I’m a history guy, and one of my favorite British characters is Lord Nelson. In 1805, he beat the combined Spanish and French armada in the Battle of Trafalgar, and today sits atop Nelson’s column in Trafalgar square, surrounded by four huge lions made from the melted metal of the enemy’s guns. He was amazing […]
If You Aren’t Smiling People Think You’re Mad Read More »
A good friend once gave me a book entitled, “I Feel Guilty When I Relax.” Can you identify? I’m about seven days into our two week, no wireless/cell phone holiday from work, and here are some things I’ve noticed about myself: I feel fine when we leave home, but when we arrive here, I’m dog
Don’t Feel Guilty About Taking A Holiday from Work Read More »
I love negative feedback don’t you? Especially when it comes from my wife and kids. My teenagers especially. Since they now have nearly 18 months of semi-adult life experience between them, it’s great to be the recipient of this storehouse of wisdom which they are so graciously willing to share with me. The truth is
Insights for Negative Feedback Read More »
Three times this week (so far) I’ve spoken with people in various stages of relationship breakdown. No, hold on, it’s actually more than that. Some are serious, some are just nuisance issues, but relationships are breaking down all the same. Plus, I’m writing this on a Tuesday, so clearly this is an issue we all
Why a Relationship can Breakdown Read More »
There’s a divide that I see a lot out there, and it’s the difference between true leadership thinking and employees who are just putting in their time and pulling a cheque. People who act like leaders will soon get the titles to match their behaviour. Here’s a list of what a typical ‘okay’ employee thinks
Shifting into True Leadership Thinking Read More »
This week I was in Toronto teaching a group of elementary and high school educators –leaders of their schools and education innovators – how to sharpen their people skills. One of the concepts we talked about was the critical leadership idea that: Your organization or department is simply a reflection of you personally. It reflects
Is your workplace really a reflection of you? Read More »
I worked on a farm through my college years, and while I made lots of mistakes (I’m just now having a vivid memory of punching a neat hole through the back of the barn with the chute of the bailer while parking it) I also had an opportunity to observe first hand, every day, the
The Law of the Farm Read More »
I facilitate lots of strategy meetings that involve sorting out the roles of employees and employee success. These are challenging conversations because the decisions made affect the lives of real people. The issues are weighty and have immense long term impacts on the organization, and on the lives of the people involved. And there’s no
The Best Leaders Consider Employee Success Read More »
I’m 53, and I’m actually embarrassed to say how much recognition and appreciation still mean to me. When I finish a day with a client and someone approaches me with genuine thanks, I go home beaming. How stupid is this? The client was helped whether or not they said so. When someone tells me that
The Importance of Recognition + Appreciation Read More »
On Monday I attended a day of instruction from Harvard Business School professor Ranjay Gulati, as a guest of my very forward-thinking client company, North West Rubber (thanks friends!). My favourite takeaway of the day was about organizational health, but there were many other interesting takeaways from the day including: There are no mature markets,
Organizational Health – Lessons from Harvard Read More »