Category: Leadership
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Words That Move Us Forward
Praise recognizes what someone has already done. Encouragement speaks to who they are becoming. One celebrates results. The other calls out potential. Forty years after a conversation with a high school teacher, I’m still learning the difference and why leaders who learn to see growth before success leave a lasting mark on the people they…
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Language Travels
The phrases leaders repeat have a way of traveling. They move from conversations to habits, from habits to expectations, and from expectations to culture. The question isn’t whether language is shaping your organization. The question is whether you’re paying attention to the words that are doing the shaping.
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Trust. Worthy.
Like you, I’ve been on every side of trust. The sidelines watching it change. In the game, trying to repair it. And sometimes, the one who caused the damage. Here’s what trust actually requires, and why the most important move you can make is to Go First.
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The Bar Is Higher. Now What?
We started this series with a high jumper from Southern Oregon who changed his approach when the old one stopped working. In this final post of the Becoming Good at Growth series, we pull it all together and ask one honest question: what are you going to do differently?
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What’s In Your Leader Library?
If you could only recommend five books every leader should read, what would they be? We landed on four. The fifth one… we’re still debating. In Part 4 of the Becoming Good at Growth series, we talk about why leaders are learners and why “good enough” is a slow leak.
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Are You Communicating or Just Talking?
I have a confession. When I’m nervous or unsure, I use too many words. And it turns out, that’s a leadership problem. In Part 3 of the Becoming Good at Growth series, we look at why communication isn’t a courtesy. It’s the operating system of everything we do.
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The K-Cup® Nobody Threw Away
What does a used K-Cup in the office Keurig have to do with leadership? More than you’d think. In Part 2 of the Becoming Good at Growth series, we get practical about what ownership actually looks like, and what gets in the way when things don’t go as planned.
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Why Trying Harder Isn’t the Answer
What if the problem isn’t your effort? What if it’s your approach? In this first post of a five-part series on leadership growth, a high jumper from Southern Oregon and a Marine in a mediocre sci-fi novel make a surprisingly strong case for why trying harder isn’t always the answer.
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Permission for Candor
“Psychological safety is about permission for candor. Not the absence of tension.” I’ve shared this idea in rooms of two and rooms of two hundred. And every time I do, I see something shift in people’s faces. Because somewhere along the way, psychological safety became a synonym for making sure nobody’s uncomfortable. That’s not what…
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What Are You Running From? And To? And Why?
All people should strive to learn before they die, what they are running from, and to, and why. There’s something about getting to a certain age where you start doing the math differently. I’m fully aware that there are more years behind me than ahead of me on this planet. That’s not a complaint, it’s…