Self Awareness

Words and Presence

Talent management is about great conversations. When we ask great questions the answers can tell us a lot, if we listen. Leadership development is often about empathy and building relationships. Here is a tip on how to do it better – compliments of a retired kindergarten teacher. My Mom.

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Behind Performance Adjectives Series: Narcissistic

How do we get past labels and deal with the root causes of performance issues? When a label like narcissistic is applied, too often that is the end of it. I think it is the potential for a much richer conversation that could shift and individual and a team to a different place in terms of trust and performance. The Birkman Method can help with that conversation. Here are a few tips for moving from a label to a conversation.

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Forget your brand. What is your art?

Talent management is about great conversations. For an individual to participate in these conversations, it is critical for them to bring a self awareness of what gifts and talents they have. Creating this self awareness as part of helping people find their place is critical. One key is how we talk about it, and Seth Godin uses the term Artist vs the traditional approach of talking about Brand.

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Leadership Journey – Strengths to overused Strengths

Talent management is about having great conversations. For leadership development, those great conversations are critical to have when transitions happen. Not sure if you believe this? Then read this post. Believe it? Then read this post where I give you some resources to become better at handling these situations so they don’t happen again.

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Listen: If you hear any of these 3 things you/we have a problem

Talent management is about great conversations. If you hear any of these statements coming from your own mouth or someone else’s, then there is a problem. Listen for these, figure out where it is coming from, and fix it. It is natural to have these barriers as leaders seek to have greater conversations with their people, but if we get stuck on one of these then things will get messy.

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Rule #1: Sleep

Sometimes it is the simple messages that are the most important. Like “just go to bed.” This message has made all the difference in the world for me, and I have the authors of Rework to thank for that.

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You don’t need more data

Talent management is about great conversations. I have used the Strengthsfinder assessment to facilitate the start of over 500 of these conversations. Now you can get more data from Gallup on the Strengthsfinder assessment, but you do not need more data. Here is why.

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It must be the shoes – Yes and No, but mostly No

Making the most of the talent in ourselves is less about learning and more about heart, attitude, and community. I received some Supeman shoes yesterday that remind me of that, and of 21 special people I was able to share a journey with over the last 106 days. The shoes are a reminder of what is really important.

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Questions to help the work get done (and the team to be built)

Talent management starts with what we will commit to doing and making sure we have what we need to be successful. These are also the building blocks for teamwork. Seth Godin paints a great picture of teamwork and how to get past disagreements. Here are a few more questions to help you use these to solve your disagreements and move the work/the team/your contribution forward.

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What is your learning BRAND?

Have you heard of TED? Where do you learn? Talent management is about great conversations. As part of that conversation, I love to ask these two questions to help me understand someones learning Brand. Use them, and if you are asked, be ready to offer some authentic and energized answers.

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Building a Leadership Development Program from Scratch

How do you build a leadership development program from scratch? It is a questions posed to me and it would not leave my brain until I wrote it down. Talent management is about great conversations, and leadership development is about structuring those conversations around experiences, self reflection, and networking. It can be done well and with a single currency – time from other leaders.

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