Strategic Serendipity

I recently gave you one way to use a journal in your personal and professional development process but there are many more.  Journals are important because the exercise of writing things down gives you time to reflect, process, make connections, and plan future courses of action.  I know it seems like this is the last thing in the world that you have time to start, but I know it will make a huge difference if you commit to it.  My challenge to you is to journal for the next 30 days and decide for yourself whether it is indeed worth your time.  For those taking the challenge, I will post journaling prompts on my Facebook Page everyday that you can use if you don't have something to write about.  (Like the Facebook Page while you're there and select Get Notifications if you want to receive the daily journalling prompts automatically.) The first question you face sometimes seems the hardest - where will I keep my journal? If you go to your local book store ...

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is based on the work of Swiss psychiatrist Carl G. Jung. Jung observed that people have inborn preferences for gathering information and making decisions and that these preferences guide an individual’s behavior. The mother/daughter team of Katherine Cook Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers expanded on Jung’s theories and created an assessment to make the combined work accessible to all individuals. Today, the assessment is used by most Fortune 100 companies and over two million people worldwide, annually. The assessment identifies an individual’s inborn preferences on four dichotomous scales: where you focus your energy, how you prefer to take in information, how you make decisions, and how you deal with the outer world. Type is best used to understand other people, improve communication, and develop individual skills. The first dichotomy is Extraversion (gets energy from other people) and Introversion (gets energy from reflection).  The second...

"Cause everybody needs to break free, from reality."  Kenny Chesney My toddler son is getting his four back teeth.  Monday night he was grumpy and up every hour crying. Tuesday I took off to take him to the doctor, because such intense pain had to be something life threatening, right?  Nope, they told me he was teething.  They had some great ideas for keeping him relatively comfortable so he went to daycare on Wednesday and evidently had a great day.  And I had a horrible day at work.  I mean the kind where you end up taking lunch at 10:30 just so you don't cry at work.  When I picked my son up at daycare, he proceeded to cry for three hours straight.  (You have to stay ahead of pain and I can't do that if he is at daycare for the full day.)  I literally crashed fifteen minutes after he did. Today was a better day at work but my days are necessarily filled with people asking me questions.  So when I left work a little early, inste...

My 18-month old son is learning tons of words a day and we are constantly talking when we are waiting for a bus, shopping in a store, etc.  I name things and sometimes he'll repeat what I say.  With the things he knows (like train, bus, and puppy) I will often ask him what is that?  What I have noticed is that if someone else is around and my son doesn't answer right away, the adult will answer for him.  Now sometimes he is playing shy and sometimes I am pretty sure he is thinking "I am not a performing monkey mom!" but either way, jumping in and giving him the answer before he has even had a chance to process is not the way to teach him.  And just because he doesn't answer right away, does not mean he is stupid or incompetent.  He knows how, in his own little way, to ask for help if he needs it and I have learned to wait for that indication before jumping in and taking over.  Sounds relatively simple and like the rambling of a mother who hasn't gotten...

I am struck by the number of amazing leaders I hear lately saying "there is nothing I can do to make things better for my team given the climate in which we work today."  Times are difficult, particularly in the federal sector where employees are facing furloughs, an increased workload, or both.  But how can you expect to maintain or increase employee engagement when you yourself are slowly disengaging either through burn-out or personal advancement disappointments? Albert Einstein said, "Setting an example is not the main means of influencing others, it is the only means." If you expect your team to weather the storm, you better be the first one in line with an umbrella and a raincoat.  Seriously. When leaders say there is nothing that can be done, they convey that they have given up.  Why would an employee keep pushing forward when their leader has given up? Does this mean that you should start pumping the soundtrack from the broadway musical Annie through...

Are you the type of person who likes to start one thing, finish it, and move on to the next? If so, I truly admire you! If not, I feel your drive (and sometimes pain) to be in the middle of many multiple projects all at once. People with this quality have to watch out for two major detailers - not finishing anything and losing track of things. Before I got pregnant, I rarely kept a solid calendar and made lists only when I was feeling overwhelmed. Call it mommy-brain or call it exceeding my capacity to remember things (or call it way too much Diet Coke) but now if something exceeds three things I have to make a list. Considering that I am usually juggling multiple types of projects at work, multiple volunteer commitments, multiple home-based businesses, a pile of bills that always seem to add up to more than my income, and raising a 17-month old son this new "rule of three" means everything goes on a list. 1. Consolidated Source for Lists My favorite way to do this...

"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are."  Theodore Roosevelt How often do we say, "if only I had the authority/power/time/money to change things?"  I am as guilty of this as anyone, I know what I "would" do if given a chance. But every day is a chance to shine.  We aren't all Ryan Seacrest, Bill Gates, or Peyton Manning.  And not to discount the contributions of those people.  But each one of us creates a ripple around us every day by our actions and behavior to others.  If you can't form a foundation, that doesn't mean you can't help those who have less than you. Think of the people who have had the most impact on your life?  Would I know their names or are they that special teacher that didn't give up on you, your parents, or a dear friend?  If those who impact your life in the biggest ways have unknown names, why can't you make an impact with what you have where you are? We typically place more limitations ...

A few months ago I wrote a post about making the most out of professional development programs .  With many training budgets being cut or eliminated, the days of formal development programs where employees had nothing to do but focus on learning may be a thing of the past.  That may not be an entirely bad thing, if organizations move to more effective blended programs, however, it does mean that participation in formal programs will be harder to be selected for.  With the changes we know are coming in the make up of the workforce and the speed at which emerging leaders will need to become leaders, the decline in formal program participation will result in little "bench" strength in organizations.  Those individuals who choose to commit to a program on their own, outside of work, will be far ahead of their counterparts who expect the organization to teach them what they need to know. If you haven't already worked through Your Personal Plan - Part I , do so now. So...

When someone engages with you in a virtual "conversation" via text, message, or e-mail how do you balance being responsive while staying on task. I have heard people who have a rule that if three or more messages go back and forth it is time to pick up the phone. This is a good rule for high priority discussions (which includes family members, friends, etc.) if you are in a situation where you can pick up a phone and speak with the person. There are those times when that just isn't an option. Here are four easy steps for handling those "conversations" when you can't pick up the phone or when you have to stay focused on your current task.  1.  Prioritize Is this something that requires your attention right now?  If yes, either pick up the phone or stop and shift your focus to responding. Many times that back and forth virtual exchange is caused because one party (sometimes more) is multi-tasking and not fully reading the exchange. If you stop and fo...

We've all been there, that moment when you know you've made a mistake.  What do you do?  If you look around you in the world you will see that there are different ways people handle a mistake. 1.  Blame someone else.  I think we've all probably been on the receiving end of this one before. 2.  Ignore it and hope it goes unnoticed.  And how often does this really work? 3.  Own up to it.  Much harder than it sounds. As leaders the way you handle mistakes will be noticed and followed by those who work for you.  In addition, the way you respond to other's mistakes will be similarly noticed.  Here are some good tips for handling mistakes. If you made the mistake. 1.  Own up to it. 2.  Propose a fix. 3.  Accept the consequences. 4.  Learn from the mistake. 5.  Move on. Don't beat yourself up for a mistake.  Some are huge and sometimes step three may mean the loss of a job, a friendsh...

Here's your chance to sound off - what advice would you give a new college grad entering the workforce if you could?  Related post to follow...

I heard a story today from a person who has been through something we have all been through...something she cared very deeply about and had worked very hard to build was shoved aside by co-workers and a boss who did not realize what it really meant to her and why.  It even started out not having the same meaning to her and I am not really sure if she understood why it was so important to her until today.  So people made a decision about something and when she tried to provide another perspective they blew her off.  Royally.  She was at that place, again, we have ALL been there at one time or another, where she thought she should just back off and shut up.  Now I admit, there are times when that is appropriate.  But when we picked apart the hurt feelings of being ignored, the rational reasons the decision was wrong in her mind, and her perception of the hypocrisy we found out why she cared so much.  She valued the program on some personal as well as bus...

In honor of the Louisville Cardinals NCAA Men's Basketball Title here's a quote on motivation... " The only way to get people to like working hard is to motivate them. Today, people must understand why they're working hard. Every individual in an organization is motivated by something different."  Rick Pitino I've told you what Thomas the Train taught me about Employee Engagement .  Now I'm bringing in Rick Pitino?  But seriously, think about it, this guy is working with young kids who could probably chuck it all and make more money in one year than I'll ever see and he keeps them in college, working together, for a title.  So I guess some things are more important than money.  It is just about know what is important to the people you are working with.   With the economy and the budget crisis teetering everyone back and forth, raises and bonuses are becoming things of myth.  As managers and employers, we need to look outside of the box for ways t...

No, I have not lost my mind.  It is the classic catch-22 - you can't get the job you want until you have experience and you can't get the experience because they won't hire you.  It is the same for new college graduates, mid-career transitions, and moving up the corporate ladder.  So how do you get that coveted "experience" to land you your dream job? I have always believed that volunteering offers you a chance to give back to your community and try out new things without making a major career change.  If you have an opportunity to serve on a committee that is in the area you think you want to go in, I say jump on it.  Not only do you get an insider's view of the position and some coveted "experience" but you will likely find some top notch mentors along the way. I also think that taking on volunteer or collateral duties at work is a great way to challenge yourself, network with others, and try something out on a temporary basis.  If you learn b...

Did you know that toddlers eat? A lot? All o the seasoned parents out there are laughing at my discovery and remembering the time that you learned that particular lesson. You could have all told me a week ago to be prepared for this and I would have laughed and said I've got it covered, after all, I handled infant growth spurts! But I didn't really get it until I spent sixty hours straight with him eating, sleeping in three hour chunks, and playing at full capacity in a continuous circle. So this morning I ran it by the expert at his daycare and she laughed and assured me that toddlers are bottomless pits. So absent proper sleep, I was able I go into work assured that I was doing the right things. Leadership lessons are a lot like that. You can read about different situations but until you actually experience them, you don't really get it. Sometimes it takes immersing yourself in the situation to really understand what is happening. And then nothing beats discussing i...