How is Your Business Acumen? Suggestions from a Leadership Coach

Coach Lucille on a farm in the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia with Confucius quote about learning.

The shelf life of skills has never been shorter. What once secured a career can now become practically obsolete overnight. If you want to thrive as a leader, you must always be learning…not occasionally when you have extra time, always. Learning about the business of business is an edge that keeps you relevant.

Unfortunately, in our world of AI, sound bites, and quick emojis, it’s easy to settle for surface-level answers. These quick answers might be acceptable in the moment, but they keep us from having to think deeply or reflect meaningfully. Acceptable doesn’t make us strong. Acceptable doesn’t achieve ambitions. Acceptable is not thriving.

The truth is that at some point in your career, being good at today's job won’t be enough. Advancement comes to those who are ready now with broader perspective, sharper skills, and the initiative to think beyond what’s right in front of them. Learning agility keeps you relevant and ready for the next leadership challenge.

In this leadership coaching blog post, I share three ways to boost learning agility specifically aimed at expanding your business acumen. Knowing where to source information, how to process what you take in, and how to amplify what you’re learning is key to growth and next level leadership.

Source Broadly.

Build your business knowledge with a variety of inputs, including these three core inputs: people, your organization, and outside resources. If you aspire to a bigger role, you need to be seeking new information and perspectives to expand your business acumen. Remain knowledgeable about business and the marketplace by sourcing insights broadly.

1. People: Talk with industry leaders. Network at events. Ask colleagues at competitors what they’re seeing. Engage a mentor. Ask your leader for perspective.

2. Your organization: Meet with colleagues in different departments. Review internal reports and research. Listen in on earnings calls and town halls. Understand your company’s business priorities.

3. Outside resources: Subscribe to thought leadership from top consultancies. Join professional associations. Read business books. Take a class. Follow credible business influencers through newsletters (subscribe to mine here), podcasts, YouTube, and websites.

Are you curious enough to seek out diverse perspectives?

Process Deeply.

Agile learners don’t just consume information; they reflect on it. Reflection, application, and experimentation turn raw information into insight to make learning real. Business insights can be heady stuff, so setting aside time to think through what you’ve heard is necessary to process deeply and apply it.

1. Spot themes: Look for patterns across unrelated data points and sources. Note repetition in phrases and ideas. Connect insights to your team’s priorities. Notice where new ideas solve old problems.

2. Apply it: Capture your reactions in the moment. Journal to put things into perspective. Use what if scenarios to test insights. Use fresh vocabulary in your communications. Take notes during meetings and notice what is new to you.

3. Experiment: Volunteer for assignments that challenge your thinking. Recommend new approaches to projects. Share an article or new data point with your team. Assess your skills now and start reinventing for what you’re recognizing is needed for the future.

Are you reflective enough to extract meaningful insights from the knowledge?

Share Generously.

When you share your learning with others, you multiple your impact. Use your broader perspective to sharpen your skills, inform decisions, and push beyond the obvious; when you use what you are learning, you lock in the learning. Amplify your learning to create your competitive advantage.

• Tell stories strategically: Frame insights in ways that drive action. Tell stories to deepen your own learning. Create a link between a current state and future possibilities. Be a part of the story for richer context.

• Integrate learning: Bring new ideas into processes and decision-making. Ask for feedback and advice as you try out new approaches. Use frameworks and establish metrics to help you evaluate what you’re learning.

• Develop others: Start a group to explore new topics. Program learning routines into your team meetings. Serve as a mentor to those with different experiences. Ask powerful questions to encourage curiosity.

Are you brave enough to share what you’re learning as you experiment?

Learning agility demands sourcing information broadly, processing the information deeply, and then sharing the knowledge broadly. Instead of settling for sound bites and surface-level solutions, be a leader who proactively seeks and experiments with new insights to grow your perspective and business acumen.

The leaders who will build tomorrow’s market-leading organizations are learning faster to create breakthrough strategies, develop transformational leaders, and stay ahead of change. Stay ready so you don’t have to get ready. Being an agile learner with strong business acumen will equip you for the long-term.

As a leadership coach, I coach growth-minded professionals to lead well, get recognized, and thrive. I publish a monthly newsletter and blog post and invite you to subscribe under my Contacts page.

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