In this episode, Dr. Dave talks about how important respect is - in leadership, in the workplace, and in life.

When leadership styles clash in the organization they can cause envy, jealousy, and other dysfunctional behavior among front-line staff.  Productivity can really take a hit as a result.  In this episode, Dr. Dave explores some of the causes of envy and jealousy in the workplace and talks about how leaders can minimize this issue and create a work environment where everyone can thrive.

Your success in any career in today's knowledge economy is based on your willingness to learn about the technologies in your particular industry.  In today's and tomorrow's economy, this need to always update your personal skills will never stop.   So don't ever stop thinking about your professional growth.  Don't stop thinking about tomorrow.

In this episode of Positive Leadership, Dr. Dave discusses how vital 'keeping your cool' is to leadership.  As a leader, you're the person everyone looks to for guidance on how to deal with crisis situations, whether it's a major system crash, a very bad financial crisis that threatens the company, or even an unforeseen accident or natural disaster.  As a leader, if you can't keep your head about you in these situations, the crisis situation may go from bad to worse, causing tragic consequences and even loss of life.  Crises are the crucible of leadership, it's vital that you 'never lose your cool.'

I recently watched some YouTube videos where the host talked about different great leadership books they had recently read.  I thought this would make a great podcast.  So in this episode, I discuss five books I view as classics.  I think these five books should be on every leader's reading list, whether you are an aspiring leader or a seasoned veteran.

I have a particular bias against meetings in the corporate workspace.  I loathe them.  Eighty to Ninety percent of your meetings are unnecessary, especially in today's communication-on-demand work environment.

But if you absolutely feel you MUST have meetings, I'm offering practical tips to make them more productive.

If your organization was faced with a major disaster in the next 24 hours, would it survive?  Would it? 

 You can't fly by the 'seat of your pants' when it comes to dealing with unexpected events.  If that's your idea of planning for unexpected contingencies, your organization might not survive the next major crisis it encounters - and we all encounter disasters in our life, so we have to be prepared for them.

In this episode, Dr. Dave talks about the importance of contingency planning and gives his listeners some great practical advice on identifying risks and creating a contingency plan.  He concludes by saying the best plans are useless if they aren't tested and gives senior leaders some advice on setting the tone for contingency planning.

So many young people coming out of college right into the workplace by into the myth of their individual hard work above all else.  Then, after performing very well for a decade or so, they are asked to step into management and leadership roles where many fail miserably.  Why?  Because they didn't take the time to learn how to build alliances in the workplace and, when faced with the opportunity to lead, have no idea where to begin.  In this episode, Dr. Martin talks about the importance of building these alliances and gives the aspiring leader some tips based on some of his real-life experiences. 

In this episode, I talk about how critical it is for a leader to write and speak well.  These two 'soft skills' are so essential to a leader that if you haven't mastered them, your leadership, even perhaps your entire professional career, will stall out.  I illustrate some examples from my own career where these two traits were essential to my professional advancement.

We often feel like the only way we can get ahead as aspiring leaders is to take on every single project that senior leaders throw our way.  I mean that's how business is done, right?  Well, not so fast, says Dr. Dave.  Taking on every single project that you're assigned may just be the way to a divorce or an early grave.

In this episode, Dr. Martin talks about the importance of learning how to say no.  He gives you several steps for doing it in such a way that most senior leaders will discover when you have too much work.  And those bosses who insist that you routinely work 70-90 hours just to get things done?  He has some words for them, but also suggests that if there is no way to change this environment, that leaders owe it to themselves to perhaps look for more favorable work environments.