT of time.

Some talk about the early days when 16 to 20 hour days were required just to meet their objectives for the month! We’ve all touched on a bit of that madness, but sustaining this sort of time commitment is a catalyst for a breakdown. So …

How do we create sustainable success? How do we accomplish growth over short and long periodswith the least effort possible? How do we use our unique talents in the most effective way to lead and to inspire increase?

The secret … simplify!

Here’s what the “revealers”, and the more reserved leaders, say about cultivating simplicity:

Develop deep intuition:
Don’t be guided by your impulses or by a range of opinions from others who aren’t fully invested in the vision or the outcome. Relax, sit down, and ask yourself, “how does this process / decision contribute to the big picture”, “what other choices and resources do I have available”, “Is this the most efficient& effective way to proceed?”

Delegate efficiently:
Micro-managing is limiting. You can pioneer a new process … but then source someone who’s gifted in that area to do subsequent repetitions – a designer, administrator, presenter, team-builder or technical genius. They needn’t be in-house. Train them, empower them and trust them to do what they do best. And you? You move forward and do what you do best.

Embrace technology:
Banking, accounting, communicating, sharing, updating, planning, storing, processing — there are some awesome technologies out there (and more cost effective and innovative than in-house teams sometimes)that aren’t taken advantage of by the biggest companies. Embracing technology may take some investment but when it streamlines your business and reduces your long-term costs – you’ll be glad you were smart and brave ‘back then’ to make the shift.

Honour deadlines:
Put a limit on how much time you spend on marketing, financing, recruiting, innovating, delivering and conducting meetings. The goal here is to keep to a flow of innovation, development, launching, feedback and refinement. The ‘pressure’ of a deadline can expose extraordinary creativity. And I’ve seen inspired leaders ‘un-develop’ their perfectionist tendencies and create rapid growth using the mantra ‘good is good enough’.

Collaborate:
The best strategic partnerships will shortcut the amount of time you spend looking for new customers, suppliers, vendors, networks and systems. The future of successful business is becoming less about secrecy and competition and shifting more towards rich customer relationship, service, sharing, collaborating, empathetic joint ventures and transparentshared knowledge.

I started this week with a list of ‘must do’s’ deadlined for the end of this month. Program development, video re-records, radio show interviews, updates from my team … all this amongst doing the one thing I love most in my business  - executive coaching with my amazing leadership, business owner and professionals clients!

I looked at the list on Monday morning, looked at the spaces in my schedule this week and you know what I did? – I scrumpled the list up tightly and binned it. ’I’m only going to do what I love this week’ I said.

So, in the gaps on Monday I finished reading ‘The Bond’ by Lynne McTaggart. In the gaps on Tuesday I started reading my first Marshall Goldsmith book (hmmm – me likey!). Wednesday followed pattern and was rounded off with an hours drive south to have supper with an inspiring friend I hadn’t seen in nearly a year.

On my drive back north through the Fife fields & farmland I just had this massive sense of gratefulness. The sun was shining on the half-harvested barley fields, I was tapping back into a sense of creativity that’s been the catalyst for up-levelling my business on more than one occasion over the past decade, and my calmness quotient was overflowing because I CAN go AWOL once in a while and everything won’t come crashing down around me.

But what if you don’t work for yourself and you’re not the boss? What if you’re in a corporate role, directing a team, with projects to complete and accountable for meeting targets and the company depends on your results? Is AWOL an option?

It’s a tough one to answer. In my 10 years of coaching executives I haven’t met a single professional who hasn’t at some point considered jumping ship or initiating an ‘extreme career change’. Some, have been on the edge of quitting, are disillusioned, or just down-right exhausted from a no-respite, limited-appreciation corporate culture.

Question is … where does the responsibility lie for the intellectual, emotional and spiritual health of a workforce? Is it with a business to ensure all it’s leaders remain engaged and motivated? Or with the individual to manage their ongoing career goals within their overall life expectations? A bit of both, however, my experience would encourage the latter – it can only be YOU who decides what works best for you and only you can know fully the elements of your life that impact your decision to stay, go or re-design your position.

Here’s what I also know to be true:

• Getting clear about what you want – hours, pay, projects, team make up, opportunities to progress, increase or decrease in responsibilities, reporting lines, work-life balance – is the key to being able to communicate that over time to your business. If you don’t know, they can’t help you.
• Negotiating regular professional changes inside your company – preferably while you’re calm enough to be factual and highlight the benefits on all sides – keeps you and your company fresh and constantly looking for a collaborative and positive future.
• Extending flexibility as individually required within your team enhances their motivation to work and, by extension, your satisfaction because more is achieved in less time.

The lesson here: AWOL in corporate cultures is for extreme cases only. And WAY before you reach that stage … get thinking, get talking, get feeling; take responsibility, and take action … and get an independent professional involved. Executive coaches are here to support leaders each step until they’re entirely living their Personal & Professional Freedom!

And here’s the thing – everyone I know has unreleased potential, even the highest fliers in their field – JK Rowling, Bill Gates, Paul Polman (CEO Unilever), Larry Page & Sergey Brin (Founders, Google), Roger Federer – whether sport, business or creative arts there never comes a point when you can say, ‘I know all I could ever know’ or ‘I have contributed all I’m able to contribute’.

The shift I work with my clients on is to become conscious of their infinite power to create and contribute. You see 99.9% of people on our planet don’t yet know that with every thought they think, they create something – thoughts are things. So we meander through life with unchecked thinking - what will I write in that proposal, I wish I had a different boss, wouldn’t it be great to win the lottery, who would I date if I could choose anyone at all, what shall I have for dinner tonight, oh, yes, that proposal – having no idea that these thoughts are creating an attraction to the outcome as we think them.

Also, about 97% of the thoughts that occur in our mind happen at a subconscious level. Anything that has to happen frequently – movement, driving, assessing a persons status, choosing the words we speak out, our emotional response to seeing lovers kissing – is predominantly in the domain of the automated part of ourselves. To actively manage what we’re creating, we have to override some of that automation (where there are limited beliefs) with some new likelihoods.

Infinite possibilities come from our ability to tap into our soul – the design of who we are in connection to all that is. It’s like a toaster plugging into the electricity supply – it can only do what it’s designed to do by having this network of power run through it. And that electricity is always there – just waiting. It doesn’t care if it’s powering a kettle, an iMac, a hairdryer or a mobile phone. It just gives out the essence of what it is to allow a product to be of service.

Same thing applies with Infinite Possibility (or universal potential) – our soul’s the plug by which we get consciously connected to it. And the ‘flow’ we connect to doesn’t make choices around worthiness, status or level to which we aspire; it’s just fully available to everyone  - man, woman, rich, poor, clear, confused, young, old – all cultures, all abilities, all visions.

So when you’re considering what it takes for you to be even more of a successful leader that you already are, ask your executive ‘electrician’ about how to connect your soul to unlimited Source energy. Infinite Possibility is what dynamic, fluent, innovative leadership is all about. Make the shift from unconscious to conscious business leadership; from ambition to meaning; and from seeing problems to acknowledging unreleased potential.

The word ‘best’ is often used to compare one person, talent or event to another. In this sense, I would steer clear of using it unless it’s in a context of comparing me with myself. Wayne Dyer once said that ‘true nobility is not about being better than anyone else, it’s about being better than I used to be’. With that in mind, here’s some of what I think it takes to bring out the best in who you’re striving to become:

• A Compelling Vision: when it’s cold and wet and you have to get up for training, when you fingers are blistered from strumming those guitar chords a thousand times over, when you’ve got to dig deep  to spend another day of business waiting for the breakthrough, a compelling vision will re-ignite passion and motivation to underpin the drive to keep going.

My vision is defined in writing, on a vision board and in a series of mind movies – so that however I’m reminded, it’s inspiring.

• Personal Responsibility: no one became the best in their field by looking outside of themselves for the answers, by comparing themselves to another or for finding someone to blame. Each person has a definition of success that’s as unique to them as is their fingerprint and a route to achieving that success that navigates through unchartered territory.

I regularly shake off the echos of ‘if you could write like her …’; ‘if you had money like him …’; ‘if you were as smart as …’. I’m 100% responsible for the thoughts I think, the choices i make and for how big I choose to show up in the world.

• Increasing Self Awareness: What other’s can observe about you will only ever be a tiny piece of the jigsaw. When you develop the skill of tuning in to the physical signs, the intellectual promptings, the emotional resonances, and the spiritual meaning of the vision you’re choosing, then you can fully expand into the truth about your purpose. Only then can you stretch for the heights you secretly dream about. No limits remember?

For me, self awareness and self development are two circles with a venn-diagram-like cross over point. My personal aim is to expand that central part to a point where awareness and development are entirly overlapping and function with syncronicity at all times … a work in progress.

I’ve worked with clients whose compelling vision, once defined clearly and courageously, has been enough to change their thoughts, their feelings, and their ability to take inspired action. Subsequently results begin to appear, sometimes so significantly and speedily that you wonder where they could have been hiding for all this time.

So, is it possible for you to be the best at whatever it is you expect for yourself? With vision, responsibility and awareness I say ‘yes’. The most important thing as I always say, is to go inside for your answers – to take some quiet time, shut your eyes, focus your mind towards your heart and let the best you step forward!

The worst story you can tell yourselves is that ‘I have no choices, I don’t know the answer, I’m stuck here … AND … everyone else is happy, thriving, succeeding, progressing’. So, here’s the thing … it’s your story … if you don’t like it, change it!

If you’re 70 pounds overweight, your remedy comes from:

1. a change in thinking
2. a commitment to take 100% responsibility for your results from now on (no excuses, no blame, no guilt)
3. a decision to take inspired action (sometimes just one, single step of it)

If you’re stuck with a relationship – a home or at work – your solution is:

1. a change in thinking
2. a commitment to take 100% responsibility for your results from now on
3. a decision to take inspired action

If you want to be financially independent, live next to the sea and contribute to worthy causes – you can do it with:

1. a change in thinking
2. a commitment to take 100% responsibility for your results from now on
3. a decision to take inspired action

We all have moments (years sometimes!!) of sensing that we’re stuck and that there’s more. The catalyst for breakthrough comes from choosing to think different thoughts. And that might be prompted by taking some time out of your normal routine, hanging out with a different group of friends, joining a new sports club, reading a book you wouldn’t normally choose. Do something that triggers you to remember that you have infinite choices and that you’re going to succeed as other ‘stuck’ people have before you and millions more will do after you – some because you showed them it was possible!

Be encouraged: ‘The sun shines on everyone – it doesn’t make choices. The rain falls on everyone – it doesn’t make choices. One spirit flows through everyone – it doesn’t make choices’.

• How do we downsize and innovate?
• How do we isolate retrainable talent, let go of change resisters and attract inspired leaders?
• How do we plan our future strategies when we can’t yet see where our products and services might fit?

Business pace is speeding up – from global corporates to entrepreneurial start ups. Technology, information availability, outsourcing, professional development, consumer education, global availability … all of it contributes to more choices being offered more frequently and creatively to more people. There’s a definite sense that if you stand still the world will move by so speedily that you’ll struggle to catch up.

Here’s the Big CEO Challenge then: “how do I create a future-healthy organisation with inspired, open-minded, way-showing leaders who will motivate their teams to serve our customers, clients, readers, viewers and listeners with respect and integrity in this opportunity-packed new business era”.

We’ve got to get our heads around the fact that the past doesn’t equal the future. The way forward requires a shiny new road map. And the beliefs and values that built railroads, encouraged competition, and taught ‘job for life’ are not those that will succeed in this time of ‘more for all, less to none’.

A Chief Executive Officer’s most powerful strategy is to be clear and to be bold – and if you’re not quite in that head-space & heart-space it doesn’t take much to shift there;  invest in your personal & professional development until you fully sense you’re out front and re-energised.

Hundreds perhaps thousands or millions are looking at your every move – all you’ve become has been leading to this moment: if a complete re-organisation is required, communicate it, plan it and do it. If the hiring of new talent is the solution for your business longevity, make it happen. And if you know you’ve got to managing the decline of selected brands before launching a new phase, do it with transparency and integrity – how you handled it will become part of your legacy.

And wait … there’s more (happy days!); leaders and teams are looking to their CEOs to have something beyond a great strategy and rich experience. The world wants to see honorable decision making, transparent accountability and respectful communication go hand-in-hand with innovative product and brand development and pristine customer service.

I give you Mark Zuckerberg of Google, “When you give everyone a voice and give people power, the system usually ends up in a really good place.”

And so it is.