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
Career Reinvention Journal™—A Primer for Getting Started
Note from Art: I'm hosting a free webinar/mini-course on 7/21 at noon central: How to Get Unstuck & Take Control in Your Career. If you are reading this after the date, drop me a note and I will send you the replay link. -- If you’re reading this, chances are...
Career Reinvention Journal™—A Primer for Getting Started
If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve thought about doing something different in your professional life. While many people daydream about the work, only a tiny percentage do something about it. My goal is to help raise that percentage. Here are some steps and tips to help you move out of your head or off the couch and into action.
The Case of the Rapidly Shrinking Attention Span
Are we losing our ability to focus? Maybe. Maybe we never had it, and it is the exception instead of the rule, but it just seems so much harder in this environment to focus on an issue and work through it to creative, complete solutions. We’re too busy racing from one sound-bite opportunity to another, focusing our precious gray matter on topics for nanoseconds before the next interruption comes along.
Podcast: Ten Big Points on Leading and Leadership, part 1 of 2
Join Art for a little less than ten minutes of Management Excellence as he shares points 1 thru 5 of his 10 Big Points on Leading and Leadership. This podcast was based on a recent guest speaking opportunity for a class of college seniors and adapted to fit anyone who...
Leadership Caffeine™ for the New Week: 5 Quick Tips to Jolt You Into Action
Whether you are Chief Executive, a functional manager or someone who leads informally on project and product teams, start your week right and put these suggestions to work. Rinse and repeat in the future. You’ll be glad that you did.
Will this Business Revolutionize How Men Shop and Rescue Me from My 1970’s Fashion Training at the Same Time?
I plan on chronicling my experience in several posts over the next few weeks, with an exciting new men’s clothing/shopping service that I was introduced to called Trunk Club. I’m not sure if I’m more excited about the solution to my fashion challenges, or the fact that this is the best recent example that I’ve seen of a service that so perfectly solves a problem that it practically sells itself.
Quick Reads and Sound Bites on Success, Career Growth and Leading
Suggested links and resources on success, career growth as a product manager and leading. Check out the review of Gladwell’s Outliers at Three Star Leadership, Career Growth and the Product Manager by Art Petty and a podcast summary of Leading from the Edge by Dennis Perkins.
The Words of Leaders
We were discussing the failure of many organizations to stop old ways of doing things, even in the face of overwhelming proof that the old ways don’t work. My student mentioned that the appointment of a new CEO last year had at first been encouraging until it was clear that nothing would truly change. This unfortunate event is all too common.
Podcast: The Leader’s Guide to Managing Fear in the Workplace
This Management Excellence podcast episode tackles the challenging issue of managing morale and fighting fear in the face of economic and job uncertainty. Art Petty offers 13 suggestions for dealing with this insidious performance killer.
Monday-The Best Day of the Week, the Inauguration and Podcasting
Most people that I know just hate Mondays. You don’t even have to take a survey to confirm this point. Just watch people in their cars on the way to work or take a look around the faces buried in newspapers on the train. Here’s the short-list of why Mondays can be your best friend:
Where Do I Go From Here?
Not surprisingly in this economy, a great number of people are busy plotting their next career and life steps. Whether prompted by a layoff, a threat of a layoff or the recognition that conditions can all too easily result in a layoff; I’m listening to many people who are dancing with the idea of a shift in direction. Some have already pulled the trigger. Similar to the theme in my post the other day on Beating the Economic Blues, it is critical to do something…to take some form of action when change is on your mind.