Posts Tagged ‘Getting Started’

The Secret Remedy Leadership Obesity or How to avoid a heart attack before your time.

“Sometimes the comfortable thing to do isn’t the right thing to do.” -Tony Blair

Let’s be honest. You are quickly outgrowing the leaders who seem bloated, disengaged, bored, tired, argumentative, egotistical or overly selfish.

Times have changed. People are increasingly fed up with being manipulated in any way, shape or form into doing what’s not in their own intuitive best interest.

Leaders need to continuously wake up and grow up in order to be inspiring examples who don’t have to use fancy footwork, force or pressure to get results. Can you use your results to inspire and motivate instead?

The heart attack is symbolical. Open your heart. Widen it, deepen it. Or have it attacked by the reality of your people’s needs, wants, dreams, hopes, ambitions and interests.
As a leader, it does not serve you or your organization if you seek out comfort. In fact, comfort can be your enemy until you are a master at your craft, and even far beyond. Lose some weight, become pliant again, freshen your perspective on life and the current times. Step out of your comfort zone. Reconnect with your bravery, honesty and sense of responsibility. Let your heart embrace the concerns of your people, short and long term. THINK!

If you don’t you might find yourself not only outsourced and useless, you might even stop being inspired. And if you’re not inspired, why should anybody else be.

Leadership starts with you, lose the weight!

We can help you start getting back into leadership shape.

Call us today at (805) 680-3988 for your personal Free 25 minutes Empowered Perspective Consultation.

Sign up for The Empowered Perspective eZine above or visit our website at www.empowermentholdings.com.

We assist you with Intelligent Leadership and Quality of Life in Business.

People often ask you what you do!
When you answer that question, do you describe your products and services? Or do you communicate the benefits your clients receive?

For example, at Empowerment Holdings we could say:

We offer business coaching, consulting and executive services for “dead” professionals!

Sounds good, but you’re probably going: What does that have to do with me, my problems, my wants and needs?

And you’re right.

If instead we’d say:

“We’re able to help you overcome your fears. Period. We alleviate your professional frustrations, dissatisfaction and inability to move beyond your current, uncomfortable situation. We wake you up from the “dead”. WE WAKE YOU UP. We help you achieve breakthroughs in personal leadership and professional development.”

You’d listen because you’d know what you could get out of your relationship with us.

A leader that possesses the ability to walk in their client’s shoes for a while, who can get a sense of what life is really like for someone they’d like to do business with, will eventually become an ally and trusted friend. And people love to do business with friends, we do too.

Be a good leader and become a real friend. Take some time today and think about what people really want and need from you. Your family, your friends, your employees, your co-workers, your community, your world – what do they really want and need from you?

Wake up. Just for a minute, let go of your self absorbed worries and problems and think about what the people you are serving or wish to serve are really like. What are they facing on a day-to-day basis and how would they like to feel facing it. Figure out a way to make them feel better and deal better with their challenges and you’ll make friends for life – you’ll deserve whatever success comes to you!

Don’t continue to stand in your own way. Call us today at (805) 680-3988 for your complimentary client consultation.

Sign up for The Empowered Perspective Newsletter above or visit our website at www.empowermentholdings.com.

Let us assist you with Intelligent Leadership and Quality of Life in Business.

Be SMART about your goals!

If you have not yet learned how to set goals using the SMART method for setting goals, you are missing something.

S.M.A.R.T. stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely.

Specific:
Specific goals have a greater chance of getting accomplished than general goals. Your specific goal must answer the six “W” questions:

1. Who: Who is involved?
2. What: What do I intend to accomplish?
3. Where: The location.
4. When: The time frame.
5. Which: Constraints and requirements
6. Why: The reason, purpose or benefit of accomplishing the goal.

Measurable:
Know in advance how you will measure progress toward the accomplishment of the goal you set. Measuring keeps you on track, helps you reach target dates, and allows you to celebrate the achievements of smaller steps that drive you forward.

Ask quantitative questions such as……How much? How many? …to know where you are.

Attainable:
If it really matters to you, you will commit to developing the right attitude, abilities, skills, and financial capacity to reach your goal. Previously overlooked opportunities seem to suddenly appear to guide you along the way.
When you break your goals down into small actionable steps you can achieve almost any goal you set your mind to. step by step wins the race.

Realistic:
When you are both willing and able to work toward your goal it becomes realistic. With regards to motivation, a high goal has greater motivational force than a low goal, which is why many small goals remain unaccomplished, so don’t be afraid to reach for what you really value.

If you have achieved similar goals in the past or have strong confidence in your ability to achieve it, it is another indicator that your goal is realistic.

Timely:
In order to be smart, a goal needs to have a deadline or a time frame. When you establish a time frame for your goal your braincells go into action. “Someday” is not specific enough. When you choose a specific date – like July 4th – your unconscious mind starts working out ways to achieve it.

Call us today at (805) 680-3988, sign up for The Empowered Perspective Newsletter above or visit our website www.empowermentholdings.com. Let us assist you with your goals toward Intelligent Leadership and Quality of Life in Business.

Have you ever wondered why some leaders are trying so hard where as others seem to be natural leaders even if they do not try?

Here are three good leadership skills that will set you apart:

1. Listen – A good leader listens well. The greatest trap for a good leader is to not hear the voices in the wind. Without that fragile data that comes to you every day from the people around you you will soon find yourself without someone to lead. And guess what – followers make a leader: no followers = no leader!

2. Understand – A good leader needs to understand. Understanding means setting aside your preconceived notions of what needs to be done and seeing the situation nakedly and clearly. If you don’t understand what you are up against or where you are going, you are like a blind leading the blind: in circles!

3. Translate – A good leader needs to be able to translate understanding into action steps. All the listening and understanding only serve you well if you know how to translate the data into skillful action. Sometimes the right path will be obvious, sometimes it won’t. How well can you translate?

Call us today at (805) 680-3988, sign up for The Empowered Perspective Newsletter or visit our website www.empowermentholdings.com. Let us assist you toward Intelligent Leadership and Quality of Life in Business.

But it’s not my fault! I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE!

Do you hear yourself think these thoughts, or say these words on a regular basis? Do you know others who say these words and you know that they are simply wishing to avoid the fact that they might have to make some significant and important changes if they were to hold themselves fully accountable for the results they created?

In business and in life, if you make yourself not responsible you are giving away your precious power to make a change for the better. Whether you are blaming your employees, your bank account, the economy, your domestic situation, your health, your politician, or anybody else. You cannot become skillful or happy in your life if you choose to avoid taking full responsibility for your world and your experience of it.

Every year, it costs businesses’ small fortunes to repair the mistakes made by people who, if willing to take full responsibility, could and would have been able to respond effectively and timely to anything from small managerial problems to large misunderstandings in operations or negotiations.

Unforeseen events constantly take place as the result of our collective previous choices and actions. When they happen, what matters most is how you choose to respond. That is all you are in control of anyway. You can control your actions and you can control your reactions; that is it.

Taking full responsibility means you acknowledge that your response to a situation is your power within a situation. This takes honesty, patience, kindness and a certain amount of humility. Traits not always common or appreciated in modern business.

Neither blaming (not even yourself) nor complaining will create a favorable outcome from any given event; just simple, straightforward and intelligent response will have an impact on moving things in the intended direction.

Whenever you choose to blame and/or choose to become a victim of circumstance, you are giving your power away.

Taking full responsibility does not mean that you are the only one responsible and that others might not have to take responsibility as well, but that should not be your main concern. Whether they do or don’t take personal responsibility is not within your control so you are wasting precious time and resources on trying to make others do things against their natural inclination and/or will.

Step up – start working with people who are ready to be accountable and become yourself a part of a solution.

Taking responsibility is what separates the mature leader from the want-to-be.

If you want to start taking more responsibility for your life and work, there are simple formulae that we teach in our programs to help you do that. First, understand the self-defeating ramifications of your inability or unwillingness to take 100% responsibility for your results. Secondly, ask yourself some tough but honest questions:

If I were to take just a little more responsibility in this arena of my life and business, what could I actually do to improve the situation? Watch what comes to mind.

It all boils down to refining your response.

There is a difference between a reaction and a response because the latter draws from the intelligent engagement of your physical, mental and emotional resources to guide a conscious and decisive act. Reaction often is simply habitual and guided by your tendency of wanting to sidestep full responsibility for the outcome.

Let me give you an example: When David, an attorney and senior partner in his firm, wanted to get his life back on track after his divorce, he called us for Awareness Leadership training and stopped blaming his wife for leaving him and destroying the comfort zone of their unhealthy relationship habits. Now, a year later, he is thriving in new experiences, more awake and happy than he has been in the previous two decades.

Or Jen, a business owner and CEO, who felt stuck in her progress as a professional because she was facing strong temptations to turn away from her deeply rooted fears and self doubts. She signed up for our Executive Coaching and now is settled stably in her growing responsibilities and deepened client relations.

So, the next time you are faced with an unwanted event remember that it is your response which is within your sole control and which will redefine the outcome. Take full responsibility for that response today.

Action Step: Call us today at (805) 680-3988 or visit our website www.empowermentholdings.com to find out how we can help you take more responsibility for your career, business and life.