I coach my students to remove “hedging” phrases when speaking, and I get asked, “Why is that so important?” Hedging phrases are non-committal to the audience. These phrases show hesitancy in your thoughts and actions. Your audience will subconsciously interpret these phrases as a lack of confidence on your part. Your audience may even see you lacking in leadership qualities.

What’s the One Sure Sign of a Leader?

In a word… courage. Leaders have courage. Leaders are willing to step into the gray areas of a decision and make them black or white. Somebody’s got to make a decision on this! Even though you’re lacking all the information you’d like to have… you still need to make a decision. This is going to take courage.

If you make decisions before you’ve collected or analyzed any data, you’re seen as reckless. If you postpone decisions too long because you always over-analyze things, you’re seen as non-committal and unfit to lead. Leaders make decisions when others aren’t willing to. Leaders make decisions somewhere between reckless (zero analysis) and non-committal (analysis-paralysis.) You’re accepting risk when you accept responsibility for your decision and that takes courage.

If you want more opportunities to be a leader, then look for opportunities to be courageous. Look for the situations that generate fear in others and be the first to step into it.

How do you Define Courage?

My simple definition for courage is “being afraid but going anyway.” Fear shows up when we acknowledge the risk of loss. The more we have to lose, the greater the risk feels. Ultimately, the leader needs to make a choice. Recognizing the risk and what’s at stake, the leader must step into the fear by making your commitment to a choice.

Courage isn’t needed if there’s nothing to be afraid of. We should be thankful for the opportunities presented by fear because it gives us an opportunity to be courageous. It gives us an opportunity to be a leader!

Why is Courage so Important?

Fear is a defense mechanism that notifies our minds when we’re at risk. When something is at risk we have an opportunity to lose something… maybe even our life! Without this fear mechanism, we would errantly walk into extremely risky situations on a regular basis. The human species would not have survived very long without a fear mechanism!

But is our fear well-founded? If the fear is a false sense of fear, then we might be holding back where we should be stepping forward. So the better question to ask ourselves is, “What’s really at risk here?” When we allow our imagination to magnify the situation beyond the true risk and what’s really at stake, we cower back into a corner and we stop moving forward.

As a Christian, I find comfort in knowing it’s all in God’s hands. That doesn’t mean I expect everything to come up roses for me. It doesn’t mean life will be easy or that I’ll never lose. What it actually means to me is freedom. It’s freedom from fear so I’m free to take a risk. Whether the results end up good or bad, he can use it. I find that thought both comforting and freeing.

How can we Develop our Courage?

This takes practice. As an entrepreneur, I’ve stepped into risky situations many times over my career. But, I’ve been able to slowly improve my ability to manage my fears by facing each situation with a question, “What’s the worst thing that could happen?” In most cases, even the potential worst case result is really not that bad.

When we allow our minds to speculate and paint a horrible future situation, we are catastrophizing the situation. In other words, creating a catastrophe in our minds when that’s only one potential (and probably unlikely) outcome.

Let’s avoid making reckless choices but let’s also be willing to choose something. Remember even inaction is an action because it’s a choice to do nothing. I’d rather choose and be wrong than let a situation determine my outcome. I don’t want to let the tail wag the dog!

Find the fear and step into it. Time to face your fear… Time to be courageous… because that’s what leaders do!

Facing my fears one at a time,
Russ

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iSpeak teaches workshops on Professional Selling to help sales professionals gather the most important data and then use that information to align the right message. Are your sales presentations closing eyelids or deals?

Russ Peterson Jr. is the co-founder and Managing Director of iSpeak, Inc. – An award-winning professional development training company. Russ is a speaker, international trainer, and published author on Professional Sales Communication and Business Communication. He delivers workshops, keynotes, and personal communication coaching services to business professionals in the US and around the world. You can connect with Russ directly through Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.