Uncomfortable leaders are aspiring leaders who have done the internal work of locating their superpower, finding confidence in their cultural background, and identifying their BHAG—in other words, they’ve done the visualization part.

What makes them uncomfortable is that they haven’t quite moved on to the actualization part—they have the vision, but something is stopping them from going after it. (See here for more good advice on planning for your dreams.)

Many of the aspiring and early-stage entrepreneurs I talk to fall into this category—in fact, all entrepreneurs face these challenges at some point. They have a big idea—maybe even a business plan—but haven’t quite gotten to the point of launching it.

For some, they have a side hustle that they’re looking to transform into their main job. Others have even launched their enterprise, but they find that it just isn’t getting the traction or support they had hoped.

This discomfort is a natural stage of the leadership journey. These aspiring leaders are looking for clarity on the path forward to developing some momentum and starting to make some progress.

I also call uncomfortable leaders “runway leaders,” because it’s like they’re in the plane, on the runway, ready to fly, and they know where they want to go—they just haven’t quite taken off yet. Unfortunately, even with a great flight plan, you’re not going to get where you want to go unless you start flying. Taking off requires leveraging the second pair of Cs of leadership capital: communication and connection.

Communicating Your Value

This part of the leadership journey starts with communicating your value. You can’t just tell your story about your capability, culture, and vision to yourself—you have to share it with the world. You have to put your dream into the universe so it can work on it.

You want to communicate two primary things. First, you need to tell the world what your superpower is—be honest about the unique value you offer. So the first step to effective communication is asking yourself: What can I offer? How can I leverage my superpower and cultural assets to benefit others?

Second, you need to tell the world where you want to go on your leadership journey—be upfront about the treasure you seek. We often can’t get what we want simply because we’re afraid to communicate our desires to others.

The empowering thing about discovering your superpower and cultural assets is that you can now practice approaching communication more confidently. You can begin any conversation with, “Here’s what I’m great at and what I have to offer. How can I help you?”

Connecting With Purpose

Effective communication positions you for opportunities to pursue your own treasure, to join other people’s journeys, and to bring others along on your journey with you as well. This amounts to building your own personal brand, telling your story authentically, and asking for the order—that is, getting comfortable stating what you want straightforwardly. Once you can do this, you can leverage your relationships with others to help you progress along your critical path to your goal.

Leveraging connections is essential to actualizing your vision. With connection, we put our communication skills to work, helping others on their journeys and getting help from them on our own journey, in turn—investing in others and getting them to invest in us. You’re not going to be able to attain your treasure alone.

The answer is in your network. Reaching out and leveraging that network enables you to lighten your load on your journey and cover more ground more quickly or with less effort.

Assess Yourself

Where are you on your leadership journey? Here's a free Leadership Capital Assessment that charts your progress along two axes: visualization and actualization.

Visualization involves figuring out what treasure you seek—your BHAG—and charting the path to that goal. This requires developing the first two Cs of leadership: capability and culture. Actualization, or putting your vision into action to achieve your goal, involves developing the next two Cs of leadership: communication and connection.