Create Energetic Teams

An effective leader creates energetic teams.

You could also say "co-create" to show how much collaboration has to do with it. True enough, collaboration IS essential.

Effective leaders get things going. Effective leaders bring their own creativity to the team. We don't need to wait for effective collaboration to get creative and energetic.

The energy you bring pushes the team one way or another. Which way will you choose?

-- Douglas Brent Smith

Comments

The Benefits of Supervisory Training

When was the last time you had any leadership training? How often do the supervisors in your organization get training? If you are like most organizations, it's never enough. Some teams go without any supervisory training at all and expect supervisors and managers to learn as they go, on the job. Unfortunately, while it is memorable to learn from your mistakes, it comes at a high cost. People get tired. People leave. Important accounts go away. Customers complain. And teams struggle without the skills and knowledge it takes to build cohesive teams that are capable of solving problems, improving performance and achieving goals. Admittedly, I can be expected to support training since I'm in the business. Still, take a closer look at your own leadership career and decide for yourself. Are leaders better off with more training and development or with less? Supervisory training can generate benefits that pay off long after the training is over. Here are just a few of the things sup

Let Them See You Work

If you can't seem to hire good performers with a solid work ethic, you might need to develop them. Maybe start by showing them what that looks like, or as John Maxwell has said "Know the way, show the way, and go the way." You know, walk the talk. I know a LOT of leaders who complain about work ethic. Maybe they need to let their people see them work... -- doug smith

Leadership Warning

If you visit the dark side, don't get stuck there. -- doug smith

Careful Expectations

Change agents don't always play by the rules. Expecting them to is the act of a fool. -- doug smith

Freedom and Responsibility

Freedom without responsibility produces more harm than good. Responsibility without freedom sparks certain revolution. High performance leaders don't FIND the balance, they CREATE the balance. Start by listening. -- doug smith

Start Positive

I went thru a grumpy period in my life. It was like a rut that was so deep no light could get in. It fed on its own bumpy grumpiness until that's all I could feel. Yuck. Forget that now. Now, I start with a positive thought. I could be wrong about finding the silver lining, but I've learned that I won't see the silver lining unless I look for it, and that's the place to start. Even the smallest positive effort has a positive impact. Let's start there. -- doug smith

Dear Home Office

Have you ever worked in the field with the responsibility of reporting to a home office? How did that feel? I've noticed that there are big distinctions between people working in the field, doing the work, selling the product, delivering the goods, facing the customers... and people in the home office who make the rules, collect the cash, drink free company coffee, and call in sick if they need a day off. When you work in the field you don't call in sick because then you don't get paid. At least not what you'd make by doing the work. So when someone from the home office wants to give you feedback, how does that feel? Maybe they have something to offer. Maybe they will give you tips that make a difference. Or maybe you might want to write them a note something like this... "Dear Home Office... Your advice sucks so please keep it to yourself. We know what works and what doesn't. We see our customers' faces. We feel their pain. We need new rules

Perfect Relationships

Is your partner perfect? Are you? I've made enough mistakes in my life and in my relationships to know that the search for perfection is illusive at best and at worst, frustrating. There are no perfect people out there waiting for us, to fall in love with us, to fix us, to bring us what we need, to fulfill our dreams. But that's OK. In fact, that's wonderful. We don't need a perfect person in order to create love. Love creates the perfect person. -- Douglas Brent Smith

The Five Qualities of Successful Leaders

What makes a leader successful? There are many lists. Sometimes the lists go as high as 100 qualities. Sometimes they are fewer competencies but still too many to remember and too many to clearly assess on a personal basis. It's part of the difficulty of taking a 360 evaluation and making sense of it. I like Adam Bryant's approach of focusing on five key leadership traits. We can quibble about which five leadership traits matter the most, but this is a workable list. My own work has also identified five leadership traits that I believe clearly shows the strengths needed and how great leaders use their flexibility (or centeredness) to optimize their use of those strengths, even though we each vary in which strengths we use the most. It is built on the work of centuries of personality sorters and bears similarities to several prominent ones which focus on four traits. I see these four strengths as Clarity, Courage, Creativity and Compassion. The fifth s

Keep Moving

Are you living the dream? When I worked in retail it was a common response from team members, whenever someone would ask "How are you doing?" to say "Living the dream!". There was more than a hint of sarcasm in that response. The only thing dream like about stocking the shelves sometimes is the dream like trance you feel in between interruptions. And yet - I also knew people in retail who were truly living their dream. They were making a positive difference. They were delighting customers. They were innovating and enjoying themselves. They were happy. Maybe it's not so much what you do as it is how you do it. Living the dream is above all, active. It's when I am most focused on working things that are important (to me and to others) and achieving new results and developing that I feel the dream is right here with me right now. And to keep that - to sustain that dream - takes constant work. It takes constant learning. It takes risks, chances, and effo

High Performance Leadership

Search This Blog