Decision Making Archives - Page 3 of 6

The Power of Coming Back to Your Foundation

emotional intelligence, values, creating your life

By Jalene Case

Experiencing imbalance and balance is part of living. How might we lead ourselves from chaos to order? Carl Jung said, “In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.” There’s a new way forward waiting for you to discover it. Before making direction-changing decisions, check the integrity of your foundation. Who are you now?

During a coaching session, my client was grappling with a decision that would change the trajectory of her career. She felt clear about what she didn’t want; however, the vision for what she wanted was still fuzzy. We were working together on clarifying her future when she brilliantly said, “I want to revisit my foundation.” To her that meant recognizing what she learned in her current professional role over the last several years, plus naming her values, priorities, and focus.

Validate Your Pivot with Innovation

By Dr. Evans Baiya

When planning or navigating a pivot, how do you know if you are pivoting in the right direction? Answer simple questions to validate your pivot and execute on four actions to help create speed-to-market.

We are hearing the word “pivot” a lot these days. The idea is that business conditions have changed dramatically and, therefore, we need to change course. Companies are finding that they must shift business and adjust the game plan in order to survive or thrive. What we often fail to do is ask ourselves what we are changing the plan to. What, how, who and where are vital questions that need to be answered for a successful pivot. Simply assuming you will find your answers along the way creates complexity and can lead an organization to adopt what is easy, not what is strategic and value-creating.

Navigate the Storm Using Innovation and the Talents of Your Team

By Tanja Yardley

I have a bias to confess to. The phrase “we are in this boat together” sparks an almost irrational irritability. While we are in this pandemic storm together, we are most certainly not in the same boat. As leaders, we know instinctively that some of our team members are flailing around in a dinghy with multiple holes, barely holding themselves above the water line and bailing continuously. Others are zooming around in a motorboat, enjoying the sea breeze and checking on all the other boats. Some are lucky enough to be cruising in a well-appointed yacht, enjoying umbrella drinks with loved ones and hoping that this quality time doesn’t end too quickly. Times like these expose the gaps, the rocks, and the choppy seas, as well as the skill and resiliency of the sailors.

Drop Your Armor to Get What You Want

By Jalene Case

What would it look like to drop the armor you’ve been using to defend yourself? What are you protecting yourself from? I believe we want to shield our soul’s desires because we don’t want to risk injuring them. The crazy thing is that when we keep them locked up in a tower with the draw bridge lifted, we block out fulfillment, accomplishment, and joy.

A coaching client shared that she wanted to drop her armor and put down her weapons. The declaration surprised me because we were talking about what she wanted to do, not what someone else was asking her to do. As we dug deeper, she realized that she was blocking herself with unhelpful, unkind thoughts, beliefs, feelings, and actions. Knowing what she wanted was not the problem. Allowing herself to make progress toward her practical goals and soul’s desires was the challenge she faced.

8 Behavioral Styles That Affect How We Return to Work

By Dr. Jeremy Graves

We are living in a world of change. We all know that the world is changing and, like most things in life, once we get used to this change a new one will occur. We may not know what tomorrow brings, but we can be certain that change is constant so learning to deal with change is a great predictor of our success as leaders.

Recently millions of people were told to shelter in place. What was novel at first quickly became mundane, and frankly lead to a large group of stir-crazy employees working from home. Over the next six to nine weeks we began to experience a new sense of normal and to develop a routine for working from home. Just like most things in life, as soon as we got good at it (and used to it) our places of work are starting to slowly re-open.

How to Know When it’s Time to Change Course

Dr. Evans Baiya, Fast Company, May 2020

What happens when you run an experiment and the outcome is not what you had planned?

One of the traps of experimentation is expecting the testing to validate your thinking. It is natural to want the experiment to say yes—even to think that if it doesn’t confirm your idea, it is a failure. Read More

Finding Opportunity in Times of Worry

By Dr. Evans Baiya

We can all agree that we are facing challenging times. COVID-19 and public precautions to slow the spread of it have left businesses in a space full of unknowns. And for many people, unknowns equal worry. It is natural for leaders (all people in fact) to feel overwhelmed during moments of crisis, especially crisis that is unpredictable and with many factors they cannot control.

Yet there is possibility, even in times of uncertainty. In times like these, we encourage leaders to work through a very simple model that helps to identify priorities and define proper resolutions within those priorities, which ultimately leads to successful outcomes. It is the Worry-Opportunity-Barrier Model.

Effective leaders embrace the mindset that crises are guaranteed, but how you deal with a crisis is an integral part of leadership. Ultimately, great leaders learn through crisis. The situation either gets better or it gets worse, based on how you handle the most stressful moments. Every crisis brings with it some stressors. It is common for leaders, especially those who feel the added weight of responsibility on their shoulders, to worry. But you cannot worry yourself out of a crisis!

Times That Try Our Souls

By Ron Price

One of the advantages of being 66 years old is that I don’t get as anxious I used to when unexpected, negative events occur. Depending on how each event is interpreted, the current coronavirus disruption is, at a minimum, the seventh crisis I have experienced over the past 45 years while in a variety of leadership roles. These crises have included a major fire, negative front-page press coverage, a debilitating breakdown in our supply chain, regulatory abuse, major contracts broken, the great recession, and the tragedy of 9/11. And we have survived every one of them!

What to do? How are we to respond when our world is disrupted so dramatically? As I reflect on this and shift gears into problem-solving around a seventh major crisis, here are things that guide my thinking:

Get above the noise. There are businesses (such as the media and others) that thrive on crisis. It actually increases their “product inventory” and compels their customers to engage. I’m not one who thinks everyone in the media is evil with ill-intent. However, it is a fact that they get better ratings (and more income) the more we engage with what they are selling.

What do you REALLY want?

The ONE Thing That Can Change Everything…

By Patrick Ensign

What do you want most for your business, your family…and you? How do all of these wants align with the actual work you do and the decisions you are making for your company?

Asking yourself these questions is the first step to gaining clarity. When you have clarity about what you are working towards, you are able to both prioritize and naturally align with those life/business practices that are effective in achieving your goal.

Whether you are a business owner, leader or professional at any level, you have heard the stats by Forbes:

40% of people are planning on switching jobs next year.
69% of employees are searching for a new position while on the clock with your organization.

Does it sound like these employees are effectively serving customers, crushing company goals, or engaged in the organization’s culture? Seeing that people are the single greatest factor in the success or decline of an organization, it would seem there is a big problem.

Greatness Starts with Optimism

By Mindy Bortness

When I was working in the marketing department of The San Diego Union-Tribune, a job I loved from the moment I stepped in and sparked a love for hiring intelligence, I used to sign my name with a smiley face.

Every memo, email or handwritten thank you note, I always signed:

Thanks,
Mindy

This little act of cheer was an extension of one of my core beliefs: optimism. It was, and still is, very important to me to extend optimism with every new interaction, client or project I’m working on.

To me, being optimistic is all about energy. When I approach a new situation with optimism, I’m bringing a lighter, more open energy into the interaction. This intention then becomes the focus. Despite what energy exists prior, or any somber facts that lead up to a current difficult situation, the infusion of optimism is always an energy reset for forward momentum and results.

1 234 5 6

OUR THINKING