Communication

This week’s Tuesday Reading is from BusinessWeek’s August 25, 2009 Communications Column:  “How to Give a Lousy Presentation”.  We all make a lot of presentations.  And, I know that you are like me and know that you are able to do better most of the time.  This piece gives you 15 excellent ways to make a lousy presentation.  It […]

For this week’s Tuesday Reading, we turn to the Career Strategies Column in the Wall Street Journal for a short piece “You’re a Success, Now Get Down to work”. Near the end of this piece, its author Alexandra Levit writes:  “Just because you’re skilled or talented in a particular area doesn’t mean you should simply pass […]

There’s lots of advice on finding and attracting staff and on identifying and retaining top performers you already have.  Stephen DeMaio, in a recent blog entry – “How to Identify Employees’ Hidden Talents” – argues that it is even more important to look for your current staff’s hidden strengths to find new skills and talents that have […]

John Maxwell, a very prolific writer on leadership, is the author of our Tuesday Reading for today:  “Influence:  Connecting with People”. Maxwell’s thesis is straightforward;  … “until leaders learn the art of connection, their influence remains minimal.”  To help us make connections, he offers eight practical steps: 1.  Don’t take people for granted. 2.  Possess a difference-maker mindset. 3.  Initiate movement toward […]

Recently, Adam Bryant, writer for the New York Times’ Coner Office column, interviewed John Donahoe, president and chief executive of eBay for the past year.  The condensed interview is today’s Turesday Reading – “There’s No Need to Bat .900”. Donahoe has a lot of good advice: •  You can’t change people.  …  Allyou can do is help them help […]

Today’s Tuesday Reading is “Stay Out of the Bunker”from the New York Times Under New Management column.  There Kelly Holland says that even though this may be a very challenging time for managers, employees still need leadership if they are to function effectively.  She suggests seven behaviors for leaders: 1.  Treat employees as responsible adults, […]

How often have you laid out for your team, perhaps in a presentation followed by a clearly written document, a future state for the team as well as the strategies for getting there.  And, you wait, and wait, and nothing happens. This is the situation that Marshall Goldsmith addresses in “Don’t Just Check the Box”.  Though […]

Power is a subject that is not often discussed in public.  Yet, an individual cannot be a leader without having power, “the potential to influence others.”  In this week’s Tuesday Reading, “Power Plays:  How to Use Your Power Wisely” from the December 2008 Issue of the Center for Creative Leadership’s Newsletter Leading Effectively, outlines nine strategies for levering your […]

  In today’s reading “How to Deal with Problem Employees”, John Baldoni addresses an issue that every manager and leader will, sooner or later, have to address -– confronting an employee whose behavior disrupts other staff.  When such behavior occurs, if we don’t step up, we are saying by our actions that it is OK for […]

Throughout ITLP we talk about the importance of listening, of choosing to carefully pay attention to and to understand what is being said. Today’s Reading “Soft Skills:  Listening for Better Leadership” addresses this topic.  In the piece, the author Diann Daniel notes that listening conveys respect, not listening makes people feel devalued and less motivated;  good listening empowers, not […]

Today’s Tuesday Reading is John Baldoni’s column “Why Leaders Need People Skills”.  This is a familiar topic to alumni of the IT Leaders Program but I thought that we could all benefit from Baldoni’s point of view.  He notes:  “Top executives [and I would say leaders at all levels] are … returning to a most fundamental tenet of […]

Over the past few weeks I’ve seen a number of pieces about how email is disruptive, how some companies are suggesting ways to that staff might step away from the constant flow of interruptions, how IM, blogs, and wikis can be effective in reducing your email load, etc.  So, there seems to be even more […]

Most of us cringe at the thought of saying no.  We think that it is not an option.  We don’t want to disappoint.  Etc.  However, saying yes to everything creates an untenable position for you and for your organization.  Esther Derby in “The Benefits of No” gives us an essential management tool, a three-point approach to saying no: 1.  Start by […]

In “Web Rage:  Why It Happens, What it Costs, How to Stop” authors Daniel Goleman and Clay Sinsky point out that most forms of electronic commnication – i.e, email, IM, and telephony – cannot provide those subtle, mainly non-verbal clues that help us form our interactions in those conversations.  Without these signals we may speak (or […]

Several weeks ago I was pointed to UBS’s Knowledge Center and a short piece True Leaders Must “Walk the Floor.”  This piece reinforces the importance of communicating with staff.  It notes that many leaders have found that interacting with their staff by walking around can build relationships, help staff understand their leader’s goals, and provide […]

The title “Talking to People is Great – Listening is Priceless” says it all.  You’ll find this piece at the Unique Business Solutions Knowledge Center, http://www.unique-solutionsinc.com/knowledge/article_20061004_105.html.    Enjoy………………jim

It’s the day after Christmas and many of you are still on holiday.  However, I thought I’d send a quick note along. We have all learned about the importance of asking the “right” questions, questions that help us get at underlying issues, questions that help us think, and questions that help others move issues forward.  […]

Today’s two-part reading takes the once-common practice of communal barn-raising where everyone in a community worked together to benefit a single farm family.  Given the right task, good planning and organization you may find a community approach gets the right result and has the benefit of generating new relationships that represent a real added value. […]

Today, I turn to Rick Brenner’s Chaco Canyon Newsletter for a piece — If Only I Had Known — that spans two issues: 1.    http://www.chacocanyon.com/pointlookout/060531.shtml 2.    http://www.chacocanyon.com/pointlookout/060607.shtml In this piece Rick asks whether you have ever regretted saying something that you wouldn’t have said if only you had known just one more little fact? He […]

In a pieces spread over three issues beginning in late January NetworkWorld discusses the IT profession in the year 2010      http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/edu/2006/0123ed1.html      http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/edu/2006/0130ed1.html      http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/edu/2006/0213ed1.html   Based upon Gartner report, the articles suggest that “technical aptitude alone will no longer be enough”, IT leaders will need to possess expertise in multiple […]