Tag Archives: leadership

How Psychologically Safe is your team?

In 1999 Harvard Business School Professor of Leadership and Management Amy Edmondson discovered that Psychological Safety was the most crucial factor for determining team performance.

Edmondson defines Psychological Safety as including the following three traits:

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The no-fuss way for leaders to seek feedback

One of the biggest challenges faced by #21CenturyLeaders, is receiving regular, honest, #feedback.

You can overcome this challenge by using the following technique.

When you are conducting your regular one on one #conversations with your direct reports or peers, consider saying the following:

“Like yourself, I’m eager to improve myself as a leader, and I want to be the best leader I can be for our organisation. Over time, I have learned that it is challenging to improve without feedback. No doubt I have a view about how I’m performing and behaving, but it is never quite the same as hearing other people’s perspectives on how I am doing.

In that context, I would appreciate it if you would be willing to provide me with specific regular feedback? By regular, I mean every month or so, while sometimes it would also be helpful if you gave me immediate feedback if you saw something that needed instant attention.”

Is this something you would be interested in helping me with?”

(Assuming they agree – which most people will)…

To help them be effective with their feedback to you, they will need clarity and structure. In this context, there are four questions I recommend you ask them to focus on.

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Why do we continue to use the term, “human resources”?

Why, in 2022, do we continue to accept the terms “human resources”, “human capital” and “human assets”? The last time I checked, we are all human beings.

You may say, “They are only words and aren’t you getting a little too politically correct!” The fact is, words have meanings.

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The true value of the move to working from home

Within a matter of days, millions of workers transitioned from on-site offices to working from home. In many instances, people overcame extraordinary obstacles to be able to continue to contribute to their organisation. It’s time we paused and recognised the value of that effort by so many people.

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Is your leadership helping or hindering?

Michele Hunt said, “Leadership is a serious meddling in other people’s lives”.

There are rare moments in time when the power that comes with leadership so poignantly aligns with Michelle’s comments, and we are experiencing one of them right now. The COVID-19 pandemic is highlighting who can lead, and who can’t lead.

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Role clarity in two steps

How do you know that you are performing your role to the best of your ability?

The first step is to have a 100% role clarity. That is, you are certain that what you are focusing your time and energy on, is what you should be focused on.

To ensure that you have role clarity, follow the two steps below.

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Excellence – if not now, when?

Excellence is an exciting topic. Is it about being perfect, never making a mistake? Or is it more about a mindset and set of behaviours?

In this article, I will share five tips that individually, and collectively, will have you achieving excellence more often, than not.

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The Leader-Learner-Trap

Successful people regularly report they are lifelong learners. I want to think that I am a lifelong learner too.

Shayne Elliott, CEO of the ANZ Bank recently shared in a LinkedIn video post that he is “#always learning“. In it, he speaks about a book that has provided great value over many years, Execution – The discipline of getting things done by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan. It is a terrific book and worth the read.

The ability to learn is essential for success. I argue that today, oxygen and learning are equally important for humans. Without them you are physically dead, or your career is dead. However, are followers tolerant of leaders who are learning? I’m not sure they are, which creates a significant problem for leaders.

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High-Quality Workplace Conversations Matter

Here’s a formula.

High-quality conversations lead to high-quality decisions, which lead to high quality actions and ultimately, high-quality results and performance. The reverse is also true. Low-quality conversations eventually lead to low-quality results.

Achieving high quality results and performance are worth the effort to learn how to conduct high-quality conversations.

The point of leverage in this model is high quality conversations. But what is a high quality conversation?

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