Agile/Toastmasters
“Leadership is not about being perfect, but about learning from mistakes and empowering others to succeed.”
Introduction
“Unleashing Africa’s Leadership Potential:
🎉 Once upon a time, Africa, a continent overflowing with abounding untapped human resources, has found itself grappling with bad governance and leadership. However, within the realm of Agile Mindset and Toastmasters core values of effective leadership, impactful communication, and the adoption of agile best practices, there lies the key to Africa’s transformation. We’ll evaluate my 5 Top poor leadership style as a Tech startup founder, lesson learned, opportunities for growth, and the legendary duo of Agile and Toastmasters.
💡 This captivating blog post delves into the intriguing relationship between the Agile mindset and Toastmasters values. We explore how embracing Agile principles and weaving them together with Toastmasters’ core values can pave the way for Africa’s progress and continuous growth. By embracing Agile and Toastmasters, Africa can unlock its full potential and set the stage for a brighter future.
Lessons Learned: Leadership Mistakes 😔
🌟 As tech professionals and leaders, we have faced numerous challenges of leading people and making numerous mistakes then labelled horrible bosses. Let’s look at five common pitfalls and the opportunities for growth they present: I’ve experienced my fair share of challenges and made mistakes along the way. Here are my top five with lessons learned:
1️⃣ Struggling with Delegation: Sometimes, I found it difficult to trust important tasks, fearing it wouldn’t meet my standards, doing is myself leading to burnout. However, embracing Agile-Mindset and best practices such as Scrum enable leaders create a collaborative environment that encourages delegation whereby empowering the team to take responsibilities according to their strengths, fostering growth and collaboration.
2️⃣ Communication Breakdowns: Clear and effective communication is the cornerstone of any successful team or projects. I’ve learned the hard way that lack of clear instruction leads to misunderstandings and assumptions capable of derailing progress. Toastmasters, improves your ability to convey ideas, actively listen creating feedback loop for growth and avoid confusion.
3️⃣ Poor Decision-Making: Making hasty decisions without gathering sufficient information, driven by data & fact impact project outcomes. Enrolling for LEARNTOR cohort to earning certifications like Professional Scrum Masters Certification to incorporate Agile practices, gaining knowledge equipped with tools to help make informed decisions, delivering valuable results.
4️⃣ Micromanagement Woes: While it’s natural to be hands-on and concerned about achieving results, excessive micromanagement can stifle creativity and hinder team productivity. Trusting teams and providing needed, leads to better outcomes and foster a sense of ownership. Agile way of working promote self-organizing teams, allowing you to focus on higher-level strategic tasks and nurture a sense of ownership among team members.
5️⃣ Struggling with Trust: Past experiences of broken promises and disappointments has made it extremely challenging to trust people. However, building trust within the team is essential for collaboration and achieving collective goals. By fostering an environment of support, understanding, and transparency, it requires openness, recognition and acceptance about our strengths and weaknesses, promoting understanding.
“An Agile mindset embraces change as an opportunity for growth and thrives on the unknown, transforming challenges into triumphs.” – Mercy George-Igbafe
Lessons learned as an Agile Toastmaster🌟
💡 I have achieve significant personal and professional growth by adopting an Agile mindset and honing your Toastmasters skills. Here are some areas where you can make progress:
1️⃣ Improved Communication: Agile and Toastmasters empowers you to prioritize clear and open communication. This skill becomes invaluable as you engage with diverse team, stakeholders, and clients, fostering transparency and a culture of collaboration. through active listening to feedback, providing clear instructions, and establishing transparent channels, overcoming communication barriers.
2️⃣ Enhanced Decision-Making: Agile mindset combined with Scrum methodologies equips you to make informed decisions based on data, collaboration, and stakeholder input involving team members, including seeking subject matter expert input. This inclusive decision-making process leads to more robust outcomes and empowers team members.
3️⃣ Strengthening Emotional Intelligence & Cultivating Empathy: Developing emotional intelligence as a Toastmaster enables you to understand the perspectives, emotions, and needs of your team members. This fosters collaboration, trust, and a positive work environment.
4️⃣ Embracing Change: Agile embraces change and continuous improvement. By incorporating Agile practices, you become adaptable, open to experimentation, and able to seize new opportunities in the fast-paced tech industry. Agility allows us to adapt to the ever-evolving landscape and seize new opportunities.
5️⃣ Promoting Growth and Development: As an African tech professional, Through mentoring, coaching, trainings opportunities, and assigning challenging projects/tasks, Talents are nurtured and empower to reach their full potential leveraging Toastmasters core values and Agile Mindset.
The Legendary Duo: Agile and Toastmasters 🌟
💃🏽 Agility and Toastmasters form an extraordinary alliance for African professionals and leaders. Agile fuels innovation, while Toastmasters equips you with the soft skills and confidence to express ideas and negotiate wisely negotiate wisely, and ignite change. Together, drive Africa’s transformation and unlock its boundless potential through adoption of Agile implementing with scrum Framework.
“An Agile mindset embraces change as an opportunity for growth and thrives on the unknown, transforming challenges into triumphs.” – Mercy George-Igbafe
Milestones Recorded as President of LEARNTOR Toastmasters 🌟
Awarded the highest Toastmasters honour as President Distinguished Club for a new club within 2 years
Organised Workshop Secondary School Students of Ikeja Senior Secondary High School
Served as Chair for Media, Branding, Publicity and communication for Toastmasters Nigeria Conference 2.0
Organised and raised funds for Learntor Toastmasters Change of Guard with Nigeria’s Industry Experts Fred Amata, Daniella Peters, Morayo Afolabi-Brown
Featured an Television and Printed as speaking on Toastmasters benefit for leaders
Successful handed-over to a new executive
Conclusion: Embracing Africa’s Destiny ✨
🌍 Africa’s professionals and leaders hold the key to the continent’s progress by blending Agile transformation and the enchanting art of communication and effective leadership from Toastmasters, Africa can overcome its challenges and embrace a future full of possibilities. Let this inspiring blog ignite the spirit of change, for Africa’s destiny is within reach. Join me on this life-transforming journey and let’s unleash Africa’s true potential together!
💬 What leadership lessons have you learned? How has Toastmasters and an Agile mindset impacted your journey? Share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below! Let’s inspire each other to greatness. ✨
💬 Share your thoughts on the impact of either Agile and Toastmasters. 🌟
How have LEARNTOR, Mercy George-Igbafe, has contributed to you as an African tech professional? Let’s inspire each other to greatness! 🌱
🙌🏽 Related Links
2022 – 2023 Presidential Impact Report
Mercy George-Igbafe
Learntor Toastmasters Website
LEARNTOR Toastmasters on Guardian Newspaper
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