The Enlightened Executive

As you rise through the ranks of leadership, experiencing setbacks and failure is inevitable. But as many successful leaders will share, what we often judge as failures are merely opportunities to grow and learn.

How you respond to the tests you face will make the difference in your ability to lead successfully. Instead of looking to place blame, you have to look for your opportunity to gain insight from every experience. Take the responsibility of approaching the situation with neutrality.

What actions caused you to get to this point? What angles could it have been approached from differently?

By stepping back and collecting the facts without emotion, the shortcomings become evident, and you can then plan out how to make more strategic action.

In the latest episode of The Enlightened Executive podcast, co-founder and CEO of WebinarNinja, and host of the $100 MBA show, Omar Zenhom, shares valuable lessons on what we can learn from undesirable outcomes to become better entrepreneurs.

What does it mean to be a leader? By shifting the mindset that you alone have the answers, you can create a space for employees to find their own solutions and take pride in enriching the company.

As a result, you can become a leader that does more than lead but also scales the capacity and capability of others.

In this week's episode of The Enlightened Executive, we spoke with Dr. ​​Louise van Rhyn, winner of the prestigious Thinker's 50 award in 2021, and designer of the innovative Partners for Possibility program.

If you're looking to create a company culture that encourages and motivates your workers while also making transformational changes within your community, then you can't settle for being a "leader." You have to become a conscious leader.

Tune into this episode to learn how to lead in a way that develops the capabilities of others with less effort from you "leading."

The benefits of hiring remote workers are many—lower overhead, higher morale, better productivity, and efficiency. Thus, we see more and more organizations are shifting to, and growing, their remote workforce.

As the leader of a remote team, you may feel like you're still adapting, and learning how best to manage your remote team members.

So, what do you need to do differently to effectively lead your remote team, and keep them happy?

Your job is to guide and support your team members, by managing communication, trust, efficiency, and keeping them aligned on tasks and priorities as the team works remotely.

In this Leadership Insights episode of The Enlightened Executive podcast, I am going to share six of my best, learned-the-hard-way tips, for managing a remote team.

The metaverse and web 3.0 are here — are you and your business ready? What can we as leaders do to prepare ourselves for how business will change?

Software is becoming more human-like than some humans; cities have digitals twins; even people have digital twins. You may find yourself scratching your head wondering "what just happened?"

Leaders, what change in your own state of mind will you need to implement, to stay relevant in the era of web 3.0?

In the latest episode of The Enlightened Executive podcast, co-founder and executive director of Transformative Tech, the largest and most respected authority on well-being technologies, Nichol Bradford, guides us through what executives and entrepreneurs need to know about the metaverse and the web 3.0 as they become more prominent in our lives.

When you reflect on how you want your career to progress, what career goals do you have? How will you achieve those goals? And who will be in your corner to support your journey?

There's a very effective method to advocate for your own career development: sponsorship. Sponsorship is when a person of influence promotes the achievements, capabilities, and potential of another.

Is a career sponsor different from a mentor? Yes. Mentorship is private, but sponsorship is public. Sponsorship transcends advice and involves making connections, nurturing visibility, and advocating for promotions.

So, what's the best way to choose someone, and then ask them to be your career sponsor?

Susan Drumm, CEO Coach, gives us step by step instructions and walks us through this process.

Is there a difference between management training and leadership development? And does your team need both?

Yes, they are different, and are both incredibly important to a leader's success. Management training is logistical; leadership development is psychological.

A typical management training program might include topics like communication, conflict resolution, time management, ethics, policies and procedures.

Meanwhile, leadership development covers topics like the way mindset and assumptions fuel performance, and how personality type affects leadership style and communication.

Or in more relatable terms, management training without leadership development is like installing a bunch of apps on an iPhone without updating the operating system. The apps might work, but they won't work very well or very quickly. And in some cases, they won't work at all.

Susan Drumm, CEO coach, discusses the many benefits of integrating both management training and leadership development programs at your organization.

Should leaders work on improving their weaknesses, or should they focus on leveraging their strengths?

It's natural for leaders to want to strive for excellence. If something is broken, you want to fix it. If you realize you need to grow in an area, you seek professional development to improve your skills.

And while self-awareness can be an uncomfortable process, it's necessary to grow as a leader and a company.

In the latest episode of The Enlightened Executive podcast, international speaker and author, David Rendall, shares his unique approach to finding success as a leader, and explains why he believes leaders should lean into their personal strengths, rather than worry about their weaknesses.

Are you uncomfortable talking to your team about diversity? An important part of being a great leader is being brave enough to have the conversations that matter most.

And while study after study demonstrates diversity drives major business benefits, most people would still rather not talk about the issues that force us to have diversity strategies in the first place.

Asking our colleagues and employees about whether and how they experience gender (or race) bias getting in their way at work, strikes many of us as a conversation ten times more loaded than it's worth. Even senior leaders fear they're walking into territory strewn with red flags from HR.

But that anxiety can cause great harm to your workplace relationships. Employees may wonder if there are better opportunities elsewhere — feeling like you're only interested in your experience, with no regard to theirs.

No matter how thorny the issue is, finding constructive ways to speak about it is essential.

Susan Drumm, CEO coach, shares her expert strategies for how to have that important conversation you've been avoiding with your team.

Should leaders work on improving their weaknesses, or should they focus on leveraging their strengths?

It’s natural for leaders to want to strive for excellence. If something is broken, you want to fix it. If you realize you need to grow in an area, you seek professional development to improve your skills.

And while self-awareness can be an uncomfortable process, it’s necessary to grow as a leader and a company.

In the latest episode of The Enlightened Executive podcast, international speaker and author, David Rendall, shares his unique approach to finding success as a leader, and explains why he believes leaders should lean into their personal strengths, rather than worry about their weaknesses.

The next thirty years will bring advancements we can't imagine. From augmented reality and the metaverse to enhancements in technology and automation, the sky isn't the limit anymore.

Whether we like it or not, the world continues to change. So how can you prepare yourself to stay ahead in this ever-changing digital world?

Ben Lytle is a successful CEO, serial entrepreneur and author. He has launched five companies, including two currently on the New York Stock Exchange. His best-known company, Anthem, is number twenty-three on the Fortune 500, with a market cap of over $100B.

On the latest episode of The Enlightened Executive podcast, Ben walks us through the importance of advancing your potential and accelerating your wisdom in preparation for the Fourth Industrial Revolution—the evolution of technology through digitization, artificial intelligence, and the metaverse.