9 More Leadership Lessons Learned The Hard Way

Written by Priscilla Hinds, Growth & Wellbeing Strategy Coach

Priscilla Hinds is an ICF-accredited coach specialising in growth, wellbeing, and mental fitness. As the founder of dream work achieve and creator of the happy growth coach app, she’s dedicated to helping people unlock their full potential and create lasting, positive change in both their lives and businesses.

Building on my previous article, 7 Leadership Lessons Learned the Hard Way From Experience, this piece explores nine more lessons that leaders often discover only through experience. These insights can help you navigate challenges more effectively and strengthen your ability to lead high-performing teams.

1. Avoid burnout: Prioritise your well-being and mental fitness

Often, the last thing leaders focus on is their own well-being and mental fitness. Historically, leaders who burned the midnight oil and focused heavily on work were seen as “high-flyers.” Yet research shows these behaviours negatively impact performance, productivity, and relationships.

Neglecting your well-being not only impacts your health but also limits your performance and your team’s success.

Action: Schedule daily time for reflection, solitude, and re-energising. Prioritise physical activity and nurture relationships outside work. Role model these behaviours to support a high-performing team and enhance your leadership skills.

2. Act like everybody is watching: You shape culture

Your team and colleagues observe all your actions and energy how you show up shapes the culture and behaviour of those around you.

Action: Model the behaviours and energy you want your team to emulate. Be conscious of the messages your actions send.

3. Use your leadership words wisely

When you speak as the most senior person in the room, your views often dominate, a phenomenon known as the HiPPO effect. Even casual comments may be taken as directives, unintentionally narrowing options and input.

Action: Ask open questions to stimulate input and promote curiosity. Share your thoughts only after others have contributed to avoid unintentionally influencing decisions.

4. Address issues early: Keep your team on course

Provide feedback in real time. Issues, if left unaddressed, tend to grow and spread, making them much harder to resolve later. Similarly, delaying positive feedback can diminish team performance over time.

Action: Address issues as soon as you notice them and provide timely recognition for good work. This keeps your team on course and maximises performance.

5. Accept not everyone will understand your leadership decisions

As a leader, you have access to more information and a broader perspective than those you lead. Others may see decisions as wrong or misaligned because they lack this context.

Action: Accept that not everyone will understand your decisions. Make the best choices with the available information and communicate with empathy the ‘why’ context as clearly as you can.

6. Lead for respect, not popularity

None of us likes everybody, so not everybody is going to like you. Pair this with making tough calls and delivering tough feedback even those that like you may not always agree.

Leadership is not a popularity contest. If you are always liked, it’s possible that you may not be being honest enough or pushing the boundaries of performance enough.

Respect outlasts popularity and drives long-term credibility.

Action: Let go of the need to be liked. Aim to earn respect through humility, honesty, and authenticity.

7. Prioritise leadership trust: Slow to build, instant to lose

In any relationship, trust is earned over a period of time. In the workplace context, it takes even longer. But losing trust can happen in an instant and affect everything for a long time.

Trust is a leader’s most valuable currency. Learn more about its transformative powers in this Forbes article.

Action: Act thoughtfully and do what you say. If you get it wrong and trust is broken, take immediate action to rectify do not let it linger.

8. Embrace vulnerability: Admitting mistakes builds trust

Most leaders want to appear competent and in control. Admitting mistakes or gaps in knowledge can feel uncomfortable, but doing so humanises you and fosters a culture of psychological safety.

Learn more about the power of vulnerability in this McKinsey article.

Action: Share your mistakes and admit when you don’t know something to build trust and connection.

9. Lead each team member according to their strengths

A single leadership or communication style won’t work for every team member. Each person is unique and will respond differently.

Action: Work with each team member to adapt your style to unlock their best performance. Adapting your style doesn’t mean changing who you are, it means adjusting your approach to unlock each person’s potential.

Leadership is a continual cycle of learning, failing, and improving. By embracing these lessons, you’ll not only smooth the journey but also accelerate your growth as a leader.

Dream work achieve offers tailored coaching to help leaders grow, build resilience, and inspire high-performing teams. Working with an experienced coach accelerates your leadership development, improves team performance, and creates a positive workplace culture.

Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and visit my website for more info!

Read more from Priscilla Hinds

Priscilla Hinds, Growth & Wellbeing Strategy Coach

Priscilla Hinds is an ICF-accredited coach specialising in personal growth, wellbeing, and mental fitness. She’s the founder of dream work achieve and brings together a lifelong passion for health and wellbeing with years of executive and leadership experience. Helping people create thriving lives and businesses comes naturally. Her mission is to inspire others to dream boldly, grow continually, learn deeply, smile often, move with purpose, and live fully as their best selves.