Leadership & Development
I developed a greater interest in training and development when I initially started my consulting practice in 2005, and my interest has continued to evolve over time.
I learned, for example, that one of the most powerful questions we can ever ask ourselves is “What will be your legacy?”, that one of the greatest gifts we can give to those around us is to help them become more self-aware by looking at themselves from the perspective of an objective observer and that a modest investment of time from a leader can have a very large positive impact on the career path of those with whom we work.
Another key learning was the degree to which there were simple lessons to be learned from the approaches of elite athletes that could be very helpful to each of us in the workplace.
-Followership: This is a PDF of two-part article I wrote for CAPLA’s NEXUS magazine in late 2015 about “followership”. It focuses on the intangibles that differentiate performance and what we can learn from an objective self-assessment to optimize our contributions and satisfaction in the workplace.
CAPLA NEXUS Followership Article
-So You Think You Can Lead: This is a PDF of a presentation on leadership I gave at two CAPLA luncheons. It touches on such topics as “the eyes of the followers”, integrity and authenticity, caring, the “servant model of leadership”, the leader as “choreographer” and the impact we have on careers and lives more generally with respect to those whom we are privileged to lead.
So You Think You Can Lead CAPLA Presentation
-Spirit of Champions: This is a PDF of a presentation I gave at a GPAC-PJVA Conference in 2013.
Spirit of Champions Presentation
The Spirit of Champions presentation is largely in the context of the similarities between sports and the workplace and the lessons we can learn from the approaches of elite athletes. Relatively few of us actually have any aspiration to be the Sidney Crosby or Connor McDavid of our workplace, of course. There are things that we can learn from a Sidney Crosby or Connor McDavid, though, involving relatively modest adjustments in approach that can help us perform at a higher level and obtain greater satisfaction from our contributions.
To illustrate, an elite athlete has a willingness to look at their performance very objectively because of a continuous desire to improve. An elite athlete has a very accurate assessment of the things he or she does well so that those skills can be used optimally, an equally accurate assessment of the things he or she does not do well and a commitment to self to take action to address those areas of opportunity that are not where they need to be yet. There is an enormous difference, for example, between telling oneself “I don’t do this well enough” and “I don’t do this well enough yet”, as the latter offers both an aspiration to improve and a commitment to self to act on the area of opportunity.
How many of us, for example, are comfortable in looking at ourselves objectively to understand how we make a difference, to identify the things we do very well and how we can build on those strengths to enhance our contributions, to identify the things we do not do well enough yet and build a plan to address those items for which improvement is required?
-CAPLA Legacy Leaders Article: This is a short article that I was requested to write for CAPLA’s NEXUS magazine as part of their Legacy Leaders Series. The article was structured as a response to several questions about leadership. It touches on the personal journey of leadership, key “aha” moments, myths about leadership, the most important aspect of leadership and some overall advice for those in positions of leadership.
2014 CAPLA Legacy Leaders Article
-The Learning Matrix: Many years ago, I’d seen a two-by-two matrix that noted the manner in which skills evolved when learning a new task. This one-page PDF summarizes what is sometimes referred to as “the Learning Matrix” or “the Conscious Competence Model”.