Who inspires you? Who supports you? American culture tends to be individualistic, where we want to do things ourselves with no help. So when considering a life change, we turn inwards to figure out what we want. And yet, there are other people who have walked similar paths before – why not learn from them?…
Month: December 2020
I almost never talk myself up, but I have realized that only talking about where I can improve is not a balanced view of myself. As a result, I want to celebrate my accomplishments more.”
I almost never talk myself up, but I have realized that only talking about where I can improve is not a balanced view of myself. As a result, I want to celebrate my accomplishments more. With that preamble, I would like to share that I achieved both of my 2020 goals for my coaching business…
How does something get easier to do?”
How does something get easier to do? By doing it. Seems obvious, right? But why does it work that way? There’s a neuroscience saying that “neurons that fire together, wire together”; in other words, when we do something repeatedly, our brain actually rewires itself to make it easier to do in the future. This is…
Look for something new, or stick to what you know?”
Look for something new, or stick to what you know? Mathematicians would call this explore or exploit, with the question being whether you should explore new options in case there’s something better out there, or exploit current options and maximize your impact. If you stop exploring too soon, it’s called premature optimization – you are…
What options are you not considering?”
What options are you not considering? I have been pushing back against binary either-or thinking in my clients, and recalled Jerry Weinberg’s Rule of Three: “If you haven’t thought of three possibilities, you haven’t thought enough”. When I Googled for it, I came across this quote from Virginia Satir, a therapist who was one of…
What is your threshold for accepting new work? ” “” “This question has come up with several clients recently, who feel overwhelmed with too much work to do. They are not wasting time, and actually want to do all the work they have – there’s just too much of it. This is a problem of…
What is your threshold for accepting new work? “
What is your threshold for accepting new work? This question has come up with several clients recently, who feel overwhelmed with too much work to do. They are not wasting time, and actually want to do all the work they have – there’s just too much of it. This is a problem of success –…
What mistakes have you made in your job in the last year?” “” “One of my mentors (Jon Williams) once asked me this question, and I proudly said I hadn’t made any major mistakes. He looked at me sadly and said something like “If you’re not making a catastrophic mistake at work at least once…
What mistakes have you made in your job in the last year?”
What mistakes have you made in your job in the last year? One of my mentors (Jon Williams) once asked me this question, and I proudly said I hadn’t made any major mistakes. He looked at me sadly and said something like “If you’re not making a catastrophic mistake at work at least once or…
What is leadership?”
What is leadership? As an executive coach, I work with my clients to understand what leadership means to them as they work towards becoming better leaders. But I came up with a definition this week that I quite like: Leadership is identifying gaps and mobilizing people to fill them. What I like about this definition…