Magic Monday: The Complexity of Priority Setting Today

Where can you find the magic at work today?

Some people say that setting priorities is very simple – it’s a yes or no. Yes, focus on this task now. No, not now (defer) or ever (discard). However, in today’s current environment deciding which of these labels to put on your to do list in a given day or week can be more complex than at first blush.

What is the balance point of priorities shifting because of an environment in flux and not getting traction in getting stuff done because the priorities change too frequently? I call this fluid priorities. This is where you want to put a stake in the ground to move things forward but you also need to be vigilant and nimble to shift if you need to, constantly discerning if what you are working on is still relevant: the most important, not just the most urgent.

We are navigating a constantly wired environment where we can too easily be in an addiction mode of responding to the latest email, text, tweet or Facebook or Linkedin post. Where are you in control of responding to a changed priority versus reacting to an urgent request that may not be your agenda but someone else’s?

This week’s reflection question: How do you stay grounded – – stay focused on the task at hand yet also aware of changing needs – so you can discern and adapt accordingly – all this while staying sane and ensuring you are getting the stuff done that matters?

At Sage Leadership Strategies, we create the space for you to reflect on your opportunities and challenges. The outcome is greater clarity, ease and confidence in how to best move forward. Please call us for a complimentary discovery session: 203-730-2103.

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: What Should The Role of the Front Line Sales Manager Be?

Where can you find the magic at work today? I find it in collaborating with other entrepreneurs to deliver value to our clients.

A colleague of mine, David Masover, interviewed me to get my perspective on what the role of the front line sales manager should be to drive growth. He interviewed five other experts and compiled the results into the format of a panel discussion in his e-book: Your Front Line Sales Manager: Glorified Sales Rep or Driver of Growth?

I think you will find the way David put together the interview answers an interesting read that looks at the complexity of the role of the sales manager balancing selling with managing and leading while ensuring bottom line results. I don’t think sales managers ever completely get away from selling, or should they. The question is on what percentage of their time should they be engaged in selling versus managing their people to sell.

I told David, “To be a really, really good manager, you need to get charged by empowering others to be the one to close the deal, and so if you’re a fantastic salesperson who’s just been promoted, if you don’t somehow have a mindset shift or are able to shift getting excited about seeing somebody else close the deal versus you being the one to close the deal, you’re probably not going to be too happy being a manager, and you’re probably not going to be good at it, because you’re probably always going to be wanting to step in and do it for them versus letting them do it.”

You may access the full interview with David and me here.

David also offers some free training, in addition to a more comprehensive paid training program you may access through the e-book. I am most curious to learn what your point of view is on what the role of the sales manager is, or should be in your organization.

This week’s reflection questions: What percentage should your front line sales person be selling versus managing? What works in your organization? How do you know your sales managers are engaged in activities that will give you growth that is sustainable?

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Follow up Friday: The Bare Essentials -Taking my Laptop and Cell Phone for Sure!

This week’s reflection questions: If you have to pack yourself up and live or work somewhere else for a few days, what would you take with you? What priorities would you focus on and leave the rest for another day or just take off the list?

If I was displaced for a few days, and I could still, or needed to work, I would take my laptop, cell phone and a notebook. As noted, by the picture, staying hydrated is also important!

These are the bare essentials that one needs to work these days. Because of the nature of my business - coaching, training and consulting – I am either on site at clients or on the computer or on the phone. Even though I rely heavily on technology as a tool, I still prefer to do some of my best brainstorming and thinking via hand written notes, thus the journal notebook. But, these are the bare essentials required in terms of tools.

In terms of priorities, the focus would be: client meetings, business development activities and the operations (website, financials, etc.) - in this order. The focus is creating value today, discovering opportunities for tomorrow and making sure everything is running okay. While there are a lot of details in these three items, essentially all activities fall into these three areas. Being a small business owner, if anything falls off in the short-term, it’s the operations. The people relationships are the most important – and yet the operations are the systems and structures that enable everything to run smoothly in the long run, so the operations can’t be neglected for too long.

Ironically after I invited this question in, there was a horrendous storm with 80-100 mile an hour winds that cut through the area two nights ago. The friend I stayed with last weekend when I was displaced had a transformer right outside her house effected. When she looked outside she saw four potentially combustible fires that burned for four hours, into the wee hours of the morning. She called yesterday to tell me her house is roped off like a crime scene with no access to get out of her driveway.

We discussed her walking down the street and me driving as far as I could go to get her and have her come and stay at my house until things are fixed. She has a generator and decided to stay put, and noted how well she is finally getting to know her neighbors after living there for twelve years. Amazing what displacement can do in terms of connecting people!

If my situation was as such that there was no access to electricity or wifi, I’d be forced to let go of all “the stuff” held by, and within, technology for a while. I’d be in conversation with others, be in nature, and be with my own thoughts. When it comes down to it – these are really the bare essentials of what we need to survive and thrive. All the rest are enablers and supports.

What about you? How do you think about the bare essentials of your business or your life?

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Staying Steady When You are Displaced

A fleet of trucks required to make my Monday Magic…

There are many ways in which you can feel displaced: at work someone younger and/or more talented comes on board and outshines you. Your boss, and major champion, resigns. A new technology is introduced, changing key aspects of your job. At home: Your last child goes off to college. Your spouse is more distant. Your ex-spouse just remarried. The list goes on…

In all these scenarios, something changes your relationship to your job or your family. Intellectually, we know we can change very little outside ourselves, but when we are hit with the reality of it, we try to change other people or situations to dynamics that make us feel more secure or comfortable. This is human nature – we are wired to protect and seek safety. It’s biological.

Sometimes our environment displaces us such as experiencing a storm or an accident. I woke up last Friday morning with no heat. I live in the Northeastern United States so this was not good news this time of year. I waited four hours for my oil company technician to arrive who told me my boiler was shot. My house was mighty cold. I spent the day getting two more opinions and by the time I landed on a vendor to install a new boiler, it was 4 pm and no boilers were available. So, my displacement was, I spent the weekend a couple miles away at friend’s house.

This meant that I cancelled my weekend house guest and navigated my dog in a new space with my friend’s cat. I was disappointed to not have my houseguest but found the weekend a bit of an adventure getting to know my friend (who I just met a few months ago), better and making myself comfortable at her house.

When it came time for Monday morning, having lost most of my workday Friday, I felt the pressure to get refocused despite my environment: I am spending the day holed up in one bedroom with a space heater while a team of technicians work on installing a new boiler in my basement. The water is turned off with periodic banging and “oh nos…”

All of this was an inconvenience while I work on staying focused and productive – producing client proposals, and keeping my top priority calls and meetings. Fortunately it is temporary and, although a huge expense I’m not thrilled to be paying, I will be on track after today. Fortunately this did not happen a week earlier in sub-zero degree weather.

Being displaced from my home for a few days unexpectedly helped reorient me. There is nothing like getting out of your everyday routine to refocus you on the bare essentials of what is really important.

This week’s reflection questions: If you have to pack yourself up and live or work somewhere else for a few days, what would you take with you? What priorities would you focus on and leave the rest for another day or just take off the list?

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: What Do You Do After You Have Your Strategy

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax. Where can you find the magic at work today?

What organization would not have a strategic plan? If they didn’t, they certainly would not admit to it – otherwise – what leadership is running the company?

The bigger question is – what do you do after you have the plan – written, agreed upon – now go execute on it? Here is what I have found: In the best organizations, the CEO writes their goals each year based on the plan and reviews it in a periodic, disciplined way. His goals are communicated and cascaded to his direct reports and to their direct reports, and so on. Then there is also discussion, not only up and down, but across the organization to ensure there is consistency and integration, using a common language. This process takes a lot of work and a lot of discussion – but it can save a lot of time in the long run.

Then there needs to be a clear and consistent way to manage the implementation of these plans. Few plans ever get executed as designed. Life happens. People don’t do what they say. Things take longer. Customers don’t buy in the way you thought they would. New competitors change things. Stuff changes.

This why strategy is a commitment and a disciplined process that must be revisited ongoing throughout the year in a proactive way. The companies who are not that effective do less, or little of what I mention above. They might talk about it, but don’t actually spend the time having the difficult or repetitive discussions to make sure people are on the same page.

There is no shame in what was done or not done in the past. The key is looking toward the future to see how things can improve. I gave a talk on strategy last week and had an executive invite me to her organization today. My first question was – why and why now? Is this part of an ongoing improvement in your process, the beginning of a new cycle, or has something changed dramatically?

It’s great to have a strategy but the bigger question is, now what? How do we make it come to life?

At Sage Leadership Strategies, this is what we do well – facilitate leadership teams to put the structures and discipline in place, and have the difficult conversations that will really enable things to happen in the way that you need to. Please call us for a complimentary discovery session: 203-730-2103.

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved

Magic Monday: How Do You Balance Curiosity with Your Expertise?

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax. Where can you find the magic at work today?

Magic Monday is about discovering new perspectives on old problems. It’s about realizing that things you didn’t think could happen, can. It’s about being open to possibility.
My clients hire me for my expertise in leadership, executive development, facilitating high performing teams and helping individuals be more personally effective. Sometimes managing ourselves is the hardest job!

Some use the word personal mastery implying that we can master ourselves. I don’t think we can ever fully master ourselves but it is in the pursuit of better managing our thoughts, being more authentic in the healthy expression of our emotions, and keeping our body healthy that we create a vital spirit – a vitality for life.

The problem is, when you are an expert, sometimes, you stop being open to wonder. You stop being curious, especially about the basics of your craft. Sometimes you can work on autopilot, or worse – make grave assumptions about people or situations because you have seen it “a thousand times before.”

The true master is a master at practice – always embracing a beginners mind, remaining curious. S/he asks the dumb and basic questions. I am struck by how often I am brought in to an organization to facilitate a senior leadership team in their planning sessions and there are many assumptions about how “everyone is on the same page.” The goals are crystal clear.

Yet when I start asking some basic questions about what the goals are or what they mean, or how they would put action toward those goals, the reality is quite different. And this is where the real work is – uncovering people’s understanding, beliefs and perceptions. This is where you sometimes need to go slow to go fast – take time out and regroup having the hard conversations. This is how you truly get aligned as a team, and it will save you much time in the long run.

Having these “back to basics” conversations are so important – particularly when you are under pressure to move fast – and particularly when you think you have all the answers or are the “expert” in a situation.

My reflection question this week: Where can you be more curious in your work? Where do you need to go back to basic questions to uncover what is really going? How does this serve you in being the expert?

At Sage Leadership Strategies, we work with successful leaders helping them grow into their next level of contribution. The outcome is more clarity, ease and confidence. If you are an ambitious, open learner, seeking or responding to, your next level of challenge, please contact us for a complimentary strategy session.

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved

Magic Monday: Over-Promoted or Lucky for The Challenge?

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax. Where can you find the magic at work today?

One of my clients was recently promoted into a job much larger than the one she had – in terms of breadth, depth and number of direct reports. Everything about the job feels huge to her. She said initially she was terrified everyday – but of course couldn’t tell anyone. All eyes are on her and she needs to project confidence and capability – even when she is secretly unsure.

Anytime you take on a new job there are new people to get to know, and new tasks and ways of thinking to master. The bigger the job the more you are stretching – and the greater the potential for your mind to run amok. We are wired for survival and our mind will do anything to keep us safe.

This client, as is the case with most of my clients, is smart, ambitious and has been successful at whatever she’s done. So, when put in a situation that is such a stretch – it can be very threatening to the ego. Initially she was not just questioning, but convinced they made a mistake. This is a very common reaction.

I will never forget when I was working at General Electric (GE), one of the leaders in sharing his lessons learned said: “If your job isn’t terrifying you, you aren’t stretching enough. Seek the jobs that terrify you. This is how you will grow.”

This is great advice. But where is the safety and support to express and work through this terror? Organizations want people’s passion and strong emotions – only when they are positive! Yet, if you are really growing and ambitious with a standard of excellence – you are going to have moments of panic, frustration, impatience. This is not necessarily bad, and to be expected. It’s more a question of what you do with these emotions – how you channel them and manage yourself so you can make decisions from a neutral space, knowing your triggers. A trigger is anything that causes you to react versus respond.

The bigger the job, the bigger the stakes – and the greater the potential to get triggered into a negative reaction – especially if you have a very public job with it’s pressures and deadlines. We only truly know our boundaries of capability when we are stretched or pushed to go up against, or beyond them (failure).

Here is what I have discovered in over 25 years coaching leaders – at some point, no matter how capable one is, they all experience these emotions. It’s part of the journey in realizing your potential and taking your sense of serving your constituents to the next level of contribution.

It is also at this time where folks start to question who they are, what they are doing “here” now, and can they accomplish what they need to? This space is especially hard to navigate for someone who identifies themselves as smart, ambitious and successful, as there is more pressure – internal and external – to “get it right.” In this kind of situation, having an external trusted advisor, such as a coach, can be very helpful in terms of having a safe place to strategize, debrief and/or vent to move through bumpy spots on the growth journey.

In the case of my client, she wasn’t seeking the job but was asked by her management to apply. Clearly they saw things in her that she didn’t see in herself. The gift is, she is now starting to understand and work with what it is that they saw.

This week's reflection question: Where are you less than confident? What supports do you have to help you get clear and think things through?

At Sage Leadership Strategies, we work with successful leaders helping them grow into their next level of contribution. The outcome is more clarity, ease and confidence. If you are an ambitious, open learner, seeking or responding to, your next level of challenge, please contact us for a complimentary strategy session.

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Embrace the Unexpected

Tucson at sunrise this morning.

Where can you find the magic at work today?

I attended a mastermind business retreat in Tucson last week. My flight home was scheduled for yesterday. Of course all flights were cancelled because of the Blizzard that slammed the Northeastern United States this weekend. The first flight I could get home is tomorrow. I had planned to spend all day Monday and Tuesday writing a proposal for one client who needed it by close of business Tuesday, and writing a very involved report for another client who I need to get to on Wednesday. In addition, this is one of the first trips where I decided not to bring my laptop as often I use it little at jammed-packed meetings like this. I figured can answer emails on my phone. Breathe.

I have been working with myself a lot lately in finding the positive versus dwelling on negative. The weather here is gorgeous. And I met a fellow attendee who lives near me and could not get home either. She generously loaned me her laptop. I had a friend go on my home computer and send me some documents I needed…and I was able to work and be productive. Amazing how things can work out in ways we never thought possible.

I even got a rest in the hot tub and a hike in. In addition, I spent most of the day with two women I met furthering our mastermind work and having amazing connections. Thank you my friends – Dan, Jeanne and Karen!

Now, to get up at 3:30 am for a flight home to the snow. Yay!

This week’s reflection question: How can you embrace the unexpected? Where can you appreciate the gifts?

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Focus on What Works

Where can you find the magic at work today?

Since our brains are wired for survival, we typically focus on the glass being half empty versus half full. We are always measuring and calculating how far off we are from our goals or what we desire. At the root of this behavior is our built-in hard wiring to ensure we are safe or okay in some way – whether it’s a roof over our heads, the raise we want, or the recognition we feel we deserve.

Measurements are important so we can gauge what else or more we need to do to get what we want.
Sometimes this focus on not having enough, doing enough or being enough can be exhausting and discouraging. Since we live in a consumer-oriented society, these messages can barrage us constantly daily. We are told we need some new product to be okay – or we didn’t measurement up in our performance review at work in the way we thought.

My invitation this week is to measure what’s working and notice why. Be in the half full glass. This energy can help build ease, momentum, and get you where you want to be in a different way. Appreciative Inquiry is a technique used to positively manage change in organizations. It’s about “the coevolutionary search for the best in people, their organizations, and the relevant world around them.” When leaders embody these positive behaviors themselves it has a big impact on the people around them. In the words of appreciative inquiry – engage in “unconditional positive questions.”

This week’s reflection question: What do you appreciate about what is present and working, not what is absent or dysfunctional?

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Buddha, Twitter and Enlightened Leadership

Where can you find the magic at work today?

In the fall I attended the Wisdom 2.0 conference in New York City. As part of that conference, I got a tour of Twitter’s New York office. While waiting in the lobby, I met a fellow attendee: Joshua Isaac Smith. We got into a discussion about wisdom, yoga and spiritual disciplines.

My point of view was this: Buddha left us with some great spiritual teachings. I love Buddha. What no one talks about is the fact that Buddha left his wife and child to go find enlightenment. Sometimes those who leave us great legacies have difficulty in their daily lives and relationships. It’s easier to feel at peace when you don’t have to be out in the world proving your value, paying the bills, negotiating with your spouse or fit dozens of your kid’s soccer games into your already overfull schedule. And also, sometimes we need to leave relationships permanently or temporarily to experience the love and insight we gain from them.

The times we are living in ask us to find a sense of peace, in the midst of our personal relationships and demanding work lives, not instead of. These are the vehicles through which we find enlightenment, not obstacles in the way. How do you keep your thoughts elevated and focused on the lessons, blessings and joy despite the uncertainty, discipline or struggles you experience? What are these relationships teaching you about yourself? Being fully engaged with life, means navigating all of it – for good growth, not cherry-picking only the feel good experiences.

I am thrilled to see that Joshua took our talk to heart and is using it as part of his application to do a Wisdom 2.0 talk. Please check it out and vote for him. The deadline to vote is tomorrow. We need leaders in the trenches and the boardroom seeking enlightenment, not off in a mountain removed from the daily challenges of life.

If Buddha was alive today, I surmise he would be both engaged in the benefits of technology to connect us, and also disconnected periodically to make sure his tweets were coming from a centered versus frenetic place.

Just because we can communicate 24/7 about anything, doesn’t mean we have to, or it’s good for us. You need to make sure you have our own internal anchor and filter for all this information. No Google search can give you the answers to your own truth and wisdom – this is only found going within and reflecting on your experience.

This week’s reflection questions: Where do you notice yourself getting distracted or looking outside for answers only you can provide yourself? What are some of your most challenges relationships and experiences teaching you?

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Happiness, Productivity & What’s Right with You

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax. Where can you find the magic at work today?

Many years ago when I was in graduate school studying to become an expressive art therapist, I had a fundamental issue with the clinical model. It mostly focused on what was wrong with people. I saw clinicians, who had lives falling apart, judging other people’s states of mind and daily living skills. They say there is a fine line between mental illness, madness and creativity & productivity.
I gravitated away from clinical work into business because I wanted to focus on what was good and right with people and help them achieve their goals. Since a whole field of positive psychology has developed.

In my corporate work the last 25 years, I have helped leaders and professionals seek the expression of their highest potential. I have seen many who are depressed, narcissistic and incredibly anxious achieve great things – even though. Let’s face it, we are all broken in some way – or at least far from perfect – despite what our social media posts indicate.

No matter where I go, I can’t move away from the human condition – this tendency to look for what is wrong or to seek perfection. Many company performance reviews leave people feeling not valued or underappreciated.

Regardless of your industry – business, healthcare or education – the invitation is to carry on and strive to be your best version of yourself – even though – Even though you have a boss who unconsciously sabotages you, a peer who always steals credit, a spouse who tries to control you, or yourself who wanes on being disciplined and confident and you hope no one will find you out. That’s a lot to manage!

The invitation everyday is to do our part to find what is good and right in them, in ourselves and in our work. This enables us to have the attitude, strength and fortitude to overcome challenges and achieve that which we seek.

While hanging out over the holiday, my daughter picked the movie for us to watch: Happy, a documentary by Roko Belic. Ironic, since last week I was talking about the difference between happiness and satisfaction. She had no idea as she does not read my posts. So many gems in this movie that I will be mining this over the next few weeks.

Ed Deiner, at the University of Illinois said “a person’s values are among the best predictors of their happiness. People who value money, power, fame and good looks are less likely to be happy than people who value compassion, cooperation, and a willingness to make the world a better place.”

There is a ton of research that says that when you are happier, you are more productive. The capstones of achieving greater happiness discussed in the film: 1) personal growth 2) relationships (building/nurturing) and 3) helping others/community.

Reflection questions to consider: What do you value? What makes you happy? What factors enable you to be most productive?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: The Gap Week

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax. Where can you find the magic at work today?

Your place of business is either crazy busy this week trying to wrap up the year or very quiet with many people on vacation.

I call this week the gap between what was and what could be. That is, this is the week that we typically reflect on the past year and project or plan for the year ahead. So it includes celebrations of goals achieved, regrets for those not achieved and setting goals and resolutions for the year ahead. This word resolution actually means making a “firm decision to do or not do something.”

Most resolutions fail within the first 30 days. I believe this is because of two reasons:

1. These are goals made from the head and the place of “should” versus the heart and the place of “passion.”
2. People often don’t get the support they need to make the resolution stick.

If you are going to embark upon something bold or new that requires change, you need the right, consistent supports to overcome challenges. True, sustained change is hard – even when it’s desired change.

This week’s reflection question: What is one thing that helped you navigate change this past year that you want to take with you into 2016? Or where do you need more support?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Looking at What is Or What Could Be

This is the week when college kids come home for the holidays. For those who celebrate Christmas, they embark on last minute frenetic shopping or gift wrapping. For those in business, it means tying up the year as strongly as you can. For those in education, it means a deserved break from students. For those in healthcare, it can mean more emergencies – or quiet time where you can really focus on one patient at a time.

Depending upon your beliefs, practices and places of work, you might look at these last ten days of the year differently.

I always notice a different energy in the air this time of year. Some of it is because of the holidays and some of it is because we are coming to the end of a yearly cycle – an ending and a beginning. Reflecting and planning.

Generally people are either more stressed and closed or more open and curious. Even if you still have presents to wrap, many miles to travel, cookies to bake, or financial books to close, I invite you to step back, breathe, and notice what is currently working and what could be a blessing. Live into the gratitude of what you already have. Open to the question of what could be. It is in this space of positive energy that all things are possible.

This week’s reflection question: What do you notice when you step back from the task at hand and notice the positive of what is or could be?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Leadership & Trauma

 Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax.

Where can you find the magic at work today?

Today is the third anniversary of Sandy Hook. I am particularly aware of this since I live 15 minutes from the school. When traumas of this nature strike, we are effected on all levels. In the case of Sandy Hook, it hit such a chord because of the nature of it: young, innocent school children sitting in their classroom learning. It undermined the inherent trust we, as parents, have in society when we send our child to school everyday.

First, your mind tries to process what really happened. Then you are overcome with shock, anger, sadness, grief – a range of emotions. These become physical and manifest in the body if not fully processed. Getting clear on your emotions and expressing and releasing them is the way to not have any negative emotions lodge themselves in a vulnerable spot in your body and surface weeks or months down the road via illness or disease.

Leaders are not immune from the stress and effects of trauma. The difference is they have more pressure because all eyes are on them and they have to react in a timely and thoughtful manner. They are responsible, which means having the ability to respond. At a time when they may be experiencing all the emotions of the average person – they have to ensure their frontal lobe – rational brain – is working on all cylinders. So it doesn’t mean they don’t feel to the depths or in ways others do. It’s more a question of what do they do with those feelings and when and how they process them. 

I heard that one of the first responders to Sandy Hook, a professional with many years experience, handed in his resignation immediately after responding to the scene. It was more than he could bear. Everyone has a different capacity to handle such trauma and you never know what your capacity is, until you are confronted with it.

Some people choose professions where managing trauma is a daily occurrence – therapists, doctors, EMTs to name a few. Being an elementary school teacher is a profession where you would not expect to be confronted with trauma on a daily basis. Yet many of those teachers instinctually rose to the occasion – because they put survival and protection before anything else in that moment. In order to do this, parts of the brain have to shutdown. Otherwise, the individual would be overcome with the horrors. Developing strength, resiliency and the ability to compartmentalize are core skills needed for all leaders today in order to navigate crises and traumas so you can effectively lead people to safe solutions. 

Three years from Sandy Hook and sixteen years from Columbine and we still have a serious problem with guns and violence in this country. We all need to help our elected officials better problem solve this issue. In times of crisis and with complex problems, we need deep reflection, engagement and open dialogue to come up with viable, sustainable solutions.

This week’s reflection: Where are you challenged in your own leadership with bouncing back from set backs or traumatic events? What can you do to foster more open dialogue and listening in situations that involve tension or trauma?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Managing Your P&L Is Not What You Think

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax.

Where can you find the magic at work today?

In order to get your profit and loss (P&L) sheet to where you want it, you need to better manage your passion and leadership (P&L).

I define a leader as someone who articulates a vision and gets people engaged and aligned in achieving that vision. It’s easier when the vision is aligned with your passion – what excites you, gets your juices flowing.

When you are on fire, you create the energy and conditions to light up everyone around you. When you do this, you are also unleashing other people’s passion and their leadership. One could lead people, projects or evolution of thought. Today, technology has dissolved hierarchies and traditional barriers. Thought leaders and innovators are emerging from all corners of the globe and pockets of organizations.

My friend Dan Brodax, who is singing in the Magic Monday video above, is a great example of entrepreneurialism, passion and leadership. He has a background in marketing and business development, and a few years ago, decided to finally pursue his two passions: music and helping people. Although he is not a trained musician or music therapist, he is healing people through music. His business is HeartSounds: Find the Way Back to Your Heart Through Song.

He takes his guitar on the road and visits assisted living residences. He gathers people in wheelchairs, walking, infirmed and cogent in hospital and community rooms, and hands out musical instruments. Dan not only sings very energetically, but he leads the residents through a musical experience, where they make music themselves. Last week, a 56 year old man, who could not talk due to a neurological condition, took pen to paper. His note to Dan said it was the happiest birthday he ever had listening to Dan’s music.

Dan is energized by getting folks who are sedentary involved in an activity. The residents are renewed by the music and the energy Dan exhibits. It’s a synergy that builds on itself. Dan markets himself as a Musical Engager. This is not a job title but a description he created to relay his unique service.

Today there is a lot of destructive passion exhibiting itself in unrest in the world and employee disengagement in organizations. What if the world was set on fire with aligned passion? Anything is possible.

This week’s reflection: Where can you more closely align you passion with your leadership? How can you unleash other’s passion and leadership?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Part 1 of 3 – One Thought Experiment: Noticing

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax.

Where can you find the magic at work today?

One of the most significant things I’ve learned is: 95% of our thoughts are repetitive. We keep telling ourselves the same thing over and over and over again. This one thought, or pattern of thinking, is always working on us – either in the foreground or background of our mind – consciously or unconsciously. This thinking pattern creates our world – always moving us toward what it is we keep telling ourselves.

I’m a yoga and meditation teacher. This is not my day job but a part-time vocation that supports me and my work as a leadership and success coach. The tools enable me to live a more empowered life by giving me more clarity, focus and peace everyday. Once I experienced such benefits myself, I felt called to teach others. So, teaching was not a goal I set out to accomplish. It emerged and evolved from my own painful journey of learning how to define and achieve success on my terms, not necessarily how society defines it.

My invitation to you is to work with this concept that your mind is largely ruled by this one thought, or a pattern of thinking, that is either serving you in where you want to go – or not. This is a three-week journey we are embarking upon – a little experiment to make headway in managing your mind to work more effectively for you.

This week’s assignment is to JUST NOTICE. Just notice what the thought or thought pattern is. When your boss comes gives you a new assignment…when your spouse throws a surprise at you…when you are confronted with a challenge at home or at work…When you have nothing in particular going on, where does your mind go?

Just NOTICE, nothing else. You may want to keep a notepad or journal with you to take notes. At first, you may not notice a pattern – but keep tracking and I’ll follow up and check-in Friday.

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: What’s Conditioning Go To Do With It?

Words of Manic Monday by The Bangles and modified by Susan Shaner. Musician: Dan Brodax.

Where can you find the magic at work?

Last week we talked about how terror makes you acutely aware of your gap: how far you are from where you want to be. Today I am asking you to analyze how your conditioning supports or impedes your ability to close that gap. The belief that you can or can’t do something is a huge factor in your success.

I always told my daughter she was smart and creative and if she worked hard enough, she could do or be anything she set her mind to. When she was 7 or 8 years old, she was trying to unfasten the bolt on the handlebars on her bicycle so we could raise it. It was really stuck. She began grunting and groaning trying with all her might to loosen it. I tried and realized it was stronger than both of us. She pulled the bike back from me. I asked her to let my friend, Dan, try as the bolt was really stuck.

She wouldn’t let go of the bike. I said, “It’s too hard. Let him do it.”

She screamed in agonizing frustration, “NOOOO!!!! I can do it!!! You always told me I could do anything!”

Stopped in my tracks, my mind raced. She was resilient and strong-willed – a good thing. How do I help her understand when to persevere against all odds, when to accept help and when to accept the limitations of her ability in an empowered way? Big questions for a young girl and even bigger questions that we live with as adults.

My daughter is now a freshwoman at a highly competitive college, so clearly she got past the defeat of the bicycle. Since, she and I have had dozens of conversations about navigating what I call the discernment space: how to know when you need to push forward – work harder, smarter or be more disciplined – and when you need to let go and accept help or give up and realize your limitations and cull the learnings to move forward differently.

This week’s reflection question: What conditioning supports or impedes you in accomplishing what you want?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

It’s Just Another Magic Monday! An Invitation to Notice & Shift

Magic Monday

A few weeks ago I introduced the term Magic Monday. I want to talk more about what I mean by this….This is a take off on the Bangles’s song Manic Monday.

I heard recently that 7 out of 10 people in the U.S. are miserable at their jobs. Wow. Really?

Those numbers are staggering! I can only imagine how difficult Monday Mornings are for those 70%. I’d like to start a movement where we think about creating magic at work – and get charged up on Mondays! We spend one third of our lives (or more) at work, why not have it be magical? I invite you to embrace and love the challenges that lie before you or within you.

Merriam Webster’s online dictionary defines magic as:
“a power that allows people (such as witches and wizards) to do impossible things by saying special words or performing special actions : tricks that seem to be impossible and that are done by a performer to entertain people : special power, influence, or skill… something that seems to cast a spell: Enchantment.”

These are powerful words. How could you become the wizard of your life? What would cast a spell over you so much so that you are enchanted with your work, workplace or the people in it? How can you influence your own thoughts and feelings regarding work to create renewed energy and perspective?

It all starts by noticing. Notice what IS working and great. Notice what is NOT working and painful. Become more aware. Wake up to your work life. You will either do something about what is not working, or you will appreciate what is working. Either way, you create change and you are the one who holds the magic to create the shift.

Each Monday I will share a thought, story, idea, model or way of looking at the world. I will end the post with a reflection question. Sit with the question and reflect on it all week and notice what comes up for you. On Friday I will follow up and share with you what I noticed in my life or my client’s lives. This not only promotes insight within yourself, but starts a dialogue to share collective insights.

You are invited to create magic. Will you join me?

This week’s reflection – what does magic mean to you and where do you notice it at play in your life?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.