Are Leaders Born or Made?
I was recently in a forum of business leaders who were discussing the question of whether leaders were born or made. The unanimous decision was that while some people have a natural ability for leadership, leaders are indeed made, not born. John C. Maxwell noted is his excellent book, ‘Developing The Leader Within You’, the […]
Are Your Employees Engaged?
I was having a coffee recently with good friend Dr. Ken Standfield and we were discussing “employee engagement” in the workplace. Ken’s credentials are way too long to list however suffice to say he is the world’s leading authority on Intangible Management, an international best selling author and has been described as, “the new management genius […]
True Leadership
There are many aspects to being a great leader. I believe that despite this, every leadership characteristic can be defined under only two main categories. These categories are either skills or behavioural. By skills I refer to things like Effective Communication, Delegating, Time Management, Conducting Staff Appraisals, Running Effective Meetings, Presentation Skills, Managing P&L’s etc. By behavioural I […]
Leaders Circle of Influence
A national survey of employees found that 85 percent of those interviewed said they could work harder in their job! More than half claimed they could double their effectiveness “if they wanted to”. Why is it that some people consistently do a great job while others are inconsistent or are consistently poor performers? I once […]
Why Teamwork Does Not Work
The title of this article will be a little confronting to most people. After all, isn’t ‘teamwork’ the catch cry of today? Indeed the corporate saviour? The only way forward? The method by which we will conquer all? The problem is that most people misunderstand teamwork and most importantly don’t know how to implement and […]
Can a HR Professional Increase Profit?
HR Professionals can dramatically affect the profit of an organisation. Here is one example. A couple of topics that are often discussed in various forums are the talent shortage (and what recruiters refer to as a ‘candidate-short market’) and staff retention. If you are in a HR, Training or Leadership role, this won’t be news […]
The Versatility of Behavioural Profiling
In the 35 years that I have worked in human resources I have been fortunate enough to use or at least be exposed to most personality and behavioural profiling tools. As a consultant working both here in Australia and internationally, DISC ADVANCED® has proved to be the most versatile and useful profiling tool I have come across. […]
Virtual Meetings Stress
A Microsoft study looked at stress and fatigue created by virtual meetings. The study was conducted by Microsoft Human Factors Lab. In the study of brain wave activity, researchers confirmed what many people sense from experience: Back-to-back virtual meetings are stressful. Researchers from the lab, which examines how humans interact with technology, asked 14 people […]