Fully Human. This is my mantra for 2021. Covid has been the great leveler. No one is exempt. Life is unfolding on our screens. Illness, death, injustice, social uprising, divisive politics. We feel the contagion of Fear with a capital F, over so many things we...
When I was a teen, I worried a lot. I worried about exams and grades. I worried about friends opinions of me. And I agonized about how I would tell my dad I did not want to go to the college he had his heart...
I want to make a case for invoking the freedom to make – and remake – our own rules, in service of building better organizations, communities, families, and societies. I remember as a kid many recess kickball games on the school blacktop. I wasn’t the...
I was talking with a leader who was defining and implementing a strategic change for her organization. She was overwhelmed, under-resourced and getting more than enough oversight from her pressured seniors. The project plan was massive, and the forward movement was glacial. I listened, and then,...
"You need to do… " is a phrase I hear often, and I confess, when someone says it to me, I have a visceral reaction to it. I feel my muscles tighten and my mind skips – like my old vinyl records used to do. ...
Meet Jeremy, a mid-level leader in a regional office of a federal agency. Initial Peer Coaching Focus: Managing Up Jeremy was a participant in an Executive Leader Development Program for high potential managers sponsored by his agency’s succession planning program office. As part of the leader development...
Meet the 5-person leadership team for a budget office supporting a large federal agency. The Challenge: The Director and another manager had recently departed. The Acting Director expected to be in the acting role for an indeterminate, possibly lengthy period. As an acting director, he was unsure...
Meet Anita, a high potential regional manager in a public sector organization. Leadership Focus: Executive Communication Anita oversaw a small staff responsible for developing and sustaining productive relationships with a wide variety of stakeholders in a multi-state territory. Anita herself was expected to foster cross- boundary collaboration...
I’m about to leave the house in the morning and, as I grab my keys and coffee, I ask my teenage son to please clean up the kitchen when he comes home from school. I arrive home nine hours later, ready to swing into action...