Monday Moment

For more than two decades, I’ve talked about leadership as a concept with three categories. One should first be yourself, then lead yourself well, before one really has any business leading others. This means efforts to maintain authenticity have tremendous value in building your leadership foundation. It also means paying nearly as much attention to

Ask a leader to record pet peeves and lack of follow through will often make the list. Ask employees for similar data and they will usually say the same of their leader. Making a commitment is easy, follow through is different. Keeping one’s commitments takes effort. Keeping a commitment can depend on whether one had

Ever had a hindsight moment in which the realization hits that had one tiny event not happened, everything would be different? Maybe it’s a statement a colleague made? Maybe, it’s an action your boss did or didn’t take. Or maybe it was knowledge of how to solve a problem that could have saved hours of

Not every leader is a born interviewer. In fact, many a leader will admit they perform well in their own interview for a new position, but are not so good at identifying their own ideal candidates. A bad hire is expensive. A bad fit is costly to the morale of existing top performers. A candidate

Yes, IT happens. Equipment breaks. Computers go down. Power fails and floods are real. This week IT happened and water flooded the office. But what does a leader do when that kind of upheaval, disruption, and change occurs in any environment? In dire cases, there is no time for panic or emotions other than action.

Leaders who have ever criticized performance or a person, relived the reaction of the recipient and know criticism can have a quick and often lasting impact. Hence the invention of the term constructive criticism intended to create a lesser impact. Leaders who have received negative feedback, know the feeling from personal experience. Yet, the impact

While anyone can be a leader, not everyone is in that prized position with the official title and role. Perhaps it’s time for a promotion. But, how does one get that to happen exactly? More so than might be freely admitted, getting promoted is often less about time in position, expertise, and experience, and more

Being a manager means you track numbers, quotas, vacation days, attendance, and other tactical, measurable figures. Leadership is focusing on the people you have the privilege of leading while still keeping an eye and a handle on those figures that run the business, department, organization, or team and keep everyone employed and productive. Leadership is

Let’s face it. For leaders there are questions, boxes, ideas, people, and issues to keep up with daily. Yet, this post is about dangers and avoiding them in the face of all those elements, at all costs. Well, costs are relative, so is the concept of danger. Perhaps it’s best to suggest, and clarify, that

One of the most common reasons employees quit is they feel their boss doesn’t value them or like them.  Yet, tremendous confusion ensues when a leader evaluates employee contributions based on opinions, assumptions, and poorly placed labels. The perception of a lack of value and lack of love can happen quick. So, while, the question