Communication

Leadership Lessons from The Road, Vol. 1

Sometimes we forgot how important our communication is to other people.  It doesn’t take much to communicate where we are going, what we are going to do or how we are feeling.  We just have to be intentional about what we want to say, within the context of the other person.

Perhaps this leadership (and communication) lesson from The Road will resonate.

 

Do you have a favorite “lesson from everyday life?”  Send me your lesson and I will try to animate it for you (and give you credit).

Featured image by Jesse Collins on Unsplash

Tootin’ your own horn

Do you toot your own horn? Maybe you should.

We’re taught early in life to not brag or boast about ourselves. And in general, that is excellent advice. Tootin’ our own horn – telling folks about our accomplishments – is bragging, no doubt about it. It turns others off and makes us look self-serving.

Sometimes though, it is entirely appropriate.  In the work environment, it is not only appropriate, but necessary.  As the old saying goes, “If you don’t tell them, who will?”

Why toot your own horn in the work environment?

Let’s start by defining today’s workplace. It’s different from the industrial environment where work was clearly measured by output and time. In today’s knowledge and service environment, much work goes unobserved. We work independently, and chances are the only time our boss hears anything about us is when we mess up.

And we will mess up – that’s how we learn. But it becomes only one half of the equation. Who is going to balance the equation with all of the great stuff accomplished? (more…)

The subtleties of gender bias

In the eighties, I worked on a project that required me to travel with a team to a site where we had to sign in and wear badges. We went there about once every month for over a year. It drove me crazy because the security guards (both male and female) would hand me my badge and say, “Here you go, Carol,” and then hand the male team member his badge with, “Here you go, Mr. James.”

Today, thirty years later, the same thing happened. A receptionist called me “Carol,” and my husband, “Mr. Anderson.” Dang. Wouldn’t you think we would have evolved, given all of the focus on diversity and inclusion?

In the nineties, I headed a diversity initiative for a bank. One of the elephants hanging around the room in those days was the chatter among female executives who were learning to play golf because they were tired of having business discussion occur on the golf course when they weren’t there. (more…)