In one of my recent LinkedIn updates (connect with me at http://ca.linkedin.com/in/jimclemmer) I featured Peter Aceto’s inspiring Globe & Mail article on the gold medal power of positive thinking. I especially loved his example of how Debbie Muir coached the Canadian synchronized swimming team to a gold medal. The team was struggling with their three-minute performance. On reviewing video of the routine she found “20 seconds of brilliance.”
Traditional coaching and training would have focused on the remaining two minutes and 40 seconds to improve that performance. Instead Debbie focused the team on those 20 seconds of brilliance to leverage their confidence and performance. She built on strengths to move them from good to great.
In a recent Forbes column, Jack Zenger, reflects on a key learning from his five decades of pioneering work in the leadership field. In, One Secret for Greatness: Choose the Right Leadership Development Goals, Jack poses a key question; “what’s the right target for your own leadership development goals? Chances are, your best opportunities for breakout success will come from magnifying your greatest strengths, not from miring in the areas where you tend to be weak. If you’re willing to make an improvement, why not aim for the stars?”
Last week’s Toronto public workshop using The Extraordinary Leader development system was filled to capacity. Once participants resisted the lure of “the dark side” of weakness-based approaches many were inspired and guided toward leveraging their strengths.
We just added new dates for The Extraordinary Leader and The Extraordinary Coach public workshops in Toronto on June 25 and 26. In these sessions, I will help participants determine existing strengths (and possible fatal flaws) with an easy on-line 360 multi-rater assessment before the workshop. We then apply our research-based road map to help leaders find the most effective route to build on 3-5 existing strengths. On June 26, I will coach leaders in building coaching skills built around our well-proven four-step FUEL model.
You can watch my 60 minute webinar overview of the approaches used in both workshops at Building Leadership Skills and a Coaching Culture. See our Coming Events section for more information on the workshops.
Spotlighting and building strengths boosts leaders from bright to brilliant.
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