Arnold Palmer: More Than A Great Golfer
A few weeks ago, we learned that thousands of Wells Fargo employees had opened fraudulent accounts to meet the bank’s “cross-selling” goals. The story was jaw-dropping. 5 years? 5,000 employees? Over 2 million sham accounts? Really? During that entire stretch of time, no Wells Fargo leader (who still works there!) ever paused to say, “Hey, […]
Ledecky, Neymar, and Getting Gritty
Late last year a board member gave me feedback on a CEO I was coaching. He concluded his comments with, “…and he has GRIT!” The word stood out to me at the time. I had not heard it recently, especially to describe a leader. But since then, I feel like I’m seeing and hearing it […]
How To Do Better By Doing Nothing
A few weeks ago, a colleague forwarded to me a sales coach’s June newsletter that admonished readers to avoid “laziness” and “overcome the dog days of summer.” He basically shamed his readers for taking time off. This glorification of “all work, no play” has become fairly pervasive in our American society. In 2015, more than half […]
Spieth’s Incredible Comeback
Leaders blow it—sometimes to the point of embarrassing themselves. Some examples of leadership “fails” I’ve either witnessed or heard about: • A CEO loses his temper and shouts at a colleague in the middle of a nice dinner at an upscale restaurant with spouses at the table. • A Sales VP, embarrassed by poor quarterly […]
When Leaders Get Stuck
Last week, a leader got on the phone and immediately told me about a very difficult conversation he needed to have with his boss. He had been working on this a lot before we talked. “Rob, I don’t know what to do.” He was stuck. And he was feeling both frustrated and vulnerable. Stuck doesn’t […]
How to Lead Millennials
I don’t know if you have noticed this, but it seems that I see the term “millennials” in at least one headline every day. I’ve discovered the reason. The Pew Research Forum reports this group now makes up the largest part of the population—even more than us baby boomers. If you care about who is […]
Where Leaders Look
After meeting with one of my new CEOs for a couple of months, I began to notice a consistent pattern to our conversations. Most of the time, the CEO brought up his problem-of-the-day for us to discuss: how to deal with a difficult employee, how to respond to the threat of losing a major customer, […]
Are You The Expert All The Time?
A CEO recently had me sit in on a weekly meeting with one of his direct reports. I noticed several things: The CEO did more talking than his SVP. The CEO talked in a way that conveyed he knew as much or more than his SVP on the topic at-hand. The CEO was quick to […]
SWOT Yourself.
Racing, racing, racing. Push it to the limit. Racing. Quick pit stop. And then, racing again. As I think about many of the leaders I know, racing characterizes the last few weeks of December and first week of January. Racing to close deals. Racing to finish projects or annual reviews (ha!). Racing to get the […]
The #1 Saboteur in our Conversations
Why are some conversations with certain people so difficult? I recently sat in on a difficult conversation between two senior executives – let’s call them “Brad” and “Stephen.” Brad was giving Stephen feedback on a project Stephen had completed recently. He told Stephen that, while he was pleased with the final result, there were aspects […]