To build a movement of Timeless Leadership, your voice and example will be crucial.
Welcome to Timeless Leadership (interlude 1)! This week I share some more detail about how you can write and share about your Timeless Leader journey. In the coming months I’m hoping to feature a handful of voices from among my early readership, and today’s post will help make this happen!
Whether you’re already planning a piece or are merely curious about what’s to come, please check out this week’s edition and let me know if you have any questions or suggestions for this collaborative phase of Timeless Leadership.
Planning to write but haven’t told me yet? Fill out this quick form and I’ll be in touch.
The Purpose
Why write about Timeless Leadership?
The first reason is foundational to all leadership development: personal reflection fuels growth. There is something about the writing process that is fundamental to clear thinking that you can’t get through any other exercise.
Sure, it’s hard. But so is running a marathon, earning a degree, building a business, or running a campaign.
If you take the time to sit down and write about your relationship to time as a leader, you’re going to discover things about yourself that you didn’t realize. You might set new goals or revisit habits. You’ll certainly find the exercise valuable, even if it’s uncomfortable.
Second, when you write as a guest author, you’ll connect with an emerging community and have the opportunity to ask for support for something you care about. Each guest author will talk, in some way, about something they are leading, and get to ask this audience (you all!) to consider supporting a cause or organization. You’ll add to your movement some aligned followers and partners.
Finally, writing and sharing about your timeless leader journey will contribute to an emerging dialogue that’s crucial for change. With more voices and perspectives featured here, we’ll all learn more. By adding your voice, you get to teach us about a part of your unique journey, discoveries, and/or best practices.
It’s a time efficient investment.
The Structure
Ok, so maybe you’re sold on the benefits. But what should you write about?
While I’m open to featuring guest posts that embrace different styles or lengths, for those of you who simply want to follow a template and a set of guidelines, here’s what we’re aiming for:
Length: 500-750 words (<5 minutes)
Topic: Personal approach to Timeless Leadership
Primary Prompt:
Pick one of the practices of the Timeless Leader (Save Time, Craft Time, and Escape Time; or Curate, Design, Teach). Write about what you do well, and/or something you’re working on.
Alternate Prompts:
When have you experienced a time crisis as a leader? How did you deal with it, and what did you learn?
What is your philosophy of managing time as a leader, and how does it apply to leading yourself, your organization(s), and society?
What is a specific tool, framework, or resource that you’ve used to help you respond to time pressure as a leader? How do you use it?
Outline:
A possible outline for your reflection could look like this:
Opening - a story; Why you’re doing this
Thesis statement
3 Supporting Arguments… or a Story in 3 Acts
A CTA or Invitation (Give-Get)
The Process
This is the first time I’m doing this, so it’s possible we’ll need to iterate here. That said, the process below I expect will lead to great outcomes in a manageable way. Realistically I think budgeting FIVE hours over 4 weeks will set you up for success.
Day 1: Submit Interest Form
2-3 minutes
This is not a commitment by the way. You can always change your mind.
Week 1: Brainstorm
Set aside 20-30 minutes to brainstorm some ideas for your piece.
If you want to use an AI like ChatGPT or Claude as a thought partner, you could* copy-paste this post into the chatbot and use the following prompt to begin:
You are a leadership coach, ghost-writer, and editor. Please advise me in writing a guest post for a Substack newsletter called “Timeless Leadership”. I will paste the guidelines into the chat. Can you can help me to build an outline for my guest post? I will also need your help reflecting on what experiences or insights I want to share, and selecting which one to write about.
Message me an update on what you’re thinking about for the post, and we schedule a tentative publication date.
Week 2: Complete draft
Set aside one hour to write a complete first draft. You might be able to do this more quickly, or my might need more time. Aim to complete a draft in under an hour, so you can then:
Sleep on it.
Take 30 minutes to re-read it a day or two later. Do some spot editing. Decide if it needs a total re-write, or if you’re on the right track.
Take 2 minutes to send the draft to me and tell me what you think the status is: “On track”, “needs an overhaul”, or “I’m not sure.”
Week 3: Revise draft
<60 minutes: Schedule or join a coaching call with me to go over your work, what you’re trying to accomplish, and your plan to finish the post.
60 minutes: Ask one or two friends, trusted colleagues, or a peer member of this community to read your draft and provide feedback. Leverage this feedback and any additional feedback I might provide to complete the draft.
Week 4: Proofing and publishing
30 minutes: Do your own final read through. Then notify me that it’s “done” and I’ll prep and my intro statement for your post and load it up for publication.
5-10 minutes: Read your published work and share it with your network
*RE: AI support - I’m considering creating a Custom GPT for writing about and practicing Timeless Leadership. Would this be interesting to you? Let me know!
In Summary
Writing a guest post will help you grow, will help you connect with others and generate support, and will help you teach others.
A guest post should not be very long, should be personal, and will blend a bit of story-telling and argument-making.
It will take some time to write a guest post, but not a crazy amount. Spaced over four weeks, you can get it done over a series of lunch breaks.
I’m excited to hear from you and hope you’ll consider signing up!
-Joe
PS. Ready to sign up? Go to this form and let me know so we can get started.
PS. If you received this via email you can reply directly to share thoughts or ideas; you can now also message me directly on Substack!