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Motivation. It’s great when you feel motivated. And when you don’t? Well, it’s exhausting and stressful to find yourself pushing and pushing to get things done. If you’ve ever struggled to motivate yourself (or your team) to perform, then why not take a leaf out of the late, great Steve Jobs book? Thankfully, as Steve seemed to intuitively know, there is an easier way to get motivated. Motivate with a compelling vision If you are working on something exciting that you really care about, you don’t have be pushed. The vision pulls you. That’s right. A compelling vision will do a lot of the motivational heavy lifting for you. At the same time, as is so poignantly clear watching the documentary A Band Called Death, a vision is not enough to keep your people motivated. Not over the long term. For your followers to stay motivated, your vision will wear thin if there aren’t some wins along the way. I was so inspired and moved this past weekend watching this 2013 documentary about the three Hackney brothers – David, Bobby and Dannis. These three teenage black guys from Detroit played killer rock music in the early 1970s. They were before their

Everyone wants to be part of a dream team. If only they were easy to create and maintain. Some years back I was so inspired by Maryellen, a great leader who was running successful hybrid teams before they were commonplace. She so inspired me then that I decided to repost it today. I hope you find it helpful. The original post: Today is a first. It’s called Tales of the Leadership Field. Featuring brilliant leaders out there in the field. I don’t mean the ones we all know about from mainstream media. I mean us more ordinary folk. The hidden leaders, quietly doing their brilliant work. My plan is to feature you. Yes you, my valued readers. Today’s tale features Maryellen Lewicki and how to create your Dream Team. If you have a story to share or a brilliant boss we could all learn from, then please let me know. You know who you are. There’s no set timetable. They’ll just pop in here from time to time. Look out for them. As much as all the bad bosses out there appal us, equally we are humbled and inspired by the brilliant bosses we’ve had. People doing great work to

It isn’t about giving without limit. Here’s an example of getting it wrong. Jane (not her real name) was at the end of her tether. She’d busted her guts to get everyone nice, new office furniture. Nearly everyone was grateful. And they let Jane know: Thank you, this is so much better.It feels good to come here now.It looks nice and is comfortable too. With one exception. Betty. As usual, nothing seemed to please her. Instead, Betty said, in a grumpy tone, as if she was being majorly inconvenienced: I’ll have to put my things back how they were now. Jane was sick of this. It felt like Betty was the one bad apple spoiling the bunch. Jane’s desire to serve her team was starting to feel like servitude. A definition Deflated, Jane asked me what I thought of servant leadership during one of our executive coaching sessions. I’m a fan of servant leadership. I even drew on the idea in my PhD. The term was coined in the 1970s by Robert Greenleaf, who wrote The Servant as Leader. The idea is that, as a leader, you see your role as helping people grow, develop and do their work well,

Unconscious bias at work. Gender stereotypes The Jean Paul Gaultier exhibition was fabulous. He’s a man who did not conform to the stereotypes… luckily for us. Remember those conical breast corsets Madonna wore on her Blonde Ambition tour in 1990? Unforgettable. And in this exhibition, what struck me most wasn’t the talking mannequins that were mesmerising and quietly disconcerting. Nor the impeccable craftsmanship and innovative design, and the fact that I wanted to take some of the clothes home with me. As much as they are out there, they’re wearable too. What struck me most was that he designed the prototype for those conical corsets at the tender age of seven – a papier mâché bra for his teddy bear called Nana. He’d asked for a doll and was given a bear instead. He wanted to dress him as a her. For Jean Paul, “to conform is to give in”. Luckily for him, no-one squashed the creativity out of him. Luckily for us, he didn’t give in. Organisational Norms In organisations, the rewards tend to go to those who conform with organisational norms. There’s a reason for that. It’s got everything to do with you, the manager. I think Hugh

Improve their mood… and yours It was a few years ago now when I learned this surprising way to improve their mood, that is, the mood of anyone a bit grumpy in your midst. I’d planned to go out with a friend to a local café. I was a little bit grumpy that day (that frustrating feeling when you can’t work something out – I was stuck on a section of my PhD). I was hoping that being out with my friend would lift my mood. I’d just been reading about Barbara Fredrickson’s broaden and build theory of positive emotions. It goes something like this: positive emotions not only make us feel good but they also broaden our thinking that leads to new, novel and varied thoughts and actions. Perfect! I’m going out… My mood will lift… I’ll have fun with my friend… My thinking will broaden… I’ll come unstuck! To be honest though, I just wanted to forget the studies and have a good time. The Grumpy Waiter We walked to the café, found a table and sat down. I was starting to feel a little bit better (some exercise, a change of environment, time with my friend). That

A Surprisingly Easy Leadership Tip This leadership tip will help you bring out the best in others. In the leadership field, you may have noticed how many ideas are simple, yet difficult to put into practice. Which is why what I’m about to share with you today is a real pearler (that’s Australian slang for very impressive). It’s straight from my award-winning PhD research. I was amazed to discover this. It really is a surprisingly easy solution to help people do even better. It’s what I found to be the key difference between those who were thriving at work and those who were not. In a word, it’s hope. Not just any old hope. It’s not hoping for the best. It’s setting a goal for yourself and then bringing a combination of both ‘willpower’ (the agency or will to get there) and ‘way power’ (pathways/how to get there). This notion of hope is based on Professor Rick Snyder’s definition. He wrote a book on it. But what I found is that it’s not hope in any old way. It’s hope under certain conditions. And those conditions involve you as their leader. Here’s what they are: Firstly, you as their leader

Mid-afternoon, you’re feeling like a champ. You started the day strong. You’ve worked out at the gym, you’ve taken the dog for a walk, and you’ve been sailing through your tasks for the day. No wonder you’re riding high on the wave of accomplishment and feeling great about yourself. And then you get home. You remember you’re having people over tomorrow night for dinner. You scan the house with a sense of slight dread: there are dishes to wash, laundry to fold, floors to be swept. It’s too much. You’re not sleepy, but all you want to do is lie on the couch and do nothing. You really just don’t want to do get organised! And you ask yourself: “Where’d that person go, the one who was ticking off everything on the to-do list all day long?” Turns out, this lack of self-control – specifically after a day when you’ve exercised a lot of willpower – is perfectly normal. According to Roy Baumeister, a professor of psychology at Florida State, willpower is like a muscle. You can build up its strength, but at some point it will deplete. It’s not an infinite resource, and requires recovery time. Roy and his

The future of leadership… it takes more than bite-sized ‘snacks’ of information. There are some things we just don’t do as well as the robots. And there are some things the robots just don’t do as well as us. Still, we need to adapt. And the best way I know is to keep on learning. Turns out I’m not alone: ‘The future of leadership is learning’, says the brilliant Heather McGowan. ‘The best leaders are the best learners’, says the brilliant Jim Kouzes. But, learn what? When it comes to leadership, whatever your craft, you’ll want to learn the people skills – the personal and interpersonal. We are social creatures after all. If Harlow and his monkeys taught us anything, he showed us that there is no substitute for the warmth of human connection. We’re still people at work and organisations are inherently relational. We get things done with and through people. Now snacking on blogs like this is a great way to remind yourself of what matters. You can even pick up useful bite-sized ideas that you can implement right away. Implementation is key here. Otherwise, it’s like the snacking in between meals and wondering why your waistline is

Yes it’s exciting to start a new job… even if you may not meet your coworkers in person for a while (if you’re in locked-down Melbourne and Sydney at least). You plan to hit the ground running, make the most of the opportunity and succeed. You definitely don’t want to make any of the same mistakes you might have made in the past. This is a common reason people seek out executive coaching. To make sure you start your great new job strong. Another common reason (both for transitioning to a new role and for seeking out executive coaching) is being in a job that’s not bringing the joy. The smart thing to do first is to work out if it’s you or them. After all, there may be a number of things you can do to make your work world better. But not always. If a job transition is the best move in the end, at least you know you’ll have done all you can and may even identify some mistakes that now won’t be repeated. Another reason, and possibly a more challenging one, is when you think you should have it altogether because you’ve done the MBA, the