2019 Archive

January 13, 2020

Smart leaders manage themselves before managing others. The art of self-management largely involves managing one’s ambitions, one’s appetites and one’s insecurities. Would-be leaders tend to have these in great supply, and they serve as rocket fuel for their early career success . . . up to a point. The early success leads to the futility of Sisyphus or the fall of Icarus unless a leader learns to govern those qualities with some measure of discipline and restraint. (Forbes)
Enterprise leadership: five big resolutions for 2020. One of the toughest development challenges is to elevate a critical mass of talent from executive management to true enterprise leadership.Â To move key talent from controlling systems, processes and financial performance to courageously create value creating significance, sustainability and purpose across an enterprise is no easy task.Â To move senior people from thinking and behaving downwards into a function, a geography, a division or a single team, to thinking, and collaborating and inspiring across all functions, across all geographies, across all divisions, across all teams and across all customer groups is a very complex and critical shift.Â Accelerating the development of executive managers into enterprise leaders may be the single most important factor in achieving your strategy and creating a more valuable and sustainable future. (Thrive Global)
What’s working: SNHU recruits leaders from within. Nationwide, 45 percent of human resource managers surveyed last spring reported offering employees cross-training to develop skills not directly related to their jobs. And 87 percent offered professional development opportunities, according to an annual survey by the Society for Human Resource Management. Nazzaro knows many companies have limited resources, but he poses a question for company executives. “How are you helping your leaders develop their people?” he said. “A big piece of that is really providing the space and time for them to do it.” (New Hampshire Union Leader)
Principals go to summer school to learn about leadership. A principal's job is increasingly complex, growing from school management to inspiring teachers, supporting families, and leading communities in crises such as bushfires, a Harvard University academic says. "It used to be a managerial role," she said. "That's not the case any more. Principals are tasked with paying attention to not just how the school operates but what happens in the classroom, being a community leader â€” especially now, given the devastation of the fires." (Sydney Morning Herald)
7 books to help you be a better leader in 2020. Sometimes, the problems start with founders and executives who neglect to focus on company culture early on. In other cases, companies struggle to maintain their culture across departments and managers as their headcount grows. If being a more conscientious, thoughtful leader is a priority for you, it’s important to both seek out advice and take stock of where other companies have gone wrong. Here are seven books that will help you take a critical look at your own company’s culture. (Fast Company)

December 23, 2019

What meditation can do for your leadership. One of the things that stands in the way of many leaders success and therefore the success of their companies is their ego. Leadership expert Jim Collins found in his seminal study on what makes companies sustainably great that in two thirds of the comparison cases, it was “the presence of a gargantuan ego that contributed to the demise or continued mediocrity of the company.” Fortunately, mindfulness can help. In fact, in my work teaching meditation to hundreds of executives, I’ve seen that one of the most valuable and largely unrecognized benefits for leaders is the ability to transcend their egos. (Harvard Business Review)
10 leadership books to strengthen your skills in 2020. Looking to take your leadership skills to the next level in 2020? Or are you making a resolution to finally read the stack of books that’s been piling up on your desk? We’ve got you covered with our annual list of leadership must-reads. The books listed below can help you become a stronger leader in the year ahead. Whether you are looking for lessons from the most successful leaders and organizations of the last decade or new insights to guide your approach to leadership in the next decade, these books can help you lead with more courage, compassion, and emotional intelligence. (The Enterprisers Project)
10 principles for leadership presence. As a leader or aspiring leader at any level, one of the biggest challenges you face is to inspire and motivate other people so that they can take the right actions on behalf of themselves and the group, that is, to have impact. That’s why you want to be a leader with a strong presence not just at conferences, but in every interaction. And if you are such a leader, then every aspect of your presence, including your physical self, your intellect, your voice, and your emotions, is intimately bound up with your message. (Strategy + Business)
15 pieces of advice to help tech leaders master delegation. Professionals new to leadership roles often struggle with delegation, especially new tech execs, who may be moving for the first time from a primarily hands-on role to a leadership position. If rookie tech leaders fall into a pattern of micromanaging their teams, they can’t devote needed attention to their new responsibilities. That’s where the art of delegation comes in. (Forbes)
Microsoft makes all new managers read and review these leadership principles from CEO Satya Nadella. The leadership principles - which encourage Microsofties to "create clarity," "generate energy," and "deliver success" are drawn from the strategy that helped Nadella renew Microsoft as a major player in the cloud computing era, taking the company's market value from about $300 billion when he took over as CEO in 2014 to some $1.2 trillion today. (Business Insider)

December 9, 2019

9 simple techniques any leader can use to show employees appreciation. Here is the harsh reality: Most employees do not feel appreciated or acknowledged, as suggested in a study by Gallup. In my work as a trainer and executive coach, the lament I hear most often is from employees who don’t feel their hard work is valued. As Margaret Cousins once said: â€œAppreciation can make a day, even change a life. Your willingness to put it into words is all that is necessary.â€ Here are nine techniques to show employees appreciation and help them feel acknowledged at work. (Entrepreneur)
4 organizational design issues that most leaders misdiagnose. Four of the most common irritants I’ve seen arise as a result of ineffective organization design are: competing priorities, unwanted turnover, inaccessible bosses, and cross-functional rivalry. If you find yourself struggling with one or more of these issues, consider if the design challenges I discuss below may be the deeper cause. Doing so may help you pinpoint, and resolve, the real problem. (Harvard Business Review)
3 things great leaders do before tough conversations. Many frameworks exist to help successfully execute these difficult conversations. Like anything, success hinges on preparation. All great leaders who thrive in having these conversations embrace the use of a three-part formula: Standards + evidence + courage = direct dialogue. If you have all three parts -- standards, evidence, and courage -- the interactions with your team members who fail, meet or exceed the standard will happen naturally. Conversely, if one of them is weak or doesn’t exist, your tough conversation falls apart. (Smartbrief)
The 70/20/10 model is changing what great leadership looks like. In his new book, Brown presents the 70/20/10 leadership model. Most people are familiar with the 10% part of this model. It describes formal training via workshops, a course or in a classroom environment. In a classroom, a new leader can acquire and hone their technical skills. However, 70% of learning how to lead comes from real-world experiences. For example, a marketing director asks a new executive to launch a campaign for the company's latest product. This level of accountability lies beyond the executive's experience. Although he or she feels unsure of what to do, at least at first, they should mature through acting. The 20% part of this leadership model involves a senior leader coaching or mentoring a junior leader. In the workplace, this traditionally translates to regular one-to-one meetings. The coach could prompt a junior leader to reflect on what's working and not working. (Forbes)
PISA 2018: slight U.S. progress but what do the results really tell us? The data can be useful, said National Education Association President Lily Eskelsen GarcÃa, but it’s important to keep the results in perspective.” These numbers are a single indicator of performance, but even given that, what we clearly see is that all the “test-and-punish” reforms have actually hurt our most vulnerable students” she said. “Every teacher knows that test scores don’t measure a child’s worth nor potential, and that no place in the world is the same as the next.(neaToday)

February 18, 2019

The Presidents of the United States offer excellent advice on leadership. Good or bad, each of the presidents offer lessons to those who examine their terms. Even for those on whom history has looked poorly, they didn't gain the presidency without some leadership skill. Whether their backgrounds were politician, soldier, or businessman, each one has found some success in influencing others. (Inc)
How to shift from education as content to education as context. Despite the call for personalized learning experiences, the focus has been on how to provide more learning choice in a prescribed, standardized system. (Education Reimagined)
How do schools train for a workplace that doesn’t exist yet? Schools just aren’t going to be able to keep up with every tech development companies can’t always keep up, so a lot of the learning will have to take place on the job. Carnevale says that internships are a great way for companies to offer students a chance to get both a taste of a career and pick up new skills. Older workers will also need employers to step in and help them train on new tools. For his part, Burns told me he suspects that “soft skills” things like critical thinking, problem solving and communication are going to be key and that those abilities will serve young people no matter how their jobs evolve with new technologies. (Hechinger Report)
Where bosses can find coaching and other leadership education. It doesn’t have to be lonely to lead. Whether you want to tackle specific challenges with a coach or build a network of business advisers through a peer circle, many resources are available to support you over the short and long term. (Star Tribune)
The power of values in leadership. When we work and lead with values in mind we can reduce complexity, struggle and stress at work. Our organization’s values and our own - providing they are compatible - offer us a reliable and guiding foundation which we can use to orientate ourselves, our aims and our decisions. This is a highly transparent way to work. Transparency has a strongly positive effect at various levels. (Forbes)

May 13, 2019

Schwab CEO says good leadership depends on trust and reputation. Bettinger talks about important advice he received from his father just days after he graduated from high school in his hometown of Ada, Ohio. “You have one reputation. Almost everything in life can be bought and sold except for your reputation,” Bettinger says his father told him. “Guard that reputation with just a tremendous intensity. Do the right thing. Believe that every action you take is transparent and seen by all other people and nobody should make decisions in your life.” (Fortune)
Does your leadership style support diversity? It’s not enough to recruit more talent from diverse backgrounds. Companies also need to make sure newcomers feel that their opinions and input matter. In other words, diversity won’t do a workplace much good if it doesn’t go hand in hand with inclusiveness. (CIO)
The 5 hidden traits CEOs look for when hiring a leadership team. When hiring a leadership team, credentials factor in, but CEOs don’t blindly rely on a resume alone. Past accomplishments, college credentials, and other on-paper accolades don’t always translate to actual ability, unfortunately. For a company to find what it really needs great managers who make excellent judgment calls the hiring team has to look beyond credentials to understand a candidate’s true colors. (Ladders)
Six-military-taught principals for precision leadership. As a leadership student, purveyor and perfectionist, I continued to look into the details of my own leadership in the years that followed and studied her methods, writings and teachings, including her book, Aim High: Chart Your Course and Find Success. In the pages of her wisdom, I discovered the importance of deliberately developing your personal leadership and how to focus those efforts as precisely as the Thunderbirds flying formation. This is the precision by which to lead. The true measure of a leader is determined by those they influence and develop to follow in their footsteps. (Forbes)
There’s one characteristic the best leaders in the world have, but most people are uncomfortable talking about it: love. The best leaders can empathize with others, which is an extension of love, billionaire philanthropist Melinda Gates says. "Love is the most powerful and underused force for change in the world. You don't hear about it in policy discussions or political debates," Gates wrote in her book, "The Moment of Lift." (Business Insider)

To all the mothers that lead every day- thank you for your wonderful leadership in every aspect- we hope you enjoyed your day yesterday!

February 4, 2019

7 Tom Brady leadership secrets that will bring you success-- on and off the field. In addition to being perhaps the greatest football player of all time -- certainly the greatest quarterback -- Tom Brady is a remarkably effective leader. Here are 7 leadership traits that have made Tom Brady so successful in his long and fabled career. (Inc)
5 collaborative practices that impact learning. If we are always reacting to the urgent, there is never time to get better. It is really important that teams are on the same page and there are always things that have to get done, but we can’t expect to collectively get better if we spend most of our time together focused on updates and logistics and completing tasks imposed by others. (Katie L Martin)
The power of relationships. This video is part of Edutopia’s How Learning Happens series, which explores teaching practices grounded in the science of learning and human development. (Edutopia)
Leadership Q& A: Leading by example. Pauline Kubat is Principal of Epping Views Primary School in Melbourne’s north, a school with a large enrollment of 1350-plus students. But, she has also had the experience of being Principal of one of Victoria’s smallest schools at a school with just seven enrollments. In today’s Q&A, she compares the experience of being the leader of each of those schools, and shares insights into her approach to collaborative leadership, how she overcomes daily challenges as a school leader, and her recent experience in the Principal for a Day program organized by the Australian Council for Educational Research. (Teacher Magazine)
Gen. Stanley McChrystal: 5 takeaways on leadership. In today’s world, it’s the people who are humble enough and empathetic enough to listen and discern what the situation is, what’s required, and then adapt themselves to that requirement who are going to be the most effective, important leaders of the future. â€œI don’t think it’s going to be the person who’s figured out what’s right and then say okay this is the way we do it, he said. (Military Times)

January 7, 2019

Fitting Five: Your bi-weekly guide to education leadership initiatives and success stories from across the nation.

2018 education research highlights. Education research continues to remind us of the powerful impact teachers have on children. This impact is overwhelmingly positive- the studies we highlight here demonstrate specific ways in which teachers can or already do help students feel a sense of belonging in school and make gains in learning. (Edutopia)
Why schools should teach the curriculum of the future, not the past. According to analysis of 750 occupations by the McKinsey Global Institute, 51% of job activities are highly susceptible to automation and that’s through adapting currently demonstrated technology alone. It’s also important to note that these activities span jobs across industries as well as skill and wage levels. This indicates that automation is much less likely to lead to the mass unemployment predicted by alarmists but is almost certainly going to necessitate the redefinition of most occupations and requisite skills. (World Economic Forum)
The number of students taking online courses is quickly rising, but perceptions are changing slowly. The Babson Survey Research Group, an organization that tracks online enrollment, notes that between 2012 and 2016 the percent of online enrollment in universities increased 17.2 percent while overall enrollment decreased. But that expansion doesn’t necessarily correlate with how the public perceives the quality of online courses, historically questioned for its lack of rigor and limited measurable learning gains. (Edsurge)
4 common myths about leadership that can hold you back. To be unstoppable leaders for our businesses and our people, tuning out from the noise and distractions potentially misguiding us is pertinent now more than ever. Pay attention to any presence of these four myths and make guiding your people a more soul-enriching journey that they and you will want to continue well past your leadership term’s end. (Entrepreneur)
GLS Applicant Insights Portal. Grundmeyer Leader Services is thrilled to help you as you seek your next leadership opportunity. Our consultants are here to help you as you try to win the position. Their expertise and combined hours of work in districts with leaders (both former principals and Superintendents and now hiring) will prove to be invaluable as you work toward your desired position in K12 school systems. Their expertise and experience is offered to you in a new Guided Applicant Process where you will get insights and advice through three guided electronic steps in the hiring process. (Grundmeyer Leader Services)

April 15, 2019

Effective school leaders understand that everyone’s input has value. Schools are a lot like companies, in the sense that innovation and creativity are vitally important. However, some principals believe that they know it all, and refuse to listen to others, even in dark times, which stifles the creativity of their staff. A great idea is a great idea, and the principals that embrace this logic are often the most successful. (The Advocate)
Nine ways to ensure your mindfulness teaching practice is trauma-informed. A recent MindShift article highlighted some things teachers should be aware of if they’re bringing mindfulness into their classrooms. Students may have experienced trauma that makes sitting silently with their eyes closed feel threatening, and teachers can’t assume it will be an easy practice for every child. That awareness is important to create an inclusive environment, but it doesn’t mean that teachers shouldn’t cultivate their own mindfulness practice or use some techniques with students. (KQED)
The cult of homework. America has long had a fickle relationship with homework. A century or so ago, progressive reformers argued that it made kids unduly stressed, which later led in some cases to district-level bans on it for all grades under seventh. This anti-homework sentiment faded, though, amid mid-century fears that the U.S. was falling behind the Soviet Union (which led to more homework), only to resurface in the 1960s and 70s, when a more open culture came to see homework as stifling play and creativity (which led to less). But this didn’t last either: In the â€™80s, government researchers blamed America’s schools for its economic troubles and recommended ramping homework up once more. (The Atlantic)
Why my leadership team doesn’t make decisions. A leadership team is not primarily a decision-making body, what, then, is it? It is a community, the members of which take collective ownership of the good of the organization. For this to work, the leadership team must function as a team. Therein is the paradox. My team is strong because it does not make decisions. (BizTimes)
Command-and-control leadership can feed your ego; instead aim for co-creation. Leadership happens in the conversational space first and foremost. Today, I believe it's necessary to raise your game for influencing and recognizing the importance of human connections. The ability to influence happens each and every time you step into the conversational space through the lens of intimate connections. An intimate connection can be created through gratitude, appreciation, deep listening, understanding another's reality, and being curious and inclusive. This is what I call "holistic influencing” and it happens when we genuinely connect to others emotionally; it can only happen when social bonds are created. (Forbes)

September 30, 2019

Desired Personal Traits for K-12 District Leaders. GLS recently released their newest report, which highlights the personal traits for school leaders over the last 5 years. It provides context to why those qualifications and experiences top the needs for most K-12 schools and what questions can be asked of candidates to gauge their leadership capacity around these qualifications. (Grundmeyer Leader Services)
Develop leadership with intention- and heart. Good leaders create an intentional culture of respect, of inclusion and of genuine connection to the people they lead. You bring your whole self to your leadership â€” your childhood experiences, your life’s tragedies and as well as your joyful accomplishments. It's okay to own the good and the not-so-good. They make you an authentic human, so be real- and lead. (nwtimes)
Why new leaders should make decisions slowly. The stakes are high when a new leader takes over. Despite their training and experience, a full 74% of new leaders say they are unprepared for the new role, and in 18 months nearly half of them disappoint or fail entirely. In many cases, leaders either judge too quickly, making snap decisions that prove to be ill advised, or wait interminably to gather more facts, only for the critical moment to slip away. Here are three strategies leaders can use to make decisions more effectively when they’re new to an organization. (Harvard Business Review)
Bill Gates says this 1 simple habit separates successful leaders from everyone else. "As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others." While that may sound vague to some (what exactly does "empower" mean?), let's put some definition around it, in the context of effective leadership performance today. But first, we need to clear an obstacle to our thinking about any misconceptions and false truths about what leadership is not. (Inc.)
October is cybersecurity awareness month. The 2019 NAIS Trendbook identifies Cybersecurity as a rising concern for schools. Staff in small schools wear many hats and have a small (or no) technology staff. They also often don't have time or expertise to focus on data and cybersecurity threats. Look for helpful assessments and offerings during October to ensure the safety and privacy of data in your district. (Educational Collaborators)

September 9, 2019

3 lessons that being in the NFL taught me about leadership. You’ve probably seen many analogies between football and business, but it’s never been more relevant than today. New technologies have changed the modern workplace, which impacts how we work in multiple ways. Like football, conditions often shift quickly, and there is more significant pressure to advance in a shorter amount of time. Employees, like players, must be nimble and agile and able to adjust to changing needs and priorities. This is no easy feat because you're also dealing with a company’s constantly evolving goals. (Fast Company)
America's most innovative leaders. Business school professors Jeff Dyer and Nathan Furr teamed up with consultant Curtis Lefrandt to measure four essential leadership qualities of top founders and CEOs: media reputation for innovation, social connections, track record for value creation and investor expectations for value creation. The researchers then ranked these visionaries in a high-powered selection of 100 innovators at top U.S. companies. (Forbes)
Don't fall into this leadership trap. As I’ve written here before, effective leadership communications involves two distinct activities: transmitting and receiving. You can think of it like a two-way radio or a smartphone. They only work when they both transmit and receive. For your leadership communications to be inspirational and influential, you need to do both as well. (GovExec)
How can you be sure someone has true leadership skills? Leadership seems to come naturally to some, though it may come at a price. You first need to grow up. So declares venture capitalist-turned-leadership coach Jerry Colonna, the "CEO Whisperer" I recently interviewed known to make founders and CEOs cry by asking tough personal questions. (Inc)
Hire leaders for what they can do, not what they have done. Academic studies show that promotions are still largely a reward for past performance, and that organizations continue to assume the attributes that have made someone successful so far will continue to make them successful in the future (even if their responsibilities change). This may explain why there are still a large number of incompetent leaders. (Harvard Business Review)

October 14, 2019

Aflac CEO on leadership: take care of your employees and they’ll take care of business. Dan Amos has been CEO of Aflac for almost 30 years. That’s pretty remarkable in the universe of Fortune 500 companies. So, what did Amos do to last that long? “Well my family started the company,” Amos says in his slow Southern drawl. “There’s a pride of that element that I know makes a difference.” He also stays true to a leadership lesson he learned from his father, Paul, and his uncles John and Bill Amos who founded Aflac. “They had a saying that I really like,” he says. “If you take care of your people, they’ll take care of the business.” (Fortune)
Leadership that moves you forward: innovation, vision, and planning. School leaders are engaged in managing transformational change at scale, shifting the model of “education as usual” for all school stakeholders. To help understand how district and building-level administrators can successfully manage the change process when leading personalized learning initiatives, the Institute for Teaching and Leading (i4tl) conducted research looking at which actions by leaders most strongly correlated to positive impact in the effective implementation of a personalized/customized learning environment. (Institute for Teaching and Leading)
Education technology could be Iowa’s new frontier. Iowa has the potential to become a world leader in addressing K-12 and higher education challenges that transcend state boundaries, said Adam Keune, co-chairman of the Iowa Innovation Council, EdTech work group and co-founder of Higher Learning Technologies. z’From the rising costs of higher education to the ever-growing sizes of our K-12 classrooms, the education system has a clear need for new ways to teach and learn,” he said. “By developing an ecosystem that supports and nurtures innovative EdTech companies, Iowa can simultaneously grow our economy while improving the lives of millions of learners all across the world.”(The Gazette)
Among today’s most prized leadership qualities: playing nicely. Employers now prefer to elevate highly collaborative executives. “Today, inclusion and collaboration are the declared values of a lot of large organizations because those qualities demonstrate effective leadership,” said Janice Waterman, founder and CEO of Waterman Hurst. The provider of leadership career services often counsels executives about how to work with competitors for higher-level spots. (Wall Street Journal)
Jeff Bezos: Amazon leadership principle that “surprises people” the most. Amazon famously has 14 leadership principles that are part of the company’s ethos. But there is one that “surprises people,” according to Jeff Bezos “it’s Amazon’s fourth leadership principle: “be right, a lot…[G]ood leaders are right a lot,” Bezos said at the Pathfinder Awards in Seattle in 2016. “You’re not going to be right all the time, but I think with practice, you can be right more often.” How do you do that? “People who are right a lot, they listen a lot, and people who are right a lot, change their mind a lot,” Bezos said. (CNBC)

October 28, 2019

How parenting books taught me to be a better leader. While business books often focus on how to improve your personal performance, leadership is ultimately about how you foster and nurture your team. To get really good at that nurturing work, go to the books that are all about nurturing: the current generation of parenting books, informed by the latest research on developmental psychology and neuroscience. (The Wall Street Journal)
Sailing toward the new metrics of leadership. The world of business is built on the logic of numbers, the foundation of economics. Examine how business leaders talk in finance-related language. We crunch the numbers, give someone a blank check, spend a fortune, look for a steal or a bang for our buck, hold the purse strings, avoid a rip-off, search for top dollar or a quick buck, scale back, and put our money where our mouth is. But, leading employees requires the logic of people. Yet we try to assess it using the same yardstick used to evaluate results. We measure morale with an engagement score; we gauge people’s success with high retention rates. (RealLeaders)
9 phrases that immediately expose weak leaders for who they are. We know them from their behaviors, and we know them for how they speak. Even if you’ve never worked for them, you can learn to spot weak leaders by just listening to how they speak and the phrases they use when communicating with others. If you’re attuned to the messaging, you can easily start to pick them out of the crowd or â€“ better yet â€“ spot the signs during an interview, and remove them from your candidate pool. (Forbes)
62% of employees want leaders to speak openly about mental health. Multiple studies show that anxiety in the workplace is peaking and burn-out at work is common. What now? The intuitive answer would be for businesses to create more awareness of mental health symptoms and how to get help. Many companies are doing just that. But today’s employees are asking for more. A younger demographic in particular is looking for more open, meaningful connections to leadership and want to hear directly from them on mental health issues. (Forbes)
The challenge of leading in a culture of distrust. Jim sat with his manager to discuss his performance during the past six months, but during the discussion with his manager Jim was caught off-guard with his manager's discussion: "Jim, you are too soft with your people, you need to show them you are a jerk, show them who the boss is." Now the culture of the organization is very toxic, but Jim was the exception to the rule, but now he was being forced to adopt a style of management not align to his personality and his values. So eventually, when the pressure was unbearable from his manager, Jim left the company to the disbelief of his team. But can you blame Jim, how can anyone lead in a culture of distrust between employees and management. (Leadership First)

November 11, 2019

Why likeable leaders seem more effective. The old adage that leadership is not about being liked, but rather only about performance, is not quite correct in the modern organization where employee’s perspectives and voices are being heard to an increasingly greater extent. Leaders need to lead, yes, but they also need to balance out a single-minded focus on outcomes by developing a rapport with and demonstrating a high regard for their people. The bottom line from our analysis is that leaders who are not liked will pay a high price as it is almost certain that their teams will evaluate them negatively on other facets of performance. (Harvard Business Review)
Leadership and being uncool. Wanting to look cool is a close cousin of the fear of looking stupid. Being concerned with coolness leads to avoiding risk and denying vulnerability which inhibits us from forming relationships. And, as vulnerability guru Brene Brown argues in her book Dare to Lead, vulnerability is essential to leadership, as it promotes the connection, communication and trust that foster innovation and collaboration. (Forbes)
How can you be sure someone has true leadership skills? It comes down to one word. With smart devices and AI beginning to dominate the workforce, the characteristics of an ideal job candidate have changed. Companies no longer need team members who can just solve a problem; they need leaders who can figure out the next problem that needs solving. Leaders are inspirational, equipped with an astute ear, and ready to break the mold at any moment and take risks. Topping the necessary skillset of leaders in the digital age is something technology has yet to master.It comes down to one word: humility. (Inc.)
Leadership mindsets for the new economy. Mindsets are mental maps that reflect and guide how people behave in organizations. They signal how people operate and what they are about. So, what leadership mindsets did respondents and interviewees feel were critical to winning in the digital economy? After analyzing our survey data and conducting a sentiment and heat map analysis of the interviews we conducted, we identified four: producers, investors, connectors, and explorers. (MIT Sloan Review)
10 lessons from history about what makes a truly great leader. With the 2020 presidential election approaching, America is bracing to choose its next leader in a time of incredible change and upheaval. How can we recognize the kind of person we’ll need to lead us through these turbulent times? What are the qualities that a truly great American president needs? What can this person, regardless of political affiliation, learn from leaders of the past? (Time)

November 25,2019

New Harvard Research: To Be Successful Chase Your Purpose, Not Your Passion. Instead of asking what makes you happy and "following your passion," instead ask yourself what you care deeply about, he instructs. By focusing on purpose you align your work with your deepest values, and also relieve yourself of the expectation that the long slog of a career will be all (or even mostly) happiness and sunshine. (Inc.)
Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Secrets Of Creativity Apply To Leadership. I was a speaker at the Fast Company Innovation Festival so I got to pop in on the session that featured Lin-Manuel Miranda, the well-known creator of Hamilton. The discussion was about the relationship between creative people and their commercial sponsors, and it featured Miranda and Elizabeth Rutledge, the CMO of American Express. Miranda had a lot to say about maintaining integrity while working with a large company and a fascinating take on what it takes to be a successful creative. There are plenty of lessons here for entrepreneurs and everyone who is trying to be creative in their own lives. (Forbes)
These are four essential qualities you need to be an effective leader. Everybody wants to be a leader. But sadly, not always for the right reasons. If leadership roles weren’t associated with higher levels of personal career success, including more status, money, and power, there would surely be a much lower proportion of people in the world willing to be leaders”particularly among men. One of the problems is that people are generally unaware of their leadership potential, not least because of the general human tendency we have to assume we are better than we actually are, especially when we aren’t competent. So before you aspire to leadership roles, check if you have these qualities. (Fast Company)
1-on-1 Meetings Are the Key to Great Leadership. Here's How to Do Them Right. Contrary to popular belief, leaders can't make someone highly-engaged. But they can create the conditions for high engagement, in which people choose to bring their best. And the most effective and overlooked way to do that is holding regular 1-on-1s with their direct reports. (Entrepreneur)
What Deloitte’s Report on Women in the Boardroom Tells Us About Leadership Diversity. In its sixth edition, Deloitte’s report titled Women in the Boardroom: A Global Perspective examines women’s representation in the boardroom and in positions of senior leadership. The research uncovers some revealing findings about women in the boardroom world over. Here’s what they found, and our analysis of their findings, which emphasizes the need for leadership diversity in an organization. (HR Technologist)

August 12,2019

Three strategies for providing top-down support for bottom-up change. Is it possible to provide equitable deeper learning for every student a school serves? The Colorado Education Initiative (CEI) partnered with Stanford University’s School Retool Fellowship to attempt to do just that- to empower Colorado school and district leaders to be the agents of change that all their students need. (Getting Smart)
How can you tell someone has really bad leadership skills? Look for these five signs. Rather than lift up the desired traits of great leadership for this entry, I'll continue down the route of harsh truth and expose the kinds of bosses that can disengage employees and tear down organizations. (Inc)
Opinion: To promote women as education leaders, stop paying men more. Education is among the most female-dominated of professions. Yet strikingly few women make it to the top role in America’s state and district education systems. And along the path to leadership, they face a familiar and frustrating pay gap compared to their male colleagues. If we want to promote more women into education leadership, it’s incumbent upon us as a nation to stop this pattern of discrimination. (Hechinger Report)
The 9- step leadership workout: complete transformation in just a few minutes a day. Fitness, health and diets take effort and commitment. We all know that. You can’t just read the latest diet book to lose weight. You can’t read a “How to get washboard abs” article and get the best belly on the beach. You actually have to stick to the program. You have to do the work. You have to commit to your goal. And, the same is true with leadership-just because someone, at one time or another, gave you the title of “boss” doesn’t mean you can stop training. (Forbes)
How servant leadership can transform your district from the inside out. How do you lead educators, students and administrators in today’s challenging environment? Does your leadership style help people to grow and become more autonomous? Of all the different leadership styles, the servant leader is the one that is most likely to achieve this goal. Let’s take a deeper look at this remarkable leadership style. As the term implies, a servant leader leads by serving others. Servant leaders place the interests and needs of their followers ahead of their own self-interests and needs. These leaders place a high value on the development of their team, work to build a community where members share power. Professor of human resource management at Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, Dr. Dirk van DierenDonck, says his research has found that the best leaders have six key servant leadership characteristics. (The Edvocate)

July 22, 2019

For leaders, decency is just as important as intelligence. Business leaders make decisions each day: big and small, positive and negative. All of them affect employees, customers, shareholders, communities, and even society as a whole. To make these decisions in moral and ethical ways, I believe we must adapt the essential qualities of a leader. Successful leaders today and in the decades to come must possess triple-threat leadership capability: IQ+EQ+DQ. In other words, they must possess a combination of two familiar attributes intellect and emotional intelligence and one that I believe must be recognized and elevated: decency. (Harvard Business Review)
Leadership and design skills chart the future of work. It is encouraging to see a growing number of schools and programs that develop the design thinking and entrepreneurial mindset that young people need to dive into complex problems and make a difference in their community. To create momentum for more valuable learning experiences in your community, hold a conversation with parents, teachers, students and business leaders. Ask them to reflect on what’s happening, what it means, and how to prepare. (Forbes)
Collective leadership is the best way to win. The world has evolved, and so should leadership models. One person can’t have all the knowledge needed to make decisions. Solving complex problems requires a diverse variety of skill sets and mindsets. Leadership must become a team sport. (The Ladders)
6 warning signs of bad leadership you should never ignore. Most of the time, I've found, bad leadership comes down to some big blind spots. Most people are able to overcome the blind spots that hold them back by raising their self-awareness. The rest is being able to apply what they learned habitually. As a result, they'll shift. Blind spots are the Achilles' heel to achieving someone's full human leadership potential, and unless people address them, they'll remain stuck. (Inc)
Effective school leaders learn how to solve problems. See how one Georgia principal used his leadership training to increase graduation rates. When Al Taylor became principal of Berkmar High School in 2013, one in three freshmen at the school in Lilburn, Ga., about 35 miles from Atlanta, was being held back. Taylor knew the research about ninth grade. Studies out of the University of Chicago have shown that performance in ninth grade is more predictive of a student’s odds of graduating than all other factors, including race and socioeconomic status, combined. If Taylor hoped to move the needle on Berkmar’s graduation rates, then 55 percent of the work needed to start in ninth grade. (The Wallace Foundation)