Self-Investment for Effective Leadership: Lessons from Warren Buffett
The best investment you can make, is an investment in yourself — Warren Buffett
Warren Buffett is well-known in the investment community and looked to as perhaps the greatest investor ever. When you are called the oracle of Omaha, it may be hard to deny the fame. Observing how Buffett manages his business and life, it feels more like someone who is very practical versus someone that is a future-teller. He is never seeking a quick win, or a shortcut to the next set of riches. Looking at his investments over time, most, if not all, were always made for the long-term, with real value attached to what those companies did. That alone in a lesson in effective leadership. There are no shortcuts, there are no quick to the finish line schemes.
Buffett has been asked on multiple occasions over the years where to make good investments during times of uncertainty or inflation. We certainly are seeing both of those right now. His answer has been consistent over the years. "Investing in yourself is the best thing you can do," Buffett stated in an interview. "Anything that improves your own talents." 1
Along those same lines, and as a way to help others understand how simple self-investment can be, he stated, “you don't need to have extraordinary effort to achieve extraordinary results. You need to do the ordinary, everyday things exceptionally well.” Again, this is as much a lesson in leadership as it is any type of investing advice.
Mr. Buffett even cites an example from early in his career, when he invested $100 in a public speaking course. He credits that simple self-investment for being able to propose to his wife, as well as sell stocks. Looking at his public speaking appearances over his lifetime, it would seem that investment paid off very well.
Identify areas where you want to make improvements. These could be things you currently see as ‘weaknesses’, and you know you want or need to get better at. Public speaking is an excellent example for many. We have nearly endless options on how to address almost every area you would want to cover. Whether it is an online course or a weekly Toastmasters group, you can find a good fit for your personal development needs.
I have written many times on the benefits of personal development and the ways you can do it. These can range from high time commitments to low, even things you can do in less than twenty-five minutes or less a day. Find areas that interest you and will add value for your career, and you will always find that it was a worthy investment. People who spend thousands of hours to perfect something they will never be, find out too late it was never meant to be. Buffett states that he could have trained for 10,000 hours to be a boxer, and still would not fare well afterward.
"Address whatever you feel your weaknesses are, and do it now. Whatever you want to learn more, start doing it today. Don’t put it off to your old age,” 2
Take some time to plan out how you will invest in yourself. Will it be finding a series of podcasts on a subject you wish to learn more about? Or find articles that can help you further develop areas of your leadership (you can always click the link below to sign up for Effective Retail Leadership articles). There are numerous online courses, great sites like TED Talks, MasterClass, or Skill Share that put tremendous resources in your hands anywhere, anytime you want. You can find a mentor, enroll in a college course, spend time with a peer or colleague that has experience and knowledge in areas you seek more information.
The investment you make in yourself only grows with time. No economic trend or external force can take away what you have put into yourself. There are few guarantees of a full return on monetary investments people make. But when making an investment in yourself, there is a promise that the more you put into you, the more you will get back. And that is something I am confident that Warren Buffett would put his stamp of approval on.
How will you take Buffett’s advice and invest in the best sure bet there is…you?
Join other retail leaders in continuing their development journey with Effective Retail Leader.com. SUBSCRIBE today to receive leadership tips directly to your inbox and monthly newsletters that provide many tools to help further develop your leadership skills. JOIN NOW!
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––