“Doesn’t being so positive with people end up meaning that you’re denying reality?” I was asked this at a Women’s Executive Leadership program at the Haas Business School at Berkeley last week. She was responding to my challenge: great relationships tilt heavily positive, so if you want to lead well, get positive! I was … Continued
Now we head down the stretch with that strange admixture of tugs and pulls: Thanksgiving, Advent, collecting from clients, Hanukkah, year-end reviews, New Year’s, bonuses, gift-giving, planning for 2017, and . . . shopping. Let me add one more strange pairing and that is leadership and happiness. Here’s an example of neither leadership nor happiness. … Continued
I often do an exercise in which I ask people to take index cards and write down the behaviors they have experienced from their managers which have dis-abled, de-energized, de-motivated, dis-couraged, or otherwise dis-sed or de-ed them. Stop for a nano-second and consider a manager who had this dampening impact on you! What did he … Continued
This blog is called Everyday Leadership. Obama is Obama. Trump is Trump. And you and I can choose to be everyday leaders. 324,707,000 people reside here. It’s pretty wonderful and pretty crazy that as 1 out of 324,707,000 each of us feels entitled to have our voice matter in this representative democracy. Doesn’t it seem … Continued
America wakes up as divided as she went to sleep. He has handily won the Electoral College. She appears to have won the popular vote. The latter is electorally irrelevant and statistically insignificant. The country is rent in two. For this piece, I hope to write to us, meaning all of us – backers of … Continued
The last marathon I ran was in Sacramento, and the last mile felt harder, slower, and longer than the first 25.1. It reminds me of this never-ending race. Wednesday, when it’s over, the question will be: How will Trump or Clinton help us heal? Since it’s a democracy, I’d ask: How will each of us … Continued
Thanks for all the great comments last week in response to my blog about whether you would have the courage to read a (rather long) Reading for Leading about race in America. If you missed last week’s missive it was about how as white folk, we have a tremendous opportunity to educate ourselves and become … Continued
My intent today is to create new and realistic hope and purpose. But I need you to go uphill with me. Please don’t give up. Give me a few paragraphs before you do. Yes? Why make this unusual plea? Because I know that few leadership topics generate the level of hopelessness that is caused by … Continued
Friends, I could not write Reading for Leading last night. Maybe it was just how upsetting that debate was. An AMERICAN presidential candidate called their opponent “the devil.” And said if he were president, “she would be in jail.” That is frightening. I have fearful deep emotional impulses about my great tribe, a.k.a., Americans. But … Continued
I think she almost laughed at me. Kind of blurted an involuntary guffaw. But then my Teaching Assistant followed up her involuntary non-verbal display with sincere verbal reassurance. We were recapping the last 3 classes, all of which were led by students themselves. We were in strong agreement that the classes had gone well (as … Continued