Business Toolkit – Page 31 – thoughtLEADERS, LLC: Leadership Training for the Real World

Five Things No One Ever Tells You About Becoming Senior Management

August 21, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Guest Blogger, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

Unveiling the Truth: Navigating the Nuances of Senior Management. Gain insights into the unexpected challenges and rewards of leadership.

Today’s guest post is by Amy Feind Reeves, author of College to Career, Explained (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

Stepping into senior management brings unexpected surprises and overwhelming responsibilities. As you ascend the corporate ladder, you’ll encounter nuances and challenges not found in textbooks.

This article explores these topics, revealing hidden truths about leadership. From decision-making to strategic management, we’ll uncover the multifaceted nature of senior leader roles.

You can’t blame senior management for everything anymore, and you learn why you never should have.

Becoming senior management means you can no longer blame what you perceive as corporate mistakes (or anything you don’t like about work) on senior management. Suddenly, you are senior management and hold the cards. The decisions are yours, and your decisions will not please everyone.

You realize that you cannot optimize every aspect of the company to meet every goal. Some of the goals have inherent conflicts. You are privy to a set of facts and data that only you and your team, and sometimes only you need to manage. With that data, you will make a decision that optimizes what is most important. And some people will be disappointed. It will look like a mistake to them. But no one else knows all the factors that went into your decision.

You must get used to looking out of touch, while the truth is that you are looking at a wider lens than others in the company have access to seeing. Suddenly, you rethink those times you complained about decisions that worked against your line P&L, and you realize senior management wasn’t dumb after all. Becoming a senior manager makes you rethink your opinion of every leadership team you ever worked under.

Organizations and employees don’t always grow in the same direction, at the same rate.

Another hard thing is making decisions about employees who have either been promoted above their ability or whose job effectiveness has changed due to new technology or partnerships. They may be marginalized through no fault of their own but remain key employees because they are well-regarded and influential. For their part, these employees can become frustrated and angry about the company. You want to find a way to keep them happy, but you can’t turn back the clock.

The difficult decision is whether to tip your hand that this individual may be looking at a severance package if they don’t accept the way things stand now and are open to new possibilities. If you don’t share this information, getting the kind of attitude change you need is rare. If you do, you will lose the employee. Maybe not soon or physically, but they will become disengaged.

This decision never gets easier, and the results rarely change. The few times I have done this successfully, it was with key employees intellectually curious enough to join a new field within the organization and enjoy a steep learning curve while applying their senior management skills. This issue is going to become more prevalent in the next three to five years as new skills for managing AI move up the chain of command. My hope is that brighter people than me can figure out a systematic way to address the issue better.

There are tons of resources available to make you a better speaker. You must learn the hard way how to become a great listener.

You get trained in public speaking, and the value of projecting confidence as a leader. But one of the things you don’t get trained in but must learn the hard way up the management ladder is the value of listening. In senior management, where everybody wants to tell you about what they are doing, being able to listen and ask questions is what is important. When you don’t have to care what other people think, it frees your head space for you to listen to, understand, analyze, and react to what others are saying! I wish I had learned this enormously freeing truth earlier!

Early, I would be distracted worrying whether my questions or comments would cause people to judge me. As I grew in my career, I learned people around the table had these same conversations with themselves in their heads. There are no dumb questions. We all need to worry less about being judged and more about listening.

You don’t HAVE to waste time in meetings.

You can say: “Unless you can prove to me that this meeting is not a waste of my time, I won’t attend.” If someone asks for your time, you have a right to know the objective in advance to prepare. You have a right to know why you are being invited and understand what you will be asked to contribute. After the meeting, you deserve to understand what follow-up you are accountable for as a result, when it is due, and how it fits into the objective of the group. This is not a pet peeve because wasting your time in meetings means wasting the company’s money in meetings. You can also let your team know that everyone needs to feel empowered to ask that meeting time be well spent.

The team you have is the team you have.

Everyone is in their role for a reason, and they directly report to you because they have had a series of wins that got them there. It is your job to work with them to find out what their secret sauce is and how you can leverage it to the most significant advantage in their current role. Changes to senior leadership are not only expensive from a cash perspective, but they can cause a reduction in productivity and engagement and send changes throughout the organization. You may not have the team you want, but you must make best use of the team you have.

Embracing the tips above can equip you with a more comprehensive understanding of leadership. Embracing the complexities of decision-making, team dynamics, and personal growth will not only enhance your effectiveness, but also pave the way for a more impactful journey.

Amy Feind Reeves is a distinguished career coach and author of the book College to Career, Explained with a wealth of experience in guiding individuals towards achieving their professional aspirations. With a proven track record in helping individuals navigate the complexities of career development, Amy is a trusted partner for those seeking to unlock their full potential in the professional world. Recognized for her exceptional ability to connect with clients on a personal level, Amy continues to make a significant impact in the realm of career coaching.

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What is your opinion of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts at your company?

August 17, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: What is your opinion of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts at your company?

They’re great! Everyone needs to feel respected, fairly treated and included 41.78%
They’re okay. I get the principle but sometimes it doesn’t work as intended 34.23%
They’re a distraction. We have more important issues to deal with 8.00%
They detract from our work environment and aren’t helpful 8.88%
They’re really bad and don’t have a place in our work environment 7.11%

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Matter. 75% of you feel DEI efforts are important in the workplace. Getting the most out of people requires understanding and accepting them for who they are. DEI efforts are often a way to build awareness of the importance of these dynamics. For those who feel negatively toward these types of efforts, ask yourself if it’s a question of how these efforts are being executed at your company or if it’s because of personal views you have toward the importance of DEI in the workplace. If it’s how the efforts are being carried out, get involved. Offer your thoughts on how these programs could be more effective. If it’s because you don’t see the value in diversity, equity, and inclusion, I encourage you to spend some time with your colleagues who feel otherwise and understand why they see it as being so important. The better we understand one another’s perspectives, the more effectively we’ll all work as teams.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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Why Making Great Decisions Matters Now More than Ever

August 14, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Entrepreneur, Guest Blogger, Innovation, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

How can leaders consistently make great decisions, particularly during times of considerable change and uncertainty?

Today’s guest post is by Jack P. Flaherty, author of The Decision Switch: 7 Principles of Successful Decision-Making (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

We are experiencing one of the greatest revolutions the business world has ever seen and unlike any other we have experienced in our lifetimes.

Are we ready for this?

In 1965, Gordon Moore saw it coming. He posited that the computing power of microchips would double every two years. A prediction he confirmed a decade later, concluding it would likely continue. “Moore’s Law” has since been used to describe the ever-increasing speed of technological innovation. But Mr. Moore and his Law could not have predicted the impact the latest technological developments, such as automation and artificial intelligence (AI), would have on virtually every industry and aspect of business.

Let’s take a moment and define some important terms. Automation is our ability to use software scripts to perform what were historically human tasks in a fraction of the time, reducing the need for manual labor and ostensibly increasing efficiency. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is our ability to use new technology platforms for processing data, recognizing patterns, and making decisions, all while constantly learning and improving their effectiveness, very much like humans.

What jobs and industries will be impacted by automation, if not displaced? What about AI and the ripple effect it already has had on creativity and informed decision-making? How will automation and AI continue to drive the current wave of digital disruption, and will we even need accountants or fast-food restaurant order-takers, after they become ubiquitous and widely adopted? Conversely, what jobs and industries will be created as a result? Who will be the winners and the losers?

Now, more than ever before, it is essential for today’s leaders and their organizations to adopt a decisive and agile mindset; one which can monitor the horizon, identify opportunities and threats, and make the types of productive decisions required to achieve their objectives and goals. I assure you that those who are decisive and agile, able to quickly pivot and pursue new opportunities will come out on top.

So, how do we do this and do it consistently?

First, we have to realize that decision-making is a process, not an event. It is the ability to assess and identify when you are being prompted by a change of any kind. The current big change is a technological change of the first magnitude. But the truth is, change of one kind or another is happening all the time in organizations. Those changes may create less urgency than what the current wave of digital disruption is creating, but they need to be successfully managed, nonetheless.

Over the past two decades, I have worked with and in top organizations. It was clear to me that some were far better at making decisions than others. Several years ago, I began to develop a decision-making framework that I call ‘The Decision Switch’, based on proven principles I have myself adopted. I have used it extensively and taught it to my teams with remarkable results. Seeing a growing need, created by an increasingly complex and less forgiving business climate, I sought to address a critical development need for leaders and authored my new book, The Decision Switch: 7 Principles of Successful Decision-Making.

The framework for The Decision Switch:

Triage First: Increase your productivity by assessing and prioritizing before taking action
Follow Your North Star: Defining a clear objective serves to align all subsequent decisions
Collaborate with Others: The power of numbers helps to achieve your goals
Recognize Cognitive Bias: Eliminating mental blinders creates more productive outcomes
Establish a Champion: Visionary leaders are able to provide credibility and influence others
Manage Fallout: Integrity and legacy start with awareness, empathy, and: helping others
Practice Self-Reflection: An acute sense of self-awareness empowers personal growth

A framework built on the validated premise, decision-making is a process and not an event. While not necessary to follow it in the exact order, all the steps are important in whatever order they are taken. Following it will keep leaders from making knee-jerk or uninformed decisions and ultimately, mistakes. It will help identify potential risks and impediments and enable you to establish a clear path forward. Allowing you to move forward confidently, knowing you have asked the right questions and made the most optimal choice available.

While digital disruption is creating tremendous opportunities for those able to catch and ride the wave of change, it is sure to wreak havoc on those paralyzed by fear and anxiety, due to a lack of understanding and heightened uncertainty about the future of their business or career.

The decisions that will be made around these new and quickly evolving technologies and yet-to-be-developed innovations, will need to be continually assessed to determine whether you or your organization is ready for what’s next, and how to proceed with confidence in your choices and actions.

At the end of the day, it’s a simple equation: Better Decisions = Better Outcomes. It’s completely possible and that’s good for everyone involved.

I wish you all the best.

Consultant and speaker, Jack Flaherty, is the author of The Decision Switch: 7 Principles of Successful Decision-Making.

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Which of the following best describes your organization’s approach to promoting people?

August 10, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: Which of the following best describes your organization’s approach to promoting people?

Promote them when they demonstrate 70-80% of the ability required at the next level 39.85%
Promote them when they demonstrate 100% of what’s required at the next level 10.16%
Promote them once they’ve been serving as an “interim” at the next level for a while 13.29%
Promise promotion but don’t be clear on what it takes to achieve it 23.43%
Promise promotion, set clear standards, and then move the standards when they get close 4.68%
We never promote anyone 8.59%

Take the risk or lose them. While a sizeable portion (40%) of you report your organization promotes someone when they’re almost ready for the role, 24% are more conservative and wait for the person to be in an interim role at the next level or fully-functioning at the next level. While this mitigates some risk, it also reduces motivation and increases frustration. You’re basically telling the person “we don’t believe you can get to that level of performance so you have to prove to us that you can before we take the risk and promote you.” Not a very motivating message or vote of confidence in their ability to grow. For those who promise promotion but aren’t clear or who change the standards before the promotion is due, you’re going to lose those people eventually. People have career goals and don’t take kindly to being toyed with. Move the standard too often or never articulate what it takes to get promoted and you might find your people moving on and getting promoted somewhere else. The cost to replace someone is drastically higher than promoting from within. Take the risk and develop them. After all – that’s what being a leader is all about.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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Building Bench Strength and Succession Plans for Your Team

August 9, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Innovation, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

Succession planning is critical to ensuring the talent gaps are short when a key player leaves or gets promoted.

One of the great things about leading a high performing team is that people grow and they grow very quickly. The problem with that is they’re always looking for new opportunities. You’re always at risk of losing someone either to a promotion within the organization or they move on to bigger and better things outside of your company. As a leader, you need to be prepared for these changes because over-reliance on an individual player can be extremely dangerous.

For example, my dad was in the Navy and he was on a submarine, and they had a badge that was called the Dolphins. And the way it worked was that every individual in the crew had to know and be able to perform the jobs of every single other crew member. Because think about it—on a submarine if someone got injured or went down, you couldn’t have the rest of the crew not know how to perform that role because it would put the entire organization at risk.

There are huge benefits to cross-training. First, it builds redundancy. If someone leaves your organization, you have someone else who can step in and fulfill those responsibilities because the business needs to continue operating. Second, cross-training gives people a development opportunity so they can grow. And third, the people conducting that cross-training are learning how to train and develop others. So you’re doing two things at the same time. That individual is learning a new skill and the person teaching it is learning the skill of developing others.

Succession planning is critical to ensuring the talent gaps are short when a key player leaves or gets promoted. As a leader, you need to start looking ahead beyond what your current team has from a people standpoint. You need to build a robust talent pipeline of people who can join your team and fill roles when gaps arise. Succession planning is not an HR responsibility. It’s yours. HR does the recruiting. HR helps you find the candidates. But as the leader, you need to understand and build that talent pipeline. You can ask HR to come in and assist you in that work. You should be regularly assessing the talent on your team as well as looking across the broader organization. Ideally, you have a short list of people elsewhere in the organization you would like to recruit should you have an opening.

I know some leaders who actually have that talent pipeline written out and it also includes people outside the company who they know from their own personal and professional network. By staying in touch with those people in other parts of the organization or in other companies, you can quickly reach out to those people and fill a role much more rapidly than the leader who doesn’t have a talent pipeline built for an unexpected opening.

By having a robust talent pipeline and making sure you’re doing cross-training and having that bench strength built in advance of a role opening up, you’re going to fill your openings faster, you’re going to get better talent that is better qualified for that role, and you’re not going to have to just settle and say, “Well, I need a body. I need anybody to just be able to do this work.”

Want to learn more about building high-performing teams? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to build high-performing teams. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

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8 Tips for Avoiding Your Leadership Blindspots

August 8, 2023/0 Comments/in Books, Business Toolkit, Guest Blogger, Leadership /by Trevor Jones

Learning to ask the right questions in the right way is a key technique for surfacing blindspots that can easily be overlooked. The best leaders know that the questions they ask are as important as the answers they provide.

Today’s post is by Robert Bruce Shaw, author of Leadership Blindspots: How Successful Leaders Identify and Overcome the Weaknesses That Matter (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

Leaders are faced with two conflicting needs. The first is to act with a deep confidence in their abilities and the strategies they are implementing. This allows them to pursue audacious goals and persevere when faced with adversity. The second is to be aware of their vulnerabilities and the need for a healthy dose of self-doubt. This allows them to see themselves and their situations accurately — avoiding, in particular, the hazards of over-confidence and excessive optimism. Those who fail to do so run the risk of having blindspots — which are the unrecognized weaknesses or threats that have the potential to harm a leader and his or her company.

Savvy leaders understand that blindspots, while they vary in severity and are different for each individual, are not the exception — instead, they “come with the territory.” The question then becomes: How do I surface and address the blindspots that matter? One way is to ask the right questions in the right way. Here are some guidelines for identifying blindspots:

1. Avoid yes-or-no questions. Closed-end questions (those that can answered yes or no) are efficient, but don’t surface information that may be critical to understanding a potential weakness or threat. Questions are called open-ended when they allow for a variety of responses and provoke a fuller discussion. For example, a closed-end question might be, “Are you going to deliver your business plan this year?” while an open-ended question is, “Tell me about the risks you face in delivering your plan and the actions you are taking to mitigate them?”

2. Don’t lead the witness. Hard-charging leaders often push to confirm their own assumptions about what is occurring in a given situation and often want to move quickly to a plan of action. This can result in questions that are really statements, such as, “Doesn’t this mean that we don’t have a problem with compliance in this area and can move forward as planned?” These types of questions, particularly when posed by those in positions of power, often prevent contrary points of view and necessary data from surfacing.

How clearly is your organization’s culture articulated and disseminated through the company?

August 3, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: How clearly is your organization’s culture articulated and disseminated through the company?

Very: we have clear statements of our culture and everyone knows and understands it 38.59%
Somewhat: people generally know what our culture is but there is some lack of clarity 34.65%
Not very: we have conflicting views of culture and no one can really articulate it 20.47%
Not at all: what’s culture? 6.29%

Culture drives execution. Culture is the sum of your daily actions. If your desired culture isn’t clearly defined and disseminated, you’re leaving it up to people’s discretion and judgment as to how they should act. Absent guidance, they’ll do the best they can but their choices might not be consistent with the culture you’re trying to build. Invest the time in defining that culture. Be clear about what behaviors are or are not acceptable. Help people understand what the aspiration is for how your organization will function. Be sure you’re routinely disseminating and reinforcing that culture. Sharing it once isn’t enough. Those cultural messages need to be projected as often as possible. Remember – you have new hires all the time and people get busy which makes it easy to forget a “culture meeting” you had a month ago. Celebrate when people take actions exemplifying your culture – share those stories so people feel rewarded and others can see what “good” looks like. It will take a while at first to start shifting the culture but eventually the flywheel starts spinning because people see others around them behaving in a culturally-consistent way.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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The Art of Mental Toughness: How Extraordinary Individuals Thrive in the Face of Adversity

August 1, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Guest Blogger, Leadership /by Trevor Jones

Explore the transformative journey towards enduring discomfort and uncertainty. Discover the techniques extraordinary individuals use to develop mental resilience. Embrace voluntary hardship and self-accountability to unlock your hidden potential for success.

Today’s guest post is by Polina Marinova Pompliano, author of HIDDEN GENIUS: The Secret Ways Of Thinking That Power The World’s Most Successful People (CLICK HERE to get your copy).

Mental toughness is a quality that sets extraordinary individuals apart from the rest, enabling them to endure discomfort and uncertainty for extended periods. But what exactly is mental toughness? Can it be achieved without undergoing severe stress and trauma? Why do some people seem to possess it inherently while others struggle to develop it? Delving into the world of mental toughness, I explore techniques used by remarkable individuals to master it.

Manufacturing Hardship

David Goggins serves as a prime example of someone who has embarked on a transformative journey toward mental toughness. Despite battling asthma, a learning disability, a stutter, and low self-esteem, Goggins found inspiration while watching a show on the Discovery Channel depicting the grueling Navy SEAL Hell Week. Motivated to change his life, he set out to become a Navy SEAL, pushing his physical and mental limits along the way.

Goggins recognized that physical fitness alone was not enough; he needed to strengthen his mind as well. Having endured bullying, racism, and abuse throughout his life, he carried deep-seated insecurities. To overcome them, he began participating in extreme endurance races, pushing his body and mind to their limits. He discovered the power of mental tools to endure pain and developed strategies to overcome the barriers that the mind sets.

Goggins introduced two crucial tools for mental toughness. The first is what he calls “The 40% Rule.” This rule challenges the common belief that we are done when our minds tell us so. In reality, when we feel exhausted and on the verge of giving up, we are often only 40% done. By recognizing this, we can push through the discomfort and reach new levels of performance.

The second tool is the “accountability mirror.” He used this method to confront his insecurities head-on. Looking at himself in the mirror, he acknowledged his weaknesses and past failures. However, he didn’t stop there; he outlined steps on sticky notes, creating a roadmap for personal growth. By holding himself accountable and taking action, He gradually transformed himself and gained confidence.

Goggins’ story highlights the importance of voluntarily manufacturing hardship as a means to build mental toughness. By intentionally seeking discomfort and challenging oneself daily, individuals can develop resilience that prepares them for inevitable hardships. This mindset allows them to break free from comfortable routines and overcome the limitations imposed by their own minds.

Developing an Alter Ego

Goggins’ approach included the development of an alter ego to distance himself from his past struggles and insecurities. By creating the persona of “Goggins,” he transformed from a weak and insecure individual into one of the world’s toughest athletes. This deliberate self-distancing technique allows individuals to reason objectively, manage emotions better, and build confidence. Adopting an alter ego can help individuals overcome self-imposed limitations and redefine their identity to align with their desired self.

The art of mental toughness is a powerful attribute that enables individuals to endure, persevere, and succeed. By understanding the strategies employed by extraordinary individuals, we can cultivate mental resilience within ourselves. Embracing discomfort, switching from self-criticism to self-accountability, and developing an alter ego are just a few of the techniques that can help us tap into our hidden potential. With practice and determination, we can train our minds to navigate challenging situations, overcome obstacles, and unlock our own mental toughness.

Polina Marinova Pompliano, author of HIDDEN GENIUS: The Secret Ways Of Thinking That Power The World’s Most Successful People is founder of The Profile, a new media company that features longform profiles of successful people and companies each week. Previously, she spent five years at Fortune where she wrote more than 1,300 articles and earned the trust of prominent investors and entrepreneurs.

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How effectively does your leadership team function?

July 27, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: How effectively does your leadership team function?

Extremely — they are a high-performing team 14.60%
Very — they generally work well together 35.77%
Somewhat — they function but have their issues 30.66%
Not very — they struggle to work well together 12.41%
Not at all — they’re a dysfunctional team 6.56%

Functional versus dysfunctional leadership teams. It’s about 50/50 that leadership teams are functioning well or poorly. Usually their level of performance directly affects the performance of their broader teams. The real question is why are some teams high-functioning and others aren’t. This is usually a matter of trust. That trust is based on how well the team members know one another, can predict each other’s behaviors, and have team/individual goals that are aligned with organizational goals. How well do your leadership team members really know one another? This is more than happy hour superficial knowledge. It’s about understanding each other’s values, goals, and perspectives. Having a deeper understanding of the individual makes their behaviors more understandable and predictable. That predictability is the basis of trust. If you don’t have this depth of understanding on your leadership team, start building it. Spend time in candid conversations on values, goals, and beliefs. The sooner you improve trust on the team, the sooner you’ll see improved performance.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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Developing Your Team: Building Individual Capabilities

July 26, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Innovation, Leadership, Strategy /by Trevor Jones

One your biggest responsibilities as a leader is helping your team members identify the places they need to grow and then giving them the opportunities to learn those skills.

Even though the members of your team might be high performing, they can always achieve the next level of performance. One your biggest responsibilities as a leader is helping them identify the places they need to grow and then giving them the opportunities to learn those skills. As you think about an individual’s development plan, there are some very clear steps that you can take to help them get to that next level.

First, look at the skills that are required based on the competencies defined by that role. Different roles require different sets of skills and you should be able to document for each role what the set of skills is for somebody to perform well in that role. Your job as a leader is to look at the next level of performance that that individual can step into and say at their current level they’re fine and they’re meeting all the competency requirements but if I were to promote them or look at expanded responsibilities for that person, how would they stack up at that next level of performance?

Once you’ve identified the gaps, you have to take a moment to think about why the gap exists. Is is that we’ve never trained this person on this skill? Is is they’ve never had an opportunity to demonstrate the skill? Once you have an understanding of why that gap exists, you need to sit down with that individual and discuss why they think the gap exists. Help them understand where they currently perform, where you expect them to perform, and what that gap looks like in terms of actual demonstrable skills that you should be seeing every single day.

Once those gaps are identified, identify specific projects or specific deliverables that the individual can take on as their responsibilities—where they’re going to be able to start performing those tasks and building those skills. Ask for their commitment to filling those gaps, because if somebody doesn’t want to grow, no matter how hard you push them, they’re not going to step into that next role. By getting their commitment to that growth, they’re going to be much more receptive to taking on additional responsibilities, going to additional training, and working a little bit harder in areas they’re not yet comfortable.

Once you both have agreement, document that agenda and lay it out as their individual development plan. In targeting their development toward specific projects you give the individual two things. One is you give them real-world experience performing the activity that they’re not yet familiar with. Second, you give them clarity and focus. You help them link the competencies to actual behaviors so they can spend their time dedicated to filling that skill gap. My rule is they should be able to do 70% of that project very easily without a lot of effort and that incremental 30% is where they’re going to develop and learn and grow.

Document their growth over time and renew the gap filling cycle of understanding. Great, you’ve built these competencies. Here’s the next set of gaps we need to fill. Here are the corresponding projects. Then you just continue with that cycle over time. Hopefully, by the time their annual review comes around, you can say, “Here are the projects you performed against and here are the new competencies that you have.”

So your role as a leader, in terms of developing others, really boils down to understanding what the requirements are for their role from a competency standpoint and then identifying gaps and tying them to very specific projects. And in doing so, that individual will see themselves grow over time.

Want to learn more about building high-performing teams? How about taking an entire course on it? Check out the video below to learn more about the course and get started. Or you can go directly to the course and start learning how to build high-performing teams. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

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Mastering Interpersonal Communication: The Key to Professional Growth

July 25, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Communications, Guest Blogger, Leadership /by Trevor Jones

If you want to grow in your career, it’s essential that you dedicate time to skills such as active listening, direct communication, and giving and receiving constructive feedback.

Today’s guest post is by Dr. Laurie Moroco—Certified Business Coach, Keynote Speaker & Corporate Trainer.

For many of us, the career ladder feels like a slippery slope. You might feel like you have no control over your career and that the decisions being made over your head aren’t always in your best interest.

However, one skill puts the rungs on the ladder of success within your reach. That skill involves how well you communicate with other people on an interpersonal level, and it can make all the difference in growing as a professional.

How communication skills promote career growth

It’s difficult to find a job description that doesn’t list “excellent communications skills” among its listed requirements, but this is because strong communication skills are crucial in so many aspects of your career. Whether you’re trying to connect with your coworkers, manage a team, or build strong relationships with clients, mastering interpersonal communication will help you on your way.

Since childhood, we have found ways to talk with the people around us — yet, somehow, it’s still something that many of us struggle with. When we learn to practice active listening, speaking directly, and how to accept and apply feedback, we can start improving our interpersonal communication skills and positively impacting our professional growth.

Start by practicing active listening

The first quality that marks strong communicators may be somewhat surprising. Rather than talking, this marker involves knowing when not to talk.

Active listening is a skill. It’s not simply about hearing what another person is saying, it’s about understanding them and connecting with the person — the individual — who is speaking to you. Active listening shows respect for the speaker and allows both parties to learn from each other.

We’ve all had moments where we felt like someone was talking over us, or perhaps too involved in their own thoughts to properly listen to us. And while learning how to master active listening does require practice, especially for those who have been misled into believing that talking is more valuable than listening, anyone can become better at it with the right effort.

To improve your active listening skills, practice being present when talking with someone. Try not to let your mind wander and focus on what the other person is saying, instead of forming your own opinions, then ask questions when they are done. Repeating and restating are very effective techniques to use. You can say things like, “what I think I heard you say was…”

Active listening involves empathy, meaning you have to understand the emotions and meaning behind another person’s words and be willing to look at the story from their point of view, learn new information, and connect with others.

Effective communication requires being clear and direct

The second marker of a master communicator is honesty. When you are able to say what you mean, you will immediately see yourself becoming a better communicator.

This requires you to resist the urge to be overly polite and indirect when speaking with others, especially in professional settings. For instance, if your boss or a colleague asks you a question, don’t leave them with a noncommittal answer, as vague statements leave things open for interpretation. While you may feel you are being polite or deferring, these statements only lead to confusion and miscommunication.

Instead, find ways to convey your message in a manner that is clear, concise, and lets the other party know what you want (and why) without being overly emotional or aggressive. If there is something that needs to happen outside of your control in order for you to do your job effectively, such as equipment and training, communicate those requirements upfront so they are made known.

Learn how to give and receive professional feedback

Mastering interpersonal communication in a professional setting involves learning how to both give and receive feedback. Whether you are an employee or a leader in your organization, the constructive feedback you receive is critical to your professional development and growth. It enables you to clarify expectations, learn from your mistakes, and become more confident in your role.

Similarly, being able to deliver positive feedback to others is not only vital to your professional growth, but is also extremely easy. The next time you’re in a meeting or on a call with your team, make it a point to tell someone they’ve done a good job by highlighting something they excelled at within the past week or two.

Negative feedback, on the other hand, is notoriously more challenging to deliver. Few people want to have difficult conversations with their peers, and may feel the urge to soften the message or delay the discussion altogether. However, doing so leaves issues unaddressed and allows issues to fester and worsen. The more you practice delivering timely feedback, the more confident you will become in your communication.

Feedback is a two-way street, and being open to receiving it — without taking it personally — is the fastest way to learn from other professionals in your field. When someone takes the time to offer feedback, it doesn’t mean they are criticizing you or thinking less of you as a person, it may simply mean they want what’s best for the organization as a whole

Interpersonal communication skills are crucial for professional growth and success

If you want to grow in your career, it’s essential that you dedicate time to skills such as active listening, direct communication, and giving and receiving constructive feedback. Mastering these skills will completely change the game of your professional life for the better. If you want to build relationships with colleagues and clients, communicate your ideas confidently, or ask for the promotion you deserve, start by learning how to communicate effectively with others.

Dr. Laurie Moroco has always been an advocate of competent and effective communication. As a solopreneur, her businesses have been featured on Rachel Ray, MSN and Working Mother, and the Republican National Convention. Dr. Moroco became a full-time tenured professor and communications chair, and she is now an assistant dean of instruction at a Colorado institute. In addition to being a professor, Dr. Morocco is also a certified master business strategist, a corporate leadership trainer, and a working mom of four children. Laurie is passionate about mentoring other entrepreneurs and encouraging them to ELEVATE their success to the next level.

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Which do you find more challenging: speaking in front of a large group or having a difficult one-on-one conversation?

July 20, 2023/0 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Leadership, Poll /by Trevor Jones

Our reader poll today asks: Which do you find more challenging: speaking in front of a large group or having a difficult one-on-one conversation?

Speaking in front of a large group 40.00%
Having a difficult one-on-one conversation 60.00%

Having uncomfortable conversations. A significant percentage of you report that the challenging one-on-one conversation is more difficult than speaking in front of a large group. This is most likely because there’s less of an emotional connection with the large group and in the one-on-one discussion, it may feel like you’re hurting someone you care about. To make those one-on-one conversations easier, focus on the facts. Make it about the behaviors, not about the person. Be clear on observable behaviors that are undesirable. Imagine you had a recording of the behavior and you were explaining the video recap of it. Once you’ve established those facts, offer your suggestions on how you want the behavior to change. Emphasize that this isn’t about them as a person. Instead it’s about changing actions to get a better result. Hopefully that approach will make those challenging conversations easier to have.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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