Every leader who has grappled with a shift in strategy for their firm understands the powerful gravitational pull of organizational culture. Here are 5 ideas to help ensure you respect and leverage the culture during periods of change:
Triumph, that moment in time when we have vanquished our competitors or achieved a level of performance long desired, is the moment of our greatest vulnerability. Leading from a point of success is challenging. Disaster breeds its’ own set of leadership challenges. The best leaders follow Kipling’s advice and treat these imposters the same.
Leadership by Cause invites greatness to the party. Anything less than a clear, galvanizing, shared cause, promotes compliance-type performance and typically mediocre results. Here are Six ideas to help you identify and promote a cause that inspires in your organization:
Those who look back and reflect upon the start-up period in their first leadership role will frequently describe this stage as having been awkward or uncomfortable. The transition from individual contributor to supervisor or manager is abrupt for many and lonely for most. Building your priorities and daily activities around the mantra, Engage, Inform, Inspire, can help you cultivate the good habits of effective leaders.
There’s a must-read article that appeared at Fast Company a few months ago by Aaron Levie, entitled, The Simplicity Thesis. The short form is that in this world of increasing complexity, the best opportunities are for those firms, products and services that are minimally complex (simple). The same goes for those of us leading others and managing our organizations.
One of the most common tripping points of first-time leaders is to mistakenly assume that they are the geocentric center of their team’s universe. Adopt the misguided belief in a Ptolemaic view of the galaxy you lead in, and expect your team members to do everything possible to escape your gravitational pull.
Every professional faces important “moments of truth” as they navigate through their work days. Whether it’s the invitation to speak at the board meeting, the opportunity to connect one-on-one with the CEO or, a tough feedback conversation with a team member, you need to be ready to succeed in these High Value/High Risk (HV/HR) situations. Here are 5 steps to helping improve your effectiveness:
Meetings are interesting beasts to deal with as a new leader. Some (OK, very few) are incredibly productive and many (most) are gigantic and misdirected time sinks. Here are 15 ideas to help you develop some effective meeting habits:
Nothing is as important to your success as a leader as the talent you bring to bear in support of the work of your organization. Here are 8 ideas to stimulate your talent acquisition thinking and promote action:
I once inherited a team previously managed by a person who reportedly filled her days with conference calls and meetings, but somehow never seemed to have time to meet with her team members to hear about their ideas and concerns or to discuss professional development opportunities. Paying attention was not a part of this manager’s style. The process of engaging with this new team taught me some important lessons about leading, including how critical it is for us to truly pay attention to our team members… .
