Hot Mess Hotline

As a leader, it's not up to you to keep everyone happy and motivated all the time. But it IS up to you to lead the way on creating a culture where employees motivate each other, where healthy conflict is encouraged, and where social and emotional connections are built even without physical proximity.

The webinar starts off with two participant questions,

"What's the #1 impact you've seen on your team because of COVID-19 and the sudden shift to working remotely?" and "What's the most important corporate value you want your team to adopt into the next normal?"

Consider these as you listen to Steve Johnson from Motivosity and I talk about building connections! 

Find the full blog post at https://stefaniekrievins.com/how-to-build-trust-in-a-virtual-team/

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

Want to talk about the biggest factor in your team’s success?

Want to talk about what success factors are important to small business owners?

Want to talk about how to improve change management?

Friends, that’s what you’ve got to do: TALK! Today’s Mini Mess is all about how to improve communication within your team. And while there’s no Golden Ticket to communication, there is a Golden Idea, and I’ll share it with you today.

Then, I’ll give you three of my favorite resources for improving communication, including one you can download right now at https://stefaniekrievins.com/how-to-improve-communication

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

Here’s the thing about SMART goals: they’re here to stay.

Look no further than a quick Google search to tell you that SMART goals are an essential part of strategic planning for any workplace that wants to be successful in reaching their quarterly, annual, or multi-year objectives.

In today's Mini Mess episode, originally recorded in January 2020, I'm talking about how SMART goals can help create focus and clarity. So why, when they’re introduced in a meeting, are your coworkers’ eyes more glazed over than the last donut lingering in the middle of the conference room table?!

See the full blog post and transcript at https://www.stefaniekrievins.com/smartgoals

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

When I start working with a team, the issues that I hear most often are trust, communication, and other problems that are rooted in trust and communication.

Today, I’m focusing on how to build trust at work. Leaders, trust starts with you, and what I have to say about what you need to share and what you need to say may make you a little nervous. But ultimately, developing this skill will allow your team to trust you more. This trust will spill over into how they trust and communicate with each other.

See the full blog post and transcript at https://www.stefaniekrievins.com/how-to-build-trust

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

If you've been here awhile, you know I'm a person who likes to get the real shizz done. I love talking sales, strategy, stakeholders, small business and salsa (so if you decide to conduct a goal-setting strategy session over chips and dip, I just might join you).

In today's Mini Mess episode, originally recorded in January 2020, it’s time to talk about how to set meaningful, motivational goals to best align with not only your project management needs, but with what really, REALLY inspires you to get your best work done. And we’re going to do this with one of my favorite "s" words- SHIFT!

See the full blog post and transcript at https://www.stefaniekrievins.com/shiftgoals

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

Gen X is often called the sandwich generation, and while that phrase is certainly true on the home front, it's applicable to the workplace as well. My fellow Gen Xers are sandwiched between Baby Boomer CEOs and leadership and managing Millennial team members, and frankly, we're burning out. 

In today's Mini Mess episode, I'm talking about Generation X motivation in the workplace and THEN, I'm talking about what to do about it, and why it's so important to take that step! 

See the full blog post and transcript at https://www.stefaniekrievins.com/whats-holding-gen-x-back-in-the-workplace 

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

In this episode, Stefanie talks with Doug Miller, the Owner & CEO of Brightworks, about his company’s experience with the COVID-19 pandemic and how his advanced-preparedness mindset helped his team immediately and seamlessly transition to an entirely virtual office while continuing to provide customer support.

Pro Troublemaker Nation founder Stefanie Krievins draws on conversations with guest CEOs and leaders, her own clients’ experiences, and the expertise of leading change-management professionals to provide tools for mid-level managers who want to learn to think like entrepreneurs.

Mr. Miller has extensive information technology operations experience in manufacturing, financial services, and health care, as well as a deep consulting background in many more industries. He is adept in roles requiring diverse skill sets that allow him to function effectively in deeply technical roles while also serving as a project manager, a business process consultant, and a leader of technical teams. Doug began his career as a system administrator and web developer and quickly moved into leadership and customer-facing roles.

Much of Doug’s experience has been in startup companies where he was required to provide hands-on engineering support one moment, and then shift into leadership or pre-sales role the next. He eventually moved into a senior technical leadership position in a large public hospital, where he was responsible for leading the Tier IV engineering function in a 24/7/365 IT environment.

Doug moved from there into several years of consulting, which included managing the migration of a hospital data center from the hospital itself to a remote hosting facility while not disrupting clinical operations – a project he completed well within budget and on time. He has also recently lead a project to replace existing hospital bed-side workstations with a new, VDI-based single-sign-on system, significantly streamlining clinical workflow.

Visit BrightWorks here.

Find “Leading Change,” by John Kotter, and the original Harvard Business Review article, here.

Stefanie Krievins is an executive coach based in Indianapolis, Ind., specializing in leadership and change management. 

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

In this episode, Stefanie discusses when it’s time to challenge the status quo and how to harness the energy of your team when they’re excited about change. Leaders will also learn what to do when a new corporate culture begins emerging as the result of change initiatives, and how that happens.

Pro Troublemaker Nation founder Stefanie Krievins draws on conversations with guest CEOs and leaders, her own clients’ experiences, and the expertise of leading change-management professionals to provide tools for mid-level managers who want to learn to think like entrepreneurs.

Find “Leading Change,” by John Kotter, and the original Harvard Business Review article, here.

Find more information on Jim Collins’ flywheel of success here.

Stefanie Krievins is an executive coach based in Indianapolis, Ind., specializing in leadership and change management. 

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

In this episode, leaders will tackle the obstacles that keep their teams from changing. Stefanie discusses the art of delegating as part of the change management process, then addresses how to break down your vision story in to multi-year, annual, and six-month goals. Listeners will learn why to set benchmarks for success, as well as how to celebrate the wins along the way with their teams.

Pro Troublemaker Nation founder Stefanie Krievins draws on conversations with guest CEOs and leaders, her own clients’ experiences, and the expertise of leading change-management professionals to provide tools for mid-level managers who want to learn to think like entrepreneurs.

Find “Leading Change,” by John Kotter, and the original Harvard Business Review article, here.

Find “The Leadership Challenge” by James Kouzes and Barry Posner here.

Stefanie Krievins is an executive coach based in Indianapolis, Ind., specializing in leadership and change management. 

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.

In this episode, Stefanie Krievins discusses why leaders need more than just a vision for their team and why you need to communicate significantly more than you think you do. Key takeways include how to create a vision story, how to communicate that story to your team with tools that you may not have considered, and how everyone at your company ultimately plays a role in the change you want to see. Leaders will gain a list of internal communication tools to begin using immediately.

In the first six episodes, Pro Troublemaker Nation founder Stefanie Krievins draws on conversations with guest CEOs and leaders, her own clients’ experiences, and the expertise of leading change-management professionals to provide tools for mid-level managers who want to learn to think like entrepreneurs.

Find “Leading Change,” by John Kotter, and the original Harvard Business Review article, here. 

Find “Traction” by Gino Wickman with EOS here. 

Stefanie Krievins is an executive coach based in Indianapolis, IN specializing in leadership and change management. 

Get these episodes and more straight-talk advice delivered directly to your inbox at https://stefaniekrievins.com/blog/.