Leadership Jam Session

In this Jam Session, I sit with Dr. Philip Zimmerman. Dr. Zimmerman is an expert on culture and passionate about developing the next generation of leaders. His leadership journey includes scaling his first business to multi-million dollars before being acquired by a public traded company, CFO of an eight figure consulting firm, and eventually wanting to pay it forward, he retired and became a high school teacher for over 12 years where he discovered a generational shift and realized companies were in big trouble if they didn't adapt quickly to the radical change in culture. This eventually led to his groundbreaking book Unleash the Millennials: and Save the World.

• Millennials are the most educated generation in human history – digitally prepared and globally connected
• If organizations don’t give them today’s toughest challenges someone else (another organization) will, and that’s how you lose them
• Boomers and millennials think differently. They want the same outcome, but how they get there is just different
• Millennials should be coached, not directed
• Millennials want to know the ‘how’ and ‘why’, not “because the client or manager said so”
• Engage millennials by unleashing them, i.e., unleash them in their development by allowing them to develop their technical skills for the career path that they've chosen. Provide them advancement opportunities, or again, they will do it on their own
• Give them as much work-life balance as they want, because they are the most productive generation ever
• Ensure there’s purpose and meaning to whatever it is that they do

Unleash the Millennials: and Save the World, by Dr. Philip Zimmerman

The path to leadership is certainly not always linear. Career paths can sometimes Zig when you want to Zag. Sometimes, it may mean taking lateral positions or even taking a step back, so long as the purpose is to take 2 steps forward. When it’s happening, it can be hard to see that you’re on a journey, and that the journey is unique to you.

In this Jam Session, I sit with leaders Melissa Manner and Heather Stitely. Both Melissa and Heather are Area Business Managers with a fortune 500 biopharmaceutical company, and they both have this in common; their leadership journey was not linear.

• Taking a lateral role or moving from a people leader role back into an individual contributor role is not moving backwards. It's just moving you toward a different direction, that in many cases, moves you forward.
•  Every decision we make, every role we move into, is a learning experience that will help us to move forward.
•  When deciding your next career move, be open-minded to the potential you can gain from that experience.
• When considering different roles, make decisions that are right for you and will put you in a better position (skills and competencies) for the future.
•  Find the right blend of formal leadership training while leveraging the resources around you, i.e., mentors, other manager's experience, reflecting and learning from your own experience.
• It's ok to show humility by admitting when you don't have all the answers.

In this Jam Session, I sit with Dr. Philip Agrios. Dr. Agrios is an Executive Performance Consultant specializing in guiding leaders to unleash their hidden potentials. Dr. Agrios shares how you, as a leader, can quickly and simply change your state of mind by revealing an inborn trait that causes subconscious blocks which lead to ineffective outcomes. Once understood, personal and professional power is enhanced creating repeatable success in all aspects of life.

• There are three sabotaging traits for all people:

1. Director – is scattered, may not plan, sometimes wings things or gets really focused and forgets about other things
2. Supplier – over values others and needs to value yourself and others in balance
3. Communicator – is not communicating well

• As a saboteur, you confuse selfishness to self-nourishment
• You can change or influence others by changing yourself, not by trying to change others
• You can be responsible to people, i.e., leading your family, etc., but you are responsible for no one else but yourself

• LIFE'S ONE LAW: 6-Step Blueprint for Repeatable Success, by Dr. Philip Agrios

In this Jam Session, I sit with Ken Miller, President and CEO at NASCO Healthcare. Ken is a transformational leader with more than 30 years of experience. Ken started his career as a sales representative and worked his way up through various positions of increasing responsibilities with companies such as Upjohn, Roche, and Novo Nordisk, to mention a few. His vast executive experiences landed him leadership positions in both the U.S. and Switzerland.

• You can be successful in business, if in fact you're able to satisfy both needs: the need to satisfy yourself personally (like financially), as well as professionally
• You may get the work done but don’t do it at the expense of losing the team at the same time
• Understand the diversity of your team, and then leverage that to become a high-performing team
• It's ok to take yourself out of your comfort zone and into an environment where you are less familiar. It is a little bit disruptive, and as a result, it teaches you how to be agile and adaptive
• As a senior leader, include your team in the development of strategy. This way, you all believe in it and can hold each other accountable to attain it
• Don’t be afraid to make mistakes and ask for help from your colleagues
• As leader, you may not always have all the facts needed to make decisions. Build trust and empower your team so that they feel safe about bringing you the facts
• Lastly, if you want or need more facts, figure out how to ask the right questions

In this Jam Session, I sit with Monte Pedersen. Monte is a seasoned executive and leader in the area of strategy, execution, and operations. Monte’s leadership consultancy has a unique value proposition where he specializes in helping senior leaders and organizations achieve their initiatives through the process of strategy execution management.

• As a senior leader, you need to continue to carry the vision of the organization. You're responsible for making sure that everybody knows what you're trying to achieve
• Be the Chief Repetition Officer, i.e., repeat what it is you want your people to do. It’s not micromanaging. It’s just making sure people understand what you need done. They may get sick of it, but you know they're certainly not going to forget it
• Don’t make assumptions that a manager comes on board already knowing what to do and how and how to execute
• Meet with direct reports every 30 days to go through their goals, their responsibilities, how they're doing, and document information. Sometimes even more frequently
• Invest time above you, below you, and with your peers. If you do that, chances are you're going to be very successful as an employee because you'll develop a 360 degree view of what's going on and you know you're going to be able to do something about it
• Lastly, remember, you can't communicate enough as a senior leader

• www.clarifydeployachieve.com
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/monte-pedersen-9554a1126/

In this first episode of a new series called “Jam Session Scenarios”, I sit with a panel of seasoned leaders - Ted Cowles, Dean DiGiacomo, and Matt Melloy. We review a few common scenarios, and a few twists and turns, as it relates to performance reviews.

• Align with each employee on the definition of ‘achieves’ and ‘exceeds’
• Remind employees ‘achieves’ is a great mark! Too often our employees feel ‘achieves’ is not doing well in the role 
• Benchmark performance and be consistent across all your employees by providing specific examples of how to achieve/exceed
• There should be no surprises if you're having continuous coaching and feedback discussions throughout the year
• Using high-performing employees as benchmarks is a delicate balance  
• Keep an open mind - there could be times where you were provided with concrete examples that you may have missed or forgotten about that justifies a higher rating

In this episode, I sit with Anthony “AJ” Vaughan, an entrepreneur with a keen focus on people development. AJ works with start-up organizations by helping them mobilize employee experience and drive true change with senior leadership through innovative strategies, and an out of the box approach to HR.

• Don't allow your ego to get in the way of your employee needs 
• Two concepts that help drive employee engagement: succession planning and career mapping 
• Employee development is just as critical to success for small businesses as it is for large corporations
• Consistently sit down with your employees to have a development discussion
• When you focus on meeting the needs of your employees, they will in turn, focus on meeting your needs 
• Create channels of communication that reach all of your employees to ensure their recommendations and voices are heard

• https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-vaughan-8ba8a8172/

It was a lot of fun being on the other side of the interview table for this! A couple months ago I was asked to be a speaker at the Women Leaders Rising Summit hosted by its founder, Lav Chintapalli. Lav is a leadership strategist and coach, who helps women develop strategies to create greater impact in their careers. Lav’s passion is to support and empower women to step bravely into their potential and have the impact they were born to have.

This episode is a short but powerful excerpt from my talk, which is an interview with Lav, on my experience in developing women into leaderships positions, and specifically, what it takes to succeed.

• Project confidence
• Positioning - where are you currently positioned and what’s your destination point?
• Find mentors who can help guide you along your journey, but be very strategic in your selection
• When it comes to your development, you control a lot more than you think you do

• https://womenleadersrising.com/
•  www.pathwaypower.com 

In this episode I sit with Shawn Tomasello, a biopharmaceutical executive and public board member with more than 35 years of experience in leading teams and companies at the highest levels. From small start-ups to multiple acquisitions, we discuss what it takes to create a highly engaged workforce culture.   

• The secret sauce for creating highly engaged cultures is to engage people's hearts and minds and do it with authenticity
• Build an environment where peers trust each other enough to have a debate with positive intent
• When it comes to setting goals, you have to inspect what you expect
• Employee Engagement Surveys are a critical component for understanding an organization's level of engagement, but you have to be transparent and ask, “what do we need to do to get better?”
• No one person impacts employee engagement scores. The team is going to rise or fall together
• When it comes to your career growth, when you're ripe, you rot, and when you're green, you're growing. If you are comfortable in what you're doing, it's time for you to get uncomfortable and take on a new role
• If you truly care about your people have the tough conversations with them
• Not everybody's going to like you. You're not going to be everybody's cup of tea. The thing you must strive for most is that even if they don't like you, they respect you, and they trust you to make the right decisions
• There's a lot of decisions you're going to make along your journey. Some people are not going to like you just have to do the very best you can to make the right decisions 

In this episode I sit with Jim Wentworth, a Vice President of Sales in the healthcare industry. We discuss how having a deep connection, and an overall great relationship with your employees, makes for better performers and organizational outcomes.   

• Make a deeper connection with your people by understanding what motivates them
• It's important for your people to understand what motivates you
• Don’t allow your coaching to become prescriptive or too process driven
• Your actions are more powerful than your words
• Figure out what is driving positive and negative behaviors with your employees
• Be authentic
• Don’t be afraid to share with your people what you're not good at, i.e., "Don't fake the funk"
• Try to remember the names of your employee's partner, spouse, kids, etc. 
• Inject a little bit of emotion and joy and laugh into your job very day
• Own your development. Even the best at the craft allow themselves to be coached