Communication

12 Dec

Leadership Blind Spots: A Lesson from Seinfeld

by Lee J. Colan and Julie Davis-Colan

All the questions in the world will not help your team if you are not listening. You don’t learn when you’re talking; you learn when you’re listening. Excellent coaches are also excellent listeners and learners.

Mark Twain said, “If we were supposed to talk more than we listen, we would have two mouths and one ear.”

If you’re not listening to your employees, you will gradually suffer from “blind spots” – weaknesses that are apparent to others but not to you.

21 Nov

7 Ways to Show Your Appreciation

by Lee J. Colan, Ph.D.

William James, the father of psychology, stated that the most fundamental psychological need is to be appreciated. We all want to feel fully appreciated for our work. The payoff for inspiring leaders is that people do more for those who appreciate them. Although leaders widely recognize the need for appreciation, it tends to be a blind spot. That is, we generally believe we are much more appreciative of our team than our team thinks we are.

17 Nov

Two Words to Motivate

by Lee J. Colan, Ph.D.

How do I motivate my team, my kids, my spouse, my anyone?

It’s an age-old question with a myriad of different answers... too many to even summarize here.

So, in our information overloaded world, let me boil it down to this. If you want to motivate, then appreciate. We do more for those who appreciate us.

The two most powerful words for any leader, parent, teacher or colleague are "Thank You!" I added the exclamation point to make sure we really mean it when we say it.

31 Oct

A Matter of Trust

by Lee J. Colan

Here is an excerpt from Leadership Matters. It contains 31 daily insights to inspire extraordinary results.

day 28: Trust

Trust is the basis for all successful leaders and all successful relationships for that matter. You cannot buy trust, but it is free. Trust is priceless yet can be earned over time.

12 Sep

How to Avoid the Silence Spiral

by Lee J. Colan and Julie Davis-Colan

When employees don’t get the necessary information to perform their jobs, including asnwers to the fundamental four questsions, they tend to “fill in the blanks” with their own assumptions, and their assumptions are often worst-case scenarios. This is not necessarily a reflection of the leader. It’s our natural human insecurity. We often assume the worst in the absence of evidence to the contrary. Lack of information and unanswered questions can start the silence spiral:

18 Jul

The Tone of Reliability

by Lee J. Colan and Julie Davis-Colan

(This post is excerpted from The 5 Coaching Habits of Excellent Leaders.)

In an age when much more is being written than spoken, appreciation for the tone of the written word is being lost. For example, a typical cryptic text or email relies on emojis to communicate a serious, sarcastic or playful tone.

11 Jul

The Language of Reliability

by Lee J. Colan and Julie Davis-Colan

(This post is excerpted from The 5 Coaching Habits of Excellent Leaders.)

04 Apr

The Circle of Consequences

by Lee J. Colan and Julie Davis-Colan

We tend to think of consequences with respect to the short term – the immediate impact of our performance (positive or negative). That’s the easy part of defining specific consequences. But it still leaves a lot to the imagination.

As the circle of consequences below illustrates, we need to help employees see and understand the longer term, the downstream impact of their performances on team results, on the organization, on customers, on shareholders, and ultimately how that effects themselves.

Communication

day 28: Trust

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