If doctors practice medicine, then leaders practice business. Think about it.

We expect doctors to keep learning throughout their careers. Experience helps them recognize patterns, ask better questions, and make informed decisions. Each patient presents a different combination of circumstances, and what worked before may need to be reconsidered.

I believe leadership requires that same commitment to practice.

We learn from books and workshops, and then the real work begins. We need to put what we learn into practice and pay attention to the results so we can adjust our approach.

That takes presence. It takes focus. And it takes creating time to think about how we lead while we’re busy doing the work of leading.

Experience Gives Us Something to Examine

Throughout my career, as both an entrepreneur and an employee, I’ve experienced a wide range of leadership styles. I’ve also had plenty of opportunities to examine my own.

Some approaches served me well. Others needed to change. How did I know? I had to pay attention to what was happening around me and how my behavior contributed to it.

Years of experience can give us confidence. They can also make it easier to assume we already understand a situation.

We hear the beginning of a problem and start preparing the answer. We recognize something familiar and reach for a solution that worked before. We walk into a meeting believing we know what needs to happen.

Sometimes we’re right and sometimes that confidence causes us to miss information that would change our thinking.

Practicing leadership means being willing to examine those familiar responses. It means asking ourselves whether our experience is helping us understand the moment or encouraging us to move through it too quickly.

Presence Is Something We Practice

Being present sounds simple until you try to do it consistently.

You’re listening to an employee while thinking about the client call coming up next. You’re reviewing a proposal while responding to messages. You’re sitting in a meeting, but part of your attention is still on a difficult conversation from earlier that morning.

I know how easily this happens. A full calendar can make divided attention feel necessary.

But the people we lead experience the attention we give them. They notice when we’re distracted and when we interrupt, or worse, when we answer a question they haven’t finished asking.

Practicing presence can begin with a small, like closing the laptop or putting down the phone. A bigger change comes when you take a moment before a conversation to consider how best to give it your attention.

Then comes the harder part: staying with the conversation when our minds want to jump ahead.

Every time we notice that drift and bring our attention back, we’re practicing a leadership skill. We’re giving ourselves a better chance to understand what someone needs and what the situation requires.

The Practice Continues After the Decision

There’s another part of leadership practice that’s easy to overlook: reflecting on what happened.

When we make a decision and communicate it, many time we then simply move on to the next priority. Unless something goes noticeably wrong, we may never return to it.

Being resent means we also ask how our approach worked.

Did people understand the direction? Did they feel comfortable raising concerns? Did I listen when someone offered a different perspective? Did my involvement help the team move forward, or did I become a bottleneck?

These questions are uncomfortable, especially when our intentions were good.

I’ve learned that good intentions still need examination. I can believe I communicated clearly and discover that someone left the conversation confused. I can think I’m being helpful and realize I haven’t given someone enough room to take ownership.

Being willing to sit with that information gives me something specific to practice next time.

Progress From Presence is an ongoing commitment to notice, think, act, and learn.

I want to recognize when I’m distracted. I want to hear the concern beneath the question. I want to create time to consider a decision before urgency makes it for me.

I also want to remain open to the possibility that a different approach could serve someone better.

That work happens in everyday moments, and we need to notice them.

The meeting where we listen a little longer.

The conversation where we ask instead of assume.

The decision we give ourselves permission to pause and think it through.

Those moments are our practice.

The only way to grow as a leader is to practice being one. Wherever we are in our careers, the next opportunity is likely already on the calendar.

How will you give it your attention?