“I know you are a coach, but what do you actually do?”
When I started coaching some ten years ago, my sons politely suggested to me that, if I ever got it in my skull to change careers again, would I kindly do something that they could explain to their friends. It gets worse!
Last year at the thirty year reunion of our law class at Stellenbosch, our then Dean (who happens to have the biggest intellect I have ever experienced) said something...
Leaders are dealers in game plans!
This month we start with the first of a series of articles entitled, Leaders are Dealers, and in this blog we are going to look at how we misuse our equivalent of a scoreboard…and get our just deserts as a result!!
Ever reminded a member of your team that they haven’t hit their target this month, or for a few months, and it’s time that they did, or words to that effect? Or been asked...
LEADERSHIP X COACHING …providing 4X4 leadership
Haven’t we put the cart before the horse? We tend to say “these are the things I need to become a good leader. When I get them right, I will be a good leader.”
Why not put the horse in front of the cart by rather saying: “What kind of leader do I want to be?” – and then be that leader. Think about it. Don’t you already know deep down what that means, even if you haven’t verbalised it? Let’s make it easier for you...
Optimising Diverssity
I have decided to spell Diverssity with 2 S’s – and I have a great group of leaders at GUD Filters (Pty) Ltd to thank for this piece of insight. By way of background, throughout this year I have had the really pleasant task of running my Critical Conversations for Leaders in Progress programme with sixteen up and coming leaders at GUD. Each month we spend a morning in a group session discussing and learning about a topic and then we meet...
What shape is leadership in?
It’s probably true to say that never before has this planet put so much emphasis on leadership and leadership development. Yet, as humankind, we are still having as much fun bashing our current flavour of the month as we did during the Crusades and in Hitler’s time and, yes, as always, we still have good and bad leaders and a whole lot in between.
But what shape is leadership in? Much has been said about the command and...
Take your own shoes off first!
We are all aware of the idiom that we need to get into someone else’s shoes in order to see things from their point of view from time to time. Years ago, I picked up an interesting addition to the idiom in one of the Once Minute Manager series brought out by Ken Blanchard, namely that we need to remember that, in order to get into someone else’s shoes, we need to take ours off first.
Commonsense, isn’t it? Well, only...
Bring on the Evolution
Isn’t it strange how we can have entirely different conversations and not see the link between them? I remember a few years ago, I had two conversations – on the same day – with two different sets of people and didn’t see the link until much later.
The first conversation took place over lunch at my alma mater’s Founder’s Day. The chap I was talking to was telling me about his barge trip to France a few weeks ago. Apparently he has been doing this for the...
