Curious Leader – March 1, 2020
LEARN A LITTLE: ESTIMATING: THE POWER OF LEADERSHIP There is a dimension of effective leadership that goes unnoticed—so much so that I don’t ever recall reading about it in a management or leadership book. I’m referring to the ability to make accurate or trustworthy...
Curious Leader – February 1, 2020
LEARN A LITTLE:CLEARING THE TABLE A friend of mine, Don Blackborn, was not only a terrific psychologist but he was also a great colleague and pool player. We played many – and I mean many – games of Eight Ball, a popular billiard game. Unfortunately, I am sad to...
Curious Leader – January 1, 2020
LEARN A LITTLE:Thoughts from Stephen Covey We as people all bring our own notes to work every day. We all have a tune in our heads and some are better than others. The word harmony comes from the Greek and means joint, concordance, fitting together. We all know what...
Curious Leader – December 1, 2019
LEARN A LITTLE:"Moods at the top move the fastest!" I was talking with a colleague recently and while describing her boss she said, “…and she’s always in a bad mood.” Several thoughts came to mind. The first was that employees do indeed notice and pay attention to...
Curious Leader – November 1, 2019
LEARN A LITTLE:Chameleon Droppings Are Worse Than Mouse Droppings In Any Organization Walking around a large organization, you are likely to see all kinds of things—people working, people on cell phones, memos on bulletin boards, coffee pots, and in the fall when you...
Curious Leader – September 1, 2019
LEARN A LITTLE:Some Common Mistakes in Delegating Tasks I was talking with a colleague recently and he was lamenting the shortcomings of delegation, namely that delegated tasks were shoddy and often incomplete. Perhaps there is an explanation. My purpose here is not...
Curious Leader – August 1, 2019
LEARN A LITTLE:It is going to be unpleasant and you are going to do it. As a leader, there are those times when you have to do the unpleasant thing: to fire someone, to reassign them, to tell the employee he has bad breath. There is also the time when you have to...
Curious Leader – July 1, 2019
LEARN A LITTLE:STOP THINKING No doubt all of us have had the occasions when we think too much. We don’t make progress on our decision making because we keep processing the same things over and over again. What we need to do is to cultivate the mindset, “just start...
Curious Leader – June 1, 2019
LEARN A LITTLE:A SENSE OF MEANING Someone recently asked me what I meant when I said, “It’s important to have a sense of meaning in our lives.” Meaning is having a full fuel tank and feeling good about it. If you have ever traveled a long distance “running on empty,”...
Curious Leader – May 1, 2019
LEARN A LITTLE:Thinking About Feedback We all know that receiving feedback can polish our skills and improve our performance. But did you ever think about who gives us feedback? If it’s someone we respect, someone who is knowledgeable, we are likely to think about it...