New Years Resolutions 101: Don’t put the cart before the horse

It’s a new year. Have you set your resolutions or goals?  Most of us do, but then give up on them by the end of January. One key reason I see people fail at goal setting in the leadership and career coaching we do (and for myself as well) is because we put the cart before the horse.  We set a goal and don’t have any method put in place for measuring progress towards it or achievement of it. Maybe a couple of examples will help: 1.  I’m so guilty of this, so I’ll use myself as an example first.  

Passion + Productivity = Give Back (Real Estate)

As I walk into Micor to talk with their Vice President, Dave Ponegalek, about how they demonstrate passion + productivity = give back in the work that they do, there are signs on every door in the building that say “Thank you Ms. Lydia for your 5 years of service.”   When I arrived, I saw “Ms. Lydia” as most affectionately call her, walking over from the other building with a huge cake in her hand.  Her anniversary cake.  Everyone in the company has been over at the building celebrating her five years of contribution to the company. Although Dave never

The Best Books to Give for Every Person on Your Christmas Gift List

My reading list for 2014 has been shorter than my 2013 list for a variety of reasons- new baby, more time spent devoted to working with some wonderful clients and probably, most importantly, due to not setting a goal around reading this year (But that’s a post for another day- stay tuned for lots of good goal setting stuff soon to help us all kick off those New Year’s resolutions in the right fashion.) But, I have read some good ones this year and want to recommend my top picks organized for those hard to shop for people in which

5 Ways To Find Your Productivity Sweet Spot

Have you already started to think about your 2014 New Year’s resolutions? Before you do, consider how you can be most productive is a good way to frame those resolutions before you attempt to define them and then tackle them with the onset of 2014. Fast Company devoted much of its latest issue to productivity by highlighting productive people. These people all found their productivity sweet spot in a variety of ways. I could find no consistency in the activities or routines each person established, but there were several insights gleaned from the ways these highly productive and successful people

4 Tips for reconciling the irony of stress and productivity in the workplace

What’s impacting performance in the workplace more than anything else these days?  Many people would say it is stress, which is pushing some to the point of full-blown mental health issues. Consider how Graeme Cowan, author of Back From the Brink, describes this reality in the Fall 2014 issue of Global Corporate Xpansion Magazine: “In a hypercompetitive global economy, organizations must be ‘on’ 24/7. Yet this scramble for perpetual performance is taking a harsh toll on employees. They relentlessly push to get ahead and stay ahead- working longer days, emailing after hours, taking fewer vacations- often with little acknowledgement for