Self-Leadership: How to Start

When you first hear of it, the concept of self-leadership can sound a little confusing. In this article, we'll show you some steps on how to put it into practice in your personal and sporting life.
Self-Leadership: How to Start

Last update: 17 August, 2020

What is leadership? It’s the capacity of each individual to influence and motivate others, to help them reach their goals, objectives, or plans, according to a study by Garza Carranza, Guzman Soria y Gallardo Aguilar (2018). Self-leadership, on the other hand, means recognizing the emotions, thoughts, or goals of oneself.

Thanks to self-leadership, people can make decisions that will positively affect their lives. What are two important aspects that need to come into play so that an individual can make these decisions? These aspects are confidence and the conscience.

Now, when we’re talking about sport, self-leadership can help someone to meet their objectives and stick to their training regimens. As the Linares study (2001) mentions, in this particular area it’s important to cultivate self-motivation and self-management to achieve success and reach your goals.

Self-leadership: what aspects does it include?

In the first place, when considering how to excel at your chosen sport, it’s important to take into account your personality type and your personal preferences.

Likewise, it’s also necessary to know exactly what motivates you. You’ll need to know this to be able to better direct your personal and professional life.

After you’ve clearly worked out these two points, you can move on to the various aspects of self-leadership. The order doesn’t matter. Following, here are the areas that makeup self-leadership:

  1. Self-knowledge: knowing yourself well means understanding and recognizing the thoughts and emotions you experience when you confront different situations. This helps you to identify where they come from and how they affect you in your daily life. When you understand your thoughts and emotions, you can get to know your own limitations in each sphere of activity.
  2. Self-reliance: this allows you to take control of your priorities, and in that way be independent when you make decisions. Thanks to self-reliance, an athlete makes themselves responsible for each action they take.
  3. Self-esteem: it’s fundamental that any criticism, evaluations and perceptions you have about yourself is made in a positive way.
  4. Motivation: this helps your own mood to be positive, with the aim of creating consistency in your activities. The result of being motivated will be that you’ll meet your objectives, be goal-oriented, and have a greater commitment in your daily life.
  5. Self-management: this implies learning to regulate your own emotions by means of analysis and accepting others’ comments to help you improve.
A woman about to start a gym routine

Types of leadership in sports

According to a study by Hernandez Mendo and Canto Ortiz, there are three types of leadership. The first one, authoritarian, is that of someone who likes giving orders. On certain occasions, this person can be aggressive and can tend to want to have control over everything without needing help.

The second style, democratic leadership, means that the person tries to generate balance within a group. The atmosphere where you find this type of leader is generally positive, and all the members of the group like to work together to reach their goals.

Finally, we find the laissiz-faire leadership type, which is someone who doesn’t really like being a leader. This type of person doesn’t worry much about the rest of the group, tries to avoid responsibility, and doesn’t like to communicate.

OK, so why is it important to get to know the different leadership types? Well, when someone understands what type of leadership they associate with best or how they would like to be, they can have a clearer vision of how to start to manage their own leadership style.

That’s to say, the individual identifies with a style, and can then use it as a model to help motivate themselves to work on the desired areas.

First steps towards self-leadership

Now that we’ve looked at the types of leadership, what’s the first step in implementing self-leadership? Getting to know yourself. You need to find out your strengths and weaknesses. Knowing these will also help you to have the coping skills to be able to face any situation.

The next step, self-learning, is a progressive step that involves accepting your mistakes and wanting to change them for the future. Thanks to the knowledge of your strengths and weaknesses, you can look for guidance, help or a solution for each need you have.

A self-motivated woman jogging

The third step is establishing goals or objectives. Once you’ve worked out where you are today, the next step is determining where you want to get to. Analyze the different tools and methods you have at your disposal for setting goals and working towards them.

When you know what your goals are, it’ll be easier to have a clear idea of the plan you’ll need to follow to achieve them.

Planning, a key step

When you’ve considered all of the above, the time will have come for planning. This step includes writing your ideas down using lists, drawings, or diagrams. The idea is to be able to keep your goals in mind at all times.

Additionally, it’s important to write down a date you want to achieve each goal. This way, you’ll be motivated to be consistent every day in working towards these goals.

When you’ve put your plan into action, you should also undertake regular reviews of your plan to reach your goals. Make sure it’s realistic. This will help you to be flexible when unexpected situations come up. You’ll be able to adapt your actions at all times depending on the evolution of what you want to achieve.

Leading with the mind and heart in sports

When a professional or novice sportsperson understands the importance of self-leadership, they can more easily put it into practice, and handle it in a simpler and more productive way. The athlete must keep in mind the fact that each decision that they make will influence the type of leader that they’ll be.

In the same way, they should keep their strengths, weaknesses, and skills in mind, as mentioned above. They can use these to meet their objectives. With good self-leadership, you’ll be able to reach your goals and achieve success in your chosen sport.


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This text is provided for informational purposes only and does not replace consultation with a professional. If in doubt, consult your specialist.