Leadership

The Top 10 Questions for Socially Responsible Leaders

The assets of your business traditionally include property, plant, equipment, and your customer base. Progressive organizations understand that business assets also include their good reputation, responsiveness to change, the ability to conduct a constructive dialogue with stakeholders, the ability to take advantage of networked resources, and a host of other non-traditional assets. Companies are [...]

Leadership

Wanted: A Dictionary-Perfect Leader

Answers are often before our very eyes or in front of our noses – particularly if we read the American Heritage Dictionary!
Explore with me how some of the multitude of definitions for the word "leader" actually serve as a performance standard for leadership.
Leaving behind the standard definition of "one who leads or guides", consider [...]

Leadership

Quality Leadership

The Lakota tribe of Native Americans has no word in the language for "I" or "me," only "we" or "us." Mahatma Gandhi insisted on traveling in third class carriages (on the train)because, as he explained, 'there is no fourth class.' "
Certainly personal desires are not a primary consideration for leaders. Quality leadership demands focus [...]

Leadership

Lessons In Leadership: What Not To Do… From A Canoe!

When it comes to fishing, my husband takes the lead. But his lack of leadership ability in a recent canoe trip on the Boundary Waters in Northern Minnesota offered wonderful lessons on how leaders can unknowingly screw up.
(1) Assign responsibility without authority.
Bill insisted that in order to cast his fishing line, he needed to [...]

Leadership

10 Attributes of Effective Strategic Leaders!

Did you know that people who lead strategically resemble fine-tuned machines? By focusing on their strategies, leaders see a bigger picture, they understand the reasons why and recognize the worthiness of elusive opportunities.
Effective leaders make strategic use of and add value to every challenge in four important ways:
1) Thinking through the lessons to be [...]

Leadership

3 Aspects of Developing Leadership Skills

Everyone knows that great leaders are made, not born. However good that statement sounds, we still want to know how we "make" or turn people effective leaders. And other questions need to be answered about the process of leadership development.
So how DO you boost your leadership skills? If you want to improve your ability [...]

Leadership

To Be An Effective Leader, Do A Check-up From The Neck Up

Before we can effectively lead anyone, we must take an introspective view of ourselves. We must do a check-up from the neck up. We must be certain that the thoughts and attitudes we hold are in alignment with the role we perform.
Check Your Vision
As a leader you need to have vision of what you [...]

Leadership

Leadership: Wisdom of the Ages

If you gather 100 experienced leaders together to share with you their most important secrets for success, you probably wouldn't hear a lot of academic theory or jargon. Instead, this is a good idea of what you'd hear:
1) Put ethics first. If you make unethical decisions for short-term gain, you will lose in the [...]

Leadership

Give Your Valentine A Very Special Gift – Empowerment

Delegating is a commonly misunderstood concept. Delegating is not about dumping problems or chores you dislike doing onto the shoulders of others, it is an invaluable tool for "motivating and training your team to realize their full potential." (Blair)
What an awesome power we each hold. We have the ability to assist another person (i.e., [...]

Leadership

The Power of the Leader Within – The Keys to Martial Arts Life Mastery, Key#1

"What do you want to be when you grow up?"
Remember that question from your younger days? Adults seem almost programmed to ask it, don't they? Maybe you remember asking that same question to your own or another's child recently. Remember?
I do.
And – do you remember any of your own answers to that question? I [...]

Leadership