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 »Change isn’t news. But the continually accelerating pace of organizational change is. People feel inundated, overwhelmed, and stressed. Adaptive organizations provide inspiration and practical tools to everyone in order to help deal with our rapid pace of change and uncertainty. Our turbulent times have created waves of fear, frustration, and uncertainty. When these negative forces […]
Read post »Gandhi, the towering political and spiritual leader of India and the Indian independence movement, once observed “There is more to life than increasing its speed.” But we live in an ever accelerating world. Zenger Folkman’s research based on their “speed index” showed that extraordinary leaders are both quick and effective. Ten years ago I bought […]
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 »Next month’s Extraordinary Leadership Summit and Coaching Symposium will be the fourth one I’ve participated in since forming our partnership with Zenger Folkman. Three intense and powerful days of workshops, Client presentations, panels, and discussion groups provides a rare chance to hear about the latest leadership, coaching, and organization development research and practices. We’re especially […]
Read post »Wells Fargo is now America’s largest bank by market capitalization. One of Zenger Folkman’s early and largest Clients, the company has been working extensively on leadership and culture development for the past decade. CEO John Stumpf observed, “We always say we could leave our strategic plan on an airplane, somebody could pick it up, and […]
Read post »How do you build a leadership strength from good to great? How do you sustain energy and endurance to keep working at developing leadership skills until others notice a substantial improvement? How do you ensure the leadership skill you’re developing is most relevant to what the organization needs or expects from you? The answers to these […]
Read post »Whenever we ask a group of workshop participants how many rank employee engagement as one of their top priorities, most raise their hands. We’re encountering a growing number of organizations finding that their engagement survey ratings are slipping — and not just at the frontline employee level. A growing number of people — at all […]
Read post »8 Tips for a Better YOU Research shows that people who put proper emphasis on their own development impact their organization in significant ways. Multiple studies show how seeking feedback can increase leadership effectiveness, but ZF’s upcoming webinar on May 27 will take a deeper dive into self-development and the critical role feedback can play. […]
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 […]
Read post »Most 360 feedback assessments search for skill gaps, weaknesses, and training/development needs. We’re running into executives who’ve refused to participate in 360 feedback assessments because they’ve found them negative and often feel beat up by the process — even when they have the counsel of a well-trained coach or psychologist. Some CEOs have banned the […]
Read post »It’s been three years since Jack Zenger and I had one of our periodic update conversations after we headed off in different directions over 20 years ago. Our previous companies, The Achieve Group and Zenger Miller, had worked together for more than a decade. When this conversation took place with Jack, my wife, Heather, and […]
Read post »A friend who hasn’t seen a doctor in years was recently diagnosed with serious heart disease. He was immediately prescribed medication to reduce his blood pressure, control cholesterol, and thin his blood. His wife is fanatically devoted to natural remedies. She found a book arguing for cayenne pepper and garlic to soften and dissolve arterial […]
Read post »With e-mail in-boxes burying managers in hundreds of e-mails while they rush through a blur of meetings, speed is essential to effectiveness — if not survival. Zenger Folkman recently analyzed 360 assessments on over 50,000 leaders to understand how speed impacts evaluations of their effectiveness. A “speed index” was created to measure speed in three […]
Read post »“Tell me about the people at the organization you just left,” said the senior manager who was screening candidates to fill a key leadership role. “They were uneducated and lazy,” the candidate responded. “You always had to keep an eye on them because they were constantly trying to goof off or rip off the company. […]
Read post »Ignorance may be bliss, but it’s deadly to leadership effectiveness. And it’s often the mark of a blind and weak leader. Feedback-impaired leaders often mistake compliance for commitment. They might, for example, proclaim an open door policy and when no one enters their office to raise problems, believe there aren’t any serious issues to be […]
Read post »Many organizations have increased their efforts to strengthen the coaching skills of their supervisors, managers, and executives. That’s because of mounting evidence showing that coaching effectiveness dramatically improves employee engagement, levels of customer satisfaction, productivity, safety, and profitability while reducing turnover, absenteeism, and costs. Coaching skills have an especially vital impact on “volunteerism.” This is […]
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