Positive Leadership: Training Talent

NVIDIA Co-founder and CEO Jensen Huang believes it is essential to train talent to effectively control a different product line, a new geography, or even to take his place. Succession planning of a closed set of hand-picked individuals is a toxic process, says Huang. It's best to treat all employees as a next generation of leaders to build a better environment and long term stability.

Positive Leadership: Training Talent

Positive Leadership: GROW through Coaching

The acronym G-R-O-W to remind us of an effective strategy for one-on-one coaching.

'All coaching is, is taking a player where he can’t take himself.' Bill McCartney

Goal – In one-on-one coaching ask the person you’re coaching, “What do you want?” and "How will you know when you’re there?" Try to limit the number of goals to no more than two per one-on-one session.

Reality – Examine the current reality.  It is the role of the coach to cut through the “fog” and help the person being coached to better define what is really going on.  Ask questions like:  “What are the numbers?  What are the facts?  What are you feeling?”

Options – Explore the options for achieving the goals.  Ask questions like:  "What have you tried in the past?  What worked?  What didn’t work?" Look at multiple options, and brainstorm together to find the best option.

Will - When you have chosen a path or an option, ask "When will you accomplish this goal?" Establish a deadline.  This may be the most difficult question to ask, but if you fail to ask “Specifically, when will you do this?” you have not done all you can to coach this person towards success. 

Positive Leadership: GROW through Coaching

Positive Leadership: Olympian Thinking

What—and how—you think determines your ability to reach your personal potential and the untapped potential of your organisation. 

Marilyn King is a two-time Olympian in the grueling five-event Pentathlon (Munich, 1972 & Montreal, 1976). An automobile accident in 1979 rendered her unable to train physically for her third Olympic Team. Using only mental training techniques she placed second at the US Olympic trials for the 1980 Moscow Games. 

For more, see: http://www.waybeyondsports.com/marilyn_king.html

Positive Leadership: Olympian Thinking

Positive Leadership: Lessons from an Olympic Athlete

Marilyn King was an American Pentathlete who competed at the 1972 and 1976 Olympics. Whilst she was preparing for the Moscow Olympics of 1980 she injured her back which put her in bed for four months. Marilyn was absolutely focused on being ready and prepared for the Olympics, despite the adversity of the back injury. So, she took the situation in which she found herself and instead of accepting it with a 'poor me' victim mentality, turned this around and looked for the opportunity in the adversity.

The Power of Visualization

Marilyn spent her bedridden time watching films of World Champion pentathletes, visualizing and feeling herself going through her event, using the technique we call mental rehearsal to run through her performance, over and over again. Although in 1970's they didn't have access to the type of advanced brain scanning technology that is available today, if we could have seen what was happening inside Marilyn’s head, we would have seen her literally exercising the parts of the brain responsible for her performance. She was keeping the neural wiring fresh and connected around her performance, using the images and feelings of excellence.

Although her preparation had been hampered by injury, (she had no opportunity to have a proper physical run through, all she had managed to do, was to walk the course, visualizing herself performing optimally) she placed second at the Olympic trial with no physical preparation.

Through visualizing, Marilyn used the pictures and feelings of performance to literally wire her performance into her brain. Installed in her subconscious mind it ran on automatic pilot, without her having to consciously think about it. (Recent research has shown that mental rehearsal and visualization actually cause physical changes in the brain.) 

From this experience, Marilyn became convinced as to the power of using the mind to enhance and control performance. She began to research visualization and mental rehearsal and found that it impacts every cell in the body. In her research she would bring together other Olympians to discuss what they thought were common to them, as Olympic achievers.

Marilyn herself didn't believe that she was exceptionally talented physically - above average was her description - so what was the difference?

The Olympic athletes identified four main areas: Mental, Physical, Emotional or (Spirit) and Other. (For many sports the 'Other' is strategy and tactics.)

The 'Mental' section was by far the biggest for the athletes. Her research showed that mental rehearsal and visualization did not in themselves bring about exceptional achievement. To achieve this result, she believes they need to be aligned with Vision, Passion and Action.

Keep Your Eyes On The Prize. Marilyn's research with other Olympians identified this, you need a Crystal Clear Goal .... Kept uppermost in your mind. Trust.... that the brain will go to work and the steps to achieve your goal will appear. Passion..... Tap into your passion for your sport; keep coming back to your passion to recharge your focus, regardless of adversity. Know what you want and stay determined to get it. Repetition is the Mother of Learning. 

Physical was the smallest list for the athletes. What did stand out though was the physical act of doing something every day to actualise their goal.

Support was essential... whether it was from parents or from significant others. To surround yourself with people who would support and believe in you whilst you focused on your goal.

Passion is the energy source that drives the goal. Our passion is connected to our values. We all have the capacity to decide what is important to us and focus on it.

Aligning our Mind, Body and Spirit allows us to perform optimally on a regular basis.

Positive Leadership: Lessons from an Olympic Athlete

Positive Leadership: Defining Yourself as a Leader in Crisis Management

Taco Bell has been impressive in reacting to the recent claims against the quality of its product.  Watch  this interview with Taco Bell CEO Greg Creed on CNBC before watching Jack Welch’s response below.

Positive Leadership: Defining Yourself as a Leader in Crisis Management

Positive Leadership and World Leadership Day

Positive Leadership is delighted to announce that its ceo, Graham Watson, has accepted an invitation to become Scotland's World Leadership Day Ambassador (www.worldleadershipday.org).

World Leadership Day ('WLD') celebrates and promotes authentic leadership around the world on or around March 20th of each year and, works collaboratively with its Ambassadors, sharing common beliefs, vision and values. Positive Leadership shares the beliefs, visions and values of WLD.

The core beliefs of WLD are:

• Leadership determines everything.
• Every individual is, innately, a leader, creator and innovator.
• Authentic leadership is courageously demonstrating one’s innate/authentic self, liberating all to so lead, thereby revealing humanity’s unlimited abilities.
• Authentic leadership is fundamental to the health and well-being of all humanity.

The vision of WLD is:

• A world that recognises, engages and cultivates the expression of the innate leader in every person.

The mission of WLD is to:

• Celebrate World Leadership Day as an annual, growing, international event to inspire, connect and transform leadership thinking and development across the globe.
• Inspire processes worldwide to recognise, engage and cultivate the innate leadership dimension and leadership skill development in every person to give them the courage to step into the unknown territory of leadership.
• Unite leaders across generations, gender, and cultures to engage in real meaningful dialogue for collective learning and inspired leadership action that addresses the critical issues facing us in the 21st century.

The core values of WLD are:

• Truth
• Love
• Freedom.

Positive Leadership Limited is delighted to be associated with World Leadership Day in this exciting capacity and looks forward to hosting a World Leadership Day event in Scotland in 2012.

For more information, please contact: graham.watson@positiveleadership.co.uk

Positive Leadership and World Leadership Day

The Leadership Mindset

Leadership isn’t a role; it’s a mindset. It is the commitment to discovering and living your own greatness, then inspiring greatness in others. This is a daily event. We all can be leaders. We all must be leaders – everyday leaders.

Leaders are clear about who they are, what they believe and how they make a difference; they know their unique talents, strengths and passions and how to use them to add their best value to the world. They focus on greatness, not on adequacy.

Leaders inspire greatness in others; They support and encourage others to know themselves, know their world and find their best fit. They constantly help others achieve their personal greatness, not by insisting that they be like everyone else, but rather by applauding and supporting others to discover their unique abilities – to be true.

Leaders model greatness behaviour; they insist on it in themselves and demand it in others; they hold themselves and others accountable. This has nothing to do with overt power. Rather it is authentic power, and a keen believe that each of us brings our best to the world when we are true to who we are. Leaders demand this of others because the result is a powerful and fulfilled life.

True leaders act like leaders everywhere in their lives. Leadership is a mindset. It a commitment to being your personal best, and inspiring that best in others – everywhere, all the time. They don’t turn it on and off. It is how they live their lives.

The Leadership Mindset

The Seven-Step Path to Sustaining Success

The Seven-Step Path to Sustaining Success (courtesy of Tom Peters):

You take care of the people.
The people take care of the service.
The service takes care of the customer.
The customer takes care of the profit.
The profit takes care of the re-investment.
The re-investment takes care of the re-invention.
The re-invention takes care of the future.
(And at every step the only measure is EXCELLENCE.)

The Seven-Step Path to Sustaining Success

Positive Leadership for a Turbulent Age

In the midst of growing financial pressures and ever-changing business needs, organisations must be confident that their leaders are ready to lead effectively. Designing and delivering an aligned leadership programme that creates “ready-now leaders” who are in lock step with corporate strategy and a sustainable network, is essential.

Positive Leadership Limited delivers such a solution.

In this programme, you will:
· access best practices in leading across cultures, companies, divisions and functions
· develop initiatives that can cross global boundaries, and benefit the bottom line
· define techniques to align strategy with leadership needs.

For more information, please contact: lee.torbet@positiveleadership.co.uk

Positive Leadership for a Turbulent Age

What is Collaborative Leadership?

Common Purpose (http://www.commonpurpose.org.uk/) asked Albert Tucker, Consultant and Non-Executive Director, Big Lottery Fund and Places for People; Janet Paraskeva, First Civil Service Commissioner, Office of the Civil Service; Anthony Salz, Executive Vice Chairman, Rothschild; Crawford Gillies, Chairman of Scottish Enterprise; and Richard Greenhalgh, Chairman, CIHE for their thoughts:

What is Collaborative Leadership?

The Impact of Authentic Leadership on Organisations

Bruce J. Avolio, Executive Director of the Center for Leadership and Strategic Thinking at the University of Washington Foster School of Business, discusses authentic leadership and its impact on organisations.

Authentic Leadership - Bruce Avolio from Foster School of Business on Vimeo.

The Impact of Authentic Leadership on Organisations

Dealing With Setbacks

No champion ever became so without the benefit of a few good failures to sharpen the mind. Michael Jordan once said, “I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”

Never surrender to the seductive pull of self-pity. If you've been knocked down, pick up the pieces and begin reconstruction. Acting as a victim is to threaten your future. Remain purposeful, productive and flexible. No wave lasts forever, but there is always another wave. Accept fate and move forward.

Turn when the tide turns. Practice instantaneous alignment with life. Instead of beating your head against the hard wall of reality and succeed only in bruising your spirit, invest your energy in making quick adjustments.   Become agile and flexible. Your own decisions can do more to influence your stress level than anything that life serves up to you.

Dealing With Setbacks

Visionaries

Here is a great video of Starbucks ceo, Howard Shultz looking at how to be an authentic leader and build for the future.

Visionaries

What Do You Want?

Do you know what you want for yourself?

Some people have trouble with this question. They know what they’re supposed to want – what their parents or bosses or friends or the media tell them they should want – but something is wrong.

While they seem happy and successful, inside they feel unfulfilled, in a rut, as if they have lost something but they are not sure what it could be. Some may even feel hopeless or terribly depressed. They can’t get what they want because they don't know what it is.

You see, if you don’t believe you can have something, often you won’t let yourself want it. If you grew up in a family where you were discouraged from expressing your wishes, or in a family where survival took precedence over everything else, you may have trouble identifying what you want.

Knowing what we want is very important information, so here’s an idea to get you started. How about starting a want list? Keep a small notebook with you. When you find yourself wanting something – anything at all – write it down. Let yourself dream. Don’t worry about practicality or what anyone else will think, and don’t leave anything out.

Once your list is quite substantial, you can highlight or number the items you want most and set goals to achieve them. Can you have what you want? Probably. But first, you must find out what it is. 

What Do You Want?

How to be a Better Leader of Change

Change is an experience – and then some!

As leaders, we need to acknowledge that change is the way of the world. As leaders, we need to lead our people through new opportunities and we have to be the momentum and motivation, from the front. So, as leaders, what do we need to do to be better at driving change? Indeed, just who do we need to be?

Here are ten easy ideas for you to think about:

Build Relationships

Change is much, much easier if there is a strong relationship between a leader and their people. There is no easier way to make this work better.

Take Opportunities

In the workplace, valuable opportunities for change come frequently, so by taking them as you go along, it will make major changes much less necessary.

Have a Value-Creating Game Plan

A strong vision for the future shapes the steps needed for change. Depending on circumstances, these steps can be made early and minimise large-scale disruption.

Start Out Right

The easiest way to minimise the need for change is to be focused enough to get it right from the very start, making just minor adjustments as you go along.

Talk to People

Aside from building great relationships, talking and listening to people often elicits opportunities which might otherwise be missed.

Ask For What You Want

By clearly stating what exactly is needed is to change, solutions often come unexpectedly.

Do Big Changes Once

If a major change is needed, it is far better to do the job in one go than by taking half-measures, several times. This severely damages morale and creates on-going tensions. Bite the whole bullet; do it once.

Change Yourself

With preparedness for stepping back from your own beliefs and attitudes, it might be possible to be really creative about solutions – this can require a great deal of personal focus from you and is definitely worth it.

Measure Against Value

Any change must be worthwhile. By measuring the changes against their value-creating outputs objectively, clearer decisions and commitment from others will follow.

Have Good Reason

Making sure that change is not merely being used to overcome weak management – e.g. instead of using a disciplinary processes. Change will be more likely to be successful then.

How to be a Better Leader of Change

Rethinking Our Values at the World Economic Forum

Time to rethink our values in Davos, says co-chair Paul Bulcke, CEO, Nestlé:

Rethinking Our Values at the World Economic Forum

Diving Into Davos

Klaus Schwab, founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum (http://www.weforum.org/) , talks to the Washington Post's David Ignatius about bouncing back from the economic crisis, and what world economies can learn from each other.

Diving Into Davos

Europe's Top Companies for Leadership

The Hay Group's top 10 companies for leadership in Europe are:



The top ten in Europe

 1  Unilever

 2  Banco Santander

 3  Telefonica

 4  Deutsche Bank

 5  HSBC Holdings

 6  Repsol YPF

 7  Volkswagen

 8  L’Oreal

 9  Danone

10 Vodafone

For more, see: http://www.haygroup.com/BestCompaniesForLeadership/research-and-findings/europe.aspx

Europe's Top Companies for Leadership

High Performing Teams

How to build a high performing team (based on the successful model of the University of Tennessee Lady Vols Basketball team):

1 Maintain high standards ALWAYS.

2 Prepare with intensity and realism.

3 Lead with long term success as the focus, even when short term success occurs.

4 Continually emphasise core leadership values as the key to sustained success.

5 Build positive traditions and recognise success.

6 Build a talent pipeline and allow it to flourish.

High Performing Teams

The Best Global Companies for Leadership

The Hay Group Best Companies for Leadership Research (http://www.haygroup.com/BestCompaniesForLeadership/research-and-findings/global-top-20.aspx ) just published shows the following top 20:

The top 20 Best Companies for Leadership

1  General Electric  2  Procter & Gamble  3  Intel Corporation  4  Siemens  5  Banco Santander  6  Coca-Cola  7  McDonald's Corporation  8  Accenture  9  Walmart 10 Southwest Airlines

11 ABB 12 Microsoft 13 PepsiCo 14 Goldman Sachs 15 Hewlett-Packard 16 Unilever 17 Cisco Systems 18 FedEx 19 Pfizer Inc. 20 BASF

The Best Global Companies for Leadership

Leadership Pipeline

Sudden Leader Loss Leaves Firms in Limbo - Are YOU Ready?

(For more, see: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704754304576096110473597184.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLE_Video_Top )

Leadership Pipeline

Leadership Coaching

It seems like everyone is doing it: getting a coach. 

Leadership coaching has become big business. According to one recent study up to 40% of Fortune 500 companies in the USA are using coaches for leadership development of executives and/or successors. Coaching is hot, and with good reason. Studies have projected an ROI of 500%+. And that return is seen in areas such as the ability to optimise direct reports, work more effectively with peers, decrease conflict and increase job satisfaction and productivity.

Like all developmental tools, the return is dependent on the investment. That means those being coached must be active participants. And not everyone readily embraces that role. Some individuals get stuck on the fact that having a coach means others realise or will realise their lack of perfection. That perspective can happen even when coaching is positioned as a perk and a sign of organisational faith in potential.

It’s important to gauge coaching readiness before introducing an employee to the coach you have waiting in the next office. For those employees needing some additional reassurances, having other employees share their coaching experiences can calm fears. Also powerful is sharing clearly defined outcomes, ideally co-created by the manager and employee. This can inspire by planting a tangible vision of outcomes.

Coaching can be a powerful leadership tool. Take the time to introduce coaching to each candidate, even if you feel it’s an accepted practice at your company, and listen for any concerns. It’s the surest way to guarantee success for both your employee and your company.

Questions for your team:

Have our top C-suite leaders visibly embraced coaching?

How do we get the message out that coaching is a Positive Leadership tool and not just one used for course correction?

How do we help managers address any doubts coachees might have?

Leadership Coaching

If You've Never Failed You've Never Lived

An inspiring video on persevering no matter how many times you have failed in life.

If You've Never Failed You've Never Lived

The Importance of Values

Tom Boardman, former CEO of Nedbank (South Africa) explains the importance of values in driving and growing an organisation.

The Importance of Values