Development for executive leaders

So my personal leadership journey started quite some time ago, joining policing as a criminal justice performance manager up until now being a deputy director within the Met. 

I recently attended the executive leadership programme put on by the College of Policing. It's helped me really dispel that imposter syndrome that so many people have within themselves – particularly women, unfortunately. 

It's built my confidence and it's really given me the right language, the right way to express what I know I'm capable of, and demonstrate that to others. 

For me it's taking those skills and using them in what is really a new job for me, but it's allowing me to change the way that I do that job. 

But it's also given me some self-belief that I'm now working at a much more national level, and then being able to bring my best self into the role has been really helpful to me. 

So I think some of the – kind of the classic leadership qualities that people talk about, being determined and driving things through, they're not my leadership qualities. The things I think are most important are things like humility, the ability to listen to others, work with others, and be collaborative and collegiate, but also just meaning that we're learning all the time, having that open mindset. 

So for me, the best leaders are the leaders that grow the next leaders for the next generation and light the spark of enthusiasm and ambition in others. 

And it's one of those things that actually some of the quietest leaders have been my most impressive in some ways. I had a superintendent in Hampshire when I first worked there, who once said that it costs nothing to light the candle for others, and that really stuck with me. And although she's retired now, I’d still consider her one of the best leaders that I’d ever worked with. 

All those little qualities, that quiet brilliance that people have, I think it's that that makes them spark.