Earlier this week I wrote a post stating that leaders should have a closed door policy.  This post has created lots of conversation – I have received a number of emails, had personal conversations and several people wrote lengthy comments on the blog post as well. I’ll admit I used the “closed door” metaphor to

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On May 6, 1954 Roger Bannister set a new world record, as the first to break  the four minute barrier for one mile – running it in 3:59.4 (the current record is 3:43.13).  While the common myth says that people didn’t think the 4 minute barrier was physically possible, the reality is it was a barrier

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Each Spring, people begin preparing for a popular hobby. Whether it is flowers or food, people are thinking about, planning for, and actually planting their gardens.  Some of these gardens are meant simply to provide beauty, others to put healthy and needed food on the table – most all are done as a labor of

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Van Morrison is a legend in the music business as a singer and songwriter.  If you are of a certain age, I’m guessing your are humming “Moondance” simply because I mentioned his name. I read this Van Morrison quote via DanielKFoisy on Twitter and it really stuck with me: “Meet them halfway with love, peace,

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This is a post I started a couple weeks ago, then I let it sit. Since yesterday was the 32nd anniversary of America’s worst commercial nuclear accident (inside the Unit Two reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Middletown, Pa.), it seems appropriate to finish it now. The recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan are terrible twin

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This weeks resource recommendation is Stop Workplace Drama: Train Your Team to Have No Complaints, No Excuses and No Regrets By Marlene Chism Everyone I’ve mentioned this title to, loves it! I mean who wants all the drama? Like many catch phrases and cliché’s, not everyone has the same definition of drama. Chism defines drama

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Every leader has, in a formal setting or not, needed to provide feedback on performance. In workshops around the world I have asked people to give me their best tips for providing effective feedback. To a person, leaders create great lists of techniques and approaches. Yet one thing, perhaps the most powerful piece of advice,

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Think about your perfect supervisor/manager/leader for a minute. Build a mental list of the attributes that perfect person would possess and think about the words you would use to describe that person. Done? I don’t know what is on your list, but I’d bet the farm on what isn’t. Micro manager. I’ve never met anyone

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You’ve likely heard when you deliver feedback it should be balanced. When you have heard that, what people typically are suggesting that you should strive to give people a balance of positive and negative feedback. This advice is only half-right. It’s an understandable misunderstanding because people think there are only two types of feedback, when

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