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Category: Management (Page 7 of 24)

Leading with Humility

10/04/2019 /

Leaders are often described as powerful and headstrong individuals, certain of their position and willing to do whatever it takes to achieve their goals or ambitions.

Recent researches have advanced  a new model for understanding and improving effective leadership: leading with humility. Scientific inquiry has shown that humility offers a significant “competitive advantage” to leaders.

Humble leaders consider their own strengths, weakness and motives in making decisions; demonstrating concern for the common good, and exercising their influence for the benefit of all.

Managers who exhibit traits of humility resulted in better employee engagement and job performance.

In this article, Gwen Moran explains how to use humility to be more effective in the following 6 ways:

1) Be open to others’ opinions;
2) Tend to others’ needs;
3) Admit mistakes;
4) Accept ambiguity;
5) Self – reflect;
6) Let people do their jobs.
Image source:  InspiredImages from Pixabay

The Power of Less

06/03/2019 /

Do you ever feel overwhelmed by all that you have to accomplish, all the deadlines, responsibilities?

Do you ever wonder how on earth you can juggle it all, obtain good (if not excellent) results, while still remaining sane?

Well, here is the simple answer: you just can’t.

It is important to learn how to prioritise our tasks and identify small steps that can help us to reach our goals in a progressive way. Only by doing so will we be able to be productive and stress-free at the same time.

In his book “The Power of Less”, Leo Babauta talks about how to find what is truly important to you and how to pursue it successfully in order to lead a satisfying life.

Here is a quick (only 4 minutes!) summary of the book: Four Minutes Books – The Power of Less

And here is the book for those of you who wish to read all of it: The Power of Less

3 best ways to say NO

20/02/2019 /

Sometimes it feels like there’s just way too much to do and too little time. There are many helpful productivity and time-management tips, but, according to this article, the most powerful one is the art of saying no. But how to say no?

 Here are three simple guidelines that might just make your life easier:

1. Don’t respond immediately.

When you are asked to do something that isn’t a part of your primary focus, simply tell the person that you will get back to them.

2. Consider creative solutions.

When someone comes to you with a request that you would like to fulfill but it would put a crimp in your schedule, think about giving them a partial yes, or offer another solution.

3. Keep it simple: Never overexplain or apologize profusely.

You do not have to apologize for doing what’s right for you and your business. If you are kind in your response and offer a few very simple words of explanation, most people will respect you for it.

Image: Flickr – duncan c  (CC BY-NC 2.0) 

The best hire

13/02/2019 /
In this TED Talk, Regina Hartley, human resources expert, explains that many successful business people had experienced early hardships, anywhere from poverty, abandonment, death of a parent while young, to learning disabilities, alcoholism and violence.

While the conventional thinking has been that trauma leads to distress, during studies of dysfunction, data revealed an unexpected insight: that even the worst circumstances can result in growth and transformation. Such a remarkable and counterintuitive phenomenon was called Post Traumatic Growth.

What is remarkable, among those  who experience post traumatic growth, is that they embraced their trauma and hardships as key elements of who they have become, and know that without those experiences, they might not have developed the muscle and grit required to become successful.

At the and, experts suggest us to always choose the underestimated contender, whose secret weapons are passion and purpose.

Here is the complete TED Talk.

Image: Flickr –Paul Miller (CC BY 2.0) 

10 Tips for Better Teamwork

06/02/2019 /

Effective teamwork is both profoundly simple and difficult at the same time. It’s not always the task at hand that challenges teams in their progress, it’s the relationships and the little things that happen day-to-day. According to this article, teams have basic needs that must be acknowledged and fulfilled if you expect your teams to experience their greatest success.

The following  ten tips describe the environment that must occur within the team for successful teamwork to take place:

  1. The team understands the goals and is committed to attaining them. This clear direction and agreement on mission and purpose is essential for effective teamwork.
  2. Team members trust each other. The team creates an environment in which people are comfortable taking reasonable risks in communicating, advocating positions, and taking action.
  3. Communication is open, honest, and respectful. People feel free to express their thoughts, opinions, and potential solutions to problems.
  4. Team members have a strong sense of belonging to the group. They experience a deep commitment to the group’s decisions and actions.
  5. Team members are viewed as unique people with irreplaceable experiences, points of view, knowledge, and opinions to contribute.
  6. Creativity, innovation, and different viewpoints are expected and encouraged.
  7. The team is able to constantly examine itself and continuously improve its processes, practices, and the interaction of team members. The team openly discusses team norms and what may be hindering its ability to move forward and progress in areas of effort, talent, and strategy.
  8. The team has agreed upon procedures for diagnosing, analyzing, and resolving teamwork problems and conflicts. The team does not support member personality conflicts and clashes nor do team members pick sides in a disagreement.
  9. Participative leadership is practiced in leading meetings, assigning tasks, recording decisions and commitments, assessing progress, holding team members accountable, and providing direction for the team.
  10. Members of the team make high quality decisions together and have the support and commitment of the group to carry out the decisions made.

 

Imagine: Flickr – U.S. Pacific Fleet  (CC BY-NC 2.0)

1,2,3 steps to work-life balance… really?

19/12/2018 /

How many times have we heard the term “work-life” balance being tossed around the workplace, the internet, podcasts and just about anywhere we turn to. This is mostly a result of how our daily routines have changed, a big part of our day usually being occupied by work-related tasks. And so the infamous search for balance begins, often ending up in us being even more frustrated than to start with.

But what does it all actually mean? Take a pause for just one moment: what does work-life balance mean to YOU?

Steve Farber, leadership keynote speaker and bestselling author, tells us that “the very idea is an insidious lie. It implies that “work” and “life” are two different things. If “work” is not “life,” then what is it? Death. Which, of course, it isn’t. ”

Funny isn’t it? He might almost be right.

This means we must find a way to build that “work” element, that we now perceive as being something outside of our life, into our life. Mind you, this doesn’t mean we have to identify ourselves with our work and dedicate our every single living moment to it; it’s not all black and white here. Rather we can try to follow these three tips by Farber to succeed in this delicate balancing act:

  1. Work harder at loving your entire life
    In Jeff Bezos’ words:  “The reality is, if I am happy at home, I come into the office with tremendous energy,” he said. “And if I am happy at work, I come home with tremendous energy.”
  2. View your life as a circle you complete, not a finish line to aim at.
  3. Appreciate what’s great about doing the work

 

To read more about these tips, head over here:

https://www.inc.com/steve-farber/work-life-balance-is-a-lie-heres-what-should-take-its-place.html

 

Image: Pixabay (CC0 Creative Commons)

 

 

McKnight Principles – Chasing innovation

05/12/2018 /

William McKnight was the CEO of 3M, also known as the “innovation company”, from 1949 to 1966. He was a living example of how all managers should create an environment which fosters a growth mindset (you can read more about that here) in order to create a successful, thriving and long-lasting business.

In McKnight’s own words, here are the principles to follow in order to build innovative companies:

“As our business grows, it becomes increasingly necessary to delegate responsibility and to encourage men and women to exercise their initiative. This requires considerable tolerance. Those men and women, to whom we delegate authority and responsibility, if they are good people, are going to want to do their jobs in their own way.

“Mistakes will be made. But if a person is essentially right, the mistakes he or she makes are not as serious in the long run as the mistakes management will make if it undertakes to tell those in authority exactly how they must do their jobs.

“Management that is destructively critical when mistakes are made kills initiative. And it’s essential that we have many people with initiative if we are to continue to grow.”

 

Image result for mcknight 3m

Image: AZquotes

The 4 A’s for stress relief

28/11/2018 /

Happy events, such as a wedding, as well as unhappy events, such as overwork, can cause stress. When your stress level exceeds your ability to cope, you need to restore the balance by reducing the stressors or increasing your ability to cope or both.

In this article are described the following four A’s to cope or reduce stress:

1 Avoid

You can simply avoid a lot of stress. Plan ahead, rearrange your surroundings and reap the benefits of a lighter load. In particular, try to avoid people who bother you, learn to say no and clearly define your priorities

However, some problems can’t be avoided. For those situations, here are the other A’s.

2 Alter Take inventory and attempt to change the situation for the better.  In particular you can respectfully ask others to change their behavior, communicate your feelings openly, manage your time in a more efficient way and state limits in advance.

3 Accept

Sometimes you may have no choice but to accept things the way they are. For those times try to talk with someone, forgive (it takes energy to be angry), practice positive self-talk and learn from your mistakes.

4 Adapt

Sometimes adapting can be the most helpful and only available solution. In particular in those situations stop gloomy thoughts and adopt a mantra, try to reframe the issue and recall all of the things that bring you joy in life.

In general, you should adjust your standards and stop striving for perfection and always try to look at the big picture.

Stress

Image: Flickr – Jesper Sehested (CC BY 2.0)

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