Leveraging Strengths and Building Team SpiritSome people like to build things with their hands. As my wife, Heather, can attest, I didn’t inherit the handyman gene. My farmer father and my cabinetmaker brother kept that gene to themselves. My passion is building with words. My grandmother was a published poet so it’s likely her set of genes that made me handier with a keyboard than with a hammer. Although there are times when I would like to use a hammer on the keyboard!

My biweekly blog posts draw from over three decades of study, personal application, and ongoing research and writing. These blogs also capture our experiences with coaching and training hundreds of organizations and thousands of leaders.

Tomorrow we publish my August blogs in the September issue of The Leader Letter. This issue is an especially broad cross section of the three pillars of our business:

  1. Keynotes, workshops, and retreats,
  2. Customized leadership and culture development services, and
  3. Zenger Folkman’s Programs and Services

This month starts with a critical choice; whether to lead, follow, or wallow. This framework is the foundation of personal, team, and organizational effectiveness. You’ll also find links to a recent webinar on Zenger Folkman’s new research of the 6 leadership levers driving extraordinary results.

Human Resources can play a critical role in leadership and culture development. But there’s a vast gulf separating top HR leaders from so many of their mediocre and very ineffective peers. Coaching skill development efforts are spreading and our Extraordinary Coach process is accelerating its effectiveness with major upgrades. You’ll also get six key lessons from a new book based on the extraordinary Zappos culture. These illustrate and reinforce core approaches that are standing the test of time during these turbulent times.

American author, Og Mandino, wrote, “Thousands of grapes are pressed to fill one jar with wine, and the grape skin and pulp are tossed to the birds. So it is with these grapes of wisdom from the ages. Much has been filtered and tossed to the wind. Only the pure truth lies distilled in the words to come.”

We don’t claim to have the pure or ultimate truth in these blog posts. We have studiously distilled research and approaches along with our own and others’ experiences. Hopefully, you’re finding leadership and culture development truths worth sipping and savoring.