Giving Thanks is a universal practice that can reap huge returns. Focusing on what's working, right and true, helps grow this positive energy. This can be the most expeditious route to getting the results you want. Try it.
Just for today.
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Copyright 2009 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC www.sagelead.com
Monday, November 23, 2009
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
A Different Kind of Leadership – or Life Purpose – Assessment
Being a professional in the field of leadership and organization assessments, I have seen everything – instruments that have been rigorously validated by Ivy League PHds to those that have been thrown together using color coding by amateurs. I am always on the lookout for something unique, meaningful, relevant and with some level of rigor and science behind it.
Last year while attending the National Association of Energy Psychology’s Conference in Alberquerque, NM, I met Roberta Coker, who was administering Hand Dynamics’ Life Purpose Fingerprint Assessement. I consider myself an open skeptic – always exploring new and different things with a critical eye. At first I thought, “Okay, this looks like some new age ‘who hoo’ thing.”
After she administered my handprint, explained it’s meaning, and I questioned her methods – I was sold on there being some validity to this assessment.
This system is based on empirical data, like modern psychology. It’s been around for 30 + years. It’s not predictive, like a fortune teller. But it can give you useful information outlining a blueprint of your inclinations, potential and nature – at a soul level. I know this word “soul” is not very “corporate,” but think of it as something core to who you are at a deep level.
It’s methods are based on those used by the FBI to identify unique characteristics. Your fingerprint patterns, unalterable and unchanging since 5 months prior to your birth, are coded in your DNA. With all the change happening in the world, isn’t it nice to know that at at least your fingerprints don’t change? For more information, check out Roberta’s website for not “just another tool” to help with cultivating self-awareness & understanding.
Her methods are based on the work of Richard Unger.
Copyright 2009 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC www.sagelead.com
Last year while attending the National Association of Energy Psychology’s Conference in Alberquerque, NM, I met Roberta Coker, who was administering Hand Dynamics’ Life Purpose Fingerprint Assessement. I consider myself an open skeptic – always exploring new and different things with a critical eye. At first I thought, “Okay, this looks like some new age ‘who hoo’ thing.”
After she administered my handprint, explained it’s meaning, and I questioned her methods – I was sold on there being some validity to this assessment.
This system is based on empirical data, like modern psychology. It’s been around for 30 + years. It’s not predictive, like a fortune teller. But it can give you useful information outlining a blueprint of your inclinations, potential and nature – at a soul level. I know this word “soul” is not very “corporate,” but think of it as something core to who you are at a deep level.
It’s methods are based on those used by the FBI to identify unique characteristics. Your fingerprint patterns, unalterable and unchanging since 5 months prior to your birth, are coded in your DNA. With all the change happening in the world, isn’t it nice to know that at at least your fingerprints don’t change? For more information, check out Roberta’s website for not “just another tool” to help with cultivating self-awareness & understanding.
Her methods are based on the work of Richard Unger.
Copyright 2009 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC www.sagelead.com
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Back to School and Back To Basics
We are launching our first public workshops:
Discover Your Umbrella Of Consciousness and
Awaken Now! Align To Greater Success in Life and Work
To learn more visit our latest newsletter
Discover Your Umbrella Of Consciousness and
Awaken Now! Align To Greater Success in Life and Work
To learn more visit our latest newsletter
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Does Sotomayor Have The Effective Leadership Skills Required For The Job?
The majority says Yes!
Even though the "Senate has affirmed that Judge Sotomayor has the intellect, the temperament, the history, the integrity and the independence of mind to ably serve on our nation’s highest court, " says Obama, there are a number of people who don't think so - all Republican. It's not helpful to set up a Democratic/Republican split - and yet if there weren't so many Democrats in office, one wonders if she would have been elected. People tune out with these labels and don't inquire or hear the reasons why a yes or no vote is cast. I found it fascinating to read WHY the Republicans voted the way they did - yes AND no reasons are equally enlightening.
How Republicans Voted for Sotomayor - check out the comments to the right of the voting record.
I find it ironic that those who said no did so because they didn't believe she could uphold the letter of the law and the constitution and/or would try to legislate from the bench - And yet some who said yes did so because they believed the exact opposite.
Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, who voted yes, cited how valuable this process has been - "requiring us to return to inquiring deeply about the qualifications of the nominees and accepting the consequences."
As with any leader, time will tell how accurate all these assessments are - and it goes to show you two people can be given the same facts, hear the same answers and interpret them in a polar opposite fashion drawing very different conclusions. While the law and this position aspire one to be as objective as possible in decision-making, is being COMPLETELY bias-free a POSSIBLE reality or an ASPIRATION that we can never stop striving for? We only have ourselves to keep each other in check.
Copyright 2009 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC www.sagelead.com
Even though the "Senate has affirmed that Judge Sotomayor has the intellect, the temperament, the history, the integrity and the independence of mind to ably serve on our nation’s highest court, " says Obama, there are a number of people who don't think so - all Republican. It's not helpful to set up a Democratic/Republican split - and yet if there weren't so many Democrats in office, one wonders if she would have been elected. People tune out with these labels and don't inquire or hear the reasons why a yes or no vote is cast. I found it fascinating to read WHY the Republicans voted the way they did - yes AND no reasons are equally enlightening.
How Republicans Voted for Sotomayor - check out the comments to the right of the voting record.
I find it ironic that those who said no did so because they didn't believe she could uphold the letter of the law and the constitution and/or would try to legislate from the bench - And yet some who said yes did so because they believed the exact opposite.
Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, who voted yes, cited how valuable this process has been - "requiring us to return to inquiring deeply about the qualifications of the nominees and accepting the consequences."
As with any leader, time will tell how accurate all these assessments are - and it goes to show you two people can be given the same facts, hear the same answers and interpret them in a polar opposite fashion drawing very different conclusions. While the law and this position aspire one to be as objective as possible in decision-making, is being COMPLETELY bias-free a POSSIBLE reality or an ASPIRATION that we can never stop striving for? We only have ourselves to keep each other in check.
Copyright 2009 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC www.sagelead.com
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
What is The Most Outrageous Way You Have Marketed Your Executive Resume?
With all the competition, you need to be bold and creative. Be a walking billboard if you have to. Literally.
This is what Darin Lonergan, a former sales and marketing executive with General Electric, did. He ran in a local road race and printed a t-shirt with his resume on the front and back. Not only did those watching the race see him, but he contacted the local paper and was able to get a photo and article about himself and his colleagues. He has been consistently participating in a support network of his peers also looking for work. This kind of group can give you feedback on your executive resume and your marketing campaign.
The challenge is to be so different that you get attention and make people want to inquire further but not so outrageous that you are not taken seriously. You medium is your message. How have you solved difficult problems in your career? How do you translate this tenacity, creativity and perserverance to your personal branding? Darin Lonergan, about to take off...
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Friday, May 29, 2009
I'm with Anna - Get A Life, Keep Perspective
Amen Anna. I feel compelled to share a speech made by Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Anna Quindlen at the graduation ceremony of an American university where she was awarded an Honorary PhD. She espouses my belief that being a whole person connected to those around us is the mark of a true leader - in life and in business. A rich wallet cannot take the place of a rich life given meaning by our "right" relationship with ourselves, with those around us and with the world. The following is a great reminder that can get lost when many in the world are in crisis - fear fosters constriction not openness and true "seeing or being-ness." Being connected and experiencing life is what gives us the strength and buoyancy to ride the waves of chaos - even if we feel it is a tsunami! Enjoy....
Copyright 2009 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC
'I'm a novelist. My work is human nature. Real life is all I know. Don't ever confuse the two, your life and your work. You will walk out of here this afternoon with only one thing that no one else has. There will be hundreds of people out there with your same degree: there will be thousands of people doing what you want to do for a living. But you will be the only person alive who has sole custody of your life. Your particular life, your entire life. Not just your life at a desk, or your life on a bus, or in a car, or at the computer. Not just the life of your mind, but the life of your heart. Not just your bank accounts but also your soul.
People don't talk about the soul very much anymore. It's so much easier to write a resume than to craft a spirit. But a resume is cold comfort on a winter's night, or when you're sad, or broke, or lonely, or when you've received your test results and they're not so good. Here is my resume: I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never to let my work stand in the way of being a good parent. I no longer consider myself the centre of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh. I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows mean what they say. I am a good friend to my friends and they to me. Without them, there would be nothing to say to you today, because I would be a cardboard cut out. But I call them on the phone, and I meet them for lunch.
I would be rotten, at best mediocre at my job if those other things were not true.
You cannot be really first rate at your work if your work is all you are. So here's what I wanted to tell you today: Get a life. A real life, not a manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger pay cheque, the larger house. Do you think you'd care so very much about those things if you blew an aneurysm one afternoon, or found a lump in your breast?
Get a life in which you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze at the seaside, a life in which you stop and watch how a red-tailed hawk circles over the water, or the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up a sweet with her thumb and first finger.
Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure, it is work. Pick up the phone. Send an email. Write a letter. Get a life in which you are generous. And realize that life is the best thing ever, and that you have no business taking it for granted. Care so deeply about its goodness that you want to spread it around. Take money you would have spent on beer and give it to charity. Work in a soup kitchen. Be a big brother or sister. All of you want to do well. But if you do not do good too, then doing well will never be enough.
It is so easy to waste our lives, our days, our hours, and our minutes. It is so easy to take for granted the color of our kids' eyes, the way the melody in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again.
It is so easy to exist instead of to live.
I learned to live many years ago. I learned to love the journey, not the destination. I learned that it is not a dress rehearsal, and that today is the only guarantee you get. I learned to look at all the good in the world and try to give some of it back because I believed in it, completely and utterly. And I tried to do that, in part, by telling others what I had learned.
By telling them this: Consider the lilies of the field. Look at the fuzz on a baby's ear. Read in the back yard with the sun on your face. Learn to be happy. And think of life as a terminal illness, because if you do, you will live it with joy and passion as it ought to be lived.'
Copyright 2009 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC
'I'm a novelist. My work is human nature. Real life is all I know. Don't ever confuse the two, your life and your work. You will walk out of here this afternoon with only one thing that no one else has. There will be hundreds of people out there with your same degree: there will be thousands of people doing what you want to do for a living. But you will be the only person alive who has sole custody of your life. Your particular life, your entire life. Not just your life at a desk, or your life on a bus, or in a car, or at the computer. Not just the life of your mind, but the life of your heart. Not just your bank accounts but also your soul.
People don't talk about the soul very much anymore. It's so much easier to write a resume than to craft a spirit. But a resume is cold comfort on a winter's night, or when you're sad, or broke, or lonely, or when you've received your test results and they're not so good. Here is my resume: I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never to let my work stand in the way of being a good parent. I no longer consider myself the centre of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh. I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows mean what they say. I am a good friend to my friends and they to me. Without them, there would be nothing to say to you today, because I would be a cardboard cut out. But I call them on the phone, and I meet them for lunch.
I would be rotten, at best mediocre at my job if those other things were not true.
You cannot be really first rate at your work if your work is all you are. So here's what I wanted to tell you today: Get a life. A real life, not a manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger pay cheque, the larger house. Do you think you'd care so very much about those things if you blew an aneurysm one afternoon, or found a lump in your breast?
Get a life in which you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze at the seaside, a life in which you stop and watch how a red-tailed hawk circles over the water, or the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up a sweet with her thumb and first finger.
Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure, it is work. Pick up the phone. Send an email. Write a letter. Get a life in which you are generous. And realize that life is the best thing ever, and that you have no business taking it for granted. Care so deeply about its goodness that you want to spread it around. Take money you would have spent on beer and give it to charity. Work in a soup kitchen. Be a big brother or sister. All of you want to do well. But if you do not do good too, then doing well will never be enough.
It is so easy to waste our lives, our days, our hours, and our minutes. It is so easy to take for granted the color of our kids' eyes, the way the melody in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again.
It is so easy to exist instead of to live.
I learned to live many years ago. I learned to love the journey, not the destination. I learned that it is not a dress rehearsal, and that today is the only guarantee you get. I learned to look at all the good in the world and try to give some of it back because I believed in it, completely and utterly. And I tried to do that, in part, by telling others what I had learned.
By telling them this: Consider the lilies of the field. Look at the fuzz on a baby's ear. Read in the back yard with the sun on your face. Learn to be happy. And think of life as a terminal illness, because if you do, you will live it with joy and passion as it ought to be lived.'
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