Videos for Leadership Training and Development

We Are All Resource Managers
The effect of great leadership is to inspire the people around you to do more and to work at a higher standard than they would otherwise on their own. There is a level of "discretionary effort" between what is acceptable to remain employed, and the best that a person can do, and that difference is directly the result of active engagement and a feeling of personal investment in one's work - an energy level fueled by the sense of value that comes from rewards not directly tied to a paycheck. In that sense, a leader is really a Resource Manager, and the mission of the leader is to tap into that energy source of inspiration. Effective leadership, then, shows its results very clearly in the increased productivity and greater output of a team, and the feeling of loyalty to the organization and higher degree of self-management displayed by individual team-members to the work at hand.

Employee Success is the Manager's Responsibility
Speaker, trainer & coach Roger Reece speaks to a group of managers in a Leadership Development seminar in 2011, describing how "victim monologues" - his term for the mental model that causes a person to unconsciously cast him- or herself as a victim in various situations - are what lie behind most of the chronic complainers and demotivated employees in the workplace. He explains the manager's responsibility to make their employees successful: to make them accountable for their performance; to learn how to motivate them; and most of all, to learn how to change the flawed mental models that hinder their ability to succeed and be happy, at work and in their personal lives.

Listening is the Basis of Leadership
In difficult situations or confrontations, it is the manager/leader's responsibility to be the stable one, to be the voice of reason. Of course you know your agenda, but be patient - you'll get your chance to say what needs to be said. The first and most important job of a leader in situations of stress or conflict is to make sure that the employee or coworker feels that they have been heard. This does not mean that your opinion won't differ, or that you won't follow through with your agenda. It is not important that the employee feel like you agree with everything they say. What matters is that they feel they have been given a fair opportunity and space to present their point of view. (And sometimes, they just need to vent.) The respect that you convey to the other person, by giving them a chance to speak and be understood - by actively listening and showing that you are willing to consider their input - begets the same weight of respect back to you, that ensures that they will listen and take seriously what you have to say, when your turn comes to speak.

Your Success Rate is the Measure of Your Competency
You have to hire people based on limited information, and sometimes what you get is not what you expected from the interview cycle. In a way, your contract with an employee is a bit like a marriage contract: you commit to a package that includes the unknown when you take them on as a member of your team; and now, for better or worse, as a manager you now own the responsibility for their success. Determination is an essential quality of leadership: we will always have to take ownership of commitments without knowing exactly what we will get, and determination is the resolve to see those commitments through. As managers, our goal should be the ability to take any person qualified for the job they are hired for, and make them successful as an employee, regardless of whatever blindspots, neural hijacks or baggage they carry along with them. Your employees' success rate is really the measure of your competency as a leader.

The Importance of Getting Your Team's 'Buy-in'
It is human nature to ask "why?" As a manager, you should expect and encourage the question, because it is the best gauge you have to determine if the reasons for your instructions are understood by your team. Your goal should not be compliance. What you really want is the 'buy-in' of the members of your team: you want them to understand and respect the reasoning behind your decisions, the overall considerations that drive your directives. Without your team understanding the 'whys' behind your decisions - without getting their buy-in - they will see them as petty and arbitrary, and their respect for you will suffer.

Every interaction you have with one of your employees is either building the respect and trust level, or tearing it down. Every action, every interaction, with any employee is building an image of you in every employee's mind, of your effectiveness as a leader.

Avoid Generalities
When coaching or training employees, or attempting to effect change in anyone, it is important to focus on specific behaviors. A generalized statement like "You've got a bad attitude" is bound to derail the conversation. First of all, you haven't given the other person any useful information on how to change, or any instructions on what to do to meet your expectations. Worse than that, the more vague and non-specific your statement is, the more likely you are to be interpreted as critical of the person's intentions. The fact is, the vast majority of problem behavior is done with good intentions, at least from the person's own perspective. The person at fault usually is either unaware of the problem, or mistaken about the results of their actions. Questioning the other person's intentions - or from their perspective seeming to do so - will only cause them to resist or discount anything else you have to say.

Always focus on specific, actionable, changeable behavior. Never question the other person's intentions - in fact, you should always assume a positive intention behind behavior. That way, what could be a difficult conversation will be framed in terms of helping them to better achieve the results they were already working toward.