You are several weeks or even months into your new leadership position, and you are struggling. You can't figure out why, but you don't feel like a leader (or your employees don't treat you like one), and each day brings challenges that you weren't quite expecting when you accepted the promotion. If that is the case, or even if you just want to become a more effective … [Read more...]
3 Steps to Harness Your Emotions and Become a Stronger Leader
If you think being a great leader (and employee, in general) means silencing your emotions, think again. The most successful people, say Ed Hess and Katherine Ludwig, authors of Humility Is the New Smart: Rethinking Human Excellence in the Smart Machine Age are those who can leverage their emotions in a way that allows them to think better and become more creative, innovative … [Read more...]
5 Lessons For Achieving a Successful Career Without Sacrificing Happiness
Personal happiness is an afterthought – if it’s a thought at all. But that’s the wrong way to look at things, says Scott MacDonald, a seasoned CEO and author of Saving Investa: How An Ex-Factory Worker Helped Save One of Australia's Iconic Companies. “Hard work absolutely is important, but I’ve met plenty of people who worked hard and never made much money or achieved … [Read more...]
Shhhhhh! Leader Thinking Here
We live in a busy, filled-to-the-brim world. That is true for everyone, but especially for leaders. There are more distractions, diversions and noise in our world than ever before in history. While everyone has 24/7 news, email, texts, social networks and a hundred other sources of information and noise coming at them all day, leaders probably have more. More demands, more … [Read more...]
6 Ways to Be More Comfortable and Confident When Receiving Feedback
On this blog, we talk a great deal about how you, as a leader, can provide better feedback—that gets results—without busting employees' morale. Today, I want to talk to you about how you, as a new leader, can become much better at receiving feedback. After all, chances are your boss, HR and maybe even your employees will have a great deal to say about your performance, … [Read more...]
Does a Company’s Reputation Rest on the Shoulders of the Leader?
Karen Tiber Leland is a branding expert and author of The Brand Mapping Strategy: Design, Build and Accelerate Your Brand. When you think Facebook, you think Mark Zuckerberg. When you think Amazon.com, you think Jeff Bezos. Those and other examples of celebrity corporate leaders show that a CEO’s personal brand can work in concert with the corporation’s brand, helping … [Read more...]
Olympic Lessons for New Leaders
The 2016 Olympics officially started on August 5, and much of the world is entrenched in the games. While some people watch for the pageantry, the human drama, the patriotism or the actual athletic competition, I believe there is another universal and more useful reason to tune in: to be inspired by others' achievement. The human interest stories give us the backdrop. The … [Read more...]
The Power and Pitfalls of Competition
Admittedly, I am a competitive person in just about every facet of life. Ask those who’ve known me my whole life and you might even hear some stories of competitive board and card game play that I’d prefer not be repeated. While I was taught to be (and think I mostly am) a good sport, my focus was most always on winning. And looking back, I can point to both the power and the … [Read more...]
10 Roles Every Leader Must Fill
Most leaders aren't ready when they step into a leadership role, so if you are feeling out of sorts, don't worry just yet. Everything takes time. Instead of worrying that you will never get up to speed, focus your energy on improving. Here are the 1o roles every leader must fill (even the new ones) that are most important to the success of the team and organization as a … [Read more...]
5 Limits Leaders Must Challenge
We all have limits. Those boundaries beyond which we just don’t go. After all, it wouldn’t be safe. It wouldn’t be prudent. It wouldn’t be easy. We set limits for safety purposes or for logical purposes, but most often, we set them because we need an excuse. We are scared or lazy or we lack confidence in our own abilities, so we need a reason (an excuse) to not try … [Read more...]