The Leader A Master Checklist Tool

You can more proactively sustain being in Leader A mode or help coach others to do the same by identifying specific opportunities using the following checklist.

Leader A Checklist for Purpose (Chapter 2)

Use the “Purpose = Contribution + Passion” Equation

• Define the tangibles and intangibles of your contribution in your role now
• Look at what stokes your fire
• Recognize that purpose is ever-evolving and dynamic

Use the Purpose Quadrants to Manage Time and Energy

• Plot your contributions and passions into the purpose quadrants
• Use the purpose quadrants to prioritize, tolerate, elevate, or delegate

Use the Purpose Quadrants to Manage Transitions in Your Career

• Watch out for the boredom signals in Quadrant II
• Watch out for the misalignment signals in Quadrant III

Use Purpose for Sifting Everyday Demands and Requests

• Determine if a meeting or an extracurricular adds value to you or if you uniquely add value to it before saying yes
• Organize “yes” into three buckets: the strategic yes, the partial yes, and the “it’s not actually my yes”
• Watch out for losing time and energy when overpackaging on presentations, overengineering a process, or staying in the weeds on any piece of work

Leader A Checklist for Process (Chapter 3)

Design Processes That Fit You and Your Context

• Determine where you fall on the “structured-unstructured” continuum
• Assess whether your natural energy flow is a “steady-as-she-goes” pace or that of a “burst tasker”
• Match your work activities to your chronotype to match when your energy is highest in the day

Preserve Your Time for What Matters Most

• Use color coding in your calendar to match the four quadrants of the passion-contribution matrix in chapter 2 and look at patterns and trend lines
• Set power hours
• Determine your time zones and home zones for work at home
• Employ look-aheads
• Make the most of white space—productively and restoratively
• Use the brush your teeth practice

Recharge and Restore Your Energy

• Employ the midweek gas tank fill-up ritual
• Try massage or other bodywork modalities
• Stretch anytime, anywhere
• Increase your sense of freedom through movement, sport, and exercise

Choose Your Top One or Two Processes

• Reframe process as a commitment to yourself, your purpose, and the vision you hope to achieve
• Use process as a way to get back on track quickly after falling into Leader B mode
• Experiment and boil it down to your top one or two must-have processes that have the most impact on your effectiveness, presence, and satisfaction

Leader A Checklist for People (Chapter 4)

Raise Your Game, Raise the Game of Others

• Adopt a mindset of making yourself obsolete with a virtuous cycle of growth
• Examine the strength of your team
• Optimize the “leverage + empower + inspire” equation

Build a Strategic Network of Support

• Recognize the importance of having a network of support as your accountabilities and performance pressures rise
• Consider whether you have each of the seven roles in your life: experts, sausage makers, accountability buddies, mirrors, helicopters, cheerleaders, and safe harbors
• Be a good citizen, enlisting support with a spirit of giving rather than taking

Update Your Boundaries and Rules of Engagement

• Practice bringing attention to your own needs
• Be clear on emotional ownership and accountabilities
• Respond to others and incoming requests with grace

Leader A Checklist for Presence (Chapter 5)

Stay in Action Rather Than Distraction and Procrastination

• Work off-line during critical power hours or when you need to focus
• Take single steps, shifting your attention from the mountain to the molehill
• Give yourself fifteen minutes to get into it
• Stay anchored in the physical
• Use a grounding visualization technique

Accelerate through Vicious Cycles and Create Virtuous Ones

• Spectate: Observe yourself and see the patterns at play
• Regulate: Find the pause and don’t scratch the itch
• Adapt: Create new patterns and “if-thens”

Spectate: Observe Yourself and See the Patterns at Play

• Understand what distinguishes self-spectating from self-awareness
• Build your spectating muscle with nonjudgment and self-compassion
• Recognize triggers and their corresponding voice track and physiological reactions

Regulate: Find the Pause and Don’t Scratch the Itch

• Defuse the emotional charge through cognitive labeling
• Extend the pause point between stimulus and response
• Don’t scratch the itch; instead, use a mantra or swing thought, breathing techniques, or mindfulness meditation

Adapt: Create New Patterns and “If-Then” Pathways to Leader A

• Recognize new choices
• Create new “if-then” pathways from old historic patterns to new desired states
• Increase access to “choice of voice”

Choose the Leadership Voice Most Appropriate and Effective for the Situation

• Keep a consistent voice of character by knowing the principles that guide your interactions with others
• Use a voice of context when sharing vision, presenting to executives, or setting the stage
• Help others to stay focused by using a voice of clarity to give clear direction, set goals, and make decisions
• Seek to understand another person’s perspective with a voice of curiosity
• Increase your voice of connection by telling stories, acknowledging others, and making time to build rapport with others

Leader A Checklist for Peace (Chapter 6)

Use the Acronym “ACT”

• Accept the moment: Take constructive and effective action for what’s within your control
• Be content in the moment: Know what’s enough and bring an attitude of gratitude
• Trust yourself and life in the moment: You’ve achieved, learned, and grown, and you will again

Accept the Moment

• Name the resistance: What don’t you accept?
• Get honest: What’s in your control? What is out of your control?
• Let go to accept
• Accept and own all parts of yourself

Be Content in the Moment

• Keep the value of dissatisfaction
• Set an internal barometer for “what’s enough”
• Add an attitude of gratitude

Trust Yourself and Life in the Moment

• Get updated to who you are as a leader now
• Engage in a Chapters Review
• Remember who you are
• See the “so what” in everything

Transition from Striving to Greater Meaning and Purpose

• Remember the leader at peace mantra: “Let me have the humility to know what’s enough, the gratitude to see that it’s all enough, and the peace within to know that I am enough.”
• Give yourself permission to thrive
• Have principles drive leadership action
• Accept and practice the ultimate paradox: honor self to transcend self

Leader A Checklist for Pay It Forward (Chapter 7)

Don’t Underestimate Your Ripple Effect

• Recognize the impact you have on others depending on whether you are in Leader A or Leader B mode
• Choose to create a positive legacy
• Have a guiding question: “Am I choosing to be … a role model for others today? An agent of change who has improved the lives of others? A visionary who keeps the whole team on course?”

Develop Leader A Leaders, Teams, and Organizations

• Create a shared language using “Leader A” and “Leader B” with your teams
• Don’t normalize Leader B; get to the root cause and build action plans using the five Ps
• Be a good steward of organizational time, energy, and resources

Keep Purpose at the Forefront for Teams and Organizations

• Make sure to spend time with your direct reports to explore what drives their intrinsic motivation on the job
• Connect people to the organization’s purpose by articulating how day-to-day work affects vision, weaving it into onboarding and training programs, and creating culture-building activities