Leadership Resources & Frameworks

Step 3 of 3: Explore

Leadership Self-Assessment — Resources

You’ve completed the assessment. Now use these resources to develop the areas where you want to grow. Browse the reading recommendations, frameworks and first action steps for each of the 12 leadership characteristics. Start with your lowest-scoring areas.

What does your score mean?

Advanced Leader

153 - 180 (85%+)

You demonstrate exceptional leadership across nearly all characteristics. Focus on sustaining this and sharing your insight with others. Explore how you coach and develop the leaders around you.

Proficient Leader

126 - 152 (70%+)

Strong leadership capability across most areas, with real depth in several. Targeted development in your lower-scoring characteristics will take you to the next level.

Developing Leader

99 - 125 (55%+)

Solid foundations and clear areas of strength. Some characteristics need deliberate focus and practice to fully embed. Use the resources below to build a structured development plan.

Emerging Leader

0 - 98 (below 55%)

An important starting point. You have characteristics to build on - the awareness itself is the first step. Start with the 2-3 lowest-scoring areas and focus there first.

Core Reading for Leaders

Five books that directly address the characteristics in this framework.

True North

Bill George

Emotional Intelligence

Daniel Goleman

Dare to Lead

Brené Brown

Coaching for Performance

Sir John Whitmore

Rebel Ideas

Matthew Syed

Resources by Characteristic

Each card shows a key book, a useful framework, and one action to take this week. Start with your lowest-scoring characteristics from the assessment.

1. Authentic & Values Driven

Key Read

True North - Bill George

Framework

Personal values audit - mapping the values that genuinely guide your decisions and holding yourself accountable to them

🎯 Complete a personal values audit. Identify your top five values and ask a trusted colleague whether they experience your leadership as consistent with them.

2. Outward Focused

Key Read

Good to Great - Jim Collins

Framework

PEST Analysis (Political, Economic, Social, Technological) - structured method for scanning your external environment systematically

🎯 Schedule 30 minutes per week for external reading and sector scanning. Bring one external insight into a team conversation each week.

3. Sense-Maker

Key Read

Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman

Framework

Context - Meaning - Direction communication structure: when communicating change, always explain the context, what it means for people, and the direction ahead

🎯 In your next team communication about a complex issue, structure your message around three headings: What is happening? Why it matters. What we do next.

4. Enabler & Coach

Key Read

Coaching for Performance - Sir John Whitmore

Framework

The GROW Model (Goal, Reality, Options, Will) - a structured coaching conversation framework for developing others

🎯 Monitor your question-to-statement ratio in your next three team conversations. Aim to ask more than you tell. Use GROW as a guide.

5. Emotionally Intelligent & Resilient

Key Read

Emotional Intelligence - Daniel Goleman

Framework

TEIQue psychometric tool - a structured assessment of emotional intelligence across four factors: Wellbeing, Self-Control, Emotionality, Sociability

🎯 Use the TEIQue to baseline your emotional intelligence. Pair the results with coaching or reflective practice to identify specific development areas.

6. Collaboration & Relationships Driven

Key Read

Rebel Ideas - Matthew Syed

Framework

Relationship mapping - a visual audit of your key relationships, showing where trust is strong and where it needs deliberate investment

🎯 Map your 10 most important working relationships. Rate trust and quality of each. Invest deliberate time in the weakest two this month.

7. Skills Chef

Key Read

Range - David Epstein

Framework

T-shaped skills model - deep expertise in your core area, combined with breadth across adjacent disciplines including digital literacy and systems thinking

🎯 Create your T-shaped skills profile. Identify the one adjacent capability that would add most value to your leadership and build a plan to develop it.

8. Agile & Adaptive

Key Read

Switch - Chip Heath & Dan Heath

Framework

The Rider-Elephant-Path model - understanding the rational, emotional and environmental factors that drive or block behaviour change

🎯 At the end of each week, ask: what did I need to adapt this week, and how did I respond? Build this as a short weekly reflection habit.

9. Accountable, Humble & Vulnerable

Key Read

Dare to Lead - Brené Brown

Framework

360-degree feedback - structured input from peers, direct reports and stakeholders, giving an honest picture of how your leadership lands

🎯 Commission a 360-degree feedback exercise and share the key findings with your team. Model the vulnerability and accountability you want to see in others.

10. Positive Communicator

Key Read

Talk Like TED - Carmine Gallo

Framework

The Pyramid Principle - structuring communication from conclusion to supporting detail, making your message clear and compelling from the first sentence

🎯 Record yourself in a team presentation or meeting. Review not just what you said but how it landed - energy, clarity, and whether it inspired or just informed.

11. Customer & Service Focused

Key Read

The Effortless Experience - Matthew Dixon, Nick Toman & Rick DeLisi

Framework

Jobs-to-be-Done theory - understanding what customers or end-users are actually trying to achieve, not just what they ask for

🎯 Schedule one direct customer or end-user conversation per month as non-negotiable time. Ask: what are you trying to achieve, and what gets in the way?

12. Brave

Key Read

Dare to Lead - Brené Brown

Framework

Korn Ferry’s Courageous Leadership model - identifying the specific moments that call for courage and building the habit of responding with action, not avoidance

🎯 Identify one conversation you have been avoiding and have it this week. Start with small acts of courage and build the muscle gradually over time.

Ready to accelerate your leadership development?

Mind-Gap works with leaders at all levels to turn self-awareness into real, lasting change. From one-to-one coaching to leadership development programmes - we can help you close the gap.

Get in Touch with Mind-Gap →

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