What’s your job? It’s a vocation, a way to make money, an expression of your identity, an extension of your talents, an inroad to community, and a source of pride. It can be exhilarating, challenging, exhausting, exciting, fulfilling and excruciating. It can be a source of all things to fill your ego and maintain your identity and it can be…
When you pursue a dream, a future opportunity or a goal, all kinds of concern, worry, and fear can show up. After all, it wouldn’t be a future possibility if you already knew how to do it. Recently, while working with a group of CEOs, one of them declared something big. It was something career and life altering that wasn’t…
Incompletions waste energy. Think about it. When something is unfinished, you ruminate on it. Whether it’s a conversation, a puzzle, a task or a project, your mind and your actions wander back to it over and over thrashing like a computer. Your energy is trapped as is your momentum. When you’re incomplete, you can’t move on. Not fully. Part of…
I was working with a team recently and one member challenged me on single point accountability. She said she disagreed with the concept and their people “share” accountability for getting things done. While this is a great idea, it will always lead to the same outcome. When things are working, it’s a fine concept. What happens when things don’t work…
There are two things that stop most of us: not knowing how and never having done it before. When you watch young children, they don’t approach anything this way. In fact, everything is new and fascinating and exciting. They approach everything with wonder, curiosity, and an exploratory attitude. They have fun while discovering what they don’t know. When did you…
Building and scaling a business is hard work. When you have the right strategy – or “recipe” to follow, the actions you take are more like “ingredients” to enhance what’s happening. I was asked in a recent interview “if there was a magic ‘reset’ button as it relates to starting your business, what systems would you go back and put…
My world is filled with working with leaders daily. Everyone is busy. Everyone. Some of them forget that from time to time. Additionally, they forget “busy” is a choice. We do the things we want to do. That’s it. Saying we’re busy, using it as a shield to hide behind, is shorthand for “not important enough.” You’re not fooling anyone,…
When things are challenging, many of us get stalled at starting and proceed to feel bad. Once we feel bad, we justify our inaction by creating stories, rationalizations, excuses, and justifications thinking our feelings are reason enough to remain stuck. We do other things, deprioritize the “big” thing we need to do that might be new, different, larger in scope,…
To lead well means you turn challenges into chances. When things get difficult, pausing to get perspective will give you space for three things: Adaptation. In order to respond, not react, you change your plans to fit the situation, just like a pilot adjusts their course during a storm. Inspiration. Find ways to boost your team’s spirits, reminding everyone of…
Whoever said structure kills creativity clearly hasn’t met its partner. Picture this: creativity strutting around like a free-spirited rockstar, leather jacket, wild hair, and breaking all the rules. And who’s right there, making sure the show goes on? Structure, the unsung hero in this creative jam (by the way, this is also how Visionaries and Integrators partner). Think of structure…