Are you a leader in waiting?

You know you're ready for more. You’ve built strong experience, delivered results, and now you feel the pull toward leadership. 

Your challenge could be "What do you do next?", especially if there are no obvious roles available in your company. You may not feel you would be a credible candidate, having never led a team before and lack the confidence to put yourself forward for a role. 

When you find yourself in this situation, there are loads of things you can be doing to prepare yourself, including building your confidence, experience and skills during this period.

Many high-potential professionals who are preparing for leadership roles often face similar challenges, including: 

• no leadership roles open internally
• not quite ready to move companies
• no formal leadership experience to showcase (yet)

So how do you stay motivated, grow your influence, and position yourself for the next leadership opportunity – even if it doesn’t exist right now?

Let’s talk about how to lead before the title.

Adopt the leadership mindset today

Leadership isn't just a title – it's a way of thinking, acting, and showing up. Leadership expert and writer Robin Sharma shares a simple but powerful message: you don’t need permission to start leading. You start with where you are and shift into the mindset of a leader.

When working with “leaders in waiting,” we start by asking: What would leading look like right now, in your current role?

You may not have a team yet – but you can still create a clear vision, build influence, and demonstrate initiative. That’s what great leaders do. One client who, within a few months of adopting this mindset, found themselves with their first direct report and the possibility of another one in the next six months.

Create your 6–12 month leadership development plan

A powerful way to show you're ready for leadership is to act like a leader in your own role.

To do this, you can build a one-page roadmap for what you want to achieve over the next 6–12 months – complete with clear goals, success measures, and a personal vision.

This demonstrates strategic thinking, planning skills, and the ability to communicate direction – all key leadership traits. If available, this might include enrolling on internal training courses around leadership.

Strengthen your stakeholder influence

Great leaders don’t work in isolation – they influence across the business.

A stakeholder mapping exercise can help you to:

• identify key people who impact your success
• assess the health of those relationships
• create a plan to strengthen and grow influence

This helps you to lead more effectively within your current role and prepare for the relationship dynamics of formal leadership.

Part of this work is assessing what your professional footprint is currently, and if this is in line with our desire to become a leader. What three words would people use to describe you now in your current role? Do these words also support your plan to step into leadership, or does work need to be done here?

Build a strategic network

Leadership opportunities often come through relationships – not just job boards.

One client discovered through coaching that his internal network lacked senior leaders in functions where leadership roles might soon become available. He proactively reached out, had value-led conversations, and learned what those leaders looked for when hiring.

Those conversations helped him:

• raise his visibility
• understand role expectations
• identify critical skill gaps (like project management) and take action

You can do the same – and your future self will thank you.

Immerse yourself in leadership thinking

If you want to lead, you need to sound and think like a leader.

Podcasts, books, and videos can accelerate your development. You can begin to do this by building a “leadership learning habit” – even 20 minutes a day can deepen your knowledge and confidence as a leader in waiting.

Final thought: Don’t wait to be picked

If you're ready to step into leadership, don’t wait passively for a role to appear. Start leading now – from where you are. Demonstrate the mindset, behaviours, and values of a leader before you’re officially given the title.

When the opportunity comes, you won’t just be ready – you’ll be the obvious choice. If you have done all this work, your confidence and skills will have helped you quickly step into the role.