The Leadership Mistake Hidden Behind Many Unmet Expectations
Have you ever had an employee you wished someone could just… fix? A few years ago, a client asked if I could “fix” one of his employees who consistently wasn’t meeting his expectations.
Dealing With Difficult People: 5 Practical Strategies
We all know someone who’s too loud, too chatty, too touchy or never at fault. Here are five proven ways to handle difficult people—without losing your cool.”
Mission-Driven Leadership: Inspiring Employees Beyond a Paycheck
Want to boost employee engagement and retention? Discover how purpose-driven leadership helps your team connect daily work to a mission that matters—plus practical ways to inspire meaning at work.
Don’t Let Grudges Cost You Influence: The Invisible Leadership Skill Most Professionals Ignore
Do you hold grudges? Name the top five people you spend the most time with at work and at home. Do you have anything against any one of them? Have you been offended recently by something they said, did or didn’t do? If so, did you address it? If not, how long do you plan to hold onto it? Offenses, resentments and grudges are interesting. They are used for emotional leverage…we want to make the other person pay. But do they? Or are we the ones actually paying?
Seven Ways To Respond To Criticism
What is your response when criticized? While it may be easier to take if it came from a well-known, likeable, kind person who was given permission, ultimately it should not matter if you want to grow. Any critique is an opportunity for you as a leader, employee, family member or friend to hear some input that could be very valuable for you relationally and possibly financially.
Conquer Conflict Avoidance: 10 Practical Steps to Tackle Tough Conversations at Work and in Life
Roughly half of the clients I coach struggle with conflict avoidance. They spend significant emotional energy beating around the bush and tolerating unhealthy or unproductive behavior. As the saying goes, “You get what you are willing to put up with.” Over time, this avoidance becomes a silent source of stress, anxiety and even resentment.
How To Disagree At Work Without Damaging Relationships
Can you disagree with someone at work and still maintain a strong working relationship? Absolutely—and you should. Disagreement is not a sign of dysfunction. In fact, it’s often a sign that people care about their work, the company’s direction and doing things well. As your organization grows, so will the range of opinions on strategy, process, management and more.
How To Make Decisions Confidently
You make decisions all day long. You have to decide what to wear, eat and even say in a conversation. But how often do you need to make significant decisions, especially those that impact others? If you lead people at work these decisions have repercussions on those in your sphere of influence.
Black and White Thinking
Can you disagree with someone and still benefit from the relationship? In the old western films, the good guys always wore white hats and the bad guys black hats. These days the tendency is to label someone or something rather quickly as either white or black. Sometimes we initially see people as “good guys” but get offended or disagree with them about something along the way and shift them to the “bad guys” category.
5 Steps To Build Trust In Your Communication
Does your communication build trust? This is always an area worth reviewing for opportunities to grow. Who wouldn’t want to be trusted more? Here are five suggestions to be more trustworthy in what you say.
What Am I Missing?
I was 60 years old and just learned something I had been missing. I see two main reasons to keep learning what you are missing.
Who Gets More Out of Mentoring?
I would like to share with you my all-time favorite photograph. It is the cover photo for this blog post. Now I have no idea who these people are. Someone showed me this 20 years ago and I have hung onto it ever since. Take a good long look at what is going on here.
How I Define Success At Work…Part 3: Have Fun
Life is really hard at times. Even so, we could use some perspective along the way. We need a way to blow off some steam on a regular basis. Pressure valves keep devices from blowing up. How do you release internal pressure? What do you do that really makes you come alive? Who were you with and what were you doing the last time your really laughed hard? I mean a belly laugh. Maybe you need to plan to do this more often.
How I Define Success At Work…Part 2: Respect Others
Respect is in pretty short supply these days. The media tends to highlight the loudest, angriest and most provocative in politics, sports and entertainment. It is rare to see a story about the quiet leader or the people humbly going about making a significant impact in their world.
10 Ways I Find More Purpose and Meaning at Work
What can we do when work becomes mundane, rote and at times pretty meaningless? It can be a challenge to remain motivated to give it our best day in and day out.
Get Ready for Next Year in Advance
How many times have you found yourself on January 2nd thinking about what you want to do in the new year? This is not the time to be planning. This is the time to hit the ground running while the rest of the world is sitting still trying to figure out next moves.
How to Keep Your Best People
How do you keep your most valued people? Ultimately, this about increasing morale and developing a healthy corporate culture. Here are a few quick ideas to consider:
The Stay Interview: Why Your Best People Keep Coming to Work for You
A tool that many companies are beginning to use is the Stay Interview. This is a meeting with employees who consistently exceed goals and get along well with their coworkers. Why wait until someone is leaving to discover valuable information about the company when you can find out the reasons the best employees decide daily to keep coming to work?
My Take-Aways: The Advantage by Patrick Lencioni
This classic by Lencioni is about a practical approach to improving organizations. The qualitative field research is just as reliable as…