It’s that time of year when business pundits and influencers are making their predictions for 2022. Perhaps that was in the back of my mind as I was watching Showtime’s hit series Billions over the holidays. If you’ve never seen it, I can tell you it focuses on the shameless world of Wall Street hedge funds, and [...]
From all the news reports, it sounds like many companies are experiencing a mass exodus of workers. People are even referring to this as The Great Resignation of 2021. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, a record-high 4.3 million U.S. employees quit their jobs in August. Why? Maybe the pandemic was a real wake-up call. (“Life [...]
In celebration of National Hispanic Heritage Month, I’d like to share some of my insights about the natural characteristics among Hispanic professionals that tend to make them influential and charismatic leaders. What qualifies me to weigh in on this topic? My father is a second-generation Hispanic from Mexico. I also grew up in the border [...]
I’ve been intrigued in recent years by the number of experienced leaders — many of them strong communicators — who have told me the same thing: The hardest part of having tough conversations is getting started. Maybe you need to address a serious performance problem. Deliver bad news. Find a compromise during a heated argument. What’s [...]
June 24 is National Work-From-Home Day—a celebration of the cultural and technological advancements that allow us to be productive working from anywhere outside the office. After 2020, I’m guessing there will be millions more people metaphorically toasting to that capability! While remote workers weren’t uncommon before, the pandemic accelerated the proliferation of tools and services [...]
If you randomly asked someone to describe the qualities of a great leader, you’d probably get these types of responses: confident, energetic, decisive and results-oriented. Are those accurate? Yes. However, I’d quickly qualify that with a “Yes, but…” I’ve often written about the paradox of leadership. Bottom line, it’s not as cut and dried as most [...]
We’re on the verge of a brand-new era in business. Covid-19 precautions are loosening. Some team members are heading back into the office, while others opt to remain virtual. But no matter where these employees choose to work, there’s a very high probability that they are exhausted and frazzled. Let’s be honest, who wouldn’t be? [...]
If you want to play a bigger role in the evolution of your company’s growth and success, there’s a mandatory step in the process: shake up your own thinking! Steve Miller, former CEO of Shell Oil Co., was well known for shaking things up. As Shell was rebranding in Europe, he invited a group of employees [...]
How to influence and impact others virtually. In the past year, I’ve shared plenty of content about how to lead remote teams. It was an important topic before 2020, but the pandemic made it mandatory. What I haven’t talked much about is how remote team members can stand out from their counterparts and become more [...]
In 2018, we made the decision to remodel our kitchen. Now we’re in the middle of another renovation…but not by choice. As I’m sure you know, Mother Nature was not kind to those of us in Texas last month. Ice. Snow. Prolonged periods of subfreezing temperatures. (I’m trying to avoid the word “unprecedented,” but it [...]