Leadership on the River

What do plastic bottles, tires and rims, Styrofoam and used hypodermic needles all have in common? The answer is, these are all things you find in varying quantities when you volunteer to pick up trash along the riverbanks. And you would be amazed by how much other stuff there is. I recently hitched up with [Read More]

Knowing What You Want

Greetings and Happy New Year. Think for a moment about the following exchanges. “Where do you want to go for lunch?” “I don’t care, as long it is not Italian, as I had that last night.” Or … “Where do you want to go on vacation?” “Anywhere, as long as it is not too hot.” [Read More]

Vision Makes A Difference

Time after time, we have documented the benefit to organizations who have embraced The Leadership Challenge Methodology. We thought you might also appreciate the real impact it can have on individuals as well. Guest contributor Brent Carter is kind enough to share an amazing testimony that the program had on one of his colleagues. Vision [Read More]

The Potential/Performance Gap

Have you ever looked at someone in your organization and thought to yourself – “ if only she would ever live up to her potential.” You know from her moments of brilliance that she has so much to offer, but more often than not, her performance is fine, just not fabulous or even exceptional. Work [Read More]

Challenging Questions

One of the joys of leadership development work is that I get to hear a lot of really thought-provoking questions about the subject. They often do not have obvious answers, but they sure stimulate some deeper thinking. Following are a couple that come to mind, which will give you an idea of what I am [Read More]

Strengthening Confidence

I have begun to detect a dip in the level of self-confidence people have. Two merging observations which have led me to this. First, I less frequently hear people describing their work as a slam dunk or similar term, indicating they will have no trouble with it. Work these days is a struggle, with plenty [Read More]

The Rehab of Leadership Practice

A friend and I were kibitzing recently about physical therapy and a great lesson about leadership development emerged. He ask his therapist, if while strengthening his shoulder and knee, there was anything he could do to tighten up that well-known “middle-aged spread,” with which so many of us are too familiar. To his surprise, he [Read More]

Truth or Convenience

Ever hear a manager remark, “my people don’t have to like me, they just have to respect me.” This particular quip stirs up a couple of question for me. First, I wonder how possible it is to actually respect someone you don’t like. Do you hear other people say that, “so and so is a [Read More]