Positive Leadership: Why Women Make Better Business Leaders

Positive Leadership: Why Women Make Better Business Leaders

Positive Leadership: Women Should be as Ambitious as Men

Tory Burch says women entrepreneurs should find their passion and be just as ambitious as men. She founded the Tory Burch fashion label in 2004. Her clothing line is now carried in more than 800 stores worldwide. She also heads the Tory Burch Foundation, which offers mentorship opportunities to women entrepreneurs and provides micro-loans to women-owned businesses. 

Positive Leadership: Women Should be as Ambitious as Men

Positive Leadership: Integrity is the Most Important Characteristic of Leadership

‘Integrity is the basis of trust. It is one quality that can’t be acquired. It must be earned.’ Warren Bennis

Corporate ethics has to be more than a buzzword or a slogan. A culture of integrity can be a major corporate asset with a value as great as a company's trademarks, patents, or brand name.  

Preet Bharara, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, leads the most aggressive and successful criminal prosecutors office in the United States specialising in white collar crimes. He has led the insider trading prosecutions of Raj Rajaratnam, the head of a major hedge fund, and Rajat Gupta, former head of McKinsey and Company, and has never lost a criminal insider trading prosecution. His office has also prosecuted major Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, money laundering, and securities fraud cases, and has a particularly intimate view of the benefits of integrity as a valuable business asset. 

(For the full speech, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTv3e5iZNOM )

Positive Leadership: Integrity is the Most Important Characteristic of Leadership

Positive Leadership

Positive Leadership

Positive Leadership: Turning a Goal into a Question

Turning a challenge statement into a challenge question consistently turns the finger of responsibility away from others and back to ourselves. Someone “out there” is no longer responsible for solving the problem. Instead, someone “in here,” me, is responsible for making change happen.

The mere act of translation ratchets up a sense of personal responsibility for identifying and implementing a solution to a problem.

Try it!

Positive Leadership: Turning a Goal into a Question

Positive Leadership: Reaffirming Your Core Values Helps You Perform Better

People who thought deeply about their most important personal values committed 44% fewer errors in a button-pushing task than others, says a research team led by Lisa Legault of Clarkson University. Self-affirmation appears to alert people to their mistakes, allowing them to improve performance. Past research has shown that self-affirmation also offsets the ill effects of mental depletion and boosts self-control.

Positive Leadership: Reaffirming Your Core Values Helps You Perform Better

Positive Leadership: What Makes Apple Great

‘Apple has changed every day since I have been here. But the DNA of the company, the thing that makes our heart beat, is a maniacal focus on making the best products in the world. Not good products, or a lot of products, but the absolute best products in the world. In creating these great products we focus on enriching people’s lives—a higher cause for the product. These are the macro things that drive the company. They haven’t changed. They’re not changing. I will not witness or permit those changes because that’s what makes the company so special….Creativity and innovation are something you can’t flowchart out……Everybody in our company is responsible to be innovative…..We want diversity of thought. We want diversity of style. We want people to be themselves. It’s this great thing about Apple. You don’t have to be somebody else. You don’t have to put on a face when you go to work and be something different. But the thing that ties us all is we’re brought together by values. We want to do the right thing. We want to be honest and straightforward. We admit when we’re wrong and have the courage to change. And there can’t be politics. I despise politics. There is no room for it in a company…….I think we have a responsibility to make products that have a greater good in them……………we want to provide a product that changes people’s lives in some way.’ 

Tim Cook, CEO, Apple (From a BloombergBusinessweek interview) 

Positive Leadership: What Makes Apple Great

Positive Leadership: Influencing Up

David L. Bradford shares his top tips on how to influence your boss and overcome power gaps in his new book "Influencing Up". Bradford is the Eugene O'Kelly II senior lecturer in leadership (emeritus) at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Allan R. Cohen of Babson College co-wrote the book. 

Learn more about "Influencing Up" : http://www.influencewithoutauthority.com

Positive Leadership: Influencing Up

Positive Leadership: Advice for Leaders Under 30

Positive Leadership: Advice for Leaders Under 30

Positive Leadership: Leading in a Crisis

“You must trust and believe in people or life becomes impossible.” ~ Anton Chekhov

Those who excel under fire do so because: 

• They have the right values and beliefs. Great leaders live by a set of principles that guide them when the need arises. 
• They are inherently courageous. There is not an absence of fear, but management of it. Anyone who has overcome intense fright will tell you that there isn’t a better ‘rush’. 
• They are prepared. Their organisations are disciplined to assess threats and map out ways to deal with the crisis when it occurs. The CEO has to believe this day will come, and when it does, the company will be prepared to cope from the moment the crisis occurs to the point that recovery procedures begin. 
• They know how to communicate. Getting the right ideas into the heads of others is paramount. In the case of a recall or an environmental disaster, the first concern is public safety, not the financial interest of the shareholders. 
• They live and breathe the company culture. If the culture is right, the decision-making is much easier.

Positive Leadership: Leading in a Crisis

Positive Leadership: Happiness

Positive Leadership: Happiness

Positive Leadership: The Power of 'Thank You!'

Thank You!

There are two powerful words every leader needs to learn, know and use daily.  It doesn’t matter whether you lead a group of 2 or 200, these two words will change your team and the culture of your organisation.

When you express these words, generosity flows.  When you fail to use these words, it can send a negative message.  Its absence says, “I can accomplish the vision without you.  You don’t necessarily matter.  You are not essential.”

A leader is only as good as her people.  Just like a great coach is only as good as his players.  Do your players know you appreciate them?  Do they know without them nothing gets accomplished?

Thank you can change your team.  It can change the way your people come to work every day.  Your success is built on the hard work of others.  That’s a fact.  It’s true for every leader.

Are you grateful for their contribution and efforts? More important, do they know it?

Thank you helps a leader create a generous and grateful culture.  Everyone wants to be appreciated.  Everyone wants to know they matter.  Anyone can issue a salary cheque.  People want to know they make a difference.

Leaders set the tone and culture of an organisation.  If you want to have a generous and grateful culture, learn to say thank you often.  It’s free and has a huge ROI.

People don’t read minds.  If you don’t tell them they are appreciated, they may assume you don’t.  True or not, it carries a negative impact.

Five Simple Ways to Say Thank You

1. Details count.  Be specific with your thank you.  If you want impact, it’s in the details.  Don’t be vague and generic.  Be specific as to what they did and how it impacted the team, department or organisation.  Let them know you are grateful for their contribution and effort.

2. Let the public know.  When you give a “thank you” and praise in public, you create loyalty.  Your team will go through a wall for you.  Bragg about them in public and mean it.  It can have more impact than a monetary reward.

3. Be true and authentic.  If the “thank you” is not sincere, it doesn’t matter.  It has to be honest.  It can’t be over used and fake.  People will see through unauthentic praise.  It will have a negative impact.

4. Write it down.  People love to get encouraging notes.  Keep blank note cards in your desk or close by.  Every week, write someone on your team a thank you note.  Take a few minutes and write out a note.  Be specific and let them know what they did, how hard they work and what it means to the organisation.

5. Equal opportunity.  Your “thank you’s” need to reach the front lines.  The people who create and impact the bottom line.  Go deep down the organisational chart with the thank you.  It’s not just for high-level employees.  Practice equal opportunity praise.  Everyone makes a difference and helps you achieve your vision.  Let all of them know it.

There is tremendous power in thank you.  Create a culture of generosity and gratitude.  You are only as good as your people. They need to know it!

Positive Leadership: The Power of 'Thank You!'

Positive Leadership: What We Can Do To Help You

Positive Leadership Limited 2013 from Graham Watson

Positive Leadership: What We Can Do To Help You

Positive Leadership: The Ultimate Measure of a Man

Positive Leadership: The Ultimate Measure of a Man

Positive Leadership: Illusions of Success

Positive Leadership: Illusions of Success

Positive Leadership: Success Secrets

'Show up, speak up, look up, team up, dont give up, lift others up.'

From the power of presence to the power of voice, leadership expert Rosabeth Moss Kanter describes how to navigate through the process of making a difference in the world.

Harvard professor Kanter describes lining up partnerships, managing the miserable middles of change, and sharing success with others. She tells stories of great leaders and ordinary people who use the six success factors to show up, speak up, look up, team up, never give up, and lift others up. This is an up-lifting talk.

Leadership Expert Rosabeth Moss Kanter is a professor at the Harvard Business School, Chair and Director of the Harvard University Advanced Leadership Initiative, and author of SuperCorp: How Vanguard Companies CreateInnovation, Profits, Growth, and Social Good.

Positive Leadership: Success Secrets

Positive Leadership: Counting Back

New Zealand scientist and an all-round disruptor, Sir Ray Avery, has a unique approach to keeping himself on track and motivated - he counts down how many days he has left on the planet to ensure that he makes the most out of life.

“I’ve got about 5,625 days to live,” the 65-year old told an audience of entrepreneurs recently. “When you’re born, you’re born with 30,000 days. That’s it. The best strategic planning I can give to you is to think about that… Every day I do a chart on what I’ve achieved and where I want to be. And it makes you scary-as-shit clever.”

Most of us don’t like to think about ‘the end’, but the idea of a reverse engineered calendar means that instead of having x amount of days left, we have x amount of days to fill with life.  An inspirational thought.

Positive Leadership: Counting Back

Positive Leadership: Why Leadership Matters

It matters because it shows that you really care.

It matters because you lead with a sense of purpose.

It matters because trust connects and enables you to make a difference.

It matters because you inspire and teach.

It matters because you drive out fear and believe in a great future.

It matters because failure is ok.

It matters because you don’t treat people like a number; you treat them like you want to be treated.

It matters because you know you don’t have all the answers.

It matters because people follow you (the leader) first and the vision second.  Who you are matters.  Your character and integrity count!

It matters because those who are willing to work hard will stand out.

It matters because positive choices trump negative voices.

Positive Leadership: Why Leadership Matters

Positive Leadership: My One Word

Positive Leadership: My One Word

Positive Leadership: Motivation to Succeed

A great video from our friend Scott Savor. Some of the best lessons and words of wisdom from successful people all over the world!

Success leaves footprints...follow them!!!!

Positive Leadership: Motivation to Succeed