A summary of things you should know about No-Drama Leadership according to Marlene Chism: Introduction In this episode Marlene Chism takes a deep dive into her book, No-Drama Leadership, whereRead More
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]]>In this episode Marlene Chism takes a deep dive into her book, No-Drama Leadership, where she discusses how enlightened leaders transform culture in the workplace.
In her book Chism provides you with the practical skills to become a more enlightened leader through real-time examples, case studies, and checklists from some of the most successful leaders in the world. The goal of the book is to teach you how to improve your leadership effectiveness, establish accountability in any workplace, communicate strategically, and increase employee engagement.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who manage a team of employees and are having trouble keeping their emotions aside when it comes to making hasty leadership decisions.
We start to work as leaders with the environment to change the identity of those even in the first level (Supervisors, new leaders) so that they more easily identified with being a leader. I think another differentiator is that I am a female writing about leadership, not from a feminine perspective, but rather from a universal perspective. At the core, leadership is as much about a way of being and not just a way of doing, especially in the world in which we are living today.
You can jump in to any chapter but I have designed it where it all works together and so there are a lot of different ways for a reader to engage with this book.
I want the readers to have the understanding that if today’s leadership, if it’s about anything, it’s about alignment.
The book is divided into three sections. The sections are The Will to Be, The Eyes to See, and The Power to Create.
In The Will to Be, the first section, I’m making the statement that the enlightened leader has the will to be aligned, aware, and accountable. In this section I talk a lot about will verses willingness, desire and so on because what I have learned is that you can’t want something for someone that they don’t want for themselves. If there is no desire to be a certain way, if a leader does not claim their values, there’s really nothing to align to. So alignment, awareness, and accountability all work together. Alignment being a major component that threads throughout the entire book with the understanding that before alignment comes clarity. I make the framework for awareness in a way that is really easy to grasp and divided it into four different types of awareness. The four types are self-awareness, other awareness, cultural awareness, and spiritual awareness. I make a big distinguish in this book between responsibility and accountability with the understanding that, until there’s real ownership, accountability just serves as a way for people to cheat and skew the numbers. When people truly accept ownership through responsibility, accountability becomes a wonderful tool to course correct quickly.
In section two, Eyes to See, the idea is that enlightened leaders have a sixth sense about how to see things and so they see communication differently. These leaders are very committed to their communication, they see it as a critical skill and they see it as a strategy understanding that from the bigger perspective it’s better to get along with people and be upfront about your intentions.
The last section is The Power to Create and the understanding here is that enlightened leaders see themselves as co-creators or creators. Enlightened leaders see other people that way as well so they work collectively to create the right environment, the right engagement, and the right empowerment.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 06:22
“If the company sees the employ as a cog in the wheel the employ sees the company as a paycheck.” – Marlene Chism
I am a consultant, an international speaker, and the author of three books which two have been commercially published, STOP Workplace Drama and No-Drama Leadership.
The inspiration came from my first book, STOP Workplace Drama, and the success of it. I was inspired to write this book for the upper level executives and business owners, not only for their own development but to see from the mountaintop why we need to change the definition of leadership.
The Power of Full Engagement by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz
Buy No-Drama Leadership by Marlene Chism on Amazon today
Visit MarleneChism.com to learn more about Marlene and her book
Follow Marlene Chism on Facebook and Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
The Discomfort Zone by Marcia Reynolds
The Front-Line Leader by Chris Van Gorder
The Top Ten Mistakes Leaders Make by Hans Finzel
Relevant advice and tips:
5 Characteristics of A Great Leader
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]]>A summary of things you should know about Everybody Paddles according to Charles Archer: Introduction In this episode Charles Archer takes a deep dive into his book, Everybody Paddles, whereRead More
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]]>In this episode Charles Archer takes a deep dive into his book, Everybody Paddles, where he reveals an effective leader’s blueprint for creating a unified team.
In his book Archer provides a leadership roadmap with problem-solving tools that are designed to remedy the consequences and issues that come with dysfunctional organizations. The goal of the book is to help you develop an organization based on camaraderie, increase engagement between employees, and improve your facilitation skills as a manager.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who run a business with 5 or more employees where team work is essential to the business and need a strategic framework that produces highly effective teams.
The one thing that makes my book unique is that I’m a practitioner and not writing a book based on theory but based on practice.
There are six chapters in the book and each can be read individually or collectively.
I would want the reader to go to work and understand the whole principle that everybody matters. You matter regardless of what your position or title is at work.
Upon reading Everybody Paddles the reader will get a practical experience about how leadership works.
The book starts out with a great forward by a very good business leader and friend, Peter. What we’ve done throughout this particular book is after each chapter you will get an experience from another business leader about that particular chapter and principle.
Principle one is Unity Stabilizes the Boat and discuses about what separates us and what brings us together. When you think about stabilizing anything it’s about the acknowledgement of what works and what doesn’t work and a lot of time in business we are a little afraid to discuss the things that cause us to be uncomfortable.
Principle two is The Purpose Provides Propulsion which is about the vision and mission of whatever your business is about. When the people connected to your business understands your vision and purpose then you are able to propel.
Principle three is The Caption Sets the Course and the Whole Crew Paddles. There are a lot of things I love about this book and this is one of the principles I concentrate on the most. Everyone wants to be in leadership but there are only a select few in that club and if you’re not a member of that club you are a contributor and should be paddling.
Principle four has to do with communication and doing it clearly to stay on course.
Principle five is Problem Solving, Course Correction. In my organization we have a rule that you get 60 seconds to tell me about the problem but you can take an hour to discuss the solution. I think when you understand it’s about course correction you will not spend a significant amount of time discussing the problems.
Principle six is Every Crew Member Matters and the whole concept throughout our culture is that there are people who matter and people that don’t matter. Throughout everything I do I create a culture where it’s understood that everybody matters and as a leader you have to find a way to make sure that people understand that.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 06:47
“I decided to find books that provided realistic guidelines for someone like me or for that matter any executive charged with providing leadership.” – Charles Archer
I’m an attorney by license, I have a masters, I’m a writer, and an advocate for people with developmental disabilities. Twenty years ago I started a nonprofit to help people with disabilities live a productive, fantastic, and fulfilling life. Over the last 20 years we’ve been able to touch people throughout New York City and New Jersey.
Everybody Paddles came out of my ability working in business and all of the things I’ve seen as an attorney and entrepreneur. The one thing that inspired me was that there were people who didn’t want to add value at work. There were people who came to work and because of whatever number of reasons the culture became hostile and wasn’t motivating. I really was inspired to create something unique based on teamwork and team building that really got people understanding that every day at work you must add value.
The Shack by William Paul Young
Buy Everybody Paddles by Charles Archer on Amazon today
Visit EverybodyPaddles.com to learn more about Charles and his book
Follow Charles Archer on Facebook and Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
The Hidden Leader by Scott Edinger
The Culture Engine by S. Chris Edmonds
The Discomfort Zone by Marcia Reynolds
Relevant advice and tips:
5 Characteristics of A Great Leader
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]]>A summary of things you should know about The Hidden Leader according to Scott Edinger: Introduction In this episode Scott Edinger takes a deep dive into his and Laurie Sain’sRead More
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]]>In this episode Scott Edinger takes a deep dive into his and Laurie Sain’s book, The Hidden Leader, where they reveal a unique way to develop greatness within a company.
In their book Edinger and Sain provide a systematic blueprint of a new style of leadership called Reverser Mentoring where senior leaders are mentored by their employees. The goal of the book is to show you how to recognize true leaders within your company, effectively utilize highly talented employees, and build valuable, long-lasting relationships with any employee.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who lead their organizations with a creative mindset and are looking for a way to effectively make the most of under-utilized employees.
There are thousands of books on leadership but the majority of them all seem directed at people who are in positions of leadership but there are very little directed at people who are your average citizen.
I designed the book to be read from front to back but if you want to cherry-pick information along the way you can do that too.
I want the reader to know that leadership has nothing to do with position or title; it’s what your actions are.
Hidden leaders look for what the outcome is or how success is defined in any given endeavor and then they figure out how they are going to do something. I am not saying they are renegades to the process but they are willing and able to look for the result that we are seeking and understand it. Another thing I see a lot of from hidden leaders is that they lead through relationships. They can’t boss anyone around or tell people what to do so they are really good at leading through relationships and that does not mean they are the popular person. Usually these hidden leaders have some kind of great technical expertise. They secondly understand the organization broadly and know way more than just their function and are able to knit teams together when they need to get things done. Thirdly, they are able to make a connection with people. The last thing that I wanted to share that I think is the heart of everything is the idea that hidden leaders demonstrate integrity.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 05:47
“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, and become more you are a leader. “ – John Quincy Adams.
Companies like AT&T, Lenovo, and Los Angeles Times hire me to work with their senior leaders. I start with senior leaders because as the senior leaders go so goes the organization. I work with them on creating growth strategies and how to create differentiation in their business as well as how to lead effectively.
A few years ago I was talking with a former colleague of mine and he was telling me about a project he was working on called Reverse Mentoring. The notion here was that instead of senior partners mentoring, the associates would mentor the senior partners. And those senior partners learned a great deal not only about technology but also about client services and some new ways to approach that. I thought that was such an interesting idea and then the next day I read an article about reverse innovation. I ended up thinking about it all when the hidden leader concept was born and then I found my publisher.
High Performance Sales Organizations by Darlene Coker and Ed Gaizo
Buy The Hidden Leader by Scott Edinger and Laurie Sain on Amazon today
Visit EdingerGroup.com to learn more about Scott and his exclusive content
Visit TheHiddenLeader.com to learn more about the book
Follow Scott Edinger on Facebook and Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
The Prosperous Leader by Jacob Engel
The Discomfort Zone by Marcia Reynolds
The Best Place to Work by Ron Friedman
Relevant advice and tips:
5 Characteristics of A Great Leader
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]]>A summary of things you should know about The Culture Engine according to Chris Edmonds: Introduction In this episode Chris Edmonds shares his book, The Culture Engine, where he revealsRead More
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]]>In this episode Chris Edmonds shares his book, The Culture Engine, where he reveals a system for driving results, inspiring your employees, and transforming your workplace.
In his book Edmonds teaches you practical step-by-step lessons on how to define your company culture, delineate the behaviors that promote high performance, and create an employee policy that guides behavior towards an inspiring workplace. The goal of the book is to help you create the best workplace possible while molding your employees into productive rockstars.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who run an organization with 2 or more employees and are on a mission to help them become high performing leaders.
The reality is that organizations are still not very nice places to operate in or fun places to work in. I am trying to craft a step by step practical framework that anybody can do. Now it takes a while but the biggest differentiator is I tell you how.
My recommendation is to read all the way through to the end.
The piece that’s very fun about this is that by getting people clearer about values and having them hold values up as important as performance is the absolute switch. If I can get that switch in leader’s heads, heart and hands they will be able to make the move and inspire others.
The title of chapter one is What Is An Organizational Constitution and Why Do You Need One? An organizational constitution allows you to craft and formalize your team’s reason for being its purpose. It’s not about making money, although that is important, but it’s about who you are serving and why they should be attracted to the product services that your team provides. The second piece of organizational constitution is about values and the values piece is the biggest shift and more important foundation. This chapter is about making values and how we should agree to treat others within our organization as well as customers and potential customers. The third piece is about strategies. From a standpoint on what the market is looking for and what your customers need your strategies need to be crystal clear and very well understood. The last element of an organization constitution is goals.
Chapter two in the book allows the reader to do some reflecting. This chapter gives you as the reader a chance to formalize your personal purpose, formalize your values and behaviors, and formalize your philosophy of leadership.
Chapter three begins with the first of the four elements of an organizational constitution and it outlines how you clarify your organizations purpose. Part of the idea here is not just crafting a compelling inspiring purpose statement but also I go through a bit of a marketing instruction because you are going to need to do a marketing campaign with some of these ideas.
Chapter four is the meat of the organizational constitution and it’s about values and defining values in behavioral terms.
Chapter five we combine the strategies and goals. In this chapter I give you worksheets to help you formalize these strategies and goals.
Chapter six is titled Your Organizational Constitution Must Be Lived. This is the piece where you want to engage everyone in the implementation. You also want to describe the way, model the way, and then align the way as you start to look at how people embrace your valued behaviors.
In chapter seven there is a discussion about how to gather feedback around valued behaviors.
As we get in to chapter eight and nine we start to look at vitally important pieces. Chapter is titled Dealing with Resistance. As you begin to engage people in a culture change like this you will be messing with power structures that won’t be happy with you. This chapter explains how a leader should address resistance and be steady consistent with this change.
Chapter nine is about hiring. You put your culture at risk every time you hire a new leader or a new team player so I outline how to recruit, interview and assess players to make sure there is a culture fit.
Chapter ten is about implementing the organizational constitution. There are five questions in each of the 10 chapters and in this chapter you will score your culture effectiveness assessment which will show you where you are now and what you need to do to move your organization forward.
“I used to see my job as managing processes and results and now I see my job as managing people’s energy.” –Unknown
I am a speaker, blogger, podcaster and writer. I am also what I call an executive consultant. So I do executive coaching usually to help leaders align their corporate cultures so that they can lead better. I have also been affiliated with the Ken Blanchard Companies now for almost 20 years as a Senior Consultant.
It’s the core driver of my passions and my work with clients over the past 20 years. I’ve done a lot of work around facilitating skill building and consulting to leadership teams and the core opportunities are often that the culture that the business operates in doesn’t support these new skills. When I started 15 years ago very proactively in doing consulting around creating a more intentional culture I found that it was way more gratifying. So my primary inspiration was behind putting these proven practices and steps in to book form.
Leading At A Higher Level by Ken Blanchard
Buy The Culture Engine by Chris Edmonds on Amazon today
Visit TheCultureEngine.com to learn more about Chris’s book and get a free chapter
Visit DrivingResultsThroughCulture.com to learn more about Chris’s podcast and blog
Follow Chris Edmonds on Twitter and Facebook
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books: The Discomfort Zone by Marcia Reynolds | Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice The Work in Half the Time by Jeff Sutherland | The Best Place To Work by Ron Friedman
Relevant advice and tips: 5 Steps to Promote Innovation in the Workplace
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]]>A summary of things you should know about How to Solve Problems and Make Brilliant Decisions according to Richard Hall: Introduction In this episode Richard Hall takes a deep diveRead More
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]]>In this episode Richard Hall takes a deep dive into his book, How to Solve Problems and Make Brilliant Decisions, where he shares practical skill and techniques to think better, faster, and more productively.
In his book, Hall teaches you how to shape, train, and inspire your thinking to deliver more effective results. The goal of the book is to help you improve your thinking skills, become more confident in making decisions, and become more effective at problem solving.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who need to improve their decision making skills in order to achieve success at a faster rate than currently able.
This book is very accessible, practical, energetic and optimistic. If you read this book it will save you a lot of time reading a whole lot of other books. I summarized and used some of other ideas and made an accessible primer for anybody who wants to think about thinking.
It’s set out in such a way that the reader can go in and out of it or read it back to front. It is very user and reader friendly.
Look around yourself and see what is going on around you. Listen to people and learn to change your mind. I would like everybody to start thinking about thinking and that is a big step forward.
We know little about the brain but what we do know is that there are two parts of our brain, intuition and rationality. Through the book I have tried to look at the various things we need to have in business. I start the book with a reflection on what I think the most four potent words are in English language which are what do you think. We should all be asking ourselves these four words and it’s not easy to do. The book constantly advices us to slow down and don’t get so stressed because the more stressed you are the less effective you’ll be. I talk about how to think better and give advice for that. The first advice is to not multitask. The brain is not designed to multitask and you need to concentrate on one thing at a time. The second advice is to loosen up, take time and be in a good mood.
The key thing to know about problem solving is the brain is lazy and we worry more about what other people think. I advise people to just sit down, look out of a window and work things out. It’s amazing that when you are stopped and not rushing around your mind suddenly starts working in a way that you wouldn’t believe. Another important thing if you are going to be a good problem solving is to ask questions and listen to what other people have to say.
A second part of the book is about decision making. I used to think making decisions was very easy but it turns out that it is actually difficult because of all the things going on around us. Good decision making is well judged risk taking because some you win and some you lose. But in the end good decision making is based on experience, breaking problems down in to small pieces and giving yourself the most amount of time to make those decisions.
Creativity is another part of the book. The logic of creativity is searching for alternatives and the ability to make connections and I don’t think it’s more complicated than that. It’s not wacky or inexplicable but it’s about a form of thinking which enables people to look at what’s in front of them and say is there another way of doing this. The most important thing about creativity is that you need to be a bit of a rebel. I think one of the joys of good creative thinking is you need to have a sense of humor because if you make people laugh they behave accordingly. In the end if we don’t engage with other people and get them to do the things we want them to do, it won’t work. I have come to the conclusion that the only thing that makes a difference between success and failure is working with other people and getting other people to be on board with what you want them to be on board with. Increasingly we are living in a world which is group driven, not solo driven, and it really matters that people hear what you want them to hear. What matters is not what you said or what you think you said but what they think you said. And unless we crack the understanding of how to get other people to think then we are not going to be successful.
The key thing about the book is for people to make the most of the amazing engine they have in their heads.
“Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Mike Tyson
I have been around in business for a long time. My background is in marketing, advertising and consulting and I’ve worked with a lot of major companies. I have had a fantastic time and am very enthusiastic about the prospects of the changing world.
I have written a number of books before on presenting career development marketing and they are all very specific in their topics. I began increasingly concerned and aware of the fact that we’ve stopped thinking in the way that we used to and there are a number of reasons for that. And this seemed to be an issue worth looking at. The second thing is that it became increasingly clear to me that we don’t know very much about the mind at all. It seemed to me that if you are going to succeed in business today you need to be thinking about thinking at the top of all things that you do.
Enthusiasms by Bernard Levin
Back To Blood by Tom Wolfe
Buy How to Solve Problems and Make Brilliant Decisions by Richard Hall on Amazon today
Visit ColorfulThinkers.com to learn more about Richard and his book
Connect with Richard Hall on LinkedIn
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books: Powerhouse by Mike Clayton | The Discomfort Zone by Marcia Reynolds | The Upside of Your Dark Side by Todd Kashdan
Relevant advice and tips: 10 Bad Habits That Successful People Avoid
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]]>A summary of things you should know about The Discomfort Zone according to Marcia Reynolds Introduction In this episode Marcia Reynolds gives a deep dive into her book, The DiscomfortRead More
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]]>A summary of things you should know about The Discomfort Zone according to Marcia Reynolds
In this episode Marcia Reynolds gives a deep dive into her book, The Discomfort Zone, where she shows leaders how to think through problems, see situations more strategically, and transcend their limits.
In her book, Reynolds give you exercises and case studies to help you use discomfort in your conversations to create lasting changes and a better workforce. The goal of the book show you how to short-circuit your mind’s defense and habitual thought patterns.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who are having trouble coaching others to stretch their limits and meet their personal goals while not making them suffer consequences.
There are two things that make it different. The discomfort zone is how leaders turn difficult conversations in to breakthroughs. There are a lot of conversation books out there but they really just focus on what the leader should say instead of what the leader should listen for. It’s really about helping the person achieve their goals instead of the leader achieve his or her goals. Another thing is it is a leadership coaching book but most coaching books are linear in problem solving and this goes to a much deeper level of what coaching really is and how to use it as a leader.
Each chapter has very specific things that they can do so if you were to jump to any chapter you would get value. But reading it all together allows it to be cohesive.
This sounds difficult but the big thing is they have to turn off their thinking brain. We rely on our thinking brain and we think that we need that in order to think through problems and resolve situations but it’s that thinking self-monitoring brain that often gets in the way.
The introduction of the book describes what exactly the discomfort zone is and why it’s so important that everyone truly understands what is necessary to create behavioral change. First I go in to what needs to occur in the brain to make the breakthrough.
In chapter one I describe the difference between most conversations and coaching techniques and why it’s important. It also looks at some of the common excuses that leaders give for not engaging in these types of conversations. I explain how it is still important for them as leaders to engage in these conversations and why if they want to achieve their results.
In chapter two I move in to the guidelines. First we explore how to establish trust and the intention for the conversation in order to make it successful. As a leader you need to consider what emotional tone you want to set. You need to have the intention that they are going to achieve their goals and you are there to help them succeed.
In chapter three we look at the model and I give a very specific model for having these conversations.
In chapter four we go in to deeper listening and how to listen with your entire nervous system which we label as intuition. This chapter describes very clearly how you can actually access the major processing centers in your nervous system which includes your gut, heart and head, to make decisions as well as listen to people.
Chapter five and six are filled with case studies where I show you how to implement these skills. Chapter five looks at how to break through people’s defense routines and chapter six explains how to help people move forward through whatever is holding them back.
In chapter seven I give you a plan on how to actually maintain your practice over time. I show you how to implement this in to your own organization and how to create your own personal development plan to make sure that your own changes sticks.
“They want you to be present more than they need you to be perfect.” – Marcia Reynolds
I have been teaching leadership for over 30 years. It’s always fascinating because the more we learn about human behavior the more there is to consider in being a leader. My family was always a family of entrepreneurs so I went out to start my own business about 17 years ago.
I think the most misunderstood area of leadership is the whole topic of listening. Leaders know that they have to listen but they confuse it with just being patient while someone is talking until it’s their turn to talk. I really feel that there is a stronger purpose for listening than most leaders realize. In order to change people’s minds they have to listen for specific things. It’s not just how to listen but the purpose and I really wanted to put this down on paper to help all leaders understand what it takes to change people’s behavior.
I and Thou by Martin Buber
Buy The Discomfort Zone on Amazon today
Visit OutsmartYourBrain.com to get more exclusive content and assess your own discomfort
Follow Marcia Reynolds on Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books: Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time by Jeff Sutherland | Leaders Open Doors by Bill Treasurer | Managing Whole People by Mark Herbert
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