Need a quick read to get you thinking about topics that most business leaders deal with?
In the blogs below, I dig deeper into specific topics from the book and share about exclusive leadership topics. These posts are meant to generate ideas about how you can evolve as a leader. I keep them short, and several of them ask questions that spur you to take action.
Building Community within Your Board
Your board of directors is crucial to your organization’s success. This group offers outside perspectives and invaluable expertise while holding leadership accountable and providing governance, oversight, and strategy to support your business.
The Rise of ESG: Integrating Environmental, Social, and Governance Factors in Board Decision-Making
Business leaders face mounting pressure to integrate environmental, social, and governance practices into their organizations. Veteran CEOs and start-up entrepreneurs alike may feel an obligation to implement ESG initiatives as they aim to practice responsible leadership. Their own values, guiding principles, and sense of duty can steer ESG decisions.
Ethical Leadership: The Role of Boards in Fostering Ethical Practices
Anybody who watches the news or even casually follows politics knows that there’s a bit of an ethical crisis occurring in the world right now. Ethical lines are blurring and shifting. Navigating the current landscape and maintaining ethical principles as a leader are challenging to say the least. The need to hold people—and organizations—accountable has never been more apparent. In business, that’s where your board of directors comes in.
Strategies for Handling Conflict among Board Members
The worst way to manage conflict is to eliminate it. Conflict—done right—is actually a great thing for teams, including boards. In fact, if your board of directors has the right structure and the right mix of people, conflict is inevitable. It’s all in how you approach conflict.
Strategies for Making the Best Decisions as a Board of Directors
The paralysis of indecision—we’ve all been there. When you can’t decide what to have for dinner, it’s one thing, but when indecision strikes in your business, it can be disastrous.
Traits of a Great Coach
As leaders, we’re driven to be the best at everything we do, including leadership. It’s easy to get caught up reading, researching, listening, and watching everything you can in search of how to be a real leader—and a good one at that.
How to Hire a Great Team
Hiring a great team for your business is no different than a coach selecting the best athlete for each position on a sports team. You have to find the players—or the employees—with the right combination of skills, experiences, and attitudes for each role.
How to Be a Leader at Work
The greatest myth of leadership is that it requires a distinct title, role, or tenure. You can practice and implement leadership skills in any role—even if you don’t oversee a team. How to be a leader at work boils down to how you influence others.
The Value of Feedback
If you dread your annual performance review and hate the idea of criticism, you’re not alone. The anxiety, the pressure, the expectations, not to mention the wasted time—annual reviews at work are largely unproductive and uninspired.
Build Your Executive Presence
Executive presence is frequently mentioned in conversations about leadership, but what does executive presence even mean? Donning a fancy title doesn’t make you a leader, like I explain in my book Leader Is Not a Title, and having the word “executive” in your title doesn’t mean you have executive presence. Like it or not, leadership and executive presence both come down to other people’s opinions.
Active Listening: Understand Before Being Understood
Most people think of the best communicators as being outspoken and articulate, but one of the most important rules of communication is actually silence—the art of active listening. This invaluable skill is especially beneficial for leaders because it helps you better connect with your team. By exploring what it means to be an active listener, you can assess and improve your own active listening skills and instill this crucial communication tool in your team.
You Can’t Become a Better Leader without This…
The key to all successful leadership is mindset management. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: nothing will change unless you change your mindset. You can invest in executive coaching programs or other leadership development tools, but nothing will change until you have the right mindset.
Technology Alone Won’t Make You a Better Leader: How to Use Executive Coaching Tools
A quick Google search reveals a wealth of online assessments to help you refine your professional skills and practice responsible leadership. There are so many executive coaching tools that it can be difficult to know where to start. Whether you’re examining your own strengths and weaknesses, considering a leadership position, or exploring your team’s potential, executive coaching tools can provide valuable insight and direction.
The Myths of Finding Your Passion
Passion is everywhere today. Find your passion. Follow your passion. Fuel your passion. Whether you’re a new college graduate embarking on your first job or a veteran professional exploring new opportunities, you’re bound to hear about the importance of finding your passion—but what does that even mean?
Understanding Personal Motivation
What makes us do the things we do? Why do we want the things we want? And why do we, from time to time, do things that we know aren’t good for us? The short answer is personal motivation.
Rules of Communication
I’m a big believer that most of the issues that arise in the workplace amount to communication issues—or rather, miscommunication issues.
How to Form a High-Performing Board of Directors
Your board of directors is crucial to your organization’s success. In fact, having a high-performing board of directors sets the tone for a high-performing organization. But how? By understanding the role of your board and identifying traits to instill—and those to avoid—you’ll set up your board, and your organization, for success.
Advisory Boards 101
The primary purpose of an advisory board is—surprise—to advise. This handpicked group of individuals serves your organization by offering expertise, experience, and knowledge to support your company and your leadership team in achieving your goals.