The senior manager and support professionals we’ve been working with these days are nervous. There’s a lot of uncertainty and plenty of negativity inside and outside our organizations. As I saw in an offsite executive team retreat I facilitated in January, the biggest danger is that leaders allow themselves to be discouraged, demoralized, and de-energized. If they hop on the Bitter Bus – or even worse drive it – whole teams and entire organizations can spiral downward very fast.

The second biggest danger is leaders who don’t re-double their efforts to refocus, reframe, and re-energize their teams. Often that’s because they may not know what to do. It’s been quite awhile since we’ve been tested with such adverse and difficult conditions as we now face.

I recently recorded a short video clip (under two minutes) outlining how this is exactly the time to invest in learning and development. Go to our main page at www.clemmergroup.com, turn on your sound, and click on the “gear graphic” in the middle of the page to play it.

I also just redesigned and updated my Leading @ the Speed of Change workshop for today’s environment and drawing from my new book in progress (working title of Thriving in Turbulent Times). Leading @ the Speed of Change: Navigating Turbulent Times on June 2 and 3, 2009 is a very rare two-day public workshop designed to help individuals and management teams address our most challenging issues and successfully navigate the choppy waters of uncertainty. This is my only date for open or public versions of this workshop in 2009. No others are planned. If you’re in Southern Ontario or the Greater Toronto Area this is a unique opportunity to bring your team to one of my sessions (if you have more than six team members, we should talk about an in-house session customized to your organization). The Kitchener Holiday Inn is only forty-five minutes from Toronto’s international airport.

For everyone outside Ontario or Canada, June is a beautiful time to visit our wonderful little piece of heaven here on earth. Niagara Falls is only ninety minutes away and many other tourist attractions are even closer. Of course, you can always go further north and look for our famous moose!

Click here for a short video clip (under two minutes) introducing the workshop and to view the agenda, outcomes you can expect, pricing, and other information.