Leaders are required to wear many hats: to be creative, ambitious, kind, understanding, and motivational – all at once. However, the most important trait of a leader (or of a successful person in any profession) is perseverance. This is especially true in the context of a crisis.
Perseverance means being hardworking and finishing what is started, despite barriers and obstacles that arise. The pleasure received from completing tasks and projects is very important to those who are high in perseverance.
Perseverance involves organizing oneself to support activities (e.g., scheduling breaks and sticking to them, rewarding in small ways along the way), but when all else fails, this strength helps the person to barrel through until the project is done. This helps build further confidence for future successes and goal accomplishment. Perseverance involves the voluntary continuation of a goal-directed action despite the presence of challenges, difficulties, and discouragement.
Nobody’s life is free from difficulties. If it was, then they never stepped outside of their comfort zone, pushed themselves to complete a goal, or challenged themselves in any way. Since challenges are practically an inevitability in the professional world, perseverance is extremely valuable. It’s more than a professional skill; it’s a life skill.
A person without perseverance and persistence isn’t tied to the need to accomplish their short and long-term goals. They often quickly abandon projects and jobs that become a challenge, and rarely improve their circumstances or skills. Lacking perseverance means also being devoid of a growth mindset. This has negative repercussions on professional and personal life.
How to improve perseverance skills?
Perseverance comes from failing and getting back up. So, it is good to change your relationship with failure to seeing it as a lesson, rather than a setback. Having a growing mindset is a way how to increase your perseverance and understand that this is a skill, which is possible to improve. Do not be afraid of difficult situations, be able to take risks. Build a network of support that includes family, friends, co-workers and peers, where you are free to open up and get feedback and encouragement during hard times.
Things keep changing on the daily basis during crisis. In a recent article for Forbes, transformational change expert Rob Carucci describes leadership in crisis: “Sometimes we step into new chapters of leadership with the wind at our back, ready to ‘take things to the next level.’ But commonly, new leadership chapters put us squarely in the face of gale-force headwinds, testing every limit of our abilities, patience and tenacity.” The cure is to have perseverance.
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
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