Managers are the individuals we need to create engagement, deliver quality results, and serve as critical enablers of change and adaptation in our world. And if Gallup. is even half right with their measures of disengagement and their pointing to managers as the cause, we're failing at manager development. Here are five big ideas to help.
While today's career world for many is about something other than "The Climb," my coaching ranks and workshop programs are filled with individuals striving to scale their impact and, for many, gain a seat at the executive table. If you are motivated to grow your responsibilities and engage at a senior management level, you must cultivate your knowledge and skills in five critical areas. In part one of this series, I focus on developing as a strategist.
When it came to leadership development investments, as an executive, it grew frustrating to send people to name-brand organizations and have them return with a "nice experience," a big bill, and no visible strengthened abilities or sustained changes.
Unfortunately, many (read: most) organizations are mired in a broken model for new manager development, emphasizing one-and-done training and avoiding longer-range sustained development that blends coaching, mentoring, cohort collaboration, and even executive sponsorship.As a result, too many new managers are left to flail and, if not fail, at least under-perform, wreaking havoc on performance, engagement, and retention.
One of my pleasures as an executive and emerging leader coach comes from the time spent in session with the cohort groups in my various programs. I am inspired by their passion for their work and hunger to learn and exhilarated by some of their perspectives. Here are seven big insights from the recent Manager Development Program cohort:
I'm over-the-top excited to share my new Experts Channel (via YouTube), focusing on sharing the insights, research, and wisdom of the individuals studying and achieving individual, team, and organizational high performance! My goal in this series is to bring people to our community who can help us all think, think differently, and challenge us to strive for success in our careers and for our organizations. Our first three interview guests do all of that and more!
We need more time to adjust our altitude to see the big picture in our industry or peer over the horizon in search of trigger events that might change everything. Here are four ideas to help stimulate leader learning.
Like many of you, ideas are my stock in trade. Whether writing the next article, designing a new workshop or course, providing strategy advisory services for a client, or supporting my coaching clients, I have to operate with a well-oiled idea machine. When the idea machine grinds to a halt, I'm in trouble and need to find a fun, engaging, practical approach to restarting it. Here are 14 hacks I use to restart mine:
It's the perfect time in our world to vanquish the long-perpetuated and unproductive myth that leaders are somehow meaningfully different from managers.
In some organizations, "being assigned a coach" has a negative connotation. That's too bad. If you are on the receiving end of an offer from your boss to take on a coach, strive to understand the rationale and then embrace the opportunity for the learning and growth experience it offers you.
