Research has shown that only about one-third of people are aware of their strengths and the management guru, Peter Drucker said that we can only lead from strengths.

A common approach in management and  leadership development has been to measure the gap between a person’s behaviour and the desired corporate competencies; whilst this approach is valid it can downplay the application of a person’s strengths.

My top strengths are; love of learning, humor, zest, perseverance, honest, open-mindedness and perspective. I know this because I have taken a test based on the research of Dr Martin Seligman and Dr Christopher Peterson.

Seligman and Peterson’s research has found six broad categories of the best of human behaviours (virtues) that are intrinsically valued across time and cultures. Seligman and Peterson suggest that these virtues may even be biologically linked in terms of survival of the species. Within each virtue category are strengths that we all demonstrate to a greater or lesser extent.
 The list is as follows:

There is a natural tendency to consider those strengths that you don’t score highly on as weaknesses but, unlike talents, strengths can be built up.

My lowest scoring strength is modesty ( for those of you who know me this is no surprise) and yet this does not mean I am not modest in some circumstances and with the awareness of this I can build it as a strength.

Positive Psychology researchers are now validating interventions to build strengths and the work is ongoing. This has major ramifications for the field of leadership development as we can know with certainty as to how to build up individuals and teams.

At Self Leadership International we have already started to build this research into our coaching and programs. A popular activity is a partner exercise in which each party listens to a success story told by the other and reflects back the strengths that they heard. The result of this exercise are profound in that colleagues who have known each other for some time get a deeper understanding of each other and managers learn to better delegate and build up their teams rather than jump to criticism.

Posted from Singapore 27/10/2010

The Square Watermelon

Japanese grocery stores had a problem. They are much smaller than in other countries and therefore don’t have room to waste. Watermelons, big and round, wasted a lot of space. Most people would simply tell the grocery stores that watermelons grow round and there is nothing that can be done about it. That is how I would assume the vast majority of people would respond. But some Japanese farmers took a different approach. If the supermarkets wanted a square watermelon, they asked themselves, “How can we provide one?” It wasn’t long before they invented the square watermelon.

The solution to the problem of round watermelons wasn’t nearly as difficult to solve for those who didn’t assume the problem was impossible to begin with and simply asked how it could be done. It turns out that all you need to do is place them into a square box when they are growing and the watermelon will take on the shape of the box.

This made the grocery stores happy and had the added benefit that it was much easier and cost effective to ship the watermelons. Consumers also loved them because they took less space in their  small refrigerators which meant that the growers could charge a premium price for them.

Creativity, Innovation and Customer Service Lessons

1. Don’t Assume – Most people assumed the task was impossible before even asking the question, “how could it be done?”
2. Question Habits – Just because you have always done something a  certain way doesn’t necessarily make it the best way. Ask yourself regularly, “Can this be improved?”
3. Be Creative – thinking outside the box is a skill that can be built up like a muscle. Creative ideas are often simple like this one, which actually put something inside a box!
4. The Impossible often Isn’t – If you think it’s impossible it is, but possibility thinking allowed a man to run the 4-minute mile and put another man on the moon. Approach your next problem as if the solution was possible.

By using creativity an innovation you too can WOW your customers.

Please come and visit us at our exhibition booth to find out more about our Leadership Development, Executive Coaching and Business Communication programs.

Mark Liew an Executive Coach and Leadership Trainer from our team will be speaking about ‘Creating Behavioural Lasting Change’ in the Corporate Learning Stream.

See you there?

Would you be interested in getting to the top of your game in less time and before the competition?

The secret is to get past the plateau. With most simple tasks we reach our highest level of proficiency after about 50 hours of practice and then our performance skills become automated and we stop learning. This explains why a 20-year-veteran brain surgeon is not likely to be more skilled than a 5-year newbie by virtue of time on the job.

What makes the difference between those that reach the top in sport and business is two things:

1. Intentional Practice
2. Immediate feedback against predetermined standards

Intentional practice is perfect practice and perfect practice makes perfect. Intentional practice requires knowing “Why” you are doing what you are doing and complete “Attention” to the task. Usually it is only possible to maintain this high level of concentration for an hour and usually in the morning when our minds are fresh.

Getting feedback against a known standard coupled with intentional practice, accelerates learning. With feedback we can make minute adjustments to our behaviour that makes the difference between a silver and gold medal. If this feedback is also positive and encouraging it will also build self-confidence and therefore motivation to keep practicing.

So what would fast track your career?

Skills such as getting along with peers, motivating a team to improve performance, influencing you boss to make better decisions are key components of leadership development, yet most people don’t think of these as things to practice.  We might read a book, take a course, even an MBA but do we think about practicing and getting feedback from a coach?

If you are serious about wanting to fast track your career you need to identify which competencies are going to make the difference and then I advise start your intentional practice and get some feedback.

Remember PPP – Perfect Practice makes Perfect!

BTW The picture is of my son Nathan who is not yet 2. He is imitating me giving a speech which he has seen on video! The shot is taken by my wife Zurina who is a professional photographer.

It works great in Firefox, and Explorer bugs such as blog feeds are being fixed as I write this post. On the website you will find all the information you need on our Leadership Development, Business Communication, Executive Coaching and Self Development programs.

The navigation has been totally re-worked so all pages have new URL’s. This makes the site easier to use but we have lost Google rankings because our incoming links are now broken. So if you own a website or a blog and find the information useful, we would really appreciate you adding a link to www.selfleadership.com or any of the pages you find interesting.

Cheers – The Self Leadership Team.

These are two important questions that you can help me answer.

1. Do we need to manage Gen Y any differently than previous generations (Gen X, Baby Boomers, Traditionals)?

2. Does Gen Y need to learn to manage upwards to update their bosses?

Research has shows that generations are not defined by age but by critical events that shape their development. The USA and Australia have similar cultures where Gen Y’s will usually be younger than 28; whilst in other countries ages are as follows: Singapore (<27), China (<28) Hong Kong (<30) and India (<31). Also the characteristics of Gen Y tend to vary in different countries/regions.

Common Gen Y characteristics include:

• They embrace technology.

• They like to multi-task, computer, iPod, phone, Facebook often at the same time.

• They actively seek feedback on their progress from their managers.

• They want meaningful and engaging work.

• They like to contribute ideas and make an impact early in their role.

• They have high expectations of themselves.

• They are concerned about work/life balance.

• They will actively seek other employment if their needs aren’t met.

Do you agree with this list or are there more?

It could be argued that these characteristics are the typical of a modern workforce in a global economy and not just a younger one. So perhaps the answer to Q1 is that we need to engage ALL employees and give regular feedback?

As for managing upwards, I believe Gen Y has a lot to offer. I regularly have ‘Green Hat’ sessions with my team (mostly Gen Y’s) and seek their input – this blog is a direct result of that. Perhaps more managers could be open to input from younger employees, after all “No one generation has a monopoly on a good idea.”

If you are Gen Y, what advice to have for your manager?
If you are a manager, what advice do you have for Gen Y?

This is a hot and current topic – so please share your views via the comments section below.

All will become clear when you understand the psychological background of personality.

The word personality comes from the Latin persona, which refers to the masks once worn by actors to give clues as to the emotions driving their behaviour. Today the term personality refers to the sets of predictable behaviours by which we profile a person. These sets of behaviours are known as types or traits and profiling tools are known as psychometric tests.

Personality profiling goes back to 2400 years to Hippocrates who suggested that one’s persona is based upon four separate temperaments (Air, Fire, Earth, and Water). This was probably the first 4-box personality type profiles which are still popular today – you may have come across tools such as DISC (Marston, 1987) or Herman Brain Dominance.

Psychologist Carl Gustav Jung, (1875 – 1961) categorised mental functioning into sensing, intuition, thinking, and feeling. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a 16-type indicator of Carl Jung’s Psychological Types (1940’s) and has been one of the most enduring of the psychometric tests used by organisations.

The weakness of MBTI is that as a ‘Type’ indicator it assumes that people are one of opposites, they are either extrovert or introvert, there is no in-between. The majority of organisational psychologists and common sense, suggest that personality is a ‘Trait’ and is more like a sliding scale (standard distrubution) where your personality can be at any point on the scale (1-10).

Using factor analysis psychologists (including Costa & McCrae 1976 and Brand 1984) have demonstrated that there exist five traits that predict personality across culture. Linking this research to Management Development gives us the Big 5 model of personality.

Using the Big 5, managers, recruiters, trainers and coaches can understand the differences between people and design work, learning and development plans to suit individuals. In addition understand the Big 5 factors can help managers and consultants to create high performing teams and winning cultures.

The 5 factors (UK labels) are Will, Control, Affection, Energy and Emotionality with 13 sub factors  (see chart).

The Big 5 Psychometric test (Facet5) is completed online and takes about 25 minutes to complete. Here is a summary of the five factors for you to do a quick self evaluation:

Will is the promotion and defence of one’s own ideas. If you score high on Will you will be good at setting objectives and pushing ideas through but you may come across as stubborn and arrogant (think autocratic boss). If you score low on Will, you will be flexible and willing to listen but you may come across as a procrastinator or too easily swayed.

Control is a measure of one’s own internal standards of the right/wrong way to do things. If you score highly on control you are organised, procedural and hard working. You may come across as overcautious, inflexible and authoritarian (think civil servant). A low score on Control indicates free thinking, casual and creative; however you may come across as disorganised with no follow-through.

Affection is a measure of how we treat and relate to others. A high score on Affection will mean you are understanding and sympathetic, very good at getting people on-side. The flip side of this is that you may be too soft even naive. A low score indicates you are pragmatic and business-like, not easily taken advantage of. The risks of low Affection are that you can come across as only looking after number one.

Energy is a measure of our interaction with the social world. A high score on Energy means you are involved, lively and enthusiastic (think extrovert). This means you may get bored easily, talk too much and interrupt others. A low score for Energy indicates that you take time to get to know people and can work independently; however you may come across as distant and a poor communicator.

The fifth factor is Emotionality which is a measure of our emotional reaction to, and our ability to cope with events and people. Emotionality is an interpreting factor which can exaggerate and distort how the other factors are seen. Highly emotional people are easily upset, anxious (lose sleep) and lack self-belief and self-confidence. Low emotionality is demonstrated by people who don’t get panicked and take things as they come. Taken to extreme low emotionality can make people appear cold and unexciting.

How did you go? Did you recognise yourself? Do you have self-awareness?

When we put all these personality factors together we get a picture of how the person might behave in a particular situation. There are 17 profiles with easily understood titles such as, promoter, producer, developer, entrepreneur etc. We can use these profiles for team dynamics, job fit or for Leadership development. In fact, Big 5 can be used to instead of the Thomas- Killman conflict handling model and Belbin’s Team Roles Model, giving a universal approach to developing people in the workplace.

If you are interested how Facet5 Psychometric or Personality testing can increase the productivity of your organisation feel free to contact  Self Leadership International in Singapore.

Many training and change initiatives including coaching are a waste of time and money because they don’t deliver results. Organisations tend to measure people in terms of performance and potential and so any investment in people should show results in either or both of these.

In Singapore,  Self Leadership International transforms people’s performance and potential by impacting how they think and how they feel about what they do and by assisting the organisation to create a culture that will support the behaviours required for success.

There are many approaches to  ‘leadership development.’ but what makes the difference is the methodology.

Self Leadership International’s consulting, training and coaching utilises a Neuro Semantic approach.  Neuro Semantics is the science of how our behaviours (actions and communication) are driven by how we feel (Neurology) and what something means to us (Semantics).

People do what they do (Neurology) because they believe (Semantics) it is the right thing to do as judged by their personal values, corporate or ethnic culture.

For leadership development to be effective it is necessary to change or create new behaviours and develop potential; it is therefore essential  to consider what meanings the individual or team has about their behaviour/performance, how they feel when performing and what cultural influences support or inhibit performance and potential. Only when these issues are understood can we consider how to encourage mindsets and develop leadership skills.

An example might be that a business wants to encourage its managers to coach their staff to develop the potential. The skills of coaching such as; rapport, listening, asking questions, creating awareness  and co-creating outcomes and action plans can be taught; but will the managers apply these skills if they don’t believe that they have the time to coach, don’t feel confident to coach and don’t get acknowledged for coaching? What if the managers have a mindset that developing people is not as important as delivering business results or believe that if they develop their people their own job is in jeopardy?

With a Neuro Semantic approach Self Leadership International can survey the hidden forces of culture within an organisation, we can assess the meanings held by individuals or groups in terms of values, beliefs and identity and we can design programs that actualise performance and potential.

Measuring performance requires establishing behavioural benchmarks for each area that you wish to measure. A benchmark takes competency, such as ‘must communicate effectively’ or ‘builds appropriate trust’ and makes it tangible by creating a scale of observable (see, hear, feel) actions.

Self Leadership International has created a number of benchmarks for key leadership competencies; however there is massive value in each organisation going through the process of creating its own benchmarks as this creates buy-in for a new culture.

Whilst based in Singapore, Self Leadership International works throughout the Asia Pacific Region.

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