29 Jun
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Triple Crown Leadership

American Pharoah: A Story in Leadership

This week we want to highlight excerpts from an article written by Kelly Merbler, Regional Manager, AppleOne. In the article, Kelly equates leadership to the Triple Crown winner American Pharoah, and how his story taught her about leadership, teamwork, goals, and the belief in something or someone that is in your gut.

American Pharoah was just another colt heading to the auction 2 years ago. Out of the thousands of thoroughbreds that go to auction every year in Kentucky, what made him special? When he went to auction his owner had big hopes to sell him for over a million. That didn’t transpire as planned but everything happens for a reason they say. In life, sometimes we meet people for a reason I believe. Everyone has a certain destiny and it’s what we do to act upon it that makes the difference.

A “Gut Feeling” Can Really Pay Off

As leaders, sometimes you feel a certain “gut feeling” for someone in front of you. That feeling that you can help them achieve great things in life even when everyone else is telling you otherwise? We meet people and we see them for face value but not for what is deep within them. When the biggest things we cannot teach are not visible to the human eye such as a positive attitude, drive, and grit.

Leadership Develop is an Investment in People

(Owner) Zayat believed in his horse and knew with the right combination of people he could be better than any other. He knew the time and energy it would take to invest in this horse but if he did that he may get something special. As leaders, we realize that leadership development is an investment in people. It is selfless and exhausting at times but when we put the time in we may get a reward that we never even imagined. As leaders, we are only as successful as the people around us.

A Team Effort Always Takes the Win

American Pharoah wouldn’t have won the Triple Crown if he was alone. It was the tireless effort of a team that knew he was special inside and he had what it took to achieve greatness. It was countless hours of planning and playing to his strengths and to race him in the right races to develop him as a 3-year-old.

How much do we put into the future leaders that surround us?

Are we planning alongside of them how they can run the right races to get to their success? How can they run for their Triple Crown?

As leaders and team mates, do we bring it every time or do we rely on the top performer next to us to do the work and help us succeed? Are we a joy to be around? Do we show up every day with the right attitude like American Pharoah does or is it all about us?

Victor Espinoza attempted 2 other times to win his Triple Crown. He had his last taste of it in 2014 on California Chrome. What kept him going and not giving up? To come so close to victory and watch it run right out from behind you. We have all been in similar life situations, but what did we do after we lost?

(We had) a big brown horse with the heart of a champion and a great attitude that just needed to be on the right team around the right people who believed in him, developed him and loved him. Once that combination found itself, history was created. It didn’t matter that no one had done it in 37 years to the horse, the jockey, the trainer, the owner, or the millions of people rooting for this. This was all about the teamwork that came together and the belief of a goal that nothing could stop them.

Thank you, Kelly, for sharing!

Do you have the belief, goals, and team members to make your dreams come to fruition?

QwikTip and QwikCoach

PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.

QwikTip for a Change Initiative

And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.

If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.

Learn More About QwikCoach

Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!

18 Jun
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

What’s Keeping You Up at Night?

Last week we concluded our series on organizational “Hot Spots and Challenges.” Of the 49 issues, which did you relate to? Were you able to determine what you or your organization “Needs To Start Doing” that currently is not being done?

Are You Meeting These Challenges in Your Organization?

Now let’s look at leadership from a different perspective. Leaders were asked how prepared they were to meet these 4 challenges:

  1. Innovation
  2. Human Capital
  3. Operational Excellence
  4. Customer Relationships

Customer Relationships scored highest with 45% of leaders feeling they were prepared to handle this well.

This was followed with Operational Excellence at 33%. Wikipedia defines this as “an element of organizational leadership that stresses the application of a variety of principles, systems, and tools toward the sustainable improvement of key performance metrics.”

Innovation (26%) and Human Capital (27%) were areas where leaders felt a little less prepared. (Human capital, as defined by Wikipedia is the stock of knowledge, habits, social and personality attributes, including creativity, embodied in the ability to perform labor so as to produce economic value).

Does it surprise you that the highest score is 45%? That for three of the four challenges, less than one-third of the leaders surveyed felt they were well prepared to address the challenge?

The Top Obstacles to Addressing Organizational Challenges

Skill-set and experience might come to mind for the low scores, but it turns out the top obstacles were viewed as:

  • Not enough time or opportunity
  • Lack of support/autonomy
  • With skill and knowledge last

Leaders also shared what they viewed as insufficient involvement “gaps”:

  • HR – 48%
  • Senior Management – 46%
  • Managers – 33%
  • Employees – 32%

The people factor seems to be the top “want and need.” Collaboration, focus, mentorships, ownership, accountability, and time, all seem to play a role.

Having clear priorities and shared goals are also an absolute must have. Experiencing change and facing challenges are inevitable, so we must all engage in leadership development and training (remember we’re all leaders!) to continually develop the skills to manage internal and external challenges we (and our organizations) are facing.

What challenges are keeping you up night? What could help?

QwikTip and QwikCoach

PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.

QwikTip for a Change Initiative

And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.

If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.

Learn More About QwikCoach

Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!

11 Jun
PeopleTek Coaching Communication, Leadership

HOT SPOTS In Organizations Final

This concludes the three part series related to “hot spot” awareness within your organization. As a reminder, the data is based on survey results from Development Dimensions International (DDI) and The Conference Board which identified what 13,124 leaders from 2,031 organizations and 48 countries stated what their organizations need to start doing.

My organization needs to start…

39. Communicating to the last mile

40. Increasing accountability and empowerment in the region; otherwise, it slows the company down in reacting to customer requests

41. Involving younger leaders in decision making; don’t take them for granted; they are much more up-to-date, hence don’t leave them in the name of seniority

42. Increasing staff levels so that we can work on being a leader rather than managing; workloads are too high to engage interaction and relational aspects of leadership and self-development

43. Involving leaders in the process of “what’s next”

44. Providing regular feedback/ideas on how someone is doing good or bad in a leader role

45. Training all leaders, not just new leaders; the leaders who have been here so long have to get up to speed with the changing culture and times; ensuring that leaders can choose between a number of leadership development courses

46. Building sustainability processes to support development

47. Creating development plans formally and making them transparent to staff so they are clear what they need to deliver

48. Doing something might be a start

49. Arming me with context/information around the business challenge areas I am not prepared for so I can cascade down

These same leaders were asked: What Is Your Least Effective Leadership Skill?

The top 5 responses were:

  1. 56% Fostering employee creativity and innovation
  2. 54% Leading across generations
  3. 45% Integrating oneself into inter-cultural or foreign environments
  4. 39% Inter-cultural communication within international business environments
  5. 34% Leading across countries and cultures

Cultural Competence seems to be another “hot spot”! Per J. L. Mason, M. P. Benjamin, & S. A. Lewis (1993), they encourage:

  • Organizations and individuals to learn to value cultural differences and attempt to find ways to celebrate, encourage, and respond to differences within and among themselves.

Regardless of your company, country, or industry, all leaders have challenges and many of those challenges are shared. The key is to know which challenges cause you the greatest pain, and then create a plan to attack it. What’s your starting point?

QwikTip and QwikCoach

PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.

QwikTip on How to be a Better Leader

And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.

If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.

Learn More About QwikCoach

Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!

04 Jun
PeopleTek Coaching Leadership

Hot Spots Part 2

Last week we started a discussion around “hot spot” awareness within organizations. This was prompted by survey results from Development Dimensions International (DDI) and The Conference Board which identified what 13,124 leaders from 2,031 organizations and 48 countries stated their organizations needed to start doing.

Below is the 2nd list of responses, items 21 – 38 (out of 49 total).

My organization needs to start…

21. Involving C-level executives in developing future leaders

22. Making senior leaders more accessible

23. Showing an interest in folks who are exhibiting our excellent leadership values

24. Walking the walk senior leaders talk; there is a serious disconnect between their vision and the implementation of that vision

25. Acting consistently with stated values; don’t just say that people are our most important asset when action shows otherwise

26. Motivating people, and not in terms of money; recognize people; give effective feedback; be honest; be clear

27. Returning senior leadership to listening to first- and mid-level managers’ viewpoints Opening the lines of communication so that senior leaders know what’s really going on and we know that senior leadership knows what’s going on

28. Making sure managers understand their employees’ aspirations and work closely to achieve them

29. Putting all leaders on the same page, with the same plan, using the same leadership tools, so we all do things the same way

30. Providing a detailed career path, and being honest about it; if there is no path, then say that; if there is a path, make sure it is understood and that I am getting the right education and information

31. Outlining a five-year career plan with best- and worst-case scenarios

32. Providing better tech tools to make managers more effective and give them more time to focus on learning and leading rather than day-to-day tasks

33. Ensuring that new and existing leaders are given the tools they need using a more structured on-boarding process

34. Recognizing the positive! Create a more fun, energetic, and vibrant company culture

35. Holding people accountable

36. Allowing employees to make mistakes in attempting new or innovative methods

37. Creating more transparency, more attention to promoting women in leadership roles, and an atmosphere in which everyone has a chance to be a leader

38. Allowing leaders to attend company sponsored out-of-the-country assignments, training, and conferences

How many are in place at your workplace? For those currently not in place, which could make it more effective?
Are you in a position to make them reality?

Let us know the top 3 you feel are most beneficial to your organization.

QwikTip and QwikCoach

PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.

QwikTip on How to More Effectively Develop Yourself

And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.

If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.

Learn More About QwikCoach

Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!