Each January I head to the freezer in my basement and pull out a worn cardboard box. There are jars, envelopes, and bags filled with all kinds of seeds. Some are remnants of seeds purchased at a store in the past while others are seeds I have saved from my own plants.

As I shuffle through the various containers, I ask myself, “What do I want to grow this year?”

The same is true for leaders...

If you’ve ever tried to grow anything, then you’re probably familiar with the uninvited companion: weeds! A weed by definition is, “any undesirable or troublesome plant, especially one that grows profusely where it is not wanted”. Pulling weeds adds a lot of extra work to gardening. Thankfully though, there are several fantastic products out there to help keep the weeds under control. Once my plants are established in my garden, I can apply my favorite herbicide (such as Preen) and it prevents other weeds from germinating and growing.  It helps to clear the way for healthier growth of every plant that I want in that area. 

I love my old truck. I’ve had it since 1990. The paint is faded, a cheap seat cover hides the years of wear, and the a/c hasn’t worked in years. It has a five speed manual transmission so I get to be a (very) active participant in the whole driving process.

Like my old truck, I believe we have often parked our face-to-face communication skills in favor of…

I recently spent a couple of hours working with a new coach on listening. They couldn’t believe how much they had been missing in conversations with others. They jokingly asked me if it was okay to use these new skills with their spouse. They felt like they now had an unfair advantage in understanding them!

While on vacation you stop in a local restaurant for breakfast. You’re adventurous so you didn’t check the Yelp ratings before choosing this one. Seated near the kitchen, you have a birds-eye view of all the action. Cooks are working furiously to keep up with all the orders thrown at them, dropping dishes or utensils from time to time, and occasionally getting yelled at by the wait staff or manager for how long it’s taking to fill an order. The menu is extremely limited because the cooks have only basic ingredients and haven’t been trained to do anything except the quick stuff. Those apples and breakfast bars back at your hotel room are looking better all the time, aren’t they?

Whether you are an associate manager or a senior executive, what you say, how you say it, when you say it, to whom you say it, and whether you say it in the proper context are critical components for tapping into your full strategic leadership potential.

Where do you think you have more impact as a leader or manager? Is it in the formal, planned interactions like team meetings or performance reviews? Or is it in the casual conversation that started with the question, "Have you got a minute?"

My experience with coaching leaders and managers is...

What are some of your "trigger words" or phrases? You know what I'm talking about. Those words used by others that ignite strong negative emotion as you hear them leave the other person's lips. For me it's phrases like "this sucks" or the frequent use of profanity.

While not as emotionally irksome as trigger words, I do think there are words we use as leaders

I had a most refreshing moment with a team of people a couple of weeks ago. We were discussing the upcoming solar eclipse, and John, (not actual name), immediately brightened and started sharing way more than I expected about the history of such eclipses. He even said he would be traveling to South Carolina to stand on the very spot where a famous (to him) astronomer stood during an eclipse in 1903. The rest of his team joked with him about his “nerdiness,” but you could tell...

This past weekend I watched the science fiction movie Arrival. While it’s one of those movies I need to watch a second time to really appreciate all the plot twists, there is a powerful "teachable" moment in the movie when the main character, Louise, is asked by the military commander about her methods to try and communicate with the aliens who have landed on earth.

When we have a resource in abundance, we tend to get sloppy in how we use that resource. No where is that more evident to me than in our communication. The minute we have a thought and want to share it... we do!

I'm not sure whether it's all the texting, tweeting, and other short forms of written communication we engage in, but I see more and more people struggle to clearly articulate their thoughts in writing. Jordan Conrad at WritingExplained.org got my attention with some of his practical tweets about writing, and I was thrilled when he offered to share some of his thoughts about improving our written communication skills. Here are some tips from Jordan: