Studies show that performance appraisals improve performance 1/3 of the time, reduce it 1/3 of the time, and has no effect the other 1/3 of the time. Clearly we have a problem. This abysmal performance of performance management has caused traditional performance appraisals to be abandoned by a third of U.S. firms. A vital question […]
Read post »Start the New Year learning how to tango! Many leaders believe it’s a trade-off; you can do it fast or you can do it right, but you can’t have both. Drawing from assessments of 75,000 global leaders Zenger Folkman proves that while many believe it can’t be done, the best leaders are already doing it. […]
Read post »Impermanence and constant change has always been one of nature’s mighty laws. Today that pace is accelerating. Organizations are turning to Agile, Lean, and other strategies to become a victor, rather than victim, of change. An organization’s speed is set by its leaders. In their newest book, Speed: How Leaders Accelerate Successful Execution, Jack Zenger […]
Read post »Peter Drucker first advised building strengths in the 1960s and it became a constant theme throughout his work. In 1990 psychology researcher and professor, Martin Seligman, published his book, Learned Optimism, and launched the positive psychology movement. In 2001, Marcus Buckingham and Donald Clifton, their book, Now, Discover Your Strengths. I read, reread, and cited […]
Read post »Do you feel like you’re expected to move faster and do more? Are you often frustrated that your organization moves too slow and gets stalled? If your organization were to move faster, would it substantially influence your success? These questions were recently asked in a Zenger Folkman survey on agility and leadership speed. Agreement with […]
Read post »“No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.” These are a few lines of a poem penned by the metaphysical English poet, John Donne, around the time of Shakespeare. Community, interdependence, and oneness has been a central part of many ancient philosophies […]
Read post »“Belling the Cat,” a tale from the ancient Greek fabulist Aesop, points to the timeless dilemma of knowing versus doing. The story describes a counsel of mice trying to figure out how to deal with “the sly and treacherous manner” that the cat sneaks up on mice and kills them. A young mouse proposed putting […]
Read post »Alvin Toffler, former associate editor of Fortune and bestselling author of books such as Future Shock, The Third Wave, and Powershift advises, “You’ve got to think about ‘big things’ while you’re doing small things, so that all the small things go in the right direction.” This is an update of ancient wisdom from the Roman […]
Read post »A sure path to marital unhappiness — if not divorce — is when a newlywed sets out to change his or her spouse. Yet how many performance management discussions are built on the same premise? Too often managers set about trying to “improve” his or her direct report by fixing weaker areas. How enthused are […]
Read post »When I poll audiences for the key performance outcomes their leadership development efforts are aimed at improving, employee engagement gets many of the votes. While many session participants agree that the immediate manager plays an important role in engagement levels, most are surprised by extensive research data showing the influence of the manager on his […]
Read post »This July will be the fifth Zenger Folkman annual leadership summit I’ve attended. These are powerfully condensed learning opportunities providing unique opportunities to: Gain deep insights and experiences from top global leaders in talent development Learn about the latest research on leadership, coaching, and culture development Participate, evaluate, or become certified in multiple award winning […]
Read post »Many succession planning processes involve identifying and developing high potential leaders. As with promising amateur athletes working to secure very scarce spots at the professional level of their sport, not every leader considered to have strong potential grows in their career to ever higher leadership roles. Through our evidence-based approaches to identifying key leadership skills […]
Read post »We’re currently working with an organization embarking on an extensive leadership and culture development process. It’s starting in a series of workshops and planning retreats with the CEO and his team of direct reports along with their direct reports. The first part of the process is our strengths-based 360 assessment. The CEO is actively engaged […]
Read post »Periodically I search Amazon’s web site to see how many books are now available on leadership. There are now 150,000. That’s up from just over 120,000 when I last searched a few months ago. The overwhelming number of leadership theories, models, frameworks, and skills makes it very hard to know where to invest development time […]
Read post »Last month Brad Smith and I attended Zenger Folkman’s Extraordinary Leadership Summit and Coaching Symposium in Salt Lake City. A highlight of the three day event were Client presentations from, and panel discussions with, General Mills, General Motors, and McKesson Corporation (a Fortune 500 healthcare services and IT company). With implementations ranging from two to […]
Read post »Are the leaders in your organization timid or bold? What is bold leadership? How does it differ from timid leadership? How much of a difference does bold leadership make? Zenger Folkman recently studied 360-degree reports on more than 50,000 leaders in all industries and from all parts of the world. This new research identified leaders […]
Read post »360 assessments are now being used by over 85% of larger and leading organizations. As I wrote in “9 Problems with 360 Multi-Rater Assessments” there’s a growing backlash and resistance to their use because they often search for gaps and weaknesses. Our work with Zenger Folkman has shown that 360 data on a leader’s effectiveness can […]
Read post »Whatever you can do or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now. These words are often attributed to the German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe but seems to be a compilation from various sources. Regardless of the author, this powerful advice identifies a timeless leadership […]
Read post »Joe Folkman is a global expert in psychometrics or measuring psychological factors. He wrote his PhD dissertation on data he collected from 360 assessments. Over the decades he’s developed feedback and measurement tools around a growing database now compromised of over a half million assessments on almost 50,000 leaders. Long-time feedback, executive coaching, and leadership […]
Read post »Many leaders find courageous conversations to give corrective or redirecting feedback very difficult. Emotions can get in the way, perceptions of the issue can differ widely, relationships may be damaged, and reactions can be volatile. Leaders may be scarred from past conversations where they gave or received tough feedback in a poorly structured and awkwardly […]
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