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In celebration of 100 episodes of the Leadership Wizard segment I thought we could look at the top tips that leaders should focus on to be effective:1. Challenge and Encourage – The leader needs to be focused on helping their team members to grow and stay motivated and that means presenting them with challenges – […]

One of the struggles when you are promoted to being a work leader or a supervisor is the likelihood that you will have to balance being a leader and being a friend. Q: Can you give us an example? Where this really can show up is when one of your buddies wants you to give […]

An effective workplace can create a long term competitive advantage, helping you to satisfy customers, retain talented employees and maximize profits. How your employees answer the questions below will reveal areas of opportunity to improve your organization. Question 1: How well do you understand what is expected of you at work? It might seem embarrassing […]

Introverts are people who are more inwardly focused – it has been said that introverts find that other people take away their energy, while extroverts, who are more outwardly focused tend to get their energy from other people. Introverts will find that they need to spend time alone after being with people so that they […]

Just got back from Halifax, Nova Scotia. It was the Canadian Association of Family Enterprise, bi-annual symposium. I spoke at the conference on the topic of “How I Nearly Ruined My Family Business and Lived to Tell About It”. Q: What is it that makes family business so unique? A: It’s the fact that we […]

Topic is celebrating success – since we are celebrating Victoria Day in Canada and our American friends will have Memorial Day next weekend. Organizations do not take enough time to celebrate their successes. Build a Base Camp – When you are climbing Mount Everest, you don’t go straight to the top – you take an […]

A common complaint I hear from people is that they feel that management doesn’t listen to them, tends to impose decisions and doesn’t let them know what’s going on. Management on the other hand thinks that employees are overreacting, should adapt more quickly to change and thinks that they do give employees an opportunity to […]

As part of our leadership training, we use a coaching simulation to teach managers how to be coaches. Here are some of the insights from that simulation: 1. Good coaches don’t have to be the best players – In most professional sports, the coaches are not former elite players. Sometimes a great athlete or a […]

Last week I spoke to a group of high school students who were planning to enter the workplace directly from grade 12. I thought I would share some observations with listeners who might also benefit: – First Impressions are crucial – most people still judge a book by it’s cover so make sure you set […]

Sometimes managers can get lulled into complacency thinking that just because employees keep their heads down and keep their thoughts to themselves that they are happy, when in reality they may be masking disatisfaction. Q: How do you identify a passive person? A: A passive person is actually defensive, it’s just that they choose to […]