Act like a leader to become one.

If you want to become a leader, don't wait for the fancy title or the corner office. You can begin to act, think, and communicate like a leader long before that promotion. Even if you're still several levels down and someone else is calling all the shots, there are numerous ways to demonstrate your potential and carve your path to the role you want.

What the Experts Say
"It's never foolish to begin preparing for a transition no matter how many years away it is or where you are in your career," says Muriel Maignan Wilkins, coauthor of Own the Room: Discover Your Signature Voice to Master Your Leadership Presence. Michael Watkins, the chairman of Genesis Advisers and author of The First 90 Days and Your Next Move, agrees. Not only does the planning help you develop the necessary skills and leadership presence, it also increases your chances of getting the promotion because people will already recognize you as a leader. The key is to take on opportunities now, regardless of your tenure or role. "You can demonstrate leadership at any time no matter what your title is," says Amy Jen Su, coauthor of Own the Room. Here are several ways to start laying the groundwork.

Knock your responsibilities out of the park
No matter how big your ambitions, don't let them distract you from excelling in your current role. Focus on the present as much as — or more than — the future. "You still have to deliver results in your day job," says Jen Su. Adds Maignan Wilkins: "You always need to take care of today's business so that nobody — peers, direct reports, or those above you — questions your performance." That's the first step to getting ahead.

Help your boss succeed
"You have to execute on your boss's priorities too," says Watkins. "Show her that you're willing to pick up the baton on important projects." Maignan Wilkins also suggests you "lean more towards yes than no" whenever your boss asks you to help with something new. Find out what keeps your manager up at night and propose solutions to those problems.

Seize leadership opportunities, no matter how small
Make sure your "let me take that on" attitude extends beyond your relationship with your boss. Raise your hand for new initiatives, especially ones that might be visible to those outside your unit. "This will give others a taste of what you'll be like in a more senior role," says Maignan Wilkins. It doesn't have to be an intense, months-long project. It might be something as simple as facilitating a meeting, offering to help with recruiting events, or stepping in to negotiate a conflict between peers. You might find opportunities outside of work, too. You can sit on the board of a local nonprofit or organize your community's volunteer day. "These activities send the signal that you aspire to leadership potential," Watkins says.

Look for the white space
Another way to prove your potential is to take on projects in the "white space." These are problems that others aren't willing to tackle or don't even know exist. "Every organization has needs that nobody is paying attention to, or people are actively ignoring," Maignan Wilkins says. For example, you might be able to identify a customer need that isn't being met by your company's current product line, and propose a new one. Or you could do a quick analysis of how much a specific change would save the company. When you take on a task that no one else is willing to do, you make yourself stand out.

Don't be a jerk
There's a fine line between being ambitious and acting like you're too big for your britches. "Don't try to exert authority when you don't have it," says Watkins. Practice what he calls "steward leadership": focus on what your team wants to accomplish instead of putting yourself first. Jen Su recommends "humble confidence," showing appropriate modesty in your role, while having the self-assurance to know that you will rise to the next level.

Be cautious when sharing your ambitions
It's appropriate to raise your ambitions with your manager if you have a trusting, solid relationship, but frame them in a way that focuses on what's best for the company. Jen Su suggests you lay out your accomplishments for the past year and then ask something like, "As we look further out, where do you see me continuing to make a contribution?" Watkins warns that these conversations shouldn't come off as being all about you. Instead, engage in a two-way conversation with your boss. If you have the kind of boss who may feel threatened by your aspirations, it's better to keep your ambitions quiet and prove your potential.

Find role models
Look for people who have the roles you want and study what they do — how they act, communicate, and dress. "Pick someone at the next level, someone similar to you, and find a way to work with them," says Watkins. Volunteer for a committee they're spearheading or offer to help with one of their pet projects. Identify behaviors that you can emulate while being true to yourself. "You don't want to fake it," says Maignan Wilkins. It might also help to study people who are stuck in their careers as examples of what not to do, Watkins says. Are they clumsy politically? Do they disrespect the lines of authority? Do they fail to make connections between departments?

Build relationships
There's an old adage, "It's not who you know, it's who knows you." When you're evaluated for a promotion, it's unlikely your boss will sit in a room alone and contemplate your potential. She'll rely on others to assess your ability, which means you need supporters across the organization — people who are aware of the work you're doing. "If you find yourself walking down the hall with the most senior person at your company, be prepared to answer the question, 'So what are you up to?'" Maignan Wilkins says, "Don't take lightly any interactions that may seem informal. Treat every situation as an opportunity to demonstrate the value you bring to the organization and your knowledge of the business."

Principles to Remember

Do:

• Look for every opportunity to demonstrate your leadership potential, at work and outside the office
• Support your boss in reaching her goals
• Find people in positions you aspire to and study what makes them successful

Don't:

• Let your ambitions distract you from doing your current job well
• Exert authority where you don't have any — use influence to prove your leadership chops
• Openly discuss your ambitions — it's safer to take a "show, don't tell" approach

Case study #1: Focus on solving problems, not getting promoted
In late 2010, after ten years at Citi, Heather Espinosa was promoted to managing director. She reached this executive position by continuously challenging herself — and by making the most of each of her previous roles. "I've never been concerned with my title. When I thought an assignment was a stretch, I took it," she explains. "When I applied for my previous position, the job carried the title 'project manager.' But after my first conversation with the manager, I knew it was a position that would require complex leadership skills and challenge me, so I accepted the job."

In each role, Heather embraced additional responsibilities without being asked. "I make an effort to volunteer and raise my hand where I see a need. I started taking on the responsibility of managing director with the hope that if I performed well, the title would come." And her bosses have always respected this approach. "I rarely walk into my manager's office and say I want to talk about my career or my next promotion. I walk in and say here's a problem and here's how we might address it," she says.

Case study #2: Take any leadership opportunity you can get
Mike Subelsky, the co-founder and CTO at Staq, a tech start-up that makes software for digital advertising companies, spent most of his early career in roles with lots of responsibility, but not much authority. "I held a number of positions where I felt I had a great deal of influence, but I was never the one calling the shots," he says.

Still he worked hard, hoping to someday move up the ladder. "I've always tried to be the kind of employee that the boss never has to worry about," he explains. He focused on doing the best he could in whatever role he had, and always raised his hand for projects. He also looked for opportunities to exercise leadership outside of the office. In 2004, he started a nonprofit in Baltimore. "It was a great laboratory," he says. "It allowed me to practice being a leader."

Then, last year, he and his partner co-founded Staq. All of Mike's preparation had paid off. In fact, the company received $1 million in seed funding this past month. "I always knew I wanted to be where I am now: I am hiring employees and creating a wonderful place to work."  by Amy Gallo

Weight loss theory.

Logic behind weight loss and weight gain
The simple reason why you lose or gain weight: your body’s ability to adapt. It’s smart - it’s a lot smarter than you think. Your body evolves to suit your daily needs and it assumes the shape you ask of it, though maybe not intentionally. The simple reality of it is: if you let your body think that it’s not required for it to move fast or carry heavy objects every single day it won’t grow muscles or shed the pounds to be able to perform better, easier and with less effort. That’s how it works to put it simply. 

So, if someone let’s say tries to lose weight fast and goes on a crush diet it shocks the system so that the moment that someone is off the calorie restrictions his or her body starts to stockpile and stockpile like mad. It’s a simple self-preservation response – you basically just let your body know that the “hard times” might return at some point and you need all that extra weight to see you through. That’s mainly the reason why you would always get your lost weight back and fast and probably gain extra. 

Conditions are vital when it comes to weight control and shaping your body. Put your body in the right conditions and that’ll force it to change the way you want to. That’s why you often hear that you must change your lifestyle in order to permanently change the way you look. It’s true enough. Sprinters have explosive, big muscles to put power into their runs and long distance runners have sleek bodies to carry them through serious distances as easily and as efficiently as possible. Body builders lift and get big muscles because they feed their bodies and force them to get used to heavier and heavier loads, while yogis spend years making their bodies bend every which way by forcing it to do it over and over again. You can always tell what your body is used to by just looking at someone, the way they walk and the way their body flows. Fit people tend to be in complete control of their bodies and very aware of themselves. Have you ever seen someone who has no idea where their body starts or ends? It’s down to practice, practice and training. 

Once you are in the conditions that force your body into change be that dietary restrictions or harsh physical activity your body begins to learn the new rules. It takes time for it to see if it’s worth adjusting to the new routine or if it can maintain the shape it is now. There are several factors that play a role here. When someone starts to exercise, for example, they begin to feel hunger a lot stronger – this is how your body tries to compensate for the energy spent training and you end up eating more calories than you burn as a result. This kind of hunger isn’t real - it’s a side effect of burning the reserves you already have. And it’s actually a lot easier to eat more than you burned since we tend to over-estimate the numbers spent and under-estimate the amounts consumed – it happens to the best of us. 

Another factor that plays a role is time. It takes time for your body to see if it can just wait it out and hold on to whatever weight reserves you have on you. It often happens to people who tend to drop in and out of training. The experience of being challenged and being under physical stress stays in the body’s memory for a while after that. That’s why you can see fast results when you try something new and then nada when you try this same thing again, later. 

Routine is something your body falls into and it does it fast, too. It’s a master of adaptation, an artist in its own right. Imagine, that you do the same old thing over and over again with the same intensity and the same calorie intake and suddenly things stop moving forward – you hit a plateau. What happened again? Yep, the bloody thing adjusted to the lifestyle and now it has optimized itself to continue going at the set pace for as long as it takes. To break free of this the best thing to do is to shake things up, let it know that routine can be broken and other things will be demanded of it any moment. That’s why it also helps to keep your training sessions fresh and mixed in intensity if it’s the change you want to see in yourself. 

When you create an active environment for yourself where you might be expected to run, jump and do push-ups you force your body to be ready for it, any time. You force it to change shape to suit this kind of environment – it’s a simple enough logic. If you do something for a while – you’ll see results fast but then, you’ll also lose them after going back to your old lifestyle. And then every other time you do the same thing over and over again you’ll see less and less out of it. Every now and then shocking your body is good but if you let it be afraid of starvation, for example, it’ll hold on to the every last bite and stockpile, stockpile, stockpile. 

And yet, it’s also all down to your lifestyle. Eventually your body learns what’s what and behaves accordingly. If you train one or two days a week you can probably do some good but it won’t make you change. It’s when not-training is something out of the ordinary that your body really starts adjusting and changing shape. It’s smart and it should be treated as such. Of course it doesn’t want to be put under pressure – the ideal conditions for it is to sit on pile of food and not move – because, who knows when you’ll need all these reserves. Yet, it needs to move in order to stay healthy – it’s happiest when it moves, actually. Your whole body begins to work like a well-oiled mechanism at any hour of the day if you give it what it needs, not what it wants. 

Our bodies are a reflection of our lifestyles, basically. They don’t exactly have a mind of their own but they may just as well have and that’s why they must be controlled and looked after. Exercising just to tick the box, cheating half the time won’t do you any good, but waste your precious time. Think about it this way: is it making me uncomfortable enough to make my body adapt? If the answer is yes, you’ll see results. If you keep it up long enough these results will become permanent. -- Neila Ray.