Leadership

Before your first day, think about your professional brand for this role. What do you want people to know about you? What can they depend on you for? What past experience do you have that could help them? Consider what you already know about the purpose for and the responsibilities of this role. Who will you be working closely with? Who will be impacted by what you do? Who do you need to have on your side? What might their issues and concerns ...

What I’ve seen work during my 14+ years as a corporate executive, and now 13+ years as an Executive Coach, are the following techniques: Make sure you have a successor. If you don’t, you’ll never be able to move on to your next assignment. Make developing your team and succession planning a priority, and make sure that you give your high potential folks exposure to your boss and the level above you, so they’ll feel confident in letting a successor take your place. ...

From a leadership perspective, the only good thing about group think is that it creates apparent harmony in the workplace since the group all agrees on whatever it is they’re thinking. But study after study has shown that diversity of thought leads to better decisions and healthier firms. When I was VP of marketing, if my team was falling into that trap, I’d challenge them to come up with at least 5 reasons why what they were proposing was a bad idea. This ...

Highly influential people generally have the following characteristics: Character – they lead by example Expertise – they know their stuff and are great at what they do Connector – they value relationships and are great networkers who love serving as a resource and referring others Collaborator – they know how to negotiate and compromise to get things done Stakeholder agility – they know who their key allies, customers and adversaries are and work those relationships accordingly Communicator – they adjust their style to ...