Leadership ON PURPOSE

What Learning & Development have in common with your hair stylist.

learningcatalyst — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 17:57:20 +0000

In my work in learning and development in the past 15 years I have noticed that people will say things in a training room about what is really going on in their part of the organization. Some times it surprises me how vocal people are and how free they are to talk about management and leadership concerns. It’s like the experience many of us have at a salon where we talk about our family problems with someone we only see every couple of months. I used to see it as venting. Now I see it as information that could be harnessed by the executive team to help the organization.

Who else in a business interacts with every department and across all organizational levels? No one. In an average month in a large organization from the first day of onboarding to performance management courses, L&D probably interact with 50 to 100 people. Behind the closed doors of the training room, facilitators create a space for employees to interact with the content that was identified as necessary to support the strategic plan. The rubber hits the road here. The feasibility, engagement, buy-in and support of employees are on the line. And employees share their opinions quite openly.

Surprisingly, I have never had someone from an executive team ask me what themes are emerging from the courses or how people are responding to the material. These conversations could be very helpful in showing some of the systemic issues that are at work. All that without a scalp massage.

Beyond Consulting – A new focus for my blog

learningcatalyst — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 23:13:02 +0000

In September I took a full-time position in the corporate office of a large retail organization. It has been a big adjustment going from consultant to employee. There are positives and negatives and right now the positives far out weigh the negatives. Today I was thinking about my blogs and how delinquent I have been for the past few months. I finally realized how I can use this blog platform. I want to write about leading from the inside and what I see as the challenges for leaders in an organization.

As a consultant, I usually show up with my wisdom and experience hoping to inspire people in their leadership. It was that ‘dropping in’ that was starting to bother me. I know that I can do a great training session in an organization and people will generally respond that it exceeded their expectations (top box!). However, I didn’t ever have the opportunity to do any formal evaluations on transfer of learning. If my experience is universal once participants are back at their desk my good intentions are often on the shelf with the binder.

Working in a system isn’t simple. It isn’t even complicated. As written about in Getting to Maybe, it is complex. There are many factors impacting leaders and actually keeping them from being the leaders they want to be. I want to use this blog to talk about my leadership journey within an organization over the next year. I am planning to do a monthly post highlighting the things I am learning on the inside.

Back to Cubicle Nation

learningcatalyst — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 11:34:05 +0000

Now that I am back in the corporate world I haven’t been blogging much. I have been writing my research paper for my MA and generally quite busy. Lately I have been thinking that I’d like to write my observations about the work place after over 10 years away from a full-time role. Things have changed dramatically during that time. I’m still trying to adjust to my new position so I am not sure how frequent this will be but I did want you to know I’m still around!

The MIndful Reader

learningcatalyst — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 11:36:19 +0000

I meant to key The Mindful Leader – since I am planning to write about the book I am currently reading. However, given all the books I have read recently on being mindful the blog post title seemed apropos.

Mindfulness and/or being present is becoming more and more important in our world of continual distractions. We used to hear a lot about listening skills but I think mindfulness is eclipsing that conversation now in terms of paying attention to what is happening around you. I recently started reading The Mindful Leader by Michael Carroll. Carrol writes,

“The primary act of mindful leadership, then, is to open – to fully appreciate our circumstances before we seek to influence or act upon them. When we are willing to open to our world before we act, we not only learn what we need to know, but equally important, we express a vital, innate intelligence that is sharp, flexible, and unassuming.”

Yesterday, I had a conversation with someone who just jumped to a conclusion that was not only inaccurate but also revealed he wasn’t really listening to me. I have done that many times myself and will do so in the future so I am not judging here! It just reminded me of how difficult it is to be mindful, to consider what a person is really saying, what might be behind their words and to stop and ask a few questions before I respond.

As far as being a mindful reader that has it’s own challenges. How often do we skim what we are reading looking for something to leap out at us that is useful. A lot more is required in reading mindfully. It involves slowing down and thinking about what we are reading and asking what it means for us.

How about you? Do you work at being mindful? What has helped you? What are your barriers to being mindful? I would be interested in your comments.

What difference are you making?

learningcatalyst — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 22:36:47 +0000

In The Truth About Leadership, authors Kouzes and Posner say:

The truth is that you make a difference. It is not a question of “Will I make a difference?” Rather, it’s “What difference will I make?”

I’ve been thinking about that statement and how all the little choices I make add up. Does my presence at a meeting add to the meeting or make people feel ill at ease? We’ve all been at meetings where as soon as someone walks into the room the whole feeling in the room changes.

Or what about the way I acknowledge someone, the tone of my emails, the attention I pay to someone talking to me? All of those things make a difference. What difference are you making?

Are You a Cliche?

learningcatalyst — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 20:08:05 +0000

I just spent about an hour looking for a picture for the header on this blog. Every picture I found that I liked because of the metaphor it represented on second look seemed cliché. I started to feel like everything has become so cliché. We seem to have exploited and over used so many images in business. It’s almost like metaphors themselves are cliché.

In this world where so many ideas flow through our inbox and twitter feeds every day it is easy to start feeling like there is nothing new to add to the conversation. Maybe the solution is to narrow our focus. Stop worrying about reaching thousands of people and really just take care of our own little part of the world. It’s rare that we feel the people we love and know deeply are played out.

Find Success in a Business with a Bad Reputation

learningcatalyst — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 14:20:46 +0000

I just read an article today on the owners of Frogbox. I loved this quote from Doug Burgoyne, “We wanted something with a bad reputation so that we could come in and offer a good service and stand out.” It made me think about how that could work for leaders as well. Could you make an impact in your organization by tackling an area that has a reputation for being difficult and turning it around? What would that look like?

It also made me wonder what other business opportunities might exist in the area of businesses with a bad reputation. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this!

Presenting 2010

learningcatalyst — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 13:31:14 +0000

I came across this excellent summary of presentations. For all of my customers that have worked hard to present with purpose in the past year I hope you enjoy this.

Blogging – the new weight loss resolution?

learningcatalyst — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 22:12:29 +0000

It is New Year’s Eve and like many people, over at Leadership ON PURPOSE the buzz has been about all things goal setting. All indicators are for a strong year as predictions for the Canadian economy are well honestly very Canadian – optimistically cautious.

In the busy-ness of running a small business one of the easiest things to neglect is the blog. The schedule for next year has consistent blog posts blocked in and there are great hopes that 2011 will be more consistent for blogging. It does make one wonder if blogging is to business resolutions as dieting is for personal resolutions. How many of you have decided to blog more in 2011? How will you make that happen? It sounds like the perfect coaching scenario!

Whatever your goals are for your business in 2011, Leadership ON PURPOSE wishes you a healthy and prosperous new year!

Cheers!

The Biggest Leadership Challenge

learningcatalyst — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 11:42:04 +0000

I’m working on my MA in Leadership and reading lots of great books as a result. It makes me wonder what the average manager, Director, VP, C- suite Officer or President faces in their work. Is there a common threat? Is it as simple as building strong relationships or leading change effectively? What’s your biggest leadership challenge?