Speaker 1: Helping leaders motivate their people to a higher level of
Speaker 1: performance through strong human relations, team building, and golajving. This
Speaker 1: is the seven Minute Leadership Podcast with your host Paul
Speaker 1: Fello Aledo. Hello everyone, and welcome to the seven Minute
Speaker 1: Leadership Podcast. It's episode six ninety nine. Let me take
Speaker 1: you up in the air for a minute. Picture a
Speaker 1: pilot in a small aircraft climbing out, turning, crosswind, then downwind,
Speaker 1: then base, then final approach. The runway is in sight,
Speaker 1: the wheels touched down, and before the aircraft even fully settles,
Speaker 1: throttle goes forward again and back up into the air
Speaker 1: around the pattern again, touch and go, touch and go,
Speaker 1: touch and go. That pilot is not flying to get somewhere.
Speaker 1: That pilot is flying to get better. Now here's the
Speaker 1: part that most people miss. There's a difference between being
Speaker 1: current and being proficient. A pilot can meet the legal
Speaker 1: requirement a certain number of takeoffs and landings in a
Speaker 1: certain timeframe and be considered current. That means they are
Speaker 1: allowed to fly. But ask any real pilot and they
Speaker 1: will tell you something straight. Currency keeps you legal, Proficiency
Speaker 1: keeps you alive. And that right there is leadership because
Speaker 1: too many leaders are current, but they are not proficient.
Speaker 1: They show up, they attend the meeting, they sign the form,
Speaker 1: they check the box. They are technically still in the game,
Speaker 1: but they're not sharp. They're not practicing, they're not improving.
Speaker 1: They're not pushing themselves through the pattern over and over
Speaker 1: again to get better at the fundamentals, and leadership at
Speaker 1: its core, is a skill set of fundamentals communication, decision make, accountability, presence.
Speaker 1: You do not master those once and move on. You
Speaker 1: practice them every single day. And let me bring this
Speaker 1: even closer to home. In EMS, your paramedics go through
Speaker 1: an annual skills review. They run through airway management, IV access,
Speaker 1: medication administration, cardiac scenarios. They demonstrate they can still perform.
Speaker 1: That makes them current. But if that paramedic only touches
Speaker 1: those skills once a year, they are not proficient. And
Speaker 1: you would never accept that on a call. You would
Speaker 1: never look at a patient say don't worry, the medic
Speaker 1: is current. You want proficiency, You want muscle memory, you
Speaker 1: want calm under pressure. You want someone who has done
Speaker 1: it so many times that when it matters, there is
Speaker 1: no hesitation. And leadership is no different. Your team does
Speaker 1: not need a current leader, They need a proficient Onefficiency
Speaker 1: does not come from annual reviews, leadership steminars, or a
Speaker 1: stack of books on your shelf. It comes from daily reps, small, intentional,
Speaker 1: repeated reps. It comes from having a difficult conversation instead
Speaker 1: of avoiding it. It comes from giving real feedback instead
Speaker 1: of surface level comments. It comes from making a decision
Speaker 1: when it would be easier to delay it. Those are
Speaker 1: your leadership. Touch and goes every day gives you a
Speaker 1: pattern to fly. Every interaction is an approach. Every conversation
Speaker 1: is a landing. Every decision is a throttle push forward
Speaker 1: to get back into the air. And here's where most
Speaker 1: leaders get it wrong. They think leadership happens in big moments,
Speaker 1: the major incident, the big meeting, the crisis. That is
Speaker 1: not where leadership is built. That is where leadership is revealed.
Speaker 1: Leadership is built in the quiet repetitions that nobody see.
Speaker 1: The extra five minutes you spend preparing for a conversation,
Speaker 1: the way you handle a small mistake from an employee,
Speaker 1: the tone you use when you're tired, frustrated and stretched thin.
Speaker 1: Those are your reps. Those are your touch and goes.
Speaker 1: And if you skip them. You only show up when
Speaker 1: it's required. If you rely on being current instead of
Speaker 1: working towards proficiency, you will feel it, your team will
Speaker 1: feel it, and when the moment comes that actually matters,
Speaker 1: you will not have the confidence or the control that
Speaker 1: comes from repetition. You will hesitate, you will second guess,
Speaker 1: you will default to whatever habit you have built, whether
Speaker 1: it's good or bad. So here's the question I want
Speaker 1: you to sit with today. Are you practicing leadership or
Speaker 1: are you only showing up for it? Because those are
Speaker 1: two very different things. One creates growth, the other creates stagnate.
Speaker 1: And here's the good news. You don't need hours. You
Speaker 1: don't need a perfect plan, you don't need a classroom.
Speaker 1: You need intention seven minutes a day, seven minutes where
Speaker 1: you consciously decide, I'm going to get one rep better today.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's how you start your shift, Maybe it's how
Speaker 1: you close out your day. Maybe it's one conversation you
Speaker 1: handle differently. That is your pattern work, that is your
Speaker 1: leadership flight training. And over time, those small reps compound.
Speaker 1: You get smoother, you get sharper, you get more confident.
Speaker 1: You stop reacting and start leading, You stop guessing. And
Speaker 1: start knowing. You move from being current too proficient. And
Speaker 1: that is where real leadership lives, not in the title,
Speaker 1: not in the position, not in the annual review. It
Speaker 1: lives in the daily discipline of showing up and practicing
Speaker 1: the craft. So tomorrow, when your day starts, I want
Speaker 1: you to think about that runway. You are not there
Speaker 1: to survive the day, were there to get better, take off,
Speaker 1: fly the pattern, make the landing go again. Because the
Speaker 1: leaders who commit to daily reps are the ones who
Speaker 1: show up ready when it counts. And if you take
Speaker 1: nothing else from today, I want you to remember this
Speaker 1: currency keeps you in the seat. Proficiency makes you someone
Speaker 1: worth following. Put in the reps every single day. This
Speaker 1: has been the seven minute Leadership podcast. I thank you
Speaker 1: for listening, and if you want more free leadership resources,
Speaker 1: head over to paulfolovalito dot com and click on free Stuff.
Speaker 1: For more Paul fell of Alito podcasts, visit Paulfellowalito dot
Speaker 1: com