Jeannette Seibly

Jeannette Seibly is The Leadership Results Coach. She has been an award-winning executive coach, keynote speaker and business author for more than 32 years. Her expertise is guiding leaders to hire, coach, and manage teams to achieve unprecedented results. Contact Jeannette for a confidential conversation @ JLSeibly@SeibCo.com

When You Rock the Boat, Do It for Better Results

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Making a commitment to speak up can rock the boat in any company. It requires an ability to take a risk to handle any consequences. The challenges are, not everyone will agree with you; and, not everyone will support you, even if you are correct. It all depend on your ability to have the conversations required to produce better results.

It begs the question, “Why bother?”

If you’re not willing to rock the boat, who will? Many people behave like ostriches with their heads in the sand. Some excuses are, “I need to keep my job.” “It’s time for my performance appraisal.”  And, “It doesn’t bother me, so it shouldn’t bother you.”

The problem is, most ostriches eventually get bit … hard … in the proverbial butt … when the company is heavily fined for violations, a product is prematurely launched, an employee is hired without conducting proper due diligence or someone fails to speak up about health, safety or quality concerns.

It Takes Courage

It’s not a matter of IF, it’s a matter of WHEN the issue or problem can no longer be ignored. Many companies are so busy with the 30,000-foot-high-view they often overlook the legal, financial, or moral implications of their decisions. Or, business owners, boards, executives, and employees may make decisions based on their own financial, personal and professional interests, which may be detrimental to the company.

Rock the Boat the Right Way

It’s important to note, when you choose to rock the boat, be aware that company policies or legal requirements may need to be addressed first.

  1. Voice your concerns in a positive tone. Remember, some of the team members will be unwilling to change after a decision has been made or direction established. If you are offering a conflicting opinion, you may be viewed as negative. Be prepared to review the facts and address any less-factual concerns.
  2. Brainstorm Solutions. Instead of believing it must done your way, brainstorm to create a win-win outcome for everyone. Be careful not to select the first idea or an idea that resonates with the team. Instead, take the time to ask the right questions. Use persuasive listening techniques to build a win-win agreement.
  1. Implementation. Even when an idea, plan or program is approved, the person responsible may not have the ability or the interest to execute it. Set up a meeting to talk with them: What has been done? What do they view as the next step? What, if anything, has stopped them from taking that action? If agreeable, offer positive solutions that the person to succeed.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2017-2018

Jeannette Seibly has been called a catalyst. She is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant who guides her clients to achieve unprecedented results. Remember, stress can be reduced when it’s managed effectively. Are you ready to de-stress for success? Step up now! Check out her website, or contact Jeannette for a preliminary confidential conversation.

11 Ways to Prevent Stress from Derailing Your Success

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StressFor busy business professionals, stress is unavoidable. It can negatively impact your results, interactions with people, and your ability to make necessary changes in your life. Stress impacts your ability to get things done the right way the first time. (And sometimes, you don’t get a second chance.)

If you are like me (and most people), you have stresses in your life: lack of time, concerns about money, bad habits, difficult situations and circumstances, frustrating employees, bosses, customers and systems. In addition, you might often think: I should have, would have and could have if only I had had the time, money, right employees, nicer customers, etc. (Sound familiar?) Stress can be cyclical, and these seemingly never-ending thoughts only add more stress. To disrupt the stress, you need clarify and take focused action steps to move forward.

11 Ways to De-Stress for Success

Pick one now and do it! It doesn’t matter which one. Just do it!

1.Prioritize. Not everything is a priority. Make a list of everything that you believe needs to be done. Circle the top ten. Now, cut the list down to the top three. Rank them 1, 2, and 3. Do number 1 now. When it’s done, move on to number 2. Now, it’s time for number 3. Celebrate the completion of each task.

2.Let Go. Not everything needs to be done immediately. If you need to file or shred papers, get an oil change for your vehicle, or replace a light bulb, schedule it on your calendar for later in the week. Then, honor that scheduled time.

3.Delegate. Stop being a lone ranger. Yes, your employees will not do things exactly the same way you would. Consider that they might do a better job … if you let them.

4.Do It for 20 minutes. Too often we have dreaded reports or other activities that must be done. Do it for 20 minutes. Then, decide if you wish to spend another 20 minutes or schedule it for later.

5.Excuses Be Gone. Too often, we create excuses about why we haven’t completed something. Stop doing this! This mental energy depletes you. Create a mantra: “I can do this and do it now.” Next, take the first step.

6.Stop Multitasking. Make a commitment to get one thing done at a time. There is satisfaction in fully completing something. While it may seem like multitasking allows you to get more things done, it rarely works that way. For example, attempting to write a report and listen to an employee at the same time only creates more stress … you will miss addressing important points in the report, and your employee will feel unimportant.

7.Walk It Out. Take 10 minutes, three times daily, to simply walk around, go up and down the stairs, or simply move! Remember to breathe!

8.Talk It Out. Turn your internal monologues into dialogues. Get them out of your head. Share your concerns with someone who can actually help you. It may be a good time to find a business coach who can help you stay focused and improve your effectiveness while decreasing your stress.

9.Write It Out. Studies have shown that when people write down their fears, upsets and frustrations, it can be cathartic. Writing helps get bad thoughts out of your head and provides insights. The key is to keep things private and not share your written journal with others. Do not send your upsets in an email or text to your boss, client, employee or co-worker (or post them on social media).

10.Meditate. Take time to simply empty your mind and be silent for several minutes. It can be refreshing. Sit comfortably. Focus on breathing in and out. When thoughts appear—and they will—say, “Noise.” Don’t make these thoughts good or bad. This may be the most effective and most difficult for highly stressed people.

11.Brag. When you learn how to brag, it is a huge confidence booster. Complete your Brag! statements. Keep these up to date and review them anytime stress doesn’t go away or you need a confidence boost.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Jeannette Seibly has been called a catalyst. She is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant who guides her clients to achieve unprecedented results. Remember, stress can be reduced when it’s managed effectively. Are you ready to de-stress for success? Step up now! Check out her website, or contact Jeannette for a preliminary confidential conversation.

Has Your Team Lost Its Ability to be Effective?

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Culture 2Building effective teams to achieve results is important. It determines the quality of your products and services, employee satisfaction, and ability to meet and exceed customers’ expectations. However, as leaders, there are many times we fail to pay attention to team dynamics. Instead, we often wait around for someone else to do it. When a team loses its effectiveness, it’s important to quickly get the team back on track (think, right now).

7 Tips to Build an Effective Team

1.Training. When was the last time the team received training on how to conduct effective meetings? (I’m surprised by how many people have never been trained.) Many team leaders and team members are not well trained on how to lead and participate in meetings effectively. They’ve read a book or watched a video that focused on the material side of meetings (e.g., scheduling, seating, agendas, etc.), but rarely do books and videos address the human side of meetings. Bring in an outside facilitator to train everyone on conflict resolution, brainstorming, sharing ideas and appreciating each member’s contribution. It’s important to train everyone to be an effective team leader and team member.

2.True Goals. Were the goals created with the team? Even if you said yes to this question, chances are good that a senior person’s idea ends up as the goal. Or, sometimes the team latches onto the first good idea and runs with it. True goals are simple, quantifiable, achievable, agreed upon and provide a deadline for results. And, the team is aligned with the goals. The goal meets the company’s needs. Remember, if the team members don’t feel heard or valued during the goal creation process, they will stop participating.

3.Focused Action Plans. Has the team lost its focus or do they feel there are too many distractions? Many times, teams get caught up in the shiny object syndrome and fail to stay focused on the actions required to achieve this current goal. A good team leader will meet with the team frequently, as a group and individually. The team leader keeps everyone focused on the goal and helps uncover resources needed to move forward. While the scoreboard may factually show progress is being made, sole focus on meeting the goal will hide the fact that there are team members who are stuck and have checked out of the process. It’s important to keep everyone in focused action, one step at a time.

4.Communication. Are appropriate communication resources being used? Keeping everyone up to date with what each person has committed to do and showing the progress being made is key. It reminds each member that they are an integral part of the project’s success.

5.Manage the Team. Who is the team facilitator? While teams can be self-managing, usually there is a formally designated leader; otherwise, an informal one will emerge. It’s important to have someone in charge of facilitating the meeting, making sure resources and other needs are available, and coaching everyone involved to achieve the goal.

6.Delegation. Is someone being a lone ranger? Too often, poorly trained or highly controlling team leaders fail to delegate. Stop it! If you want to truly achieve unprecedented results, get everyone involved. If a team member is being a lone ranger, it’s critical to unravel this situation quickly before it goes on too long and the team leader loses the ability to correct the situation.

7.Celebrate. When was the last time everyone was acknowledged and appreciated? Celebrate the small steps, wins and other accomplishments of the group and individual team members. Don’t forget to share brags at each and every meeting.

Review each of these seven tips and make sure they are all implemented to improve the team’s effectiveness and their ability to achieve the intended results.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Jeannette Seibly has been called a catalyst. She is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant who guides her clients to achieve unprecedented results. Remember, meetings can be effective, fun and rewarding! And, they require everyone to become a team facilitator. Are you ready?

10 Myths about Executive Coaching You Need to Know

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Successful business owners, executives and leaders know that having an executive coach isn’t a luxury, it’s a necessity.

While many business professionals believe the DIY approach works, it’s a myth! The DIY process will prolong the time it takes to achieve your goals, and in the process you’ll become tired, stressed and hit the proverbial wall.

Many DIYers quit, change their goal to reflect what progress they have made, or fall victim to the allure of some shiny object. At that point,  intended results have been sidelined, dreams diminished, and the vision for success forgotten.

Uncovering myths about executive coaching allows you to see why it’s a critical component to success. Having the right coach allows you to get real about your goals, keeps you focused and reawakens your commitment to succeed.

The Top Ten Myths about Executing Coaching:

1.I can do it myself. (Unfortunately, many DIYers think they can be their own coach. Listening to yourself is a fool’s game and rarely gets you promoted.)

2.A good coach needs a certification. (Certificate programs can be helpful and provide technical skills. However, an executive coach with experience, powerful listening skills and the ability to customized ideas to your unique situation is far more powerful. That kind of experience cannot be learned from a certification program.)

3.It’s too expensive. (Not necessarily. How much are your career, time, family and financial future worth?)

4.My company won’t pay for it, so it must not be important. (There comes a time when you have to value yourself, your career, and be willing to invest in both to ensure your success.)

5.Coaching is only for people who don’t have what it takes. (Coaching is for anyone and everyone wanting to take the next step up in their career. Having a confidential sounding board helps you become aware of your blind spots. And, everyone has them!)

6.If you work harder, you will be successful. (Working smarter, not harder, means doing things in a way that is effective and efficient. The right coach will help you work smarter.)

7.I’m doing fine and don’t need a coach to prepare me for the next step. (Great! Are you ready to handle the next issue or challenge with ease and effectiveness? If you say yes, ask your employees, boss, customers and vendors if they would truly agree.)

8.I have friends and family who provide me with lots of advice. (Yes, many people do. While they mean well, most friends and family members don’t have the courage to tell you what you really need to hear. As a result, you miss out on the critical factors required to make better decisions, build stronger teams and achieve intended results.)

9.I have too much work to do and cannot take on anything else. (If this describes you, coaching should be at the top of your list. Most coaching comes just in time, when you need it most and when it can provide the greatest impact.)

10.I’ve already hit the glass ceiling and no coach can change that. (Nonsense! Anyone can become a successful leader with the right coach navigating them to success. Additionally, success today is about more than just technical and financial skills. It requires being forward-thinking, team-oriented and goal-driven…all areas where an executive coach makes a big difference.)

When you uncover the myths holding you back, you will see that hiring an executive coach is the most critical component for your success. What are you waiting for?

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Jeannette Seibly  has been an executive coach, business advisor and management consultant for over 25 years. Do you need a confidential sounding board, someone that can help you navigate issues and challenges effectively? Are you ready to catapult yourself toward success? Contact Jeannette for a free confidential conversation.

How to Address Unconscious Biases When Managing Employees

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UnconsciousBiasMany of us believe we are not judgmental people. Yet we must make judgments every day about everything from what to wear to work and eat for lunch to who is the best person to handle a project. These often-subjective decisions normally reflect biases that we may not be aware of (pants vs. dresses, sandwiches vs. salads—and our favorite go-to employee vs. our less-favorite employees).

It starts with each of us. As a boss, it’s important to become aware of and responsible for our unconscious biases, especially as they pertain to race, age, gender and culture. If we are not aware of them, these biases will influence our interactions with employees, how we make our decisions and how we manage our teams.

As bosses, we most frequently run up against our unconscious biases while hiring, coaching, managing and training employees. Whether we agree we have them or not, these biases are usually evident to others, especially when we hire and manage based solely on our guts. They will also show up when we communicate in an insensitive manner or make decisions without factual data. They determine the company’s culture.

Biases always impact the company’s ability to hire the right person for the job, coach each employee to succeed, train each team member to develop skills, and manage everyone to meet the customers’ needs in an effective and non-discriminatory manner. Failure to be responsible for our biases impacts our ability to create positive and productive workplaces for everyone.

How to Create a Responsible Workplace Culture:

  • Provide communication and sensitivity training to boost awareness for everyone.
  • Conduct mandatory bias-awareness training for all employees, including how to handle perceived biases, and repeat this training quarterly.
  • Train bosses on techniques for coaching and managing all of their employees.
  • Review job evaluations and stats on promotions, hires and pay to determine biases.
  • Put together a strategic and tactical plan to correct inequities, and execute it.
  • Pay attention to the words you use when interacting with employees.
  • Stop trusting your gut when making hiring and promotion decisions–objective information will always improve these decisions.
  • Become aware of stereotypes and how your brain will trick you into thinking jokes, comments or innuendos based on race, age, gender and culture are funny.
  • Use qualified assessments to help you better hire, coach, manage and train your employees. These objective tools create awareness that each employee has unique skills, behaviors, interests and learning styles beyond your biased perception of who they are. Also, qualified assessments provide a foundation for employees to learn and appreciate each other in a positive manner.

If you want to build a positive and productive workplace culture, it’s critical to become aware of unconscious biases and be responsible for them.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Jeannette Seibly  has been an executive coach, business advisor and management consultant for over 25 years. What coaching and guidance do you need to improve your managerial, executive and leadership styles? Are you ready to let go of what you’ve been doing to do something new? Contact Jeannette for a free confidential conversation.

How to Become Unstoppable and Achieve Results

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strategic hiringWhenever projects or programs don’t go as planned, we stop. We focus on issues that we believe are in our way. Then, when we don’t uncover those roadblocks, we start blaming ourselves and others. These five often-overlooked areas will help you get back on track to achieve your intended results—and become unstoppable.

5 C’s to Becoming Unstoppable

Commitment. Everyone says they are committed. Yet if you look at their actions, attitudes and behaviors, they rarely hide the truth: They are not committed to results. Commitment starts with being results-oriented and doing the work to get there. Ask yourself: What do I truly want? What does the team want? What’s in the way to fulfill our commitment?

Choice. We often falsely believe that if we had more choices or resources, we could succeed. However, there are many success stories in the news that showcase people who have succeeded without a lot of readily available resources. Set aside your many excuses and get into focused action. Choose to take the initiative. Choose to be resourceful. And, choose to be willing to step outside your comfort zone.

Collaboration. When a project or plan isn’t gaining traction, it might be that team members simply don’t have the interests, skills or willingness to do the work … no matter what they tell you. Actions always speak louder than words. Bring in an outside facilitator to uncover underlying team issues. Use a qualified assessment to help individuals better understand themselves and each other, and what keeps getting in their way.

Communication. Communicating frequently via emails, texts and conference calls is very important.  Without good communication, people will forget their commitment, find distractions to focus on, and attempt to be lone rangers. It’s your job to keep them focused on the project, goal and guidelines, check on progress, and be readily available for questions.

Coaching. How often do you have partner who is 100% committed to your success?  What value do you get from someone who doesn’t allow your doubts and frustrations to get in the way?  When you have a coach, you can share your concerns, come down to reality and get out of your own way. Then, you’ll be unstoppable in achieving unprecedented results.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Are you ready to create a robust Q2? Jeannette will guide you and your team through a set of powerful exercises designed to get everyone back on track. Her clients have gone through this process, uncovered issues that were in the way, and resolved them, achieving their intended results. To learn more, contact Jeannette Seibly at https://seibco.com/contact/. 

Jeannette Seibly is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant. Do you and your employees need to learn how to work together as a team, conduct effective meetings and develop powerful solutions during 2018? Check out her website, or contact Jeannette for a free confidential conversation.

Coaching for Success Is the Boss’s No. 1 Job

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coachable3In our current employment environment, it’s more important than ever for bosses to become coaches. Unemployment is at an all-time low, qualified candidates have become passive job seekers and bosses are still cited as the No. 1 reason employees leave. Instead of relying on performance improvement plans when the employee fails to meet expectations, it’s time to focus on developing employees’ soft skills, their ability to follow established systems and procedures, and a can-do attitude in the face of challenges throughout their employment.

For Success, Become Your Employees’ Job Coach

Coaching is needed at all levels within an organization. Being a boss who coaches employees is important. If you don’t have the interest, make sure to hire an experienced coach to help you and your team succeed.

Use Qualified Assessments. This is where you start. As the boss, understanding who your employees really are is required before you can coach for success. Without this, both you and your employee will feel frustrated. Qualified assessments provide coaching, team and managerial reports to clarify specific areas for coaching. For example, a top-level saleswoman had been achieving great results by opening up new markets for her company. In an effort to help broaden her skills, and improve her patience and diplomacy, her company reassigned her to work larger prospects with a much longer sales cycle. Because she was unable to close a sale quickly and change her personality (remember, you can’t fix and change a person), she left and joined a company where her skill set and job fit mattered.

Focus on Strengths. Focusing on weaknesses is a colossal waste of time. Instead, hire the right people for the right job. Build on their strengths to grow their effectiveness.  For example: A customer service rep was having a difficult time working with a system that did not have a procedural manual. To develop her strengths, her boss advised her work with a longtime employee, take notes and create a procedural manual.  Now, she’s the go-to person when something isn’t working and training is required.

Meet Weekly. It’s important to meet with your employees frequently. When someone is struggling, it’s even more important. Meeting weekly will help them fine-tune their skills and approach, and help you uncover any bad habits early. While habits can be transformed, first the employee must become aware of them and then you must customize an approach that works.

Hire Yourself a Coach. To become your employees’ job coach, it’s important for you to have your own coach to help you move forward. With your own coach, you will uncover your blind spots and improve your decision-making, project management and communication skills.

Hire a Team Facilitator. For those bosses who are not interested in being their employees’ job coach, hire a facilitator. A facilitator will help improve team meetings and communication skills, and keep your team focused on achieving success.

For those of you who doubt the importance of these techniques, one of my clients used all of the methods above, and each of his employees went from managing $750K to managing $1.25M.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Jeannette Seibly has been called a catalyst. She is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant who guides her clients to achieve unprecedented results. Remember, being your employees’ job coach will be effective, fun and rewarding!  Are you ready? Step up now! Check out her website, or contact Jeannette for a preliminary confidential, laser-focused conversation.

4 Important Reasons to Stop Hiring with Your Gut

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hiring costsAs busy bosses, we often rely on our gut to determine who to hire and why. We falsely believe our intuitive abilities make us foolproof. Yet we are often wrong and our results suffer, clients stray, miscommunication becomes the norm and team conflicts erupt. And, even more sadly, our key employees often leave!

All of this is preventable.

The truth is, objective data will improve hiring decisions!

Facts will always matter!

Why Do You Often Ignore Facts?

  • You’re busy putting out fires and rely solely on resumes to select who to interview. (By the way, 70 percent contain inaccuracies, and we spend less than 6 seconds reviewing each resume.)
  • Statistically, 86 percent of the time you’re unable to discern the lies offered by job candidates.
  • You believe candidates when they say they want to work for you.
  • You believe it’s too expensive to incorporate objective data into your decision-making process.
  • You rely mostly on feelings (your gut) about how the candidate looks, talks and interacts. (Remember, the right person will be trainable.)

4 Often-Overlooked Reasons Why Facts Will Always Matter

Your lack of objectivity will cause stress for everyone. In today’s job market, every employee has other alternatives … they can leave.

1.Job Seekers. They are savvier today than ever before, and unemployment is at an all-time low. It’s harder than ever to attract qualified candidates. It costs a lot of time, money and energy to interview people who are not well-suited for the position, or who do not have a real interest in the job or company. Remember, the right job candidate is out there, waiting to be found. Also, job candidates will decline job offers when they don’t trust interviewers to hire the right way. (They think, Where else is this potential boss cutting corners?)

A job candidate is impressed by:

2.Employees. They are tired of training new people who leave through a revolving door, and of attempting to clean up messes that could have been prevented. So, instead, they update their resumes and reach out to others in their networks. They leave you still hiring the way you’ve always done … by how you feel. They leave you sitting at your desk, frustrated at losing another good person, wishing there had been more money in the budget to keep them. Hint: The No. 1 reason employees leave today is because of their boss, not their paycheck!

3.Customers. They are also tired of training new hires or employees who transferred into positions they don’t fit. I remember calling a company, needing to have a question answered. After I repeated my request a couple of times, I asked the receptionist what else she was doing. I could hear tapping in the background. Her reply: “I’m multi-tasking and typing up a report for my boss.” Needless to say, I did not feel like a valued customer and didn’t get my question answered. I became another lost customer.

4.Vendors. They can be great allies in helping build your company. However, their job and paycheck are dependent on helping as many customers as they can, not training yet another new person who doesn’t have the interest or willingness to do the job. The wrong employee can also hurt long-time vendor relationships by making uninformed decisions about the products and services and by changing agreements, causing chaos throughout the company and hurting customer relationships.

Obtaining objective data is easy. It can also save your own career! Remember, everyone affiliated with your company is depending on you to objectively hire employees based on facts, not on your gut.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Jeannette Seibly is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant. Are you ignoring facts? Are you aware of how much this is costing your company? Are you willing to make simple and effective changes in your hiring process? First, you have to step up! Check out her website , or contact Jeannette for a free confidential conversation.

How to Turn Around Management Team Conflicts

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Millennials Lead.2We all want to believe that key employees, leaders and executives get along with one another. However, when issues arise, so do people’s egos. Information silos, inappropriate comments and an inability to resolve differences often get in the way of supporting the company’s success. These conflicts can hurt the profitability, performance and productivity of any company.

While differing opinions and managed discussions can create better decisions, they require using high-level emotional intelligence, listening to understand and employing good business practices. And, when you put the collective success of the company’s management team first, great results can be achieved.

The Only Thing That Matters Is Being Responsible for the Team’s Success

There is no magic formula, and there are no quick answers. Get real and be responsible for your team’s success.

Hire a business advisor. Using the same thinking that created the problem will not provide the solution. I’ve seen companies rely on books, a team member’s strong personality and other non-contributing factors, and still they fail to resolve the true underlying issues. Hoping and waiting for everything to work out is a default strategy that rarely makes a positive difference. Instead, hire a business advisor who can uncover the real issues (not the surface issues) and guide team members to get everyone on the same page by making the required, and sometimes difficult, changes.

Use Qualified Assessments. When attempting to make positive changes, you cannot transform a team without first addressing the truth in a respectful manner. Objective data about the team’s personality can provide insight into how to move everyone forward together.  For example: If you have a team that primarily relies on their feelings to make decisions, interjecting factual information will help everyone move forward.

Listen to Understand.  I remember years ago a business owner stating, “This listening takes too much work.” He’s right. It can when you haven’t developed the necessary communication skills. Always remember when you are feeling impatient that if you take the time to address concerns now, you’ll save a lot of time, money and energy later.

Manage Conflict. Differing opinions, thoughts and feelings can make for better decisions. To make it easier for others to hear you, state your opinions, thoughts and feelings as your own:  “I believe …” “In my opinion …” When listening to others, repeat what you heard them say first and clarify before offering your opinion. You will be amazed at the results. When you see that you agree on some points and agree to disagree on others, you can build better win-win decisions.

Talk Straight When Apologizing. Instead of further upsetting the situation with excuses about why you said what you said, simply say, “I’m sorry.” Then, be quiet! While it’s important that leaders develop a thicker skin, it’s also important to be responsible for what you say and do.

Encourage Team Members to Work It Out Now. Another benefit to using a qualified assessment is that the results can be a starting point for difficult conversations. First, have team members review each other’s results, one-on-one. Second, talk about where you are similar and where there are differences. (Remember: Results are not good or bad, right or wrong). When two strong-willed executives started making negative comments about one another, their coach told them to sit down and work it out now. They used the assessment as their starting point. They learned why they were frustrated with each other’s different work and communication styles. They now have an amicable work relationship that they value.

Stop It Now! If you sense a problem brewing, don’t wait. It’s easier to understand the crux of the problem at its infancy then if you wait until it has become a full-blown problem and everyone has taken an inflexible position.

When the Problem Is You. Each person on a management team is responsible for its success. If you and others are not good facilitators, get the team trained now! Learn how to listen to one another’s points of view, value each person’s input, build on others’ ideas and acknowledge each and every person’s contributions. This will build a strong, successful team and company.

If you truly want to master turning around management team conflicts, use these tools for taking responsibility. When every team member takes responsibility, you will be able to build a successful company.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Need a speaker or facilitator to successfully address company issues? As a leader, it’s very important for you to know how to facilitate a group, even if you are not the one leading it. Contact Jeannette Seibly. She will provide confidential, laser-focused coaching that works! 

Jeannette Seibly has been called a catalyst. She is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant who guides her clients to achieve unprecedented results. Remember, meetings can be effective, fun and rewarding! And, they require everyone to become a meeting facilitator. Are you ready? Step up now! Check out her website, or contact Jeannette for a preliminary confidential conversation.

Listening to Understand Will Make You a Powerful Leader

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talk_to_the_handHow do we listen as leaders? We listen through a filter—a filter that supports our feelings, thoughts and opinions about the person talking, the person or situation being gossiped about, or a topic we may or may not have an interest in. The bottom line is that we listen to see if we agree or disagree. As a result, we miss out on a lot of information that could give us insight to create positive and profitable changes. As leaders, we don’t have the luxury of not hearing what others are saying. Failure to listen will negatively impact our businesses, customers, employees and our own careers.

6 Ways to Listen to Understand

1.Quiet the Chatterbox. Everyone has an ongoing internal mental monologue that never stops, except when we sleep. We have become unconscious to it, yet it automatically reengages each time we are awake! Practice silence through meditation and pay attention to what you are thinking about. This will help you take charge of your chatterbox.

2.Be Present. Instead of rehearsing your rebuttal in your head, first listen to understand the other person’s point of view. When you are truly present to what is being said, you will know how to respond. Remember, you don’t need to fill silence with needless chatter as you think out loud. Ask questions to clarify what the other person is trying to convey, and engage in a dialogue. You will be amazed how quickly and easily you can become an active listener—and how rewarding it can be.

3.Put Away Distractions. This very bad habit gets in our way every time, particularly as leaders. Not only is multitasking a no-no, we lie to ourselves (and others) that we are really listening each time we glance at our electronic gadgets. When you get distracted from the person speaking, they assume you are not listening. Why? Because you’re not listening … you’ve allowed your mind to wander! Put away gadgets, papers and other distractions to keep you focused and in the conversation.

4.Build Win-Win Outcomes. Building agreement through conversation is not a lost art. It’s simply one that few practice. As a result, people become upset when others disagree with them. When conflicts erupt, employees will head for the cover of their cubicle, work, electronic gadgets, or they’ll check out of the conversation while sitting in the meeting. Instead, listen and build the habit of hearing what others are saying. You will find points of agreement. Acknowledge them and build on them.

5.Release Emotional Attachments. Remember, emotions take over common sense. Adding facts will help the conversation. However, when black-and-white data is not forwarding a conversation, share your thoughts and feelings by owning them (“I believe …” “I feel …” “In my opinion …”). Don’t be afraid to remind people that you are speaking from your own beliefs. If you’re open to releasing emotional attachments, you will expand your ability to see both sides of the topic being discussed.

6.Engage in Real Brainstorming. This lost art is truly lost when people grasp on to the first good idea or check out when a person in a position of power declares an idea to be the right one. It’s important to stay in the conversation and continue to toss out additional ideas. If not, you may be supporting a project or plan you (and others) don’t agree with. Use persuasive listening, facilitation and strong emotional intelligence skills to share your ideas and open up the conversation to create win-win-win results.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2018

Need a speaker or facilitator to successfully address company issues? As a leader, it’s very important to listen to understand. While this may seem like a difficult skill to acquire, contact Jeannette Seibly to refine your ability to be an effective communicator. She will provide confidential, laser-focused coaching that works! 

Jeannette Seibly has been called a catalyst. She is celebrating 25 years as a business coach, advisor and consultant who guides her clients to achieve unprecedented results. Remember, listening to understand and utilizing persuasive listening skills are required to be a powerful leader. Are you ready? First, you must step up! Check out her website, or contact Jeannette for a preliminary confidential conversation.