When faced with a setback or crisis, do you have the right leadership mindset for overcoming adversity? In my last blog post, I outlined three steps leaders can take to defeat obstacles, manage crises and conquer setbacks, suggested by Ryan Holiday, in his book, The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials…
As a leader, how effective are you in overcoming adversity? Responses to setbacks or crises not only test leadership character, they define it. Your reaction in times of adversity reveals your leadership effectiveness. Some difficulties are devastating, of course, but they are also compounded by leadership responses. There’s no real training for adversity on the…
A good book on mental toughness is Mental Toughness for Women Leaders: 52 Tips To Recognize and Utilize Your Greatest Strengths by LaRae Quy. These suggestions also apply equally to men. Here are a few of the tips to help you continue on your path of self-awareness and mental toughness. Identify your emotional hot buttons….
Self-awareness is the ability to accurately perceive your own emotions. To be successful, you must stay alert to emotions in order to manage behavior in various contexts. It’s not enough to be aware; mental toughness means you are both willing and able to tolerate the discomfort of negative feelings. “He who knows others is wise….
Few of us wake up in the morning with the intention of being a hero. Instead, we hope to get by without any major stumbling blocks and aim to do what is expected of us. It’s only when confronted with obstacles that threaten to derail our routines and plans that we don the armor and…
Leaders with habitual skepticism are not hard to spot: they suffer with the “not-invented-here” syndrome, habitually skeptical of the ideas of others. I’ve been writing about the types, causes, and ways to defeat skepticism. What I’ve found in my coaching practice is that the best leaders know that they don’t have all the answers—no one…
Can we REALLY defeat skepticism? As I shared in my last post, skepticism is a logical and rational challenge of ideas to get to the reality or truth about a specific issue. But the typical impression we have of skepticism pertains to a close-minded, doubtful, and hard-to-convince mentality. This often stems from a fear of…
Skepticism in leadership takes on several forms; some are advantageous, and some are detrimental. In its truest sense, skepticism is a logical and rational challenge of ideas to get to the reality or truth about a specific issue. Leaders with such a constructive, critical eye possess a positive strength, especially in a fast-paced environment where…
These last few blog posts have been dissecting the elements of trust (Leading with Trust, What Builds Leadership Trust? and 5 Trust Building Skills). If you were to boil down trust to its four most basic and essential components, what would they be? In The Integrity Dividend: Leading by the Power of Your Word by…
I’ve been exploring what builds high leadership trust (Leading with Trust and What Builds Leadership Trust?). Maister, Green and Galford wrote about the elements that build trust in their book The Trusted Advisor (Free Press, 2001). Trustworthy leaders practice and master five key abilities: Listen Well Most leaders only use their listening skills to gather…