Learn from my good friend and colleague, Ian Berry, Alexander Blass and myself about how doing good is great for your business and your life – Singapore, August 17, 2010. (click the image for details).
Just a quick note to say that I will be speaking on Influence at the Singapore Leadership Development Congress on Monday.
I have a limited number of complimentary tickets available so if you want to learn about leadership and influence and are in Singapore, contact the organisers and mention this blog and they will have a ticket emailed to you (whilst stocks last).
See you there? Andrew Bryant,CSP
In Australia, almost one half of organisations are not effective in finding and developing leaders, which identifies some critical challenges for employers if they are to take advantage of the economic recovery – this situation has been revealed in a recent study by Drake International.
The report, Gearing up for Growth, found that 44% of organisations rated themselves not effective in finding and developing leaders. Furthermore, improving retention of skilled employees was the most important people challenge facing employers in a growing economy. This was mirrored in the report’s findings that 72% of organisations expect to face skills shortages this year at the same time as accelerating staff turnover, with one-quarter of employees expecting to move employers in 2010.
“With economic recovery now gathering pace, as further evidenced by the IMF forecast, employers are recognising that they have a critical challenge to remotivate and engage their workforces [and] leadership will be one of the key drivers behind the growth that corporate Australia and businesses will have to focus on.”
Improving the retention of skilled employees was also top of the list of people management priorities for employers (94%). Whilst this is an Australian study, the same could be said of countries such as Singapore. This situation is partly caused by cutting back on leadership development during the downturn and so the wisdom of a strategic approach to leadership development is now evident.
Source: Human Resources Leader
I just got a call from Australia, from James who needed a coach for one his bank’s people in Singapore. The reason I got the call was that James had heard about me from Yuvi who had previously used me for some communication training and the reason he used me is that he had heard about me from Carole who had been introduced to me by Stephanie who I met at a conference in Kuala Lumpur!
How much was that conversation worth? Continue Reading »
It is more than a year ago that I walked through the door of the Self Leadership International office for the first time. I was a young graduate of psychology, coming all the way from Romania to learn about training and leadership development in Singapore; with very little idea of what my internship will bring about.
Now, one year later, I can whole heartedly say that it was the greatest learning experience of my life.
Neuro Linguistic Programming – NLPNLP is a model of how humans think, feel, behave and communicate. When NLP was developed in the 1970′s by Bandler and Grinder it was a radical departure from the field of psychology, which at the time was focused more on human dysfunction than peak performance.
Today, with the acceptance of positive psychology, NLP appears less radical can be viewed as an excellent framework for learning to communicate effectively, to model people and systems and to design strategies for peak performance. Learning NLP can improve the performance of athletes, sales people, business people, coaches, trainers, teachers, therapists and parents.
I use NLP and NeuroSemantics in my consulting, training and coaching and I enjoy sharing the technology through public programs that I hold in Singapore and other parts of SE Asia. You can get a list of the upcoming programs by clicking here. I highly recommend NLP Communication and Coaching Essentials which is the first 3-day of a NLP Practitioner program and covers how to communicate and coach effectively plus we are conducting a full NLP Master Practitioner training in October.
If you like watching videos on YouTube then you can watch part of my presentation to the Singapore NLP Association.
Should is a signpost to our mental maps. When you say, “I should do this or I shouldn’t do that”, you are telling yourself and those who are listening about your personal ‘rules of behaviour’.
What is more interesting however are the ‘unsaid shoulds’. When we get angry or upset it is most probably because somebody else has not complied with our ‘shoulds‘ or ‘shouldn’ts‘.
For example; if somebody pushes in front of you in a queue, do you feel angry? You do? Well that is because you (and me for that matter) believe that they shouldn’t push in.
Customer service is all about anticipating the expectation of should and shouldn’t. Last weekend I was taking my wife and children to see Barney (the pink dinosaur who dances!) at the Singapore Expo. Well firstly the car park was a nightmare, not enough spaces and people parking illegally and blocking traffic. I could feel my stress levels rising as I knew I should get the kids to the show on time and that the expo SHOULD have provided enough parking.
I chose to drop my family at the entrance and go and find another car park, so after jogging back to the venue I was just in time for the show to start. My wife asked me to find two seat boosters for the kids and so I hurriedly set off in search of these only to be told by expo staff that they had run out of boosters and that I SHOULD have been there earlier!
Now I am not proud of my response to this situation because I raised my voice and told the girl that I had paid for the most expensive seats to see the damn dinosaur and I damn well think they SHOULD provide enough boosters! In defense of the Singapore Expo or the organisers of Barney and Friends we were recompensed with two buckets of popcorn but it is another example of reacting to a ‘should’.
I have just stayed at an excellent hotel (The Grand Millennium Bangkok, Thailand) where my every need was anticipated. On check-in I was asked, “Should I need a wake up call and should I need a car to take me to the airport.” This hotel continued to impress me and I was reminded of how wonderful life is when the world meets or exceeds your mental maps.
The reason I was in Bangkok was to conduct a 3-day leadership program for senior managers and during that training I emphasised using the phrase, “what’s important to you about that?” This question uncovers a person’s values including their – ‘shoulds’. Knowing your own and other people’s mental map results in effective communication reduced conflict and increased influence.
So shouldn’t you get better at your shoulds?
Monday May 25, 2009: Executive Coach and Meta Coach, Andrew Bryant will present ‘Masterful Coaching’ at the Singapore International Coach Federation (ICF) chapter meeting.
Together with Executive Coach, Dennis Heath, he will facilitate a debrief a video of masterful coaching by Meta Coach Michelle Duval.
If you are in Singapore and want to see how masterful coaches, build rapport, ask questions, probe for meaning, and co-create new behaviours and reinforce resourceful thoughts and actions, then come along. Details here.
Self Leadership International is a sponsor of the Singapore Human Resources Summit 2009. Continue Reading »
Executive Coaching has come of age, and is now viewed as an effective way of developing leaders.
I was recently asked to contribute to a book on executive coaching by Dr Susie Linder-Pelz who wanted me to share my perspectives on Executive Coaching in Singapore and Asia. To get the full scoop you will have to buy the book but here are a few things that might interest HR professionals or those looking to engage an executive coach. Continue Reading »
