How to Power Up Your Leadership What are you hoping Father Christmas will bring? This question from my childhood rings true at this time of year. I remember the excitement of possibility, the anticipation of what might be in my stocking or under the tree on Christmas...
Do You Get My Drift? One of my favourite ways to help senior leadership teams to break down silos and lead more effectively together is to invite them each to share a time when they felt proud of a contribution they made or progress they achieved. I describe the...
Are You A Need-To-Know-It-All? Have you ever been in a conversation with someone when you know that they don’t know the answer, but are bluffing their way through?Yes. Me too. And maybe just maybe… has the person ever been you…?Hell yes! Me too. It’s a thing isn’t it,...
Are you a good leader? How do you know if you’re a good leader? Can we judge ourselves as a leader? What input should we seek? We explored these questions at The Leaders Surgery this week and it was interesting to ponder what good looks like when it comes to assessing...
How to suffer less as a leader Have you ever wondered how some leaders are able to ‘read the landscape’ – almost as if they have a crystal ball – and elegantly adjust by reinventing themselves, innovating new ideas, and meeting new market needs? When life happens and...
The Leadership Skill No One Talks About It wasn’t my decision to make.Not my challenge to meet.Not my ‘life gristle’ to chew. And I think I’d have rather it was! A close friend was navigating a challenging situation at work and it wasn’t going well.The other leader...
How to Lead with Ease Who we are is how we show up. In the big moments and the little ones; the moments that matter and the moments that slip by unnoticed. Who are you in each of these moments? With colleagues and peers? Family and friends? Your nearest and dearest?...
The Upside of Constraints… You can’t always get what you want… It’s a reality of life, and whether we like it or not, there are often constraints in the world that we have to work with. When we rail against the system or the reality in front of us, we make and keep...
Letting go to level up I was so angry… furious No. More than that, I was embarrassed. I felt humiliated. I was in a high level meeting of peers that I respected and admired. In these kinds of situations it’s not often that I will raise a hand and put my voice...
How to communicate signal not noise “We’re shouting at each other, with closed minds and an attachment to ideas, experiences and beliefs. Is it any wonder there’s so much defensiveness and division?” This was just one of the golden nuggets of wisdom that conscious...
Why leaders need to chew before they swallow One of my favourite books to read to my children, as they were growing up, was “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt” by Michael Rosen. A classic children’s picture book, it tells of a family, going out on an adventure to find a bear...
How to make good choices How can we stay on track with ‘what good looks like’ when there’s so much else going on at work and in life generally? This was a question at The Leaders Surgery this week and I understand why… It’s one thing to understand what good looks...
