While some people view an invitation to present to executives as a prison sentence (or worse), this truly can be a career enhancing opportunity. However, like any challenging situation, preparation and attitude are keys to success. Here are 7 ideas to help you ace your next (or first) presentation to the executives:
To the extent that we struggle to see our own weaknesses, we are remarkably naïve and blind to our strengths. This gap in our own view-of-self is in my experience more detrimental to career success and personal-professional satisfaction than the issues surrounding our alleged weaknesses. Here are at least 4 barriers that get in the way of seeing our own strengths:
If your typical day resembles the one that most of us experience in the corporate environment, it’s a series of meetings interspersed with a series of transactional exchanges that might be better described as interruptions. There’s little of that elusive and precious asset called “quality time” on our calendars or in our days…and in reality, much of our daily lives are filled with what has been been described as “unproductive busyness. Here’s a reminder to create the downtime our brains and bodies need to recharge and place things in proper context.
There’s an interesting article in the May, 2014 issue of Harvard Business Review, entitled, “In Hiring, Algorithms Beat Instinct.” According to the authors, we would be better served by letting algorithms do the heavy lifting before inserting our own bias-filled and easily distracted selves into the hiring equation. Provocative, yes, but I’m not convinced that it’s time to defer judgment to a test instrument. Here’s why…
Understanding the discipline and tools of project management is now de rigueur for professionals with any intention of growing in their careers. However, when I take a close look at project teams that struggle (and too many do), it’s generally not the misapplication of project management tools or practices that are at the source of the problems. Most often, it’s the absence any visible form of project leadership.
As managers, we tend to tolerate certain employees who straddle that toxic boundary, in large part, because we can rationalize their aberrant behaviors in the context of what they do well. This is a mistake with tremendous costs to the organization, team and to your own credibility as a leader.
I was struck by the simplicity and power of an observation from one of the (early career) participants in a recent leadership program of mine. After studying different styles and approaches and examples of leaders, he indicated that he was walking away from the program with a sense that there was no one style he was required to emulate on his path to leadership success.
Most of us have very little real understanding of how our behaviors impact others. We cruise through our days secure in our view of our importance and convinced that our presence lights up every room, enlightens our colleagues and brings joy and prosperity to our teams and organization. Just in case you happen to be the Office Overbearing Smarty Pants, here are 5 tips to help you reform your ways:
Much like my topic a few weeks ago about the importance of finding time to think deeply about the big issues in front of us, it takes deliberate and sometimes herculean effort to find focus in our work lives. Focus is a key ingredient on the critical path to success.
Almost all of us get this wrong in the professional environment at some time or another. Myself included. We find ourselves in a tense situation with someone or some group who is attempting to assert a direction or insert themselves into the area we perceive as our domain, and we react by aggressively defending our position and by challenging or attacking their position. Here are five ideas to help you defuse and improve these difficult discussions:
