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Leadership

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Leadership skills and style testing. Know how you motivate and coach people to gain success at work and in life.
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Effective leaders keep up-to-date with effective self-coaching.
WHAT IS LEADERSHIP?
Leadership is an interactive conversation that pulls people toward becoming comfortable with the language of personal responsibility and commitment.
LEADERSHIP TIPS
“The crux of leadership development that works is self-directed learning: intentionally developing or strengthening an aspect of who you are or who you want to be, or both.” Primal Leadership by Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis & Annie McKee (Harvard Business School Press)

Your Resistance to Change

Resisting change is normal. Perhaps up to 90% of the American people do not have a clue about change. Once you discover how significant change is in our lives is every day (and how an understanding of change can make you happier), we still resist change to some degree.

Whether the change is positive or negative, we know some pain is coming, and it is only natural that we try to avoid it. What we can do is influence our reactions to the emotions that all change will cause.

What is change?

Change is doing something different. Change is a feeling or emotion that is constantly going on around each human. We cannot change the emotions or feelings but we can control our response caused by change.

Positive and negative change causes the same emotions. Going through change always causes some form of pain. So no one really likes change.

Understanding change is not difficult. However, you must know how to control the feelings and emotions change always causes.

A working knowledge of change can make a person happier. It is a matter of not being blind-sided by the emotions and feelings of change on a twenty-four hour basis. The first step is to acknowledge we are having these feelings and emotions and where they are mostly coming from. Once we do that we can then combat these feelings and emotions.

Conquer Change and Win is an easy-to-read, fun book about the serious subject of change. This book will change your life for the better. It will lower your stress level.

Source: Jr., Ralph Masengill: Conquer Change and Win: An Easy-to-Read, Fun Book about the Serious Subject of Change

John Bielenberg: Think Wrong: How to Conquer the Status Quo and Do Work That Matters

January 31, 2017 in Books, Career , Communication, Current Affairs, Failure, Health, Memes, Personal Coaching, Personal Life, Success, Tips, What is, Women, Work life | Permalink | Comments (0)

Leadership through Thinking Wrong

Is it easy to think wrong?

No. At least not at first. And here's why.

Today, we might not stand trial for heresy as Galileo did, but we do stand trial. Every single day. We stand judged against the orthodoxy of what's acceptable. The mainstream, understood norms of how things are supposed to get done. What will work, what won't. We might be encouraged with pat phrases and told to think "outside the box" or "disrupt," but the fact is, humans loathe disruption. We love routine.

It's not all our fault. We're wired for it. The simple truth is our brains conspire against us.

We tend to return to the familiar, well-trodden paths in our brain--what is referred to as those long-established practices that control and bias the mind.

Meanwhile, the brilliant solution you seek most likely lives outside those normal pathways.

The authors of THINK WRONG developed hundreds of drills to put their practices in action. These drills give you counter-moves to the most common and tenacious biological and cultural challenges.

Consider the drills your recipe for thinking wrong.

Source: John Bielenberg: Think Wrong: How to Conquer the Status Quo and Do Work That Matters

January 30, 2017 in Books, Business Coaching, Career , Failure, Leadership, Memes, Personal Coaching, Personal Life, Self-Awareness, Skills, Success, Tips, What is, Work life | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ego Free Leadership

At a time when workers feel a sense of disconnect with their jobs and companies--a September 2015 Gallup Poll recorded U.S. employee engagement levels at thirty one percent, with almost twenty percent of employees actively disengaged--it's vital that leaders of organizations be able to recognize how their own behaviors and egos might be contributing factors.

Asked to describe an ideal team or organizational culture, most employees will use words like supportive, transparent, authentic, collaborative, and trusting, yet when asked to describe their company's actual culture, they will use words such as competitive, political, territorial, untrusting, and conflict averse. If leaders know the culture they want, why do so many organizations struggle to create that environment?

Interpersonal conflicts are a fact of business whether they involve subordinates, peers, suppliers or boards of directors. Resolving those conflicts with a win-win mindset can unlock untold dividends in the form of a shared sense of purpose and commitment according to "EGO FREE LEADERSHIP: Ending the unconscious habits that hijack your business", by business executive Brandon Black and executive coach Shayne Hughes.

Black's case is not unique since "fish always sink at the head."

Once he resolved to acknowledge how his behavior was creating organizational dysfunction and took corrective measures, the impact on the company's performance was dramatic. Between 2009 and 2013, while many in his industry closed their doors during the Great Recession, Encore's revenues and profits increased 300%, operating cost declined 30%, and the stock price rose 1,200%.

EGO FREE LEADERSHIP provides an in-depth examination of the habits and beliefs that hold executives and their teams back and offers solutions to removing crippling ego dynamics.

Source: Brandon Black: Ego Free Leadership: Ending the Unconscious Habits that Hijack Your Business

Self-Coaching Books in ebook or paperback editions:

Can't Get Enough Leadership

Develop Leadership Skills: A Mobile Reference Guide

Ask the Coach

January 25, 2017 in Books, Career , Communication, Ethics, Failure, Leadership, Memes, Personal Coaching, Self-Awareness, Skills, Success, What is, Women, Work life | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you can't trust the White House, who can you trust?

Defending a series of false statements by the official White House spokesman and administration advisers suggest that invoking "alternative facts" is not untruths.

For example, the White House's Kellyanne Conway says voters didn't care about the issue of Mr. Trump's taxes. The fact is Mr. Trump was the first presidential candidate from a major party since 1976 to release no tax returns. Although during the campaign he said he would release them after what he and his lawyers said was a multiyear Internal Revenue Service audit. However, the IRS has said he could release the returns, regardless of any audit.

Mr. Sean Spicer, the press secretary, had appeared before reporters last Saturday and accused the press of misstating the crowd size at the inauguration. Mr. Spicer added, "This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration--period--both in person and around the globe"...a statement that photographs clearly show to be false.

The truth is Nielsen reported Saturday that Mr. Trump's inauguration drew a broadcast audience of 30.6 million people. However, that was smaller than the 37.8 million Mr. Obama drew for his first inauguration in 2009, according to Nielsen.

Mr. Trump also took issue with news reports about the number of people who attended his inauguration, complaining that the news media used photographs of "an empty field" to make it seem as if his inauguration did not draw many people.

And he incorrectly claimed that ridership on Washington's subway system was higher than on Inauguration Day in 2013. In reality, there were 782,000 riders that year, compared with 571,000 riders this year, according to a study by The Washington Post.

In a visit to the Central Intelligence Agency, designed to showcase his support for the intelligence community, Mr. Trump ignored his own repeated public statements criticizing the intelligence community, a group he compared to Nazis just over a week ago.

He also called journalists "among the most dishonest human beings on earth," and he said that up to 1.5 million people had attended his inauguration, a claim that photographs disproved.

Sources: The New York Times (Jan 22, 2017) and The Wall Street Journal (Jan 23, 2017).

January 23, 2017 in Business Coaching, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Current Affairs, Ethics, Leadership, Memes, Safety & Security, Self-Awareness, Skills, What is | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hamilton Recognized His Challenges

Why Know Yourself Better?

Because when we are unaware, we unconsciously engage our default behavior. Only when we become aware of who we are and how others see us are we able to change our behavior.

Sometimes, just being aware, allows the problem to solve us--rather than requiring us to solve the problem.

As Alexander Hamilton would have realized, the ancient Greek aphorism know thyself is an excellent place to start in the study of leadership. You are unique, so it is important to first examine yourself in order to recognize what your strengths and weaknesses are.

There are many practical ways to assess your particular skills and challenges. Read about strong leaders and compare yourself to them. Take online personality tests and skills assessments.

In addition to the assessment of your strengths and weaknesses, knowing thyself should include an assessment of your lifetime dreams. To fulfill your dream, you will have to establish multiple long-term goals that complement one another.

Once you have set your long-term goals (for example educational goals, financial goals, family goals), start setting short-term goals that will help you attain them.

Alexander Hamilton was orphaned at the age of thirteen. Through hard work and self-directed study, he pursued a college education in what is now called Columbia University. While in college, he was caught up in the spirit of the revolution and joined a New York militia company. His talents were soon recognized by General George Washington.

"Perseverance and spirit have done wonders in all ages." George Washington

Source: Gordon Leidner: The Leadership Secrets of Hamilton: 7 Steps to Revolutionary Leadership from Alexander Hamilton and the Founding Fathers

January 18, 2017 in Books, Business Coaching, Ethics, Leadership, Memes, Personal Life, Self Assessment, Self-Awareness, Skills, Success, Tips, What is, Women, Work life | Permalink | Comments (1)

Leadership Secrets of Hamilton

On April 30, 1789, George Washington took office as the nation's first president. The man who would one day be eulogized as "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen" faced monumental problems as the executive of a fledgling nation.

Of Washington's many troubles, America's economy loomed the largest. The United States of America had no international credit, a worthless national currency, and no definitive means of taxation or raising revenue.

To address America's overwhelming fiscal problems, Washington turned to his most trusted advisor--the gifted thirty-four-year-old Alexander Hamilton--and appointed him as the first United States secretary of the treasury.

Hamilton's 1790 report on the public credit and his subsequent reports on the national bank and a manufacturing-based economy have been called "the most important and influential state papers of their time" and remain among "the most brilliant government reports in American history." With them, Hamilton provided America an effective description of how to accomplish his vision.

In the "The Leadership Secrets of Hamilton", author Gordon Leidner's little book is packed with tons of applicable wisdom of Hamilton's vision of respecting your people and getting them to aim for more.

As the United States brings in a new U.S. President this week, it is our hope that he will be more like the first Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton and less like the Vice President Aaron Burr who shot him.

January 17, 2017 in Books, Leadership, Memes, Safety & Security, Skills, Success, What is, Work life | Permalink | Comments (1)

A Culture of Trust

Repairing and replacing a damaging workplace culture is tough--largely because people form and join cultures instinctively.

Neuroscientist Paul J. Zak set out to shed light on this cultural blindness by measuring the brain activity of people at work. His research uncovered the connection between the release of the feel-good neurochemical oxytocin and the experience of being trusted.

The oxytocin rush revved up recipients of trust to reciprocate by being trustworthy and more trusting of others. "Trust motivates a desire to make an extra effort to reach organizational goals," Zak attests. "A culture of trust is a powerful lever on human behavior--as long as it is properly implemented."

In TRUST FACTOR: The Science of Creating High-Performance Companies, Zak shows that building a culture of trust is essential for any organization that aims to be successful. An engineering guide to getting the "soft stuff" right, TRUST FACTOR identifies eight components of a culture where employees feel empowered, valued and happy, reinforeced by the acronym OXYTOCIN.

Work colleagues hate surprises. But two out of three employees are surprised by the feedback in their annual performance reviews. Compare that to how often supervisors check in with highly engaged employees: weekly. Those who get weekly feedback are rarely surprised.

Setting difficult but achievable expectations engages the brain's reward system so that meeting goals at work becomes highly engaging and enjoyable.

Are you practicing the Law of Reciprocity in your life?

By being selective as to who we let into our social networks, we retain the ability of instantly collaborating with many people across time zones and borders. The foundation of network technology is how the people we connect with think about the collaboration process.

Effective social networks that are built on the "law of reciprocity" flourish. Those networks that violate the law of reciprocity die. So what is the law of reciprocity and how can you use it in your personal and business lives?

"One of the most potent of the weapons of influence around us is the rule for reciprocation. The rule says that we should try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided us." Robert B. Cialdini, author of The Psychology of Persuasion (William Morrow, 1993)

Source: Paul J. Zak: Trust Factor: The Science of Creating High-Performance Companies

January 16, 2017 in Books, Business Coaching, Career , Communication, Ethics, Leadership, Memes, Self-Awareness, Skills, Success, Tips, Web/Tech, What is | Permalink | Comments (0)

When in doubt, get out.

Why is Brookdale Senior Living Inc. in talks with suitors about a possible sale of part or all of the company, the nation's largest operator of senior living centers?

The talks are at an early stage and may not lead to a deal, people familiar with the matter said according to the January 11, 2017 issue of The Wall Street Journal.

However, its shares tumbled in the last couple of years with long-term debt and lease obligations of nearly $6 billion as of September. Shares have fallen from nearly $40 in 2015, surged 15% Tuesday to close at $14.80 after The Wall Street Journal reported on the deal talks.

Land and Buildings, a well-known real-estate investor that owns about 2% of Brookdale, said last month that the slumping stock price is evidence a new review is needed.

Why is that? Could it be that the Brookdale's business plan isn't working?

January 11, 2017 in Business Coaching, Current Affairs, Failure, Health, Real Estate, Tips, U.S. Stock Market, What is | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Search for Truth in Leadership

Over the course of 29 years as a professional coach, Mike Jay has been in search of the "truth" about development. Now, finally relieved after not finding it, Jay has entered into the age of post-truth!

Let him share briefly with you what he found while traveling, working and living around the "world of development." It’s called [email protected] (It was Behavioral Meta Dynamics but [email protected] seemed more user-friendly.)

Mike found "7" buckets leaders must get right to position themselves and people who are "led" by leaders into cognitive-friendly developmental environments, or to say it another way ― to allow people to be, do, have, become, and contribute meaningfully.

Those "7" DYNAMICS are:

Bias
Role
Level
Style
Capability
Values
System

Here's the bottom line:

"People have a right to be, do, have, become, and contribute, and they can't until they are."*

*[To borrow and augment a quote from Spiral Dynamics Inspirator Dr. Clare W. Graves]

It's up to leadership...to provide "cues, support, and scaffolding" for our natural process of development, to be nurtured... "to help people have lives." ― Mike heard Phil Crosby say across the dinner table one night.

[email protected] is a platform of tools for Postmodern Leadership, in post-truth conditions emerging from a VUCA-laden reality where anti-fragility and resilience are better than the "best-laid plans of mice and men."

To fill up those "7 buckets" we need "meaning-making" and lots of it generated by a process that has emerged, which Mike labeled DYNAMIC INQUIRY. It's a simple system arising from a Complex Interactive Process [CIP], that helps reveal where people are, and what's appropriately next for their development. While that's a mouthful, here’s another way to say it, "how we talk matters."

Mike teaches people, who have no prior knowledge of DYNAMIC INQUIRY, to start to use it strategically with a week of exposure.

Disclaimer: Making it an unconscious skill takes longer but brings with it side benefits of you guessed it... personal awareness, purpose, competence, well-being, and results!

To learn more about [email protected] and to register for Mike's COACH2 Skills Program: DYNAMIC INQUIRY ― a [email protected] prep course ― visit https://leaderwareatflow.com/2017p/5day/ .

Your First Leadership Job

The Doerr Institute for New Leaders

How to be the Leader

Building Your Leadership Brand

January 11, 2017 in Business Coaching, Communication, Current Affairs, Failure, Leadership, Memes, Personal Coaching, Self-Awareness, Skills, What is, Work life | Permalink | Comments (0)

Reshaping Leadership

New data-driven capabilities are breaking down barriers between formerly siloed business units, flattening out management structures and streamlining production processes, prompting many firms to redraw leadership roles and responsibilities, according to information-technology executives, industry analysts and management consultants.

“Companies that transition from a more traditional business model to one built around technology and IT must adopt a management practice that can support this evolution,” says Dave Webb, global chief information officer of Equifax Inc.

They are broadening the use of so-called agile management techniques, known for shorter and more frequent development cycles that make use of customer data.

Rather than issue top-down directives, these managers instead strive to help self-directed teams leverage digitally enabled data sources, collaboration and sharing tools, and tighter feedback loops, to “get things out the door faster,” Mr. Webb says.

Shifting the role of managers who oversee those units away from “dictating how things should be done,” to acting more like coaches who guide collaborative, multi-functional teams to “get the work done” on their own.

New collaboration tools such as Microsoft Teams, Slack or Workplace by Facebook, place a new set of obligations on managers “to be connected and stay in contact.”

Source: The Wall Street Journal, January 4, 2017

Can't Get Enough Leadership