As part of a larger culture development effort, we’ve worked with dozens of executive teams over the years to articulate or revise their core values. An almost universal core value is some variation of respect, integrity, or equality, or fairness. Whether our espoused or aspirational values become the real or lived values to everyone inside […]
Read post »Talent Management including succession planning, developing high potentials, and attracting and retaining top people is now a critical issue. During the financial crisis and economic downturn of the last few years organizations slowed or stopped leadership development. As executives now face a wave of retiring Baby Boomers and take a longer term view, “leadership bench […]
Read post »There’s an old story about a man walking into a drugstore to use the pay phone: “Hello, ABC Company, sometime ago you had an opening for an operations manager. Is the position still available?” After a slight pause, he continued: “Oh, you have. Six months ago, huh? How’s he working out?” A somewhat longer pause. […]
Read post »Since the mid-sixties, there have been a large number of experiments with animals and people revealing that helplessness can be a conditioned or learned response. An early experiment with learned helplessness was demonstrated with rats. When they were put directly in ice water, they could swim around for forty to sixty hours. But if the rats were […]
Read post »It’s all about perception. Eons ago the ancient Greek Philosopher, Epictetus, mused “What concerns me is not the way things are, but rather the way people think things are.” We so easily mouth the words “perception is reality.” But do we seek out and work from our customers’ reality? Or do we tend to dismiss […]
Read post »Customer service and quality is one of todays most talked about and least understood concepts. Service/quality is a very slippery concept. It’s exasperatingly difficult to define and a source of great confusion to many managers. There’s a wide range of differences in premises, concepts, and even in the meanings of key words. Definitions of “service/quality” […]
Read post »Surveys show that when we’re asked to rate our own driving skills, over 75% of us score ourselves as above average. Similar self-assessment distortions show up when managers are asked to rate their own coaching effectiveness. In researching and developing The Extraordinary Coach development system, Zenger Folkman identified four powerful reasons for asking coachees for […]
Read post »In an organizational survey at a large telecom company, managers were asked to rate how well they coached the people reporting to them. They scored themselves high. The people reporting to those managers were asked to rate the coaching they received. They scored their managers very low. A big part of the problem is around […]
Read post »Free Coaching Assessment and Webinar Ask 100 people if they have good common sense and more than 95% will tell you they do. Similarly, if you ask 100 managers if they are good coaches the number may be lower than 95%, but not by much. The managers we talk to assume that if they are […]
Read post »“The knowledge of the difference between what we can change and what we must accept in ourselves is the beginning of real change. With this knowledge, we can use our precious time to make the many rewarding changes that are possible. We can live with less self-reproach and less remorse. We can live with greater […]
Read post »From its beginning in the 1960s, cognitive psychology has developed science/evidence-based approaches that have proven more effective then drugs and other methods in treating people with depression, phobias, obsessions, addictions, eating disorders, and other life-disrupting problems. University of Pennsylvania professor of psychology, Martin Seligman, established a successful track record researching, developing, and documenting treatment techniques. […]
Read post »I enjoy playing baseball and I am a big fan of the sport — especially the Toronto Blue Jays. So far this year, the Jays are tantalizing their fans with their winning ways. We can only hope it continues right into September! Recently I was facilitating an Extraordinary Leader workshop. This process is based on […]
Read post »A few months ago I had a lengthy and very engaging conversation with freelance writer, Diane Peters, on using money as a motivator. She’s just published an excellent article in CPA Magazine with further research and practical tips on this critical management issue. Here are a few of Diane’s key points from “Cash Disincentive” that […]
Read post »Is your meeting or team too often dominated by one vocal person who forcefully pushes his or her point of view as if they’re speaking on behalf of everyone else? Do you often suspect their position is not shared by most others but find he or she has hijacked the discussion? Do you have people […]
Read post »Turbulence means disorder, chaos, and instability. Turbulent times are unpredictable, disruptive, and confusing. Sound familiar? Yes. It sounds like life. While it’s tempting to want stability, predictability and orderliness, be very careful what you wish for. Writer, academic, journalist and scholar of early modern English literature Germaine Greer warns, “Security is when everything is settled. […]
Read post »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 […]
Read post »….when it comes to goal pursuit, it really is the journey that counts, not the destination. Set for yourself any goal you want. Most of the pleasure will be had along the way, with every step that takes you closer… we can call this ‘the progress principle’: Pleasure comes more from making progress toward goals […]
Read post »I was drawn to this book because Jonathon set out to identify the origins of the burgeoning field of positive psychology in ancient wisdom. Drawing on classical thought from India such as the Upanishads and Buddhism, Chinese philosophers, Mediterranean like the Old and New Testaments, Greek and Roman philosophy, and the Koran he structured the […]
Read post »I am facilitating a series of leadership development and organization effectiveness sessions for 200 middle managers and senior executives of a public sector organization. One of the key issues we’ve focused on is the growing “expectations gap”– customers/clients are expecting more services while paying the same or less taxes. Of course, this doing-more-with-less pressure is […]
Read post »Many people find giving or getting performance appraisals stressful and negative. That’s likely why one of the most popular white papers we’ve featured in some time was “Making Performance Appraisals an Inspiring Event“. Strengths-based performance discussions can dramatically change the energy, focus, and effectiveness of these discussions. Focusing on strengths creates higher energy and much […]
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