Coaching for Leaders

Bonni Stachowiak: Teaching in Higher Ed

Bonni is the host of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, Dean of Teaching and Learning and Professor of Business and Management at Vanguard University, and my life partner. Prior to her academic career, she was a human resources consultant and executive officer for a publicly traded company. Bonni is the author of The Productive Online and Offline Professor: A Practical Guide*.

Key Points

Dave asked what advice we would give to our younger selves about leadership.

Bill asked about how to balance stern and serious with light and loose.

Luiza asked about how to lead volunteers.

Jeff asked about influencing change in culture.

Elmer asked what he can do with his StrengthsFinder results.

Resources Mentioned

The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom* by Don Miguel Ruiz

Working Wardrobes

8 Ways To Influence Without Authority

Finding the Career That Fits You

What Color is Your Parachute?* by Richard Nelson Bolles

Related Episodes

The Value of the StrengthsFinder Assessment, with Steve Dosier (episode 89)

How to Interpret Your StrengthsFinder Results, with Steve Dosier (episode 90)

How To Create Joy At Work, with Richard Sheridan (episode 122)

Start With Why, with Simon Sinek (episode 223)

How to Figure Out Your Career, with Scott Anthony Barlow (episode 259)

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Croft Edwards: CROFT + Company

Croft Edwards is a Master Certified Coach who has been serving an array of clients from energy and mining, to forestry and aviation, since 2000. He’s a retired US Army Officer and has over eighteen years in the Army National Guard and Army Reserve.

Key Points

Much of leaders’ effectiveness has to do with their level of self-mastery.

Flow is a combination of physical, mental, and emotional factors.

We learn our behaviors from others, and they learn their behaviors from us.

Resource Mentioned

Flow* by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Related Episodes

Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do, with Amy Morin (episode 204)

Increase Your Personal Capacity, with Beth Buelow (episode 218)

How to Tame Your Inner Critic, with Tara Mohr (episode 232)

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Susan Gerke (web) is the president of Gerke Consulting & Development. She has worked with global teams and has certified facilitators around the world to deliver management, leadership, and team offerings. Susan is co-creator of GO Team, a training suite for organizations to power team performance.

Chris Voss: Never Split the Difference

Chris Voss is the Founder and CEO of the Black Swan Group and the author of Never Split The Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It*. Chris was the lead international kidnapping negotiator for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, as well as the FBI’s hostage negotiation representative for the National Security Council’s Hostage Working Group.

Key Points

Compromise is a dirty word.

Really smart people often have trouble being negotiators.

Negotiation is not just a rational conversation, but brings in the emotion of both parties.

A successful negotiation is one where the other party walks away respecting you after the interaction.

Beware of anchoring high at the start of a conversation as it may exclude you from an even better outcome.

Resources Mentioned

Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss*

The Dark Side of Emotional Intelligence by Adam Grant

Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School

Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In* by Roger Fisher and William Ury

Related Episodes

How to Get Way Better at Accepting Feedback, with Sheila Heen (episode 143)

How to Be a Non-Conformist, with Adam Grant (episode 238)

How Women Make Stronger, Smarter Choices, with Therese Huston (episode 255)

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Bonni Stachowiak: Teaching in Higher Ed

Bonni is the host of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, Dean of Teaching and Learning and Professor of Business and Management at Vanguard University, and my life partner. Prior to her academic career, she was a human resources consultant and executive officer for a publicly traded company. Bonni is the author of The Productive Online and Offline Professor: A Practical Guide*.

Key Points

Rachel asked about how to balance performance and people.

Mike asked about getting the employees to communicate, engage and work together as a team.

Pierre asked about how to prevent the distortion of storytelling.

Rasmus asked a follow-up question from a previous episode on our motivation for continuing to move forward.

Resources Mentioned

Leadership Dilemmas-Grid Solutions* by Robert Blake and Anne McCanse

Managerial Grid Model

Bonni recommended the author Debra Tannen

Radical Hope: A Teaching Manifesto by Kevin Gannon

Related Library Episodes

The Four Critical Stories Leaders Need For Influence, with David Hutchens (episode 148)

How to Transform Your Limitations Into Advantages, with Mark Barden (episode 207)

How to Succeed with Leadership and Management, with John Kotter (episode 249)

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Bob Frisch and Cary Greene: Simple Sabotage

For over 30 years, Bob Frisch has worked with Senior Executive Teams and Boards on their most vital strategic and organizational challenges, both as a consultant and a corporate executive. Cary Greene has over 20 years’ experience working with senior executives and boards on challenging and complex strategic issues. They are co-authors with Robert Galford of the book Simple Sabotage: A Modern Field Guide for Detecting and Rooting Out Everyday Behaviors That Undermine Your Workplace*.

Key Points

When creating a book on how to sabotage an occupying enemy’s industry, the OSS (precursor to the CIA) recommended a list of organizational sabotage techniques. Ironically, these techniques look very similar to common actions we see in our organizations today.

Committees

Make sure a committee is appropriate for the task.

What is the purpose of a committee?

Who actually needs to be on a committee?

Make sure committees are structured and have an agenda.

Make it clear what authority the leader of the committee has.

Is the committee being asked to make a recommendation or asked to make a decision?

Emails

Overusing the CC function in emails creates an overwhelming and unnecessary amount of communication.

Remember that sometimes it’s best to just pick up the phone or walk down the hall to communicate with someone.

Use the email subject line effectively.

Resources Mentioned

Simple Sabotage Field Manual (1944)

Simple Sabotage: A Modern Field Guide for Detecting and Rooting Out Everyday Behaviors That Undermine Your Workplace* by Robert Galford, Bob Frisch, and Cary Greene

Related Library Episodes

Communication in a Family Business, with JoAnne Norton (episode 74)

How We Do Things Around Here for Results, with Kent Rhodes (episode 144)

How to Tame Workplace Incivility, with Sharone Bar-David (episode 210)

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Scott Anthony Barlow: Happen to Your Career

Scott Anthony Barlow is the Founder of Happen to Your Career. He’s been featured on CNBC, Yahoo, CareerBuilder, Fast Company and Huffington Post and various colleges and universities as a top expert on career happiness. He's held roles executive roles in human resources, business development, and career coaching.

Scott is the host of the Happen to Your Career podcast, featuring the career stories of many successful professionals. His team and him have worked with over 25,000 people to help them stop settling, find their signature strengths, and start doing meaningful work they are enamored with.

In this conversation, Scott and I explore common career misconceptions, how framing your career around your strengths is key, and tools and assessments like StrengthsFinder that will support you.

Key Points

Common career misperceptions:

You need to have it all figured out at the start

You should focus on getting better at the things you’re not good at

It takes a ton of experience to move into the job you want

Framing a career around your strengths is key.

If you had to work extremely hard to get good at something, it’s probably not a true strength.

There are exercises and assessments like StrengthsFinder (also known as CliftonStrengths) that you can participate in to help you gain clarity on the above.

Resources Mentioned

Finding the Career That Fits You (Scott’s FREE 8-Day Video Course)*

The Ultimate Guide to Using Your Strengths to Get Hired*

How To Become a Career Coach*

Scott interviewing Dave on why your career is not a straight line

StrengthsFinder training for individuals and teams* (use code CFL10 for a 10% tuition discount)

StrengthsFinder 2.0

Related Episodes

The Value of the StrengthsFinder Assessment, with Steve Dosier (episode 89)

How to Interpret Your StrengthsFinder and CliftonStrengths Results, with Steve Dosier (episode 90)

The Secret To Happiness (episode 134)

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Brian Robertson: Holacracy

Brian Robertson is the primary developer of Holacracy, which allows leaders to release the reins of personal power and persuasion into a trustworthy and explicit governance process. He co-founded HolacracyOne to support Holacracy’s growth, and he fills and loves a broad variety of the company’s roles. Brian is the author of the book Holacracy: The New Management System for a Rapidly Changing World*.

Key Points

Holocracy functions like a city; everybody knows the parameters, and they go about their business without constantly having to consult a leader.

It replaces the functions of managers with a set of processes.

It holds meetings to decide who has authority and is responsible for each project, but not to decide how to do a project.

Resources Mentioned

Holacracy: The New Management System for a Rapidly Changing World* by Brian Robertson

Related Library Episodes

The Surprising Truth About Influencing Others, with Daniel Pink (episode 84)

How to Delegate Work Effectively (episode 117)

New Practices in Organizational Leadership, with David Burkus (episode 253)

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Tom Henschel: The Look & Sound of Leadership

Tom Henschel of Essential Communications grooms senior leaders and executive teams. An internationally recognized expert in the field of workplace communications and self-presentation, he has helped thousands of leaders achieve excellence through his work as an executive coach and his top-rated podcast, The Look & Sound of Leadership.

Key Points

There is a certain amount of fear involved in a promotion over peers.

The situation has feelings attached to it.

People’s reactions will be based on a bell curve, with most people not caring, but with a few being either really happy or really unhappy.

What group will you focus on?

Don’t take things personally.

Have intentional conversations with your former peers to acknowledge that feelings are there and to listen to how they feel.

Resources Mentioned

The First 90 Days* by Michael Watkins

Self-Esteem at Work* by Nathaniel Branden

The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem* by Nathaniel Branden

The Look & Sound of Leadership podcast

Related Episodes

Three Steps to Soliciting Feedback, with Tom Henschel (episode 107)

How to Handle a Boss Who’s a Jerk, with Tom Henschel (episode 164)

How to Improve Your Coaching Skills, with Tom Henschel (episode 190)

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Bonni Stachowiak: Teaching in Higher Ed

Bonni is the host of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, Dean of Teaching and Learning and Professor of Business and Management at Vanguard University, and my life partner. Prior to her academic career, she was a human resources consultant and executive officer for a publicly traded company. Bonni is the author of The Productive Online and Offline Professor: A Practical Guide*.

Key Points

Phan asked about how to best identify a business partner.

Ruben asked for recommendations on 360 assessments.

Jaimee asked about how to educate herself on becoming a leader of leaders.

Phillip asked how leaders can themselves find the next opportunity, especially without the right experience.

Resources Mentioned

The Leadership Challenge* by James Kouzes and Barry Posner

Leadership Practices Inventory

Human Synergistics

42 Rules for Your New Leadership Role* by Pam Fox Rollin

Your First 100 Days In a New Executive Job* by Robert Hargrove

Related Episodes

Five Rules For Your New Leadership Role, with Pam Fox Rollin (episode 98)

Promote Yourself Through Intrapreneurship, with Dan Schwabel (episode 163)

How to Get Value From Associations, with John Corcoran (episode 209)

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