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What is One Way You Can Challenge People to Try Out New and Innovative Ways to Do Their Work?

When a direct report walks into your office with an issue, challenge or answer they need, what do you do? Do you give them the solution to the challenge, and answer to their problem? Then, is the next thing you do is complain because you can’t find the time to get your own work done? Do you think there may be a connection here? The second behaviour in the practice of Challenging the Process is to challenge people to try out new and innovative ways to do their work (The Leadership Challenge, Kouzes & Posner, and leaders who are doing extraordinary things in organizations are ones that practice this behaviour. In this weeks Vlog post I give you some ideas on how you might handle this challenge….

John K Whitehead & Associates coaches individuals and organizations in becoming more effective by helping them improve their interpersonal communications, emotional intelligence, and resiliency.

You can read my blog at https://johnkwhitehead.ca

If you have enjoyed reading these posts, please Follow Me – and if you sign up for my Blog I will send you a copy of my eBook, “What Are These Things Called Soft Skills?”

How Does One “Challenge the Process?”

Kouzes & Posner break down Challenge the process in this way. Leaders who make extraordinary things happen in organizations “search for opportunities by seizing the initiative and by looking outward for innovative ways to improve” and “experiment and take risks by consistently generating small wins and learning from experience”. I add to this with and use the learning. How can we do that? For me it is about continuous learning, staying informed about what is happening in my industry and about staying relevant. With knowledge we can look forward and challenge the thinking so that we don’t get caught in the “we have always done it that way” mentality. What do you need to do to challenge the process? Let me know and if I can be of help, reach out.

 

John K Whitehead & Associates coaches individuals and organizations in becoming more effective by helping them improve their interpersonal communications, emotional intelligence, and resiliency.

You can read my blog at https://johnkwhitehead.ca

If you have enjoyed reading these posts, please Follow Me – and if you sign up for my Blog I will send you a copy of my eBook, “What Are These Things Called Soft Skills?”

What Does It Mean to Speak with Genuine Conviction About the Higher Meaning and Purpose of Our Work?

 This is the sixth and final vlog on Kouzes and Posner’s second practice of the five practices of exemplary leadership from their book The Leadership Challenge.  We are talking about vision. We are talking about where we want to take our organizations, what the is vision of the work that we are doing, what we are aspiring to. It’s bit longer than my usual vlog posts but I believe it’s one of the most important ones I have done so far in this series, so please bear with me and watch to the end…. Let me know how this landed for you.

John K Whitehead & Associates coaches individuals and organizations in becoming more effective by helping them improve their interpersonal communications, emotional intelligence, and resiliency.

You can read my blog at https://johnkwhitehead.ca

If you have enjoyed reading these posts, please Follow Me – and if you sign up for my Blog I will send you a copy of my eBook, “What Are These Things Called Soft Skills?”

Thinking of the Big Picture: What Do We Aspire to Accomplish?

Thinking of the Big Picture: What Do We Aspire to Accomplish?

In this week’s Vlog post I explore how Vision is about the big picture. We start with the big picture and from there start developing how we get there, but we need to start with looking forward and upward. It is also about bringing others along with you on your journey. One way to do that is to ask others what their vision is for the organization. Kouzes and Posner in The Leadership Challenge give us some questions we can ask to help us clarify what our own vision of the future may look like, but we can use these same questions to ask others what theirs is. They are: What is your ideal work community? What qualities make the future of your organization/team/project distinctive, one oof a kind? What is your vision like (symbol/metaphor/image etc.)? What are the trends that are propelling your vision? Who are constituents/partners/clients?

 

 

John K Whitehead & Associates coaches individuals and organizations in becoming more effective by helping them improve their interpersonal communications, emotional intelligence, and resiliency.

You can read my blog at https://johnkwhitehead.ca

If you have enjoyed reading these posts, please Follow Me – and if you sign up for my Blog I will send you a copy of my eBook, “What Are These Things Called Soft Skills?”

How Are You Enlisting Others in Your Vision?

Kouzes & Posner in their work “The Leadership Challenge” state that “Visions are images in the mind; they are impressions and representations.” As leaders we need to present our vision in ways that our direct reports and others can grasp it, to “draw on that very natural mental process of creating images”. How can you do that? Well for me one way is in repetition, repeating my vision in as many different ways and as often as I can. Once is not enough. In this week’s Vlog I use the example of attending networking events on a consistent basis to make connections, build relationships and to be consistent with my message – my vision – of who and what I do. What do you do? How Are You Enlisting Others in Your Vision?

 

John K Whitehead & Associates coaches individuals and organizations in becoming more effective by helping them improve their interpersonal communications, emotional intelligence, and resiliency.

You can read my blog at https://johnkwhitehead.ca

If you have enjoyed reading these posts, please Follow Me – and if you sign up for my Blog I will send you a copy of my eBook, “What Are These Things Called Soft Skills?”