Articles/Blog
4 Truths About How To Be A Great Leader That Might Surprise You
The first session of our 2019 LeadFORWARD class started last week. As I prepare to work with and support a new group of accomplished leaders, my intention is to start this journey as if I’m beginning right along with them. This is our 8th LeadFORWARD class, and I want to be sure that time, confidence…
Unstuck your Team
Teams frequently get stuck. While different than complete dysfunction – but sometimes a precursor – teams may become challenged and stagnant for various reasons. In the worst case scenario, they remain stuck and become dysfunctional, and so identifying a stuck team and getting it unstuck is an important responsibility for a leader. In Patrick Lencioni’s…
What’s Missing?
As leaders, we are often in situations that involve uncomfortable conversations – but conversations that are necessary to help our teams and employees achieve maximum potential, for themselves and for the organization. Unfortunately, because these conversations can be difficult, they are often avoided. A few years ago, our team put a definition to the term…
Leaders: Myth and Reality – Book Review
I have always been drawn to reading and learning more about effective leadership, and at some level I have come to realize that it is challenging and perhaps limiting to try to define leadership. And if not limiting, it is a bit naïve to attribute a set of defined characteristics to leadership. In their book,…
Demonstrating Influence
Which one of the following tips from the Inc Magazine article, “7 Ways to Build Influence in the Workplace,” do you feel is the most important? Build Trust with your Co-workers Cultivate Reliability Through Consistency Be Assertive, Not Aggressive Be Flexible Be Personal Focus on Actions Rather than Argument Listen to Others All of these…
Predictably Irrational – A Book Review
My niece, who attends Clemson University in South Carolina, shared a required reading from her economics course with several of my family members. Knowing how much I adore human behavior and psychology, she thought this book would be “right up my alley.” And my father-in-law knew I’d enjoy “Predictably Irrational” by Dr. Dan Ariely, the…
Unfiltered
A longtime client recently observed that he thought I was refreshingly more unfiltered of late in sharing both my perspectives and opinions. At first, I was concerned about being offensive, but his use of the word refreshing put me at ease. He then asked if he could probe a little bit as to why I…
The Minimum Age Required to Influence
A supervisor influenced the company president to change a decision. An intern influenced a senior designer with a fresh idea. A millennial persuaded her baby boomer manager to get back into regular exercise. A son influenced his father to be more patient. A college graduate convinced an entrepreneur to take a chance and hire him.…
Curiosity Did Not Kill the Cat!
The “curiosity” idea for this blog stemmed from a client interaction a couple months ago. During our leadership development session with her team, our client reflected on her interactions with others and the fact that she is always curious about why people think, feel, and act the way they do. And I thought, what a…
Ask Powerful Questions… Creating Conversations that Matter – A Book Review
Will Wise’s book, “Ask Powerful Questions,” was one of my summer reads this year, and once started, I couldn’t put it down. If you’ve read any of my previous book summary blogs, you will notice that three things typically hook me about new books: 1) the subtitle (it’s got to be catchy and relatable); 2)…