What makes a leader stand out as remarkably effective? Everyone expects great things from leaders—probably more than is humanly possible. But leaders must deliver only four interdependent promises to drive business results. Failure to complete a single promise will likely lead to disappointing outcomes.Consultants Robert J. Anderson and William A. Adams delineate these promises in Mastering Leadership: An Integrated Framewo...

Look at today’s top-performing companies, and you’ll inevitably find a high degree of employee engagement. From frontline workers to CEOs, people are passionate about their companies’ purpose, values and mission.Most workers are motivated to give their best and often go beyond what’s required. Some are lucky enough to work for companies that are consistently designated a “best place to work.”But for countless other organiza...

Up to this point in history, we’ve organized work based on four very different worldviews: impulsive, conformist, achievement and pluralistic. This organizational evolution is tied to the four stages of human consciousness proposed by psychologists Clare Graves, Don Beck and others, as summarized by Frederic Laloux in Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations Inspired by the Next Stage of Human Consciousn...

The way we work isn’t working anymore. Some experts blame traditional organizational hierarchies, incentives that fail to motivate, disengaged employees (two-thirds of the workforce), and a system that overcompensates management while undervaluing frontline workers.New ways of working have already evolved, explains corporate coach Frederic Laloux in Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations Inspired by th...

Successful people are great communicators who recognize that conversations are part of an evolving social process. They aren’t just skilled listeners; they’re attuned to subtle social signals that are more revealing than words alone — and they use them to their advantage. We’re more connected than ever before. The ability to reach out and communicate with people around the globe has never been more accessible. But are we pa...

Human interactions rule our lives. Our social nature may be even more valuable than we realize. In a world where technological advances increasingly provide solutions and perform jobs, our social skills can increase or diminish our value.But most of us—professionals, employees and managers alike—undervalue our social skills. This is not an option in an era of dwindling job opportunities.“When people in an organization devel...

How Great Leaders Manage Perceptions“You can influence people’s perceptions of you by playing to their needs. Once you understand how to make other people feel comfortable with you, you’ve won their approval.” —Corporate marketing consultant Camille Lavington, You’ve Only Got Three Seconds (Main Street Books, 1998)Even at the highest levels of government and business, leaders struggle to communicate their intentions. Most o...

We coach leaders to cultivate, creativity, clarity, focus and trust in a full engagement culture.Creating a State of Flow at WorkOne of my CEO executive coaching clients is working with his executive leadership team to create an organizational culture that unleashes employees’ intrinsic motivation and state of flow. I am coaching him to become more effective at appealing to employees’ intrinsic motivation and core values, a...

Have you ever had a midcareer fantasy where you quit your job and go do something new? Many executives secretly admit to their coaches that they’re contemplating midcareer shifts. They may not actively seek change, but they certainly start imagining it. Of LinkedIn’s 313 million members, 25% are active job seekers; 60% are passive job seekers (not proactively searching for new jobs, but seriously willing to consider viable...

“Leaders often fail to notice when they are obsessed by other issues, when they are motivated to not notice, and when there are other people in their environment working hard to keep them from noticing.” ~ Harvard Business School Professor Max Bazerman As a leader, you’re responsible for making key decisions each day. But how confident are you in your ability to notice all pertinent information? If you’re like most leaders...