Tag: Inspiration

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The Secret Weapon To Achieving Your Goals

March 26 , 2019 •  6 minute read • by Saeed

“Work is love made visible.”

-Kahil Gibran

Contrary to the common belief, goal setting was not invented by self-help gurus and life coaches.

There is actually an impressive body of evidence behind the theory of goal setting dating back to the early 70’s. This research shows how focus, attention, persistence, feedback, incentives, rewards, self-efficacy and a host of other factors influence our degree of success or failure in achieving goals.

In over 25 years of working with real people, I’ve fine tuned what an effective goal-setting process looks like and I’ve come to the conclusion that while goals can be SMART, aligned with your values, big, audacious and hairy, there is one factor that people commonly skip, that tends to make the biggest difference in whether or not those goals are reached.

Research shows that when we make a goal visible and keep it in front of us, our chances for achieving that goal increase dramatically.

In 1979, interviewers asked students enrolled in a Harvard MBA program, how many of them set goals. They found 84% of them set no goals at all, 13% of them set goals but they weren’t committed on paper and only 3% of them set goals that were committed on paper and had planned to accomplish them.

In 1989, they interviewed the same individuals again, they found that 13% of those who set goals but weren’t committed on paper were making twice as much as the 84% who had never set goal.

The 3% who set goals and committed on paper and had the plan to accomplish them were making more money than the 97% put together.

Goal visibility is about motivation, commitment, progress and accountability. It is at this intersection that success in achieving your goals is had. As a social species and one that gives primacy to sight, people have envisioned their dreams and desires from the dawn of time. It’s only natural that we still do. We care about what others think and see. In today’s workplace, shared goals are a powerful way to keep team members on the same page and to drive engagement.

How to make your goals visible:

1.      Talk about it: telling others about your goals creates an immediate accountability mechanism. The larger the audience, the larger the accountability. It’s easier to slip out of accountability if you tell one friend or colleague vs. your whole team or company.

2.      Doodle about it: draw, paint, clip pictures out of a newspaper and create something compelling and meaningful that can represent your goal and how you see it. Having a visual representation of what you are trying to achieve and where you are trying to go is a powerful reminder of the rewards waiting for you. Human beings are not terribly good at being patient for what’s in the distant future. A visual representation of the future you want to create would go a long way towards keeping that desired state in your line of sight.

3.      Write about it: studies have consistently shown that writing down goals increases the odds of completion. When you write down goals, they immediately become real and in writing them down, you can see whether they lack specificity or are overly ambitious. The act of documenting the goals helps get you clear on them.

4.      Post about it: finally, sharing your goals with others provides the opportunity for feedback and accountability. Friends and colleagues will begin to take an interest in your goals and check in on progress. Sharing your goals will also encourage others to share their creating the opportunity for mutual accountability partners. But you also have to avoid making goals *too* visible. Derek Sivers discusses public goals in his TED Talk, sharing how a public announcement of goals gives you a similar satisfaction to actually completing them — and then, you don’t bother.

A final word…

Lastly, be sure you review your goals on a regular basis and don’t be afraid to discard those that are outdated or no longer relevant.  If a goal is no longer meeting its purpose, don’t be afraid to yank it. Sometimes you need to eliminate less important goals in order to meet the ones that matter. The law of diminishing returns would dictate that the fewer goals you have, the more likely you are to meet them with excellence and depth.

It goes without saying that goals have to be meaningful. Otherwise, goal setting can lead to pressure, frustration and a feeling of failure. Stay determined and positive. With the right mindset and mechanisms in place, you can achieve anything you want. Above all, make it visible.

Good luck.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others. 

I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

©2019 – All Content by Saeed H. Mirfattah, M.A., CPCC

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5 Steps to Coaching Your Employees to Success (Based on the Co-Active Coaching Model)

March 14, 2019 • 5 minute read • by Saeed

“While the big events of our lives create the impetus for change, it is the moment-by- moment choices that mold and shape us.” 

― Karen Kimsey-House, Co-Active Leadership: Five Ways to Lead

If you have room in your head for only one nugget of leadership wisdom, make it this one: the most powerfully motivating condition people experience at work is: making progress at meaningful work. And coaching can help your team members experience progress at meaningful work.

To do so, regular communication around development — having coaching conversations — is essential to understand what drives each person.

Unfortunately, many supervisors think they don’t have the time to have these conversations, and many lack the skill. Yet 70% of employee learning and development happens on the job, not through formal training programs. This is an opportunity missed.

Coaching is a powerful experience that creates a resonant connection with another person and helps them achieve something they care about while helping them become more of who they want to be. If there’s anything an effective, resonant coaching conversation produces, it’s positive energy.

Start today to be a more effective manager by engaging in regular coaching conversations with your team members. As you resolve to support their ongoing learning and development, here are five key tips to get you started.

1.      Design Your Alliance

First, design and sustain your alliance. While your role as a coach is not to provide answers, supporting your team members’ developmental goals and strategies is essential. But to do so, you need to establish an environment of mutuality and trust. As a coach, you must know how to work with your team member to empower them. This is a process of ‘co-creation’ where the employee also helps create the kind of coach she needs. Here, you can ask questions like:

  • What are you looking for in me as your coach?
  • If this coaching was to be effective, what would it look like?
  • What is the best way for me to challenge you?
  • How do you want me to respond when you have not completed something you wanted me to complete?

The designed alliance is the co-created space within which the coaching takes place. This space is dynamic and evolving so periodically you can check in on your designed alliance to see how it’s working for you. Just like ground rules you may need to add, modify, or delete some of your agreements depending on how the relationship has evolved.

2.      Listen with curiosity: 

Have you ever had the luxurious and deeply validating experience of communicating with someone who is completely focused on you and actively listening to what you have to say with an open mind and an open heart? What does that feel like? That’s coaching. And listening in coaching may be the most important skill set.

You can open a coaching conversation with a question such as “How would you like to grow this month?” Listen with your full attention, and create a high-quality connection that invites your team member to open up and to think creatively and then follow your curiosity.

3.      Ask, don’t tell.

As a manager, you are used to problem solving. This is fine when you’re clarifying action steps for a project you’re leading or when people come to you asking for advice. But in a coaching conversation, it’s essential to restrain your impulse to provide the answers. Your path is not your employee’s path. Open-ended questions, not answers, are the tools of coaching. You succeed as a coach by helping your team members articulate their goals and challenges and find their own answers. This is how people clarify their priorities and devise strategies that resonate with what they care about most and that they will be committed to putting into action.

There are two main types of questions, OPEN and CLOSED. Closed questions are less useful in coaching because they only promote a “yes” or “no” response. Open questions promote discovery and stimulate thinking. They are therefore ideal for coaching.

Open questions are ones that start with what, where, when, how, and who. Aim to avoid the ‘why’ question which can be seen as aggressive and stimulate a defensive response. There are three specific types of open questions you may find helpful when coaching. They are:

  1. Clarifying questions: “What else can you tell me about that?”
  2. Creative questions. “What if the possibilities were limitless?”
  3. Process questions. “How would you approach that from a different perspective?”

The best way to get someone to self generate ideas and solutions is by asking them, which is why powerful questions are so critical. And powerful questions are the key to helping individuals unlock their own potential.

4.      Forward the Action

Oftentimes in a coaching conversation, the person you’re coaching will get caught up in their own stories.  While it can provide temporary relief to vent, it doesn’t generate solutions. Take a moment to acknowledge your employee’s frustrations, but then encourage her to think about how to move past them. You might ask, “What is it you really want?” or “Which of the activities you mentioned offer the greatest potential for reaching your goal?” Then, when the employee is settled on an action, ask them what action, if taken, would make the biggest difference in helping them advance towards their goal.

5.      Build accountability.

Last, but not least, it is imperative that the employee follow through on commitments. Accountability increases the positive impact of coaching conversations and solidifies their rightful place as keys to organizational effectiveness. If your employee plans to network with other potential business partners, for example, give these plans more weight by asking her to identify specific individuals with dates and times and to deliver this information to you by a certain deadline.

A Final Word

If you want to build stronger bonds between you and your team members, support them in taking ownership over their own learning, and help them develop the skills they need to perform at their peak, try establishing regular coaching conversations.

Coaching accelerates progress by providing greater focus and awareness of choice. It concentrates on where you are today and what you are willing to do to get where you want to be tomorrow. Coaching provides a transformative space for your employee to experience easier and accelerated growth to move them towards their goals. It provides insights and clarity, pattern recognition and interruption, conscious commitment, real time feedback, and accountability.

Join the movement and coach your heart out.

Good luck.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others. 

I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

©2019 – All Content by Saeed H. Mirfattah, M.A., CPCC

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The Secret to Coaching Performance: Begin with Empathy

February 27, 2019 • 8 minute read • by Saeed

“What is necessary to change a person, is to change his awareness of himself.”

Abraham Maslow

You’ve been a manager and a leader for a long time. You’ve followed the traditional route of managing performance. It has had mixed results. You want more. You yearn more. You want to develop and grow your people. You feel a sense of responsibility towards them and to yourself. If so, performance coaching may be just the remedy you need for your management hangover.

Re-framing the conversation

At first, when adopting a performance coaching approach, you may find it challenging to change the types of conversations you usually have with your employees. This is understandable. The likelihood is that these are long-standing relationships where conversations have been limited to tactical considerations vs. growth and development concerns. In contrast, performance coaching (coaching aimed at optimizing performance) seeks to re-frame such conversations into discussions of the results the employee seeks to achieve, in terms of both improved performance and improved operational results.

However, there are “basic” steps or pre-conditions that need to be met before an individual can successfully advance to the next level and achieve progress towards performance goals.

At the root of every organization are its people. Their needs are universally human. Humans generally want to contribute their best work, and they need to believe their work matters in order to do so. They need to be an accepted part of a tribe. They need to be empowered and enabled to get work done. They need their contributions appreciated, and their ideas and opinions respected.

So, where do you start?

Start with Needs

If you are a proponent of Freudian psychology, human beings are entirely driven by primitive urges like sex and aggression. If you are in the B.F. Skinner camp, they are just over-sized lab rats waiting to be conditioned.  At best, these approaches were dehumanizing. At worst, harmful. Their rather bleak, soul-less vision of human nature constituted the first two “waves” of psychology as a science. In the third wave, Abraham Maslow and the humanists brought a more optimistic view of human nature that focused more on positive mental health and psychology than their predecessors’ obsession with mental illness and misery.

It’s upon this work that the modern workplace can fashion its approach to performance and productivity coaching. Just as the Hierarchy of Needs is a model in which Maslow attempted to capture different levels of human motivation, a similar mental model is useful here to establish a baseline from which we start performance coaching.

A 2017 Gallup poll found that only three in 10 employees strongly agree with the statement that their opinions count at work. Gallup calculated that by “moving the ratio to six in 10 employees, organizations could realize a 27% reduction in turnover, a 40% reduction in safety incidents, and a 12% increase in productivity.” And macro-level employee engagement data is generally dismal, showing that nationally around 30% of employees are engaged with their work, meaning a healthy majority are disconnected and unmotivated.

The framework presented here recognizes that these employees are not having fundamental needs met and is grounded in developmental theory and builds on the work of Abraham Maslow’s “hierarchy of needs.”

These needs can be summarized as follows:

1.      The need to feel valued – Investing in employee appreciation is critical. In fact, if ensuring your employees feel valued is not one of your primary prerogatives as a manager, your company will suffer as a result. That is simply because feeling valued is probably the most central need humans have. Feeling valued is not a one-off like feeling appreciated. It’s something that is built over time. This reinforces the importance of regular coaching conversations.

2.      The need for psychological safety – Fear of failure is a key indicator of an environment with low levels of psychological safety. Psychological safety is present when the environment is safe for interpersonal risk taking and people feel able to speak up with relevant ideas questions or concerns.

3.      The need for trust – Trust is the foundation for building strong teams, creating a positive work culture, and producing results. You know the environment is suffering from a lack of trust when communication is covert, employees lack loyalty, and results are inconsistent.

4.      The need for connection – work relationships are incredibly important to employee well-being. As humans, we crave contact and connection with other people just as we do food, shelter, and safety. Hence the success of so many social media platforms. As humans, we crave contact and connection with other people. It’s an important component of belonging to a tribe and a key stimulator of intrinsic motivation.

5.      The need for meaning – People find meaning when they see a clear connection between what they highly value and what they spend time doing. That connection is not always obvious, however. Hence, the coaching conversation. We are usually pretty good at sharing financial data. But far more motivating to employees are stories about human impact and how what they do has influence on that impact.

6.      The need for autonomy – When asked why they decided to switch to a different career, the vast majority of employees represented in a recent U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics report indicated they felt either a lack of respect or a lack of autonomy. Autonomy is both a personal trait and a motivational state. From the time you learned to crawl, you have been striving towards a feeling of self-determination and self-directedness. But while we reach for autonomy and self-determination, we are continuously hamstrung by rules, structures, and policies. This means that although autonomy can be somewhat stable at the personality level, it can vary from situation to situation and moment to moment. Evidence from research suggests strongly that when the need for autonomy is satisfied, people feel more interested, engaged, and happy.

7.      The need for respect and recognition – Recognized employees are happy employees. How many times has your manager taken credit for an idea you had and how many times did your motivation go down the tubes along with it? You may or may not take your work home with you but you do take home the feelings you are left with when you have not been recognized for your contributions. You feel slighted, angry, and disappointed. You might even start hitting the job boards. Conversely, recognized employees tend to stick around and report feeling more fulfilled on the job. Despite years of research proving the overwhelmingly positive effect of employee recognition on the bottom line, few bosses take the time to recognize and reward their employees for a job well done.

8.      The need for growth and learning – Employees will always perform at their best when the environment is conducive to growth. One of the most important factors in employee engagement is whether employees feel as if they have opportunities for growth and development. Those who grow are far more likely to engage than those who stagnate in their roles. It’s no secret that innovative technology and generational expectations are redefining the relationship between work and learning. Careers today are a continuous learning journey rather than the product of one necessitating the modern workplaces to become hubs of personal development. That’s a good thing because with the dynamic and ambitious millennial generation set to make up half of the U.S. workforce by 2020, the demand for progressive career models is on the rise. If you want engaged employees, embrace continuous learning.

9.      The need to understand the ‘why’ – If you don’t know your responsibilities and you don’t know why you are tasked with a particular project or outcome, it’s hard to be engaged. Unless employees understand the greater why behind what they do, their motivation to do it will always be less than 100%. This is a critical component of management but also a difficult one because often as managers, we just want the work to get done. The truth is however, that the change you seek will never happen organizationally unless people understand the ‘why’ behind their what. The way to approach this is simply to communicate the strategy in a more proactive manner, so that all employees understand the importance of the changes you seek to implement.

10.  The need for certainty and consistency – Finally, human beings don’t do well with uncertainty and a lack of clarity. Obviously, when employees feel insecure in their jobs because of pending lay-offs or toxic bosses, motivation is impacted. But more commonplace, when there is no vision, no goal, no north star, it impacts motivation. Most people can deal with a boss who is demanding and quick to criticize… as long as he or she treats every employee the same. And your company vision creates a sense of purpose and adds a little meaning to even the most repetitive tasks. True,

I would argue that these top 10 needs all must be met at some level in order to optimize individual or group performance. This list does not preclude other needs such as the need for feedback. And we can discuss and debate the placement of each need in the hierarchy or whether some actually sit side-by-side. We don’t even have to think of it as a hierarchy. We can think of it as a chain that mustn’t have any weak links. Instead of debating how important we think each need is, manager-coaches should enter the conversation with this basic framework in mind. The highest-level need identified by the employee likely correlates to their main lever of motivation.

Ask Powerful Questions

Finally, to properly adopt a performance coach approach, you will need to reframe the conversation from a focus on evaluation and weakness to one that focuses on employee strengths, growth and development. Re-framing requires asking powerful questions in an effort to influence the way someone thinks about their role and their performance within that role. Research has it that self-perception is a greater predictor of performance than any other metric. Managers sometimes fear that such questions will be perceived as challenging the employees’ capacity to perform. Nothing is further from the truth (though I agree there is both a science and an art to the practice of asking powerful questions). If you are a manager of people, you need to start honing your questioning skill to a fine edge if you want to influence your employees’ performance.

A Final Word

By connecting your questions with the mindset of the employee, you begin to establish the baseline for having impact on their performance.

What kind of difference would it make for your company if your workforce was engaged in solving problems, making recommendations, expressing their new ideas, and taking care of your customers?

We all need employees who are enthusiastic and who bring their A+ game and their whole self to work every day.  You need this not just from your star players but from everyone every day. The single element that distinguishes one company from another more than anything else is its people and the effort they exert. I would argue that the secret to unlocking this unlimited source of energy for your company is to build and strengthen the bonds between you and your employees. When you trust and respect your people–and really connect with them–they will respond with commitment and enthusiasm.

The way to do that is to adopt an empathetic performance coaching approach.

Good luck.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others. 

I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

©2019 – All Content by Saeed H. Mirfattah, M.A., CPCC

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7 Ways to Succeed in Any Role by Using Leadership Skills

January 30, 2019 • 7 minute read • by Saeed

“Leadership is not a position or a title, it is an action and example.” 

Cory Booker

Leadership is what makes an individual effective and successful at any job. At the most basic level, being a leader is about positively impacting the people around you. The characteristics of a good leader include the ability to anticipate problems and solve them when they arise, to ‘read’ challenging situations, take initiative, and simply exhibit virtue that inspires others to be their best. In leadership, character comes first. To be successful in any role, let your leadership qualities permeate and show through more than just one approach: be resourceful, be composed during a crisis, and be flexible when dealing with colleagues and clients.

Here are a few more leadership lessons applicable to any role:

1.      Be a Problem Solver

The core responsibility of any leader is to resolve organizational issues at every level. This comes by analyzing the entire situation logically and with a cool head. The consequence of this would be a fast action-oriented decision that would work in the best interest of the organization and its stakeholders. It is the problem-solving skill that helps any leader to analyze and anticipate trends and issues. It is what makes a leader strategic and effective. Due to the successful turn-around of any problem, a leader will inspire the team while cultivating an image of reliability and credibility thereby earning the respect of all.

2.      Focus deeply on a few issues

Leaders don’t go wide, they go deep. Instead of picking 16 topics to cover in a shallow way, leaders pick a small number of issues that they want to own, and go deep on them developing expertise along the way. By contrast, some try to address a large number of issues and end up with mediocre or poor performance. When it comes to achievement, the law of diminishing returns is as real as the law of gravity. Diving in shallow waters does not bring you the big fish.

3.      Always Show Initiative

A common scenario in any industry is when you are faced with a problem but it’s not clear whose job it is to fix it. When faced with such a challenge, a common reaction is to say that this is ‘not my job.’ It is imperative in such moments that you are able to display traits that will demonstrate why you were hired in the first place. This means demonstrating qualities of an effective leader including confidence, foresight, and the willingness to take the initiative to resolve the situation. By following these, you will not only get to the root cause of any potential problem but more importantly avoid unnecessary extra work. Displaying attention to detail and taking initiative shows that you are trustworthy, diligent, and dependable – and above all – you are a leader.

4.      Put People First

An effective leader is one that assesses a situation clear of prejudice and examines everything with an open mind through an objective outlook. In any job, it is necessary to interact with everyone accordingly. Underestimating the importance of relationship is a huge mistake. It is reckless to compromise a relationship to score a point with the boss. Throwing your team members under the bus is an unethical and unprofessional act. Great leaders put great stock into all their relationships because ultimately, they know it contributes to them being more effective at the different roles they have to perform.

5.      Have High Standards, Even Higher Values

Demonstrating strong values is one of the most important leadership competencies in the workplace. You shouldn’t throw your values out the window just to make a job easier. Not upholding certain ethics, standards, and values will lead to all sorts of issues. To put it simply, allowing for such to happen is unbecoming of a leader in any role. Values-driven leaders lead from a deep sense of purpose and service to others demonstrating strong values such as honestly, integrity, excellence, courage, humility, trust, and care for people and planet.

6.      Become a Communication Ninja

All great leaders are good communicators. They understand how to get a point across, describe the company vision to their employees, make sure daily tasks are getting done, facilitate office conversations, and know when it’s the right time or the wrong time for a meeting. It takes an investment of time, emotion, and effort to be a good communicator. It’s the job of the leader to rally and regroup the troops when times are tough and devise better plans that will reap better result. Being an effective communicator will inspire your team to work harder, possibly even going beyond their job responsibilities. After all, cohesive teamwork, in any and every shape and form, translates to more work done.

7.      Embrace radical accountability

We tend to think of accountability as something that is good for others but not ourselves.  But a successful leader is all about accountability, especially when results regarding certain projects are not favorable or when their own limitations are holding a project back. Most people are not prepared for the behavior changes that are required of them to be radically accountable. If you care about gaining the trust of others, you have to not just tolerate, but to embrace a deeper level of scrutiny and be able to engage in authentic feedback. This type of transparency and authenticity builds trust. Trust becomes the foundation of great teamwork and great relationships. We tend to hide our weaknesses never exposing them to the light. But by exposing them to the light, we have the opportunity to liberate ourselves from those limitations that we might otherwise subconsciously identify with. Accountability is a condition that is created in the interior of our relationships. Accountability is the ability to take into account the experience of the other and to own responsibility for the outcomes you have set out to achieve.

A Final Word

The Importance of leadership skills cannot be emphasized enough. It forms a strong foundation for your career success as well as the success of any team or organization. Adopting and nurturing these qualities will not only help you survive as an employee but also show that you are in fact a leader! It will help you to thrive within your role and with your team. All the factors above contribute to a well-rounded and highly effective leader. Consider each of these elements and incorporate them into your daily work as you move forward into becoming the best leader you can be.

Good luck!

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others. 

I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

©2019 – All Content by Saeed H. Mirfattah, M.A.

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7 Ways to Master the Art of Showing Up

November 5, 2018 • 4 minute read • by Saeed

“80 percent of success is showing up.” Woody Allen

The difference between people who want to do something and those who actually do, those who develop mastery and those who don’t, is the showing up.

But what makes it so hard to go from thinking to doing? You wanted to go to the gym today, but did you? Just showing up means you’re 80% of the way to a good workout. The trick is in cultivating the self-discipline to start and then to sustain the momentum. Here is a 7-step roadmap to get you there.

1.      Think big, start small…

It’s okay to have big goals and vision. But you have to accept that you will need to start small. If you want to buy a mansion in Manhattan, you may need to start with a condo in Kansas. If your goal is to run 10 miles a day, start by setting your running shoes and gear aside the night before. When people begin a project, they often default to the big prize and forget that life is like a game of football, you make progress in inches, not yards. If at every play, you expect a touchdown, you will soon be disappointed and give up.

2.      Whatever you do, do it daily…

Daily action builds habits. Small actions each day accumulate into “compounding interest” of continuous improvement. Bruce Lee famously said: “I fear not the man who has practiced 10000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.” Daily action yields greater benefits than waiting for inspiration to make your big splash.

3.      Eat a live frog first thing in the morning…

Mark Twain famously said that if you eat a live frog first thing in the morning, meaning do your least desirable task first, you can go through the rest of your day knowing the worst is behind you. While it seems like common sense, many people indulge and reward themselves first by doing favored tasks and then dread and avoid the less desirable tasks the rest of the day. To break the cycle, always start with essential projects first, no matter what. You’ll thank yourself for your diligence come the afternoon.

4.      Create a false sense of urgency…

Some people work and thrive under pressure. They need that extra bit of adrenaline to get them past the finish line. You can recreate that sensation by blocking out less time than you actually think you need. Often, you’ll find your focus improves when you begin working and ultimately finish on time. If you need to hack and trick your brain into being productive, then so be it.

5.      Tame your unconscious mind…

If you listen to Mihaly Csikzentmihalyi (The Psychology of Flow), the whole idea of mastery is nothing more than the self-expression of your ability to consciously dedicate your time towards something that in the long run gives you structure for the entropy of your mind. This means cultivating the daily discipline to tame the chaos of your unconscious mind, avoid distractions, and focus only on what is wildly important. Harness your focus, and you will harness your success.

6.      Be a diver, not a dabbler…

If you’ve ever watched waterfowl, you might have noticed that some ducks are divers while others are dabblers. The divers propel themselves underwater diving with intention and ferocity towards their target. The dabblers, in contrast feed in the shallows skimming food from the surface. For me this is analogous to being a jack of all trades and a master of none. The unavoidable truth is that without deep practice, there is no such thing as skill. There is obviously nothing wrong with having multiple skills or even having superficial knowledge in them. But in order to have any kind of mastery on any kind of subject, you need to be a diver.

7.      Get comfortable with failure…

The bright side of all this is that you can own your own success by taking responsibility for it. But that means you have to own the struggle and failure, integral parts of any goal worth pursuing, as well as, the success. If you aren’t comfortable with failure, it’s hard to be successful.

Final Word

The future belongs to those who master the art of showing up daily. There is a simple reason for that. It’s easier to make significant progress on a project if you simply show up to do it. If you want to be an author, show up to write your manuscript every day. If you want to be a pilot, go to your flying lessons, and if you want to be the CEO of the company one day, then show up being the CEO of your own station every day. Doesn’t it make sense that by showing up each day, you set yourself up to take advantage of opportunities?

So, if you want increase your chances of success by 80% – Show Up!

Good luck.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others.  I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

A Special Offer:

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As a trained co-active coach, I am currently enrolled in a 6-month professional development program to complete my certification. As part of that training, I need practice clients to try out my new skills, and I am offering a huge (>50%) discount for the first five practice clients.

You can do a free call with me to see if my approach and style would be a good fit for you (and no worries if it’s not – coaching is super personal and I’m happy to recommend you to other coaches that might be a better fit for you).

You can check out my website here. You can also contact me on LinkedIn.

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The 6 Most Important Ingredients of the Recipe for Lasting Change

November 2, 2018 • 5 minute read • by Saeed

“We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.”

– John Dryden

Have you ever wondered why most change efforts, whether individual or organizational, don’t last? All of us want to create lasting change in our lives on some level. The question isn’t what, it is how. Is it really possible to overcome habitual behavior and identity traits that have cemented themselves over the course of your life? The answer is yes but it does take work and attention to the important ingredients that are part of the recipe of lasting change.

1.      The importance of focus…

First, there is the law of diminishing returns which says if you spread your efforts too thinly among many different goals and objectives, you end up doing nothing.

The key here is to really focus on one or two goals at a time and then to persist until achieved.

2.      The importance of commitment…

Don’t take on a goal just because it would be nice to have. Instead, make sure it has deep meaning for you and your life purpose. It is the deeper level of commitment to the goal – and not progress –  that helps you persevere in the face of adversity.

You will know that’s true if you’ve ever started a new diet or exercise regimen successfully (progress) only to sabotage yourself by eating a piece of cake as your reward for that success. You made progress but you lacked the deeper commitment to keep going.

3.      The importance of your tribe…

To make true lasting change, you need your tribe, your network, your group of supporters to fuel your motivation through their on-going encouragement and celebration of your successes.

No one is successful for long when they go it alone. Lasting change requires that we have mutual accountability partners, social support and a sense of belonging to something that is greater. We are the people we interact with.

4.      The importance of being uncomfortable…

To truly change, you need to be willing to experience discomfort and lean into it. Most change is uncomfortable, even scary. That’s why most people resist change.

But being conscious about why you are seeking the change, and the benefits it holds, helps us to accept whatever we are experiencing as it arises – whether pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.

Bringing discomfort along for the ride, rather than trying to get rid of it, can be a very helpful skill, to allow us to get a longer-term reward.

5.      The importance of values…

Most people are not conscious of the fact that behind their desire to change are strong values. When we hold out in front of us what we most value, and identify why this behavior change matters to us, we are more willing to endure for long-term, sustainable change.

Take a moment and think about what behavior you want to change and ask yourself why?

  • How will changing this behavior align you with your values?
  • How will changing this behavior help you align with the parts of you that you most value about yourself?
  • How will it help you with the impact you want to have?

6.      The importance of mindset…

Success is not linear. If you have expectations that it is, or that all you do and think will have a clean cause and effect correlation, you will be disappointed and give up before what you want to change has had a chance to breathe.

We all experience setbacks, and the more we can build a growth mindset around the process of change, and approach our mistakes and failures as lessons to be learned from rather than opportunities to beat ourselves up, the more likely we will have the motivation needed to reach our goals.

Final Word

We all have a concert of voices in our heads. What we say to ourselves matters far more than we may realize, and often we don’t even pay attention to this harsh and self-critical voice.

To access real change, there are struggles and self-limiting beliefs that we have to battle before we can move forward.

Label and define that saboteur voice in your head that shows resistance at the thought of stepping outside of your comfort zone.

Take some time to get clear about where you are and where you want to be. Focus on changing how you think about the things you want to change, which affects the actions you take.

Above all, form new habits and stay accountable to them through strategic alliances with your tribe. Having support in your life can be the difference between success and failure.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others.  I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

A Special Offer:

In addition to being an organizational development and leadership consultant, I am a personal leadership coach who specializes in helping passionate, thoughtful, creative people like you find your inner leader and live the life you deserve.

As a trained co-active coach, I am currently enrolled in a 6-month professional development program to complete my certification. As part of that training, I need practice clients to try out my new skills, and I am offering a huge (>50%) discount for the first five practice clients.

You can do a free call with me to see if my approach and style would be a good fit for you (and no worries if it’s not – coaching is super personal and I’m happy to recommend you to other coaches that might be a better fit for you).

You can check out my website here. You can also contact me on LinkedIn.

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Why You Should Only Work with Trained Coaches

October 28, 2018 • 5 minute read • by Saeed

“The only journey is the one within.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke

Professional coaching is a relatively recent profession so some of the misconceptions surrounding what coaching is and is not, shouldn’t be surprising. It seems that everyone these days is a coach of one form or another.

What Coaching is and is not…

Historically, coaching has often been used remedially, as companies attempted to correct employees’ unwelcome behavior or perceived lack of competencies. Many conventional programs still use this approach. Obviously, this is a misappropriation of coaching since it yields few positive or lasting results. It is also entirely antithetical to the paradigm of coaching.

The best and most effective programs support the whole person and not isolated issues or problems. They take into account things like habitual patterns of thoughts, emotional states, and underlying mental models that may keep someone stuck.

In the 1990s, the first established accreditation groups for professional coaches were formed and coaching went from being used remedially to how we mostly recognize it today – as a developmental tool initiated by the client who is seeking self-improvement and lasting results.

In a study of the professional coaching industry by the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development (CIPD), coaching was found to be used by 90% of organizations surveyed. Even in the global economic recession of 2008, when companies were cutting corners left and right, 70% reported increasing or maintaining their commitment to coaching.

As coaching has grown in value and evolved in design, so too has its potential for mainstream application. Today, Harvard Business Review reports that coaching is a $1 billion a year industry.

Coaching, it appears, is a growth industry.

So, what is coaching and what do coaches really do?

The International Coach Federation (ICF) — the leading global coaching organization and professional association for coaches — defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential.”

Despite this guidance, one of the challenges of defining coaching and its effectiveness remains the relative lack of adequate research with significant enough control groups and clear parameters and measurement tools applied to a coaching framework that fully supports the complete range of ways in which personal and professional development efforts can influence behavior change.

But there are enough evidence-based insights that validate the value of coaching when applied in a systematic framework by a trained professional.

While many people attach the title of coach next to their name, it does not mean they are practicing true coaching or know how to get lasting results. The key to personal and professional transformation is the coachee’s belief in the benefits of coaching and their own ability to make lasting behavioral changes, couple with an evidence based methodology applied by a trained professional.

In a 2013 study published in Research in Organizational Change and Development, researchers adapted traditional clinical psychological practices into the context of executive coaching into a highly-customizable process of program design and found the approach was highly effective in enabling executives to develop behaviors and competencies aligned with their ideal future state and in improving adaptability in both actions and thoughts.

The International Journal of Theory, Research and Practice, conducted a study in 2016 and examined the emerging approach to workplace coaching, which increasingly emphasizes “enhancing both the performance and the well-being of individuals and organizations in ways that are sustainable and personally meaningful.” They found that simplicity and personalization lie at the heart of this methodology and the effectiveness of coaching as a framework.

Another large-scale study of executive coaching conducted in 2016 found that a strong working alliance from the perspective of the coach and coachee predicted coaching effectiveness.

Conclusion

All of these research studies simply validate what the professional coaching industry has known for decades. Clear, practical models make coaching methodologies accessible and more likely to create lasting individual and organizational change. Deep personalization, in which the coach seeks to understand the coachee’s personal values and goals in a holistic way, is equally critical to success.

From an evidence-based perspective, this kind of coaching has been demonstrated as being highly effective in many peer-reviewed studies with randomized control groups.

Trained coaches who excel in relationship management competencies, understand the importance of building a foundation of trust and a strong working alliance with their clients, and establish clear tasks and goals to reach desired outcomes, were rated most highly for successful coaching results.

Final Word

Coaching has exploded as an industry. Today, I hear many execs say they have not one but two or three coaches who help them with everything from leadership presence to public speaking to shifting to a growth mindset. But I also hear just as many people self proclaiming to be a leadership coach, an executive coach, a motivational coach and a life coach. Cue eye rolls.

As good coaching is fundamentally a quality conversation based in trust, it follows that authentic, individualized coaching is vital to cultivating genuine organizational change and personal development.

Coaching is about being in service to the growth and development of the person being coached. As a leader, if that excites you and drives your leadership engine, then coaching skills are an appropriate and successful addition to your leadership toolbox.

But to be of true service to clients, you can’t just print up some business cards and call yourself a coach.

To be accredited by the International Coach Federation, a training program must meet a number of criteria. Among them, it must offer a minimum of 125 hours of contact between students and faculty, six hours of observed coaching sessions, 10 hours of mentor coaching and a performance evaluation. There are more than 446 programs (132 in the United States) accredited by the federation.

I, myself, am about to complete a year-long program at the Coaches Training Institute, the world’s largest in-person coach training organization, a Harvard Medical School affiliate and widely considered to be a pioneer and the “Gold Standard” in the coaching industry, to become a certified coach. I can tell you from my own experience, that while the course has been rigorous and sometimes taxing, there is no substitute for professional training. It is the best decision I have made for my own career as a professional coach.

Good luck.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others.  I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

A Special Offer:

In addition to being an organizational development and leadership consultant, I am a personal leadership coach who specializes in helping passionate, thoughtful, creative people like you find your inner leader and live the life you deserve.

As a trained co-active coach, I am currently enrolled in a 6-month professional development program to complete my certification. As part of that training, I need practice clients to try out my new skills, and I am offering a huge (>50%) discount for the first five practice clients.

You can do a free call with me to see if my approach and style would be a good fit for you (and no worries if it’s not – coaching is super personal and I’m happy to recommend you to other coaches that might be a better fit for you).

You can check out my website here. You can also contact me on LinkedIn.

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Want Top Flight Performance? Give Your Employees C.R.A.P.

July 17, 2018 • 6 minute read • by Saeed

“Leadership is not a position or at title, it is action and example.” ~ Unknown

If you think there are a lot of definitions of leadership then you might be very concerned by the number of models there are to explain what leaders actually do! In fact, there is solid leadership research and literature that points the way to a more conscious approach that leads the path to accomplishing extraordinary things in organizations.  Here is one of the simplest definitions offered by management guru Peter Drucker:

·        Leadership: from an ancient Greek word meaning path-maker

·        Management: from an ancient Greek word meaning path-follower

What Does Poor Leadership Look Like?

You wake up, take one look in the mirror, and realize that you simply can’t face going into the office. You feel demoralized, dejected and defeated. Your expectations have gone unmet and your boss just doesn’t seem to get it. Like a polar ice cap, their unconscious behavior has slowly eroded your morale over time. You complain to your friends and spouse that all you get at work is crap.

Here is some of what they do:

  • They contact employees on their time off
  • They micromanage instead of fostering trust and empowering you
  • They are unwilling to listen to new ideas (or worse yet, take the new ideas but don’t give you credit)
  • They provide vague, useless feedback
  • They don’t foster a learning and growth environment
  • They criticize publicly
  • They iterate and reiterate your work until all feeling of satisfaction and engagement is squeezed out of it like a wet sponge

Do you recognize any of this? The truth is it doesn’t have to be this way.

What Does Good Leadership Look Like?

When working at their best leaders challenge, inspire, enable, model and encourage positive behavior, creativity and productivity. They do this through committing themselves to particular sets of behaviors linked to these values.

These leadership traits are an observable and learnable set of practices, available to anyone prepared to spend time developing them. Now, let’s look at some of what great leaders actually do:

  • They thrive and learn from adversity and challenge
  • They take risks and regard failure as a chance to learn
  • They seek challenging opportunities to help you grow, innovate and improve 24/7
  • They envision an uplifting and ennobling future
  • They enlist others in a common vision by appealing to their values, interests, hopes, and dreams
  • They achieve results through others and build trust in doing so
  • They are impeccable role models (and readily admit failure)
  • They recognize individual contributions to the success of every project
  • They celebrate team accomplishments

These traits and others, all go hand in hand to create a working environment that empowers employees to be their best. When employees feel that growth in the company is impossible, their motivation goes out the window and they stop performing at their best. And can you really blame them? What happens next is crucial. They either give up and move on, or face the dysfunction head on. Most choose the former. Look around. Is there a constant exodus in your company?

Give Them C.R.A.P.

The key to employee retention, engagement and satisfaction is consistent quality supervision.  People want caring, respect, appreciation and praise (C.R.A.P.) from their organization. But unfortunately, leaders are often not trained and don’t know how to show they care and that they respect their people or how to give appreciation and properly praise people. Training leaders on these skills is crucial. Most want to give their people C.R.A.P but have not been taught how to. If they are equipped to give their people C.R.A.P., they will, and if they are not, well, they just end up giving them crap!

A Final Word…

By giving your people C.R.A.P. you will inspire loyalty and your impact on the organization will go beyond the bottom line. Most leaders, I believe, have the desire to succeed but have never been trained on basic leadership skills. They are unconscious. Much of leadership is about becoming conscious, learning and then applying skills that support and serve your workforce. If an organization does not have consistent, ongoing leadership training, it will struggle with employee retention, because supervisors and mid-level leaders are the drivers of employee retention. Without trained leaders, you will never optimize your employee retention, and ultimately, your bottom line will flounder. There is a better way. Give them C.R.A.P.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others.  I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

A Special Offer:

In addition to being an organizational development and leadership consultant, I am a personal leadership coach who specializes in helping passionate, thoughtful, creative people like you find your inner leader and live the life you deserve.

As a trained co-active coach, I am currently enrolled in a 6-month professional development program to complete my certification. As part of that training, I need practice clients to try out my new skills, and I am offering a huge (>50%) discount for the first five practice clients.

You can do a free call with me to see if my approach and style would be a good fit for you (and no worries if it’s not – coaching is super personal and I’m happy to recommend you to other coaches that might be a better fit for you).

You can check out my website here. You can also contact me on LinkedIn.

Posted on

8 Steps to Coaching Your Boss to Success

July 3, 2018 • 5 minute read • by Saeed

“The medium is the message.” ~ Marshall McLuhan

Stop pulling your hair out over your boss.

The frustrations of managing the boss-employee relationship come up again and again in my executive coaching sessions. The best way to approach this challenge is to “coach up.”

When you think about it, we’re all private coaches at least some of the time. So why not be more intentional about coaching to help co-create the experience you want to have in your relationships; including the one with your boss.

Let’s first debunk one myth. Coaching up your boss is not a sneaky way to get what you want. The coaching model doesn’t work unless you actually care about the person you’re working with. It doesn’t work unless you have created a partnership and designed your alliance together. You don’t have to love the person you are coaching, but you do have to respect them and care about their well being.

Coaching up means learning and using coaching techniques to promote an authentic, positive, and productive relationship with your most significant professional relationship: your boss. When used effectively, coaching up can enrich mutual understanding and often reduce frustration and stress. In fact, use the ‘coach approach’ in all aspects of your life, and it will quickly become second nature and help you succeed through tough conversations and difficult relationships inside and outside of work. Here is how:

1.   Start with the right mindset: Suspend negative judgments about the boss, whether these are conscious and crystal clear or faint and subtle. Suspending does not mean permanent deletion but temporary hold. If you do not do this, you risk your judgments getting in the way of being truly present and open.

2.   Be Curious: Coaching is all about unleashing your curiosity. That means beinggenuinely curious and interested in your boss’ point of view. That may be hard to do if you are at odds with your boss but it is imperative to put things on the right footing.

3.   Deploy your attention:  This means listen with your full attention and ask clarifying questions when needed. If you disagree, instead of getting defensive (default reaction) try getting even more curious. Ask questions like “What factors are influencing this decision?” or “Please help me understand this.”

4.   Ask artful questions: Ask open-ended questions rather than questions that are answered with “yes” or “no.” We begin our questions with “how” and “what” as often as we can.

5.   Work with, not against the grain: This means attending to your boss’ communication and learning style.  Some learners are visual while others are auditory. Some like big picture information, while others prefer lots of detail; some like crisp bullet points, others like longer pieces; some like to be told after actions have been taken, and some like to know our every step before and during our tasks. If you don’t know your boss’ preferences, it’s time for a curious conversation!

6.   Work towards a win/win: Negotiation is a key business skill to learn. For example, if your boss wants a daily written report, and you don’t have the time to compose that each day, ask if she would accept a weekly written report instead. She may say yes, and she may say no. If she says no, offer another solution that will meet her needs as well as your own.

7.   Seek common ground: Begin by understanding your boss’ values. It does not mean you have to agree or have the same values but understanding what they are is a good first step to learning to co-exist. This can also begin to create a sense of common ground and shared values, on which to build your future relationship.

8.   Communicate clearly and assertively: The challenge with assertive communication is that it takes some education and a little practice, particularly for those who weren’t taught assertive communication growing up. Many people mistake assertiveness for aggressiveness, but assertiveness is actually the balanced middle ground between aggressiveness and passivity. Communicate your requests and needs clearly and with confidence. The right balance is between being humble and respectful, and confident and assertive.

A final word:

While effective leaders know their options and their plans, they are also open to shifting gears if they receive persuasive new information. They know that they may not always have the full picture of what’s involved in the complex challenges of the organization. This is particularly true when working with bosses who have a much broader organizational perspective than we do. As you continue to coach up, you may improve your opinion and feelings about your boss. Even if negative judgments do creep back in from time to time, we have tools to work toward mutual understanding, if we choose to use them. Coaching up isn’t a magic bullet, but it is a very good way to enrich our partnership with the boss—that most significant of all organizational relationships. In the end, coaching up is about forging a partnership with your boss so you can produce your best work. And there is nothing wrong with that equation.

Good luck.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others.  I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

A Special Offer:

In addition to being an organizational development and leadership consultant, I am a personal leadership coach who specializes in helping passionate, thoughtful, creative people like you find your inner leader and live the life you deserve.

As a trained co-active coach, I am currently enrolled in a 6-month professional development program to complete my certification. As part of that training, I need practice clients to try out my new skills, and I am offering a huge (>50%) discount for the first five practice clients.

You can do a free call with me to see if my approach and style would be a good fit for you (and no worries if it’s not – coaching is super personal and I’m happy to recommend you to other coaches that might be a better fit for you).

You can check out my website here. You can also contact me on LinkedIn.

Posted on

The Most Powerful (and least used) Leadership Tool

June 19, 2018 • 4 minute read • by Saeed

“Dialogue leads to connection, which leads to trust which leads to engagement.”

~ Seth Godin

Authentic and conscious dialogue is the most powerful tool available to us as leaders. It’s also the most underutilized.

Trust is the cornerstone of all relationships and it tends to grow over time – with mutually beneficial dialogue. Dialogue is the process of fostering ‘power with’ instead of ‘power over.’ That’s why it engenders trust.

Leaders often fall into the trap of believing in their own ‘power.’ Little do they know that their power is limited by their immediate circumstance and is always ephemeral. Even Presidents turn over every 4 years.

Dialogue is an art. In dialogue, we offer our thoughts and feelings as new dimensions of the collective exploration. In dialogue, we place the emphasis on hearing everyone and considering all facets of a problem until the best obtainable truth or solution, agreeable to all present, emerges. Dialogue refers to people exploring meaning together. “Meaning” might refer to ideas, experience, or feelings. In other words, things we talk about in dialogue are not trivial or irrelevant. In dialogue I’m engaging with meaning, not just socializing.

In dialogue, we are mining for shared values, affinities and understandings. This usually involves a more sophisticated process. It involves partnership. Engagement in dialogue requires conscious awareness. Authentic dialogue involves following an unfolding inquiry.

In dialogue, we are practicing co-evolution, co-exploration, co-intelligence.

There are many ways to explore meaning together. And there are many aids to mastering dialogue as a skill. More will probably evolve.

In my experience, the quality of exploration in dialogue depends largely on how open people are willing to be with each other – it depends on how conscious we are. If the dialogue is being facilitated, it also depends on the quality of facilitation. Positive, collective engagement and conscious dialogue is the progenitor to positive change. So what does that look like?

In conscious dialogue, we start from a place of appreciation.

In conscious dialogue, our attention is the currency of exchange.

In conscious dialogue, we use silence as well as words.

In conscious dialogue, we are fully present.

In conscious dialogue, our orientation is towards a solution.

In conscious dialogue, we are active listeners.

In conscious dialogue, we employ, rather than avoid confrontation.

In conscious dialogue, we have no hidden agendas.

Good luck.

Wait! Before you go…

I really appreciate your readership. If you found this article valuable, please like, comment, and share it with your network so that it can benefit others.  I also invite you to FOLLOW ME on LinkedIn or subscribe to my BLOG to receive exclusive content not found here.

A Special Offer:

In addition to being an organizational development and leadership consultant, I am a personal leadership coach who specializes in helping passionate, thoughtful, creative people like you find your inner leader and live the life you deserve.

As a trained co-active coach, I am currently enrolled in a 6-month professional development program to complete my certification. As part of that training, I need practice clients to try out my new skills, and I am offering a huge (>50%) discount for the first five practice clients.

You can do a free call with me to see if my approach and style would be a good fit for you (and no worries if it’s not – coaching is super personal and I’m happy to recommend you to other coaches that might be a better fit for you).

You can check out my website here. You can also contact me on LinkedIn.

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