Wake-Up Calls for Managers
For the hard parts no one prepares you for
When the path isn’t clear, the stakes are high, and the answers aren’t obvious—this is where managers struggle most.
Wake-Up Calls for Managers delivers practical, real-world guidance for navigating:
- Tough conversations
- Leading through uncertainty
- Building influence without authority
- Driving results through others
The Leadership Caffeine Blog
Leadership Caffeine™—You Own Smarter, Better, Faster
Leading in today’s organizations is a complicated, often frustrating experience. I talk daily with individuals operating in the middle of their organizations and with those occupying the upper layers of power and decision-making authority. The pressures they describe...
Leadership Caffeine™—You Own Smarter, Better, Faster
There’s pressure for everything to move faster in our organizations at a time when it feels like we’re all trying to run through water or worse. Here are eight questions for you and your team to jump-start moving faster:
Enjoy Being Part of the Gang? Better Not Lead.
One of the rude awakenings for leaders promoted from within a team is the uncomfortable recognition that the easy camaraderie of the pre-promotion days immediately gives way to an awkward distancing of relationships.
Congratulations on your promotion. Oh, and you’re no longer part of the gang
Leadership Caffeine™: Resistance and the Leader
Resistance shows up in many forms in our daily lives. It’s what keeps us from eating properly, working out regularly, taking that leap into a new job that we’ve been dreaming about for years, and pushes off to some unknown point in the future, the writing of the book that nearly everyone says that they have in them. If none of those examples fit, think of something in your life that you know you should do, but haven’t found the time or had the discipline to do it. That’s resistance.
Resistance shows up in leadership settings and in the workplace in many forms:
The August Leadership Development Carnival
It is always fun to be part of the Leadership Development Carnivals, because it gives me a chance to hang out with some very accomplished leadership bloggers and thought leaders. I learn something of value from these great professionals every time, and I never mind that I benefit from being in their company!
This month’s issue of the Leadership Development Carnival is hosted at Intentional Leadership, the home of Mary Jo Asmus, one of my must-read favorites for her wisdom, insights and the fact that she exudes professionalism and that “all around great person” in everything that she writes.
18 Ideas to Avoid Becoming a Ghost While Between Jobs
I had a chance to chat with a number of recent and not so recent additions to the ranks of unemployed professionals, and to a person, they reported experiencing a range of emotions, most particularly, an uncomfortable feeling of helplessness, and in one case, an increasing sense of futility.
The individuals also agreed that the fight for economic and mental survival is a two-front war….taming the internal demons and turning what one described as creeping lethargy into action.
We discussed coping strategies, and here’s the list of very compelling suggestions offered up for anyone uncomfortably thrust into the role of formerly employed.
Ghosts of the Economy-Quiet Casualties of this Silent War
You’re to be forgiven if you’ve walked into a coffee shop, library or anyplace else where those “between jobs” congregate, and felt a chill run down your spine. It’s one of those feelings that we get when we sense that something is wrong but we can’t quite put our finger on it. Like the characters in Henry Miller’s The Turn of the Screw, it’s the flicker in the corner of our eye and the haunting sense that we just saw a ghost.
Leadership Caffeine™: Things I Wish Someone Would Have Told Me When I First Became a Leader
Note from Art: this one’s with a little help from my friends. I’ve been working a great deal with first-time leaders recently (my favorite groups!) and I posted a tweet to the extremely talented group of great people that I follow on Twitter asking what they wish someone would have told them when they started out in their leadership careers. Here are a few of their insightful thoughts with attribution, commingled with thoughts of my own.
Art Rants: The Insane and Confusing Battle for the Pipe Into Your Home
All across America, legions of streetwalkers (not that kind!) have been dispatched to your home to help you deal with the serious issue of your television service. Or is that your Internet service? Or your phones? Or your wireless phones? Or your toaster?
You’ll soon realize that you’ve become involved in some form of new, maniacal game brought to you by people that have created rules that don’ benefit anyone but them. It’s your job to figure out the catches and traps and gotcha’s! I’m not certain that you as the consumer can win this game, but you can definitely lose. The issue is, how much?
Want Different Results? Change Your Definition of Success and Don’t Forget to Align the Measurements
The old adage of “you get what you measure” is an old adage for a reason. It’s generally true.
He Looked at the Stack of Reports and said, “Excuses!” The Art of Communicating with Senior Executives
Getting called in front of the board or the senior executives of the firm can be an intimidating experience for many younger and even some experienced professionals. No amount of paper or pixels on screen will compensate or adequately explain root cause problems or satisfy someone that and your ideas to fix what’s wrong will work. The best salesmanship is to avoid attempting to cover-up blemishes and to shoot straight on issues and next steps.