Chapter 1
You as a leader
Every journey starts with YOU. Before you lead a team, a function or a transformation, you lead yourself — your strengths, your blind spots, your preferences. Skip this chapter and everything else in the book leaks.
“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.”
— Aristotle
Self-reflection is treated as an extra task — the thing you would do if there were time. The book makes the opposite case: in a wicked world of conflicting interests, complexity and dilemmas, self-reflection is the work that lets every other piece of leadership land. This chapter gives you the lens, the language, and the courage to start.
Why self-reflection matters — and why most leaders avoid it
Self-reflection is a substantial element in personal growth and development. Yet in business, it's often taken over by the delusion of the day — the urgent crowding out the important. Leaders pay the price quietly: reactive decisions, inconsistent signals, teams who can't read the weather coming off the boss.
The Hourglass Model offers clarity about your context and helps locate where the focus should be. Used with a team it creates a shared language; used on yourself it grows your impact as a leader. Be grounded in self-awareness as a leader to make a greater impact — that line, lifted from the book, is the whole chapter in seventeen words.
Perception, awareness — and the blind spot you can't see
Every individual has their own way of looking at the world. Not everyone is aware of their own perception. Strong perception lets a leader read patterns, trends and challenges before they become problems. Strong awareness lets them read the room — the emotions and needs of the team, the client, the stakeholder — and adjust.
No one is perfect, and everyone has blind spots. The Johari Window (Luft & Ingham, 1955) is the classic map: what you know about yourself versus what others know. The only way the blind quadrant shrinks is feedback. The only way the hidden quadrant shrinks is disclosure. Both feel uncomfortable. Both are non-negotiable.
Behavioural preferences and the four Colour Energies
Carl Jung's Psychological Types (1971) introduced the idea of preferences — and the Insights Discovery system turned it into a working language. Four colours map four combinations of attitude (introvert/extravert) and function (thinking/feeling): Cool Blue, Earth Green, Sunshine Yellow, Fiery Red. Everyone uses all four. Everyone leads with one or two.
Knowing your colour is interesting. Recognising other people's, and adapting how you communicate with them, is what changes results.
The Ladder of Inference: catch yourself climbing
Harvard's Chris Argyris (1982) showed how, in milliseconds, we climb from raw observation to selected data, to added meaning, to assumption, to conclusion, to belief — and then act as if we'd been at the top all along. The ladder is fast, automatic and invisible. Until you name it.
Naming it is half the work. The other half is climbing back down — with someone else — to compare what each of you actually saw, and what you each made of it.
Power of words, the Platinum rule, and feed-forward
Words are enormously powerful tools that most people don't fully appreciate. Leaders who develop true mental agility with language become highly effective communicators — they translate the real meaning of what one person says to another, and reach out based on each person's preferences.
The Golden Rule says: treat others as you would like to be treated. The Platinum Rule goes further: treat others as they would like to be treated. Combine that with feed-forward — goal-oriented, future-focused, shared accountability — and you have a development conversation that actually develops.
"The time has come to stop giving feedback and start giving feed forward. We must become leaders of people not just managers of tasks." (Kruse, 2012)
Tools in this chapter
Pick up the practice
The Hourglass Model
Connect YOU → CONTEXT → IMPACT. The model that holds the whole chapter together.
Colour Energies
Recognise the four Jungian preferences in yourself and others — and adapt to lead across all four.
Ladder of Inference
Catch yourself climbing from raw data to firm belief, and learn to climb back down with someone else.
Reflection
Take this into your week.
- →Why do I do what I do — what is the deeper driver behind this issue being important to me?
- →What habits or assumptions are hindering me and others?
- →What is my effect on other people — and how do I actually know?
- →Which strengths will help me make the impact I want to make?
- →Where am I avoiding feedback because I sense it would be true?
Inside TOP Academy
Chapter 1 is also Module 1 of the Leadership Essentials Programme — where you don't just read about your blind spots, you get a personal Insights Discovery profile, peer feedback, and a coach who keeps holding up the mirror until something shifts.
The Leadership Essentials programme has run with 350+ leaders across Europe and Asia — blending the book's models with peer coaching, real-life cases, and follow-through that sticks.
See the programmeDon't let this stay on the page.
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