I’ve been asked a few times over the past week or two to give my perspective on leadership during COVID. I don’t know much, but here’s what I do know…

Doing the best with what we have at that moment

Whether you are a leader of our country or state, a leader in our local area, leaders in local business or if you are leading your family and community, leaders right now are doing the best with what they have. You might be home schooling your children or leading an organisation, waking up each day fearing what the numbers will look like or pushing on as if it’s business as usual; leadership looks like a lot of different things right now. What our leaders need from us is compassion, empathy and understanding. Each of us are doing the best we can. PS. Year 1 geography—not my best!

Leaders need to lead

So many times during this pandemic I have wanted to stay under the covers and not get out of bed in the morning. But as a leader, I know that I have to not just get up and keep going, but be the example to my family, to my staff and to our community that rallies them to keep going. If you are running your own business during this time, you know how scary it has been. So many times I have made decisions out of fear, (some have turned out to be good, some terrible!) and sometimes decision making comes easy, but freezing and not moving forward is not the way to ensure the long term survival of your business during this time. We need to be constantly thinking, what is next, what can we do to bring value, how are we going to show up? I listened to Rob Lowe (yes that Rob Lowe, think Waynes World, West Wing and Brothers and Sisters, hubba hubba!!) with Rachel Hollis on the RISE podcast and he said something that hit me right in the guts “If small business owners aren’t awake a night thinking of the next thing that can do to bring value to their communities then they won’t be around after this thing is over.” Boom Rob. Talk about telling it like it is (Listen to RISE here.)

Make your mistakes, dust yourself off and keep going

Goodness knows I am not getting it right all the time, especially at the moment, but I am continuing to show up and admit when I have got it wrong. Leadership is not about playing small, it’s not about waiting until the right time. It’s about action. Sometimes you get it right and sometimes you get it wrong, but you don’t stop playing the game. You don’t give up (no matter how much the haters want you to!). You put your big girl panties on, apologise, cop it on the chin and keep moving forward. People are watching you and waiting to take their lead from you, show up, eyebrows up!!

And most importantly: you cannot pour from an empty cup

Take some time for yourself. Get some white space in your calendar, walk the dog, ride your bike (omg! Have you seen my new bike, check my Instagram for pics!) have a bath or do a brain dump. Do all the things you need to do to fill yourself up. And if you don’t know what they are yet, make it your mission this month to figure it out. Try new things and keep coming back to the things that make your heart sing. Because if you are feeling good, you will be in such a better place to serve. And at the end of the day, that’s what leadership is, service. 

And I keep coming back to Brene Brown a lot lately, (and if you’re not aware of the context of this quote then you have some reading to do 😉 ) but you should not be interested in feedback from people who are not in the arena. Do not waste your time stewing over what people think about you, you are far too busy and wonderful to let other people’s opinions get you down. 

You’ve got this.