Your real battle as a leader is the one for your focus. It’s a battle too many lose. It’s imperative you figure out what matters and then focus. Learn to feed the mission, not the machine.
The Leadership Caffeine Blog
Leadership Caffeine™—Expect to Struggle When These Two Ingredients are Missing
Transparency is measurable. Accountability is binary. If transparency is low and accountability is turned off, expect to struggle.
Leadership Caffeine™—Harnessing the Power of Purpose in Your Work
If we’re not involved in moon-shots or mars-shots but rather working for seemingly pedestrian causes or offerings, how do we manufacture that sense of purpose? It’s easy, fall in deep love with the people we’re ultimately helping with our work.
Leadership Caffeine™—A One Line Job Description for Managers
If you manage, lead, or are otherwise responsible for the work of others, the working environment is everything. Creating a healthy working environment is literally your only job. Get this right and the results take care of themselves.
Lead Like Lives Depend Upon It—Six Leadership Lessons from Pfizer’s Moon-Shot
What if we led as if lives and livelihoods depended on the outcome? There are some great lessons from the vaccine moon-shot described by Pfizer’s CEO Albert Bourla in the latest issue of Harvard Business Review. It’s time to put these lessons to work in all of our organizations.
It’s Past Time to Rethink the Role (and Label) of Manager
The view on the role of Manager is a relic of yesterday’s thinking and practice in management. It’s an industrial revolution hangover that is ripe for retirement to a museum display. The label and old meaning don’t hunt in a digital world.
Leadership Caffeine™—Small Changes in Your Routine and Approaches Can Generate Big Results
I regularly talk with managers and leaders who believe they are grinding harder but getting nowhere. One described himself as working in quicksand: “The more hours I spend and the harder I push, the faster we are sinking. I need to do something different.” Raise your hand if you’ve ever felt this way. Here are ideas to help you adjust your approaches and regain control:
Winning the Inner Game of Leading With Positive Self-Talk
Fear, self-doubt, and the tendency to catastrophize situations are your adversaries as a leader. The essence of life is overcoming challenges. Instead of allowing your negative emotions to rule you, engage in a little self-trickery and reset and reframe the negatives to positives.
Insights from the Latest Feedback Boot Camp
Every few months, I run a three-hour boot camp on strengthening your skills as a receiver and a giver of feedback. Here are the top ten insights from the recent cohort group.
Fresh Opportunities for Professional Growth (and a free resource)
There’s never been a better time to help yourself or your team members move from good-to-great and add the skills essential for success in what will be a still-challenging world filled with new opportunities. Here’s our Spring 2021 Professional Development Catalog:








