I watched my friend resist the urge to buckle her toddler into her stroller. She could have done it well and much quicker than her little one, but she took a deep breath and said, “Ok, you buckle yourself in just like I showed you.” The precious little girl smiled up at her and said, “Okay mommy!” with pure joy.   The same was true with my five-year-old who has wanted so badly to put her hair up in a ponytail holder by herself.  I walked out to the car the other day and she beamed with pride. While waiting
The last three books about workplace effectiveness I’ve read have all discussed it. Two of our clients are having lots of trouble with it. It is what research shows us leads to team success more than any other factor. It is the concept of psychological safety. According to Amy Edmondson, a lead researcher on the topic, “Psychological safety is a belief that one will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns or mistakes.” And according to research conducted by Google: Following the success of Google’s Project Oxygen research where the People Analytics team studied what makes a great
I’m the mother of three boys. Two teenagers and one about to hit that “preteen” stage. Most days I want to bang my head against the wall. I feel like I need a support group for moms of teens. I miss when they were little and hung on my every word. Now I’m lucky if I can get them to take the earbuds out long enough to hear anything I say. We recently went on vacation and I forced them to put their phones away and engage in conversation with me. That request got me dirty looks and eye rolls.
I’ve found myself talking about skill and will a lot lately. Whether it be in one-on-one leadership coaching sessions or in group training, the conversation is often directed towards customizing a leadership approach based on the needs of the person being “led”. Much of our basic leadership training modules focus on customization based on personality, but that is only one piece of the puzzle. A person’s level of skill in doing a job or task and a person’s will to do the job or task (which includes aspects of personality) are critical to success. So what is skill and what
I came across a post on a Facebook group a few weeks ago. The mom participant posted a question to the group asking how people simplified their lives. She has three young children, and I took her post to mean she wanted to spend more meaningful time with her kids but didn’t know which direction to take or have the ability to do as a working mom. Most of the responses to her question came down to two types of responses 1) limit your kids (and your) extracurricular activities 2) outsource. People recommended outsourcing laundry, grocery shopping, ironing, and clothes