Recovering Leader

Monday’s LeaderTip: A Good Question

When facing a problem -- whether daily annoyance or all-out crisis -- a crucial question is: "What's needed here?" Without such orientation, the ego can lead us into the "why?" of the unchangeable past, or the "place / avoid blame" syndrome. While seemingly innocuous, this question helps leaders avoid reactively wasting time and energy, and focus on the whole picture.... Read more →

Harry Truman on Leadership

"Men make history, and not the other way around. In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better." Harry S Truman, 33rd president of US (1884 - 1972) Read more →

Take A Page from the Drunk's Playbook

I adapted these questions from what’s known in 12-step circles as a “Group Inventory.” If you’re looking for something new and different to do at your next leadership team meeting, here’s something you might try. These are all good things for any group to consider, and to act upon, in order to capitalize on its strengths: What is the basic... Read more →

Leadership and Exposing "Stories"

Someone reminded me this week that objects have no intrinsic color -- our eyes and brain interpret reality, assigning the colors. "Brown," therefore, is merely our own interpretation of a particular wavelength on the electromagnetic spectrum. So what? It's an example of the fact that the brain loves to make meaning out of the objective world -- and that can... Read more →

Outline for Creating a "Living Business Plan"

This article summarizes our approach to preparing one particular type of business plan with a client, along with the outline I’ve developed over time. We offer it freely to blog-readers and others who may find it useful. When I help a client with a viable business create or update their business plan, I first make a distinction about the type... Read more →

Monday's LeaderTip: Owning the Solution

Is your team or organization operating effectively enough for you? If not, you may have concluded that your people just don't get it, or have gone off track somewhere along the way. While one or both may be true, the first -- and sometimes most sobering -- place to look is in the mirror. Are you providing clear guidance, and... Read more →

Leadership Case Study: "What's Needed Here?"

I was looking at the results of my own Leadership Circle Profile, and focusing on one of my areas that need work: namely, a higher arrogance score than I would have liked, and a lower score in "selfless leadership." With the help of my coach, I found a little bugger of a pattern that started young, and got stoked as... Read more →

Article Published in Employment Relations Today

"High-Yield Reference Checking: Adding New Value to the Hiring Equation" was published last week in "Employment Relations Today," a professional journal put out by Wiley-InterScience. It covers practices and questions to help managers/executives with hiring responsibilities. It's a long article, but my intention was to provide a fresh perspective on Reference Checking, and tools to make it a more value-added... Read more →

You're Soaking In It

Great Quote To End The Week "We don't know who discovered water but we're pretty sure it wasn't the fish." -Marshall McLuhan Read more →

The “Set the Bar High” Edge

“Live every day like it’s the last day of your life…” is bad advice, according to one comedian, who said that, in that case, “We’d all just be running around all day yelling ‘help me – help me – I’m going to die!’ ” Yet the soul of that advice is to “go for it.” In the workplace, that means... Read more →

Article in Forbes on Leadership Coaching

Do You Need a Coach? Nice little article, and glad to see more coverage on Leadership Coaching. Read more →

Changing Channels

According to the U.N. today, 34,000 Iraqis were killed in 2006, and that's in addition to the almost 3,000 U.S. troops since we started this war. Given the increasing similarities between Iraq and the war in Vietnam, I can't help but ask myself why we, the American people of the new millennium, are failing to make our voices heard? Please... Read more →

Monday’s LeaderTip: Responsibility to Rest

Time off is not a luxury, it's a responsibility of leadership. As the weeks click by, it's easy to catch ourselves thinking that a vacation would be an indulgence-that our work is too important to leave. But without taking time to recharge, a leader can lose perspective, and begin to miss critical, often obvious, opportunities. If it's hard to remember... Read more →

Leadership Case Study in Common Sense

As a management consultant at PriceWaterhouse in the early 90's, I was asked by the board of the retail arm of a well-regarded Brokerage firm based in Boston to recommend improvements to help their sales. They had done a tremendous job recruiting top talent, yet sales were still slow. I remember traveling from region to region on my chosen quest,... Read more →

Quickie: Leadership and Imagination

Great leaders imagine a future better than the present, and inspire others to make it a reality. Imagination is the soul of all we create. The more we embrace our imagination, the greater our leadership becomes. David Peck Comments are welcome--click the comment link, below. Read more →

A Leader's "People Standards"

When I teach coaching to a group of managers, I explain that coaching is most effective when the person being coached is both capable to learn and develop, and self-motivated. They are two qualities that come as “original equipment” when someone shows up to work for you. If they are missing, the person may be effective in their job, but... Read more →

Assessing Capacity for Change

As leaders, accurately evaluating capacity for change in ourselves, others, and situations, is as important as any other responsibility we have. When assessing aspects of ourselves, another person or situation we would like to change, it can be seductive to hope change will happen on its own. This is particularly true when the person or situation presents, as many do,... Read more →

Deciding Who to Coach

Leaders are called many things these days: coaches, mentors, managers, trainers, tutors, you name it. But it’s confusing – not to mention inaccurate – to use such words interchangeably. For instance, while both imply a certain level of leadership, to coach is quite a different thing than to lead. More often than not, leaders coach, not the other way around.... Read more →

Designing the Future You

Part of leading others lies in knowing ourselves. Yet so many of us lead from the outside first before we ever even begin to think about examining what’s within. What are our daily needs? How can we grow, prosper, and have more success as individuals as well as leaders? It’s easy to overlook our own personal growth while leading others... Read more →

Monday's LeaderTip: Power and Humility

Humility is highly desirable in a leader, and necessary to keep self-importance in check. As successes, money, and position grow, one's sense of self can inflate along the way. Without a bit of humble pie, we can end up wielding power overbearingly, which causes good people to lose focus and motivation. Even garden-variety arrogance-such as overconfidence-can crop up at times,... Read more →

Addiction to Power: Hubris and Leadership

A leader asked me the following question today: "Many/most leaders fall into the hubris/power trap - and fail at some level. What practices do people have who are able to avoid this?" Hubris in modern times is typically defined as arrogance, exaggerated pride, and/or overconfidence. In ancient Greece hubris was somewhat different, but was then (as it often is now)... Read more →