Leadership

Fearful Bosses

by

Many bosses today have become fearful of losing their jobs and being unable to find equivalent or better ones. They spend more time manipulating others’ perceptions of their worth in order to keep their jobs than achieving the required results. Their lack of commitment to the company, its employees, customers, and communities usually turns their fears into the reality of becoming unemployed! As a boss, remember that if employees are not doing their work, it’s a reflection of your management style. If you are not achieving the results, you are not taking the right, focused action steps. If you are blaming others for your challenges, you are probably not in the right job! Get help now! Hire a coach and develop clarity to do the right work.  

(c)Jeannette L. Seibly, 2013

Eliminate the Guessing Game

by

Do you know how to ask for what you want? Or do you expect your employees or vendors to simply know? Do you falsely believe you will know what you want when you see or read it? Eliminate the guessing game and take time to clarify the goal or outcomes you wish to achieve, in writing. By writing goals down, it’s easier to get everyone on the same page. Stay away from spelling out how to achieve outcomes. Share your outline and include others’ ideas before providing the details.

(c)Jeannette L. Seibly, 2013

Making the Same Hiring Mistakes?

by

When you keep making the same hiring mistakes over and over, it’s costly and very time consuming. You lose credibility with your staff and clients. It’s time to stop and get help. You have a misperception of potential employees’ work experience, skills, and/or job fit required. With clarification and by learning new ways to interview, how to use qualified assessments, and how to improve your due diligence processes, you can improve your hiring results. (BizSavvyHire.com)  Hopefully, it won’t be too late to rebuild your credibility.

(c)Jeannette L. Seibly, 2013

Helpful Hint:

Job ads with trite sound-bites fail to attract, e.g., great opportunity and work hard. Learn how-to attract the right employees: http://BizSavvyHire.com

 

 

 

 

The Right Inner Talk Expedites Results

by

Do you want to successfully achieve intended results? Are you willing to do what you don’t want to do and don’t like to do, and stop complaining about it? If yes, understand that results require practice and developing a discipline by following focused action steps. Hire a business advisor, coach, or other professional to help you along the way.

A coach has you do what you don’t want to do so you can achieve what you’ve always wanted.

What is the key ingredient often overlooked?  The right inner talk expedites results. Your self-talk guides you toward achieving your goals. It’s your inner core and determination that keep you moving forward day after day, week after week. Pay attention to the words you use to communicate your concerns or fears. They are usually the insight needed to blast through any inevitable wall. But don’t fall into the trap of falsely believing recitation of the right words is the sole answer. You need to believe in them while you are doing the work!

©Jeannette L. Seibly, 2013

Be a Kick-Butt Warrior for Your Career

by

Developing clarity and focus is the key to becoming a kick-butt warrior for your career. Stop waiting or relying on your boss or company to pay for workshops, seminars, or one-on-one coaching. Take matters into your own hands and pay for them. The return-on-investment will be significant — these activities have consistently helped others land on the career path of their choosing.

(c)Jeannette L. Seibly, 2013

Money conversations

by

Having fear-based beliefs that you can’t afford something important can create a lot of mischief in your enterprise. Although budgets, monetary controls, and other financial considerations must be handled in a fiscally responsible manner, doing so in a Scrooge-like way usually takes its toll on the company–particularly when it’s self-serving.

Teach yourself and others to become resourceful, honor budgets, and learn how to become fiscally responsible. Many employees have not had responsibilities in costing, pricing, or creating profit margins for products and/or services in a competitive manner. Don’t make it difficult to achieve intended results; simply be responsible for the financial outcomes of how and where you spend the company’s money.

(c)Jeannette L. Seibly, 2013

Don’t allow your better judgment to be thwarted.

by

Most busy professionals allow their better judgment to be thwarted in an attempt to look good, save time, or keep their job, a client, or an employee.  Making bad decisions can take its toll on you, the company, and your team. Take time to breathe before making a decision. Yes, the simple act of breathing and counting from 1 to 10 before making a decision can save you 10 minutes, months, or years in attempting to rectify that moment.

Stop Trying Harder!

by

I adopted five-year-old Gracee a couple of months ago from the Dumb Friends League. She had broken her back leg when she was a kitten and her gimp is very noticeable when she walks. However, you wouldn’t know it by watching her zip around chasing her toys. One of her favorite activities is to race down the stairs to fetch a bouncy ball.  It’s a combination of a run and bunny hop!

How many of you are willing to go for it? Regardless of your challenges?

Or, have you fallen into the tiring and endless trap of “trying harder?” One of the biggest challenges for executives and business owners is learning that “trying harder only creates more of the same challenges.” It leaves you, and them, tired and cranky at the beginning and end of each day!

How can you be unstoppable? It’s inspiring when handled in a biz-savvy manner.

Banish the illusion of the “perfect time.” What are your excuses for not pursuing your goals? Write down these time mongers! You won’t find anything new or inspiring! Instead, write down what you really really really want to accomplish.  Rewrite it into a goal. Develop “I can do it and I do it” attitude and proceed forward. Talk with your coach to help you through the inevitable “walls of life.” 

Stay connected. Pick up the phone. Stop relying solely on emails or social media venues to stay in touch. It’s amazing what you can accomplish when you talk with others and allow them to contribute their ideas. Sometimes the simplest suggestion can spark the right change required to move ideas forward.

Focus on priorities. It’s very easy to get caught up in the swirl or chaos of too much to do. Pick two key items to get completed during the day based upon priorities, or boss or client mandates. Regardless of whether you like to do them! These accomplishments will create naturally-centered confidence.

Have fun.  Take a couple of minutes at the end of each day to write down today’s achievements and setup tomorrow’s “must do’s.” Now, enjoy quality time without worrying about work. It will be there tomorrow!  Be good to yourself and learn appreciation. Gratitude helps you work smarter and achieve your goals faster!

Learn to Brag! Bragging to others in a biz-savvy manner gives voice to your accomplishments. Why is sharing important? You find out you’re not alone in your challenges. It encourages you, and others, to build on your strengths, achieve your goals and work smarter to enjoy your job and life. (TimeToBrag.com)

©Jeannette L. Seibly, 2012

Are You a Moody Leader?

by
  • Do you thrive on drama?
  • Do people calculate your approachability before talking to you?
  • Do you gossip about your employees or clients?
  • Do others consider you untrustworthy?
  • Do you make decisions based upon your feelings at the moment?

Leaders set examples for the rest of the organization to follow. If you lack consistency in how you communicate, disrespect others in word or deed, or don’t trust others to do their best, employees respond accordingly. If you react (or over-react) before getting the facts, they may be afraid to speak up for fear of retribution. You create more of an issue.

If others are concerned about your effectiveness as a good leader, they will withhold valuable information. In these situations, often your employees’ focus is not on the organization’s goals. They are focused instead on how to work around your moodiness and still keep their jobs.

As a leader, immediate help is required to reaffirm your leadership position and move the enterprise forward. What can you do to resolve this?

Hire a business advisor. Being coachable is critical to anyone’s success, particularly top management. It can be lonely at the top; too often leaders don’t have someone else to talk with and their job can feel like a burden. Talk weekly with a business advisor. Focus on less dramatic ways to handle issues and have the benefit of consistent clarity to guide your organization forward.

Communicate effectively.  #1 concern for any leader! Be prepared to listen more than talk. Learn to ask the right questions. Be open to news you may not like, or new ideas you had not considered. Stop the internal chatterbox ; it inhibits your ability to actually hear what others are saying. When you need to deliver unpopular news or decisions, first think through what you need to say. Write it out. Read it out loud in the mirror. Keep it short, not long-winded.

Stop “should-ing.” Too often we believe people should have known or shouldn’t have said something. We forget the mistakes we’ve made ourselves over the years! A good rule of thumb: When someone does something great, let them know. When they make a mistake, take time to discuss it as soon as possible, one-on-one. When performance concerns are addressed in a consistent and respectful manner, it provides clarity about your expectations. Your employees will usually make the corrections required. If you scream at them, even once, it can damage your long term effectiveness.

©Jeannette L. Seibly, 2012

Effectively Manage Your Leaders’ Focus

by

Many companies today are moving away from the traditional skill-based job descriptions, toward performance-based job descriptions for their leaders. What’s the difference? Skill-based simply means they have the skills and knowledge to do the tasks. They may or may not use these skills to work in the direction of the Vision and Mission of the company. Performance-based is focused on the design and execution of goals and focused action plans to achieve the Company’s intended results.

When companies can clearly define performance expectations up front, both leaders within the company and the newly-hired know what is required. They can focus their efforts with a clear direction, communicate these metrics to their employees and manage accordingly. This takes the guess work out of hiring the right person and conducting effective performance appraisals.

To ensure these new descriptions are successful, you must:

Focus on the results.  Start with action verbs to ensure their role is clear. For example:Lead an initiative to upgrade financial reporting from monthly to weekly. Convert 100 customers to new product/service. Sell 30 customers product/service each month. (Fill in actual name of product or service.) Be sure to include a timeline and budget. The key is to now manage with these numbers to determine what’s working and what needs improvement on a weekly basis. This will ensure no surprises at month end (e.g., people, price point, budgets and/or systems).

Allow for innovation. New ideas are critical for growth. People create workable and sustainable systems and follow them – or not. At the end of the day, these processes must meet the demands of your customers. The leaders within your organization must be able to work with and through others to achieve the intended results, sometimes on a global basis. Use a qualified assessment to ensure clarity of the person’s interest, thinking style and core behaviors. These are critical for hiring for job fit and ongoing laser-like coaching.

Tell the truth.  In order to grow the enterprise for on-going success, it requires truth-telling today. To transform anything, you must succinctly tell the actual issues/circumstances that prevented the results previously or created the new challenges. Share appropriately. For example: when developing an IT system: company experienced 50% growth during the past twelve months, lost 25% of current customers since the system could not handle volume of orders and lack of training prevented managers from up-selling and cross-selling repeat orders.

©Jeannette L. Seibly, 2012