Continuing yesterday’s theme of happiness as central to leadership, today’s practise is a daily walk. And today is a most amazing day here in Victoria to do just that!
Archives for February 2013
Leading through happiness 1
February 7, 2013 By 3 Comments
I’ve been having conversations about happiness over the last week and it reminded me of one of the best books I’ve read on leadership in some time, How Remarkable Women Lead, by Barsh, Cranston, and Lewis. Their 5 elements of centred leadership (meaning, framing, connecting, engaging, energizing) really spoke to me, in particular the concept that meaning involves identifying strengths, purpose and happiness. I’ve had to work on happiness and so I will be featuring practises over the next few blogs that have helped me cultivate happiness. Today’s is the practise of writing down 5 things at the end of each day that you appreciated about the day.
Save your team some time
February 6, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Does your team have the same conversation over and over and/or not follow through on your decisions? Clearly documenting decisions is one way to avoid this. It’s also useful to mention the decision making strategy employed and who was involved in the decision as well as the outcome of the decision. This blog is based on the three of clubs from our Teamwork Explorer cards and iPhone app.
One tip to lighten your day
February 5, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Is this you? It’s certainly been me at times and I have gone through phases of watching too much doom and gloom on TV (and this includes the daily news – sorry all you news junkies who think you can’t live without it – you can). It’s amazing what cutting back on this sort of stuff will do for your energy, optimism and creativity.
Of course, this doesn’t include those compelling evening soaps, too numerous to name at this point 😉
Just one step
February 4, 2013 By Leave a Comment
I spent Friday with an amazing group of women reflecting, visioning, questioning, visualizing, laughing, supporting, realizing. As a result, I have put in place a big vision and Monday morning has brought with it an overwhelming sense of yikes, how will I ever do this??? And right behind that, my own words many times in our creativity workshop, “just take one step and don’t think about the whole thing or you will become paralyzed and not do anything!”
Making it safe to fail
February 3, 2013 By 2 Comments
The Etch A Sketch designer, Andre Cassagnes, died at the age of 86 this past month which got me thinking about creativity. A few things to note:
- People often create outside their discipline. Cassagnes was an electrical technician who was working with metal powders and noticed the potential for a toy.
- Etch a sketch itself, much like the ipad today, creates conditions to make it safe to fail. All you need to do is shake or erase and you can start over.
It’s too bad we find it so difficult to collaborate with others outside our discipline and shake and start over in organizations!
The Extravert/Introvert Conundrum
February 2, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Today’s blog is inspired by the sometimes complex interactions between extraverts and introverts and a most hilarious clip from Big Bang Theory. Enjoy!
The fallout of showrooming
February 1, 2013 By Leave a Comment
I was shocked to hear about Best Buy closing a number of stores across Canada. It used to be that working for a large organization offered some job security, but no longer. Given that Best Buy has named this “stage” of their transformation Renew Blue (apparently in response to the growing trend of showrooming) why is it that employees showed up to closed stores as if this was something no one saw coming?
Some leadership lessons here methinks …
