Anyone can be placed in a leadership role. In most organizations, the reward for being an outstanding individual contributor is to be promoted into leading a team of other individual contributors. But those leaders often find that the skills that made them great employees aren’t as helpful when leading great employees (or even mediocre ones). As Marshall Goldsmith famously says, "what got you here, won’t get you there." 

Being successful as a leader requires developing a certain set of new skills. These skills that may or may not have been a part of any "leadership training" program you’ve attended. In this article, we'll review five skills leaders need to develop in order to be successful—and five skills aspiring leaders should make a point to develop before stepping into their first leadership role.

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It’s rare that leaders arrive in their first role with these skills. They take time to develop. And that means great leaders don't stop developing these skills after a certain level in the organization or years of experience. Great leaders are always learning and always developing. What got them into leadership may not get them any further. But, developing these skills will. And these skills will build teams that are better equipped to do their best work ever.

//DO YOUR BEST WORK EVER

//ABOUT DAVID

He is the best-selling author of four books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, USAToday, Fast Company, the Financial Times, Bloomberg BusinessWeek, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS This Morning. Since 2017, Burkus has been ranked as one of the world’s top business thought leaders by Thinkers50. As a sought-after international speaker, his TED Talk has been viewed over 2 million times. He’s worked with leaders from organizations across all industries including Google, Stryker, Fidelity, Viacom, and even the US Naval Academy.

A former business school professor, Burkus holds a master’s degree in organizational psychology from the University of Oklahoma, and a doctorate in strategic leadership from Regent University.

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