Self Leadership Coaching Blog

Have you ever been in the position where you have said, “on the one hand I want to do this but on the other hand I want to do that”?

This is commonly called being in two minds. You might be in two minds about your career, your work/home balance, a business decision or a romantic commitment. Being in two minds is certainly not a productive or even comfortable state to be in, nor is it demonstrating self leadership.

We do not in fact have two minds, but one mind that has two functions; conscious attention and unconscious processing. When we are torn between two choices, it often means that we cannot consciously process a conflict that exists in the unconscious functions of our mind. Continue Reading »

Do you sometimes feel frustrated when someone is clearly doing something that dis-empowers them? Or do you often feel hurt by what others do?

If the answer is “yes” to either of these, chances are you have been feeling responsible FOR other people.

A key component of  self-leadership is healthy responsibility in relationships.  I am talking about relationships with; loved ones, friends, colleagues, employees, bosses, etc. Continue Reading »

“We live in an age of unprecedented opportunity: if you’ve got ambition and smarts, you can rise to the top of your chosen profession, regardless of where you started out. But with opportunity comes responsibility. Companies today aren’t managing their employees’ careers; knowledge workers must, effectively, be their own chief executive officers. It’s up to you to carve out your place, to know when to change course, and to keep yourself engaged and productive during a work life that may span some 50 years.”  – Peter Drucker (HBR 1999)

Self Development is intrinsic to self-leadership as leadership and learning are inseparable. So as Drucker says, we must take responsibility for our own growth and success – we must be the CEO of our own mind and body. Continue Reading »

Confidence is a key success factor for modern managers and leaders and yet many lack confidence in the following areas:

1. Managing downwards when subordinates have higher qualifications or are qualified in a different discipline
2. Influencing peers or external stakeholder when there is no direct authority
3. Managing upwards even in a matrix organisation Continue Reading »

With the way today’s organisations are structured you probably work as part of team, even if it is a virtual one. Working in a team means getting work done with, through, and for others – and the thing about other people, is that they are different! It is this difference that makes team work both exciting and frustrating.

An important realisation when working in a team is that the way you perceive and respond to the world (your personality) is NOT the “Right Way” or “The Only Way” to do things. This realisation reduces our frustration and opens us to the possibility of collaboration rather than compromise.

The team work cycle highlights the need for different personalities. Continue Reading »

A key principle of self leadership is the ability to notice and then respond effectively to feedback.

As I write this blog post I am aware of the pain in my wrist from playing tennis. I have only just started to play tennis; I used to play squash and so I am used to flicking my wrist to get the shot. Flicking your wrist in tennis is not the correct technique and doesn’t deliver the required result; in fact, the result is pain. Now I can focus on the pain or I can focus on the message it is giving me – “correct your grip.” Continue Reading »

I have been an executive coach in Australia and Singapore for some years and I have seen some significant changes in the acceptance and application of executive coaching.

Harvard Business Review (HBR Jan 09) has just published a review of the field of executive coaching and makes some significant points on how to effectively use executive coaching as a self-leadership or business tool. Continue Reading »

I think you would agree with me that to create a better world we need to teach our children self-belief, and the confidence to to do the right thing. Further to my post on Self Leadership for Children I have come across another article that inspires me a as a parent to make a difference. Continue Reading »

I have just returned from a client meeting, where the client needed to train its sales people to effectively increase sales.

Increasing sales is one of the key actions that is going to help this client weather the recession and profit afterward. After identifying the urgent need to train trainers to equip the sales team with product knowledge and values based selling skills across 14 countries, the business development manager told me, “Yes, we need this but I was told yesterday that there is a freeze on discretionary spending.”

I wanted to yell, “Since when is learning discretionary?” Continue Reading »

Interruptions are one of the most powerful time wasters.

The simple reason is because for each activity that we engage our brain in, we need a period of warm-up (just like in any sport), and then only can we start performing at the peak of our potential.

The problem is that if we get interrupted in the process, we need to go back to the warm-up phase again. And the more we get interrupted, the less chance there is that we ever reach the peak of our brain potential. Therefore we end up wasting precious time. Continue Reading »