Joelle K. Jay

Joelle Jay

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The Key To Purposeful Networking

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I recently attended the Silicon Valley Business Journal’s 10th Annual Women of Influence event – an evening I was excited about and pleased to be a part of. When one of my clients asked me where I was going that evening, I heard myself saying I “had a networking event.” She groaned and rolled her eyes. It startled me, because her reaction was so counter to how I felt: enthusiastic and inspired. It caused me to rethink the word “networking” and our associations with it – something we may all want to do if we value relationships as an important part of leadership.

Networking has developed a negative connotation, but for leaders who want to be active, engaged and advancing in their careers, it’s worth understanding how it can be viewed as not just essential, but exiting.

First let’s explore why networking has become problematic. Many people see it as too transactional. Others find it to be a waste of time, boring, time consuming, or overly political.

But networking is also a doorway to new relationships, new opportunities, and endless possibilities. So, how do leaders make better use of networking to make sure it’s time well spent?

First, we’ll need to change our perspective. One way to do that is to redefine networking. You might even give it a new name – one that appeals to you and motivates you. For instance, above I used the shortcut explanation to my client that I “had a networking event,” but that’s not how I viewed the evening at all. I saw it as an opportunity to meet people I enjoyed working with in person, spend time with them, and celebrate the successful leaders at being honored at the event. I could have shared that instead. It would have been more accurate than offhandedly calling it “networking.” You might experiment with eliminating the term “networking” and replacing it with something you’re enthusiastic about – like spending the evening with like-minded people, building new relationships, or learning new things in your industry.

Second, we can breathe new life into networking by setting the right goals. Consciously, or unconsciously, many people go into networking with the wrong goals: rubbing elbows, boosting their ego, or being seen. No wonder when they think “networking” they roll their eyes. Instead, try going into networking situations with goals revolving around finding people who help you become more effective and proactive, and understanding more about the opportunities around you so that you can be more impactful and successful. Ultimately, the goals of networking have to be aligned to a purpose you find valuable to be effective.

When you go change your perspective about networking and choose the activities that move you forward, onward and upward, you may find yourself no longer rolling your eyes, but rushing instead to build new relationships and advance your career.

For more networking tips for leaders, see my resources and latest book, The New Advantage: How Women in Leadership Can Create Win-Wins for Their Companies and Themselves.

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The Executive Comeback: How to Put Back the Shine In Your Star

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A client of mine and I recently had a long talk about how scary it can be when, for some reason, you’re losing favor at work – or, as she put it, “when the shine is off your star.”

We thought of several situations where we’d seen it happen.

  • One executive was tasked with implementing a risky, high stakes project that put him in a treacherous no-win position. When things predictably became challenging, he felt like the fall guy.
  • Another leader watched as his position was eliminated during an org change. He retained his employment but ended up hidden in a distant corner of the organization, feeling like he added no value at all.
  • Two other leaders actually lost their jobs entirely, leaving them searching without a safety net for new roles and new companies – a painful and highly stressful endeavor.

If you’ve ever fallen into one of these situations, you know how you can easily feel dejected, even rejected, and downright depressed. You can lose faith, question your own value, and even give up.

Or, you can stage an Executive Comeback.

I was pleased to contribute to Joann Lublin’s Wall Street Journal column, “How to Mount an Executive Comeback,” on this topic. In her article, Lublin quotes the CEO of Avnet, William Amelio, who says: “It’s how you recover from a job loss that really builds your character.” It’s also how you recover from any career downturn that builds your character. I believe the opposite is also true: your character is going to help you create job gains and create a much more positive and exciting career upturn.

If you want to stage your own comeback, start by asking yourself some key questions:

  • Why do you need a “comeback?”
  • What happened, or what changed, that has you feeling “on the outs?”
  • What’s your perspective on the situation? What other views are out there?
  • What is the true story – the empowered version of how you’re leading your way out of what could be perceived as a negative situation and back to a place of leadership and positive impact?
  • What actions can you take to move forward – onward and upward?
  • How can you keep your spirits up and your motivation high during this transition?
  • What is your ultimate outcome, and how would you describe it to others?

Answering questions like these can be the basis for a program of personal development: your Executive Comeback.

By looking honestly at your situation, and learning to tell your story, while at the same time building an action plan based on positive results, you are creating your Executive Comeback.

If you feel like “the shine is off your star,” or you want to move to a more powerful place in your organization as a leader, let’s set up a time to talk. You can reach me directly here.

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Why We Need To Talk Work/Life Balance

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Recently when I was giving a keynote talk to a Silicon Valley tech company, I asked the question, “How many of you want a better work/life balance?” Every hand in the room shot up.

I then asked, “How many of you believe you have work/life balance?” Every hand in the room dropped down.

Test it. What if I ask you?

Do you want better work/life balance?

Do you believe you have it?

If you are one of the lucky ones who are living their lives with a sense of serenity and ease, be sure to pass on your secrets! And if you’re not, know that you can get there. Either way, often the first step on the path to achieving that elusive work/life balance is to talk about it.

Talk to Your Friends and Co-Workers

            When I encourage you to pass on your work/life balance secrets, I actually do mean it – and if you’re seeking those secrets, ask around for ideas.

It may sound too simple, but I can tell you from experience that it works. The breakthroughs you so desperately want may be only a conversation away. All you have to do is take the initiative.

In that Silicon Valley room, seeing how the participants felt about work/life balance, I gave them some time to talk about it. In small groups they simply shared their best ideas – the ways they, individually, had saved themselves time and found better balance. In the span of just a few minutes, ideas were shared, collected, and adapted around the room. You could practically see the light bulbs going off as participants racked up ideas to save themselves hours and hours of time.

One participant learned how to better set expectations. Her co-worker at the table told her how she starts every meeting by telling everyone exactly how much time she had, and she sticks to it – saving herself at least an hour of meeting overflow time per day in the process. What would you do with an extra hour a day? Could setting expectations in some area of your life help you, too?

Another participant discovered she could save two hours a day by shifting her work hours to avoid traffic. Bay Area commutes are notoriously long, and for a driver whose commute could last 90 minutes each way, a simple change in those work hours could save her, her company and her family (day care!) time and money. Would your company prefer to have you wasting time in traffic, or contributing meaningfully to work on a slightly different schedule? Would your family be happier to have you home more? Would you? If your company is open to flexible work hours, this is something worth bringing up to management.

Perhaps neither of these suggestions fit for you. If you’ve read this far and aren’t getting any new ideas about setting expectations or shifting your work hours, you’ve proven my point: you need to get out there and find your own new ideas. Find the ideas that do help you break through. Want work/life balance? Talk about it. Ask for ideas. Go get your light bulb moment.

Talk to your Partner

Maybe what you need at this stage isn’t to get more ideas, or maybe you already have ideas but just need to put them to work.

One of the key people to involve in this discussion is your partner – your significant other or even your business partner. These are people whose lives are intimately entwined with your own. Are there agreements you need to make? Changes? Requests? Many people go through their days stressed and strapped for time, assuming there’s no way to change the situation, but it could be that if you have the courage to talk to your partner, the two of you can come up with new solutions.

Talk to Your Boss

Just as we make assumptions about what is or isn’t possible with our partners, we can also make assumptions about what is and isn’t possible at work.

Again, when I think about all the leaders I have coached to save them time and help them balance their lives for a more fulfilling and impactful approach, the ideas start rolling.

There was Tom, who brought his baby to work at times when his wife was traveling.

There was Renee, who cut back on travel by mastering the virtual meeting.

There was Kurt, who gave up endless hours of stress, worry and busyness by focusing his role and reconfiguring his team.

As another reminder, the point isn’t that these strategies are the ones that would work for you – although they might – but that all of these strategies came out of new agreements these leaders developed with their boss.

Having a discussion around what you want your job and home life combination to look like is a great step in the right direction. In doing this, you will be able to design the best strategy for your time and find the balance you never thought possible.

Let’s Start Talking!

If you’re ready to create a better balance, try these 7 shortcuts for maximizing your time. You’ll be amazed at what’s possible when you do.

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My Top 3 Strategies for Gaining Recognition in the Workplace

As Dale Carnegie said, “People work for money but the extra mile for recognition, praise and rewards.” For many leaders, recognition in the workplace is a reward in itself. They want their good performance celebrated, and recognition by management and peers of their contribution to the organization is a source of validation and fulfillment.

You might want that kind of recognition for yourself. Many of us do. But we don’t always get it.

In fact, many of us feel just the opposite. Unappreciated. Undervalued. Overlooked.

 

You can actually influence this yourself, however. Instead of waiting for others to recognize you or hoping they do, you can build recognition with some effort of your own. Try these strategies:

 

Signposting

To reiterate the importance of performance, the quickest way to get noticed is to get something accomplished that no one else has been able to do. But there’s an additional piece to performance that ensures you actually get your good work recognized – you have to point it out.

One strategy you can use to do this is called “signposting.” You tell people exactly what you did so they can recognize it. It might sound something like this: “As you know, I’ve been working on increasing revenue. I’m pleased to announce in the last quarter I raised our revenue by eight percent.” Or: “You’ll see our team has succeeded in bring in several new clients. I’m proud of their efforts. I’ve made it a priority to focus their attention and make sure they had the resources to get there, and they did.”

Signposting doesn’t mean you brag about yourself and take all the credit. In a team effort, you may very well acknowledge that the team gets the credit and that they made the difference. But you can also make it clear as to who enabled that to happen.

 

Capture the Brilliance and the Buzz

Secondly, when taking credit or looking to get noticed, it’s important to make sure you got the message right. You have to take responsibility for expressing what you want, and you need to be qualified when you do so.

Some people do this badly. They may take credit they don’t deserve, or make their results look better than they are. You have to have the substance to back up your claims. Does that mean a little bit of buzz doesn’t matter? Not necessarily. If people don’t know you very well, they may respond to your enthusiasm and the impression you make. The excitement you create around your ideas can draw attention to your ideas. On the other hand, if you have a brilliant mind and game-changing ideas but convey the message awkwardly, people may get distracted and overlook the substance.

In other words, neither is enough. The goal is to have substance, presented well—the brilliance and the buzz. Some people have exceptional performance that goes unnoticed. Some people get all the attention but don’t deliver. You need both.

 

Know Where the Bar Is

Finally, in order to gain recognition from others, you need to know what they’re looking for and what will count as success. For example, it’s not just what matters to you that gets you noticed. It’s what matters to the person you want to do the noticing.

If you want to impress your bosses, are they impressed by numbers, or do they focus more on stories that wow and inspire?

If you want recognition from your team members, do they value autonomy more, or direction?

Being able to discern what others value gives us the opportunity to align to their needs, which they are likely to appreciate and recognize.

So we ask ourselves, how do we find out what matters to these people? Begin with being perceptive—notice what people respond to and what they seem to value. Then, put yourself in their shoes. Understand what their concerns and goals are, along with what drives them. Finally, you can ask the person directly what’s most important to them. You can view this as a high sign of respect.

 

By taking these steps, you’ll make an impression on the people you want to notice you – developing your relationship with them while understanding more about how you can stand out in their minds.

Find more strategies for gaining recognition and creating win-wins for your organization and yourself in Joelle’s book with Howard Morgan, The New Advantage.

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How To Define Your Metrics For Success In 3 Questions

What is the single biggest driver for career advancement? In my view, it’s your performance. Or, at least performance is the one over which you have the most control. If you excel at your job and get stellar results, you’ll know you’re positioning yourself to be noticed.

 

There are three questions you can ask yourself to assess the impact of performance on your career:

First, is performance emphasized where you work?

Second, which performance measures will you use?

And finally, how will you claim your results?

If you can get crystal clear in all three areas, you will be doing everything possible to make your good work count.

 

Begin by assessing your company, and what it values when promoting. Does your company place a high emphasis in performance, or does it take in to account other aspects which are more important to them? If your company does place a high emphasis on performance, then you have to decide which performance measures will best highlight your hard work. There are tons of performance measures to choose from, some of which your company might track themselves, and others that you will have to do on your own. Either way, tracking your performance so that they numbers can talk for themselves is very important.

Finally, you have to be willing to claim your results and let people know that you played a vital role in achieving them.

In short, the strategy is this: focus on performance, get the results, and make an effort to point out those results so you can get the credit (and opportunities) you have earned.

 

Performance is one of the key advantages for leaders who want to advance their careers. To learn all nine advantages, check out The New Advantage: How Women in Leadership Can Create Win-Wins for Their Companies and Themselves and take your free self-assessment!

This article was originally published on Inc.com.

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How to Develop Your Inner Edge: An Interview with Skip Prichard

“If you want to be your best, you need to build on what’s brilliant about you.” -Joelle Jay

Leading On the Edge

Dr. Joelle K. Jay is an expert in personal leadership.  She has coached executives in numerous companies, written several books and numerous articles, and is a principle with the Leadership Research Institute, a global leadership development firm.

Reading Dr. Jay’s new book, The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership,  I felt like I had hired a personal leadership coach.  She shares practices and principles that are enduring.  I had the opportunity to ask her a few questions to introduce her thinking to you.

 

“Better leadership equals better results – higher profits, bigger market share and a global advantage.” -Joelle Jay

 

What does it mean to lead on the edge?

“Leading on the edge” is about challenging ourselves to take the leadership position in our own lives – pushing ourselves not to sit back and hope for things to happen but getting out in front and making them happen with our own intent and effort.

 

“Most true happiness comes from one’s inner life.” -William Shirer

 

What are some of the benefits of mastering personal leadership?

I believe that everyone is a leader – if not the leader of a team or a company, at the very least the leader of his or her own life.  Strong companies have learned that better leadership equals better results – higher profits, bigger market share and a global advantage.  Personal leadership helps us get the results we want for ourselves – a more fulfilling career, a more rewarding experience, a happier life.

TheInnerEdge_CoverYour book outlines ten practices of personal leadership. Let’s discuss a few of them. The first is “get clarity.”  How do you help leaders understand who they are and where they want to go?

 I recently heard a speaker say, “Clarity is   everything.  Confusion is the enemy.”  In our  fractured and distracted world, leaders need to learn to cut through the noise to hear their own voice.  They do this by asking themselves powerful questions – chief among them, “What do I want?” When leaders can get clear about what they want, they can outline the steps to get there.

 

Tap Into Your Brilliance

I love “Tap into your brilliance” because I am often amazed at people’s strengths.  How does a leader encourage an environment where everyone is operating in the strong zone?

 

 

“Wherever you go, go with all your heart.” -Confucius

 

When leaders learn to leverage their strengths, they positively burst into action. Suddenly their efforts are infused with energy as they discover they can finally do things their way – the way that comes naturally to them and the way they do them best. That has a contagious quality, so strengths-based leaders are naturally encouraged by their own successes to help the people around them – their managers, direct reports, their teams – to organize their activities around the strengths in the group. It’s a more satisfying experience for everyone – but more than that, it’s also far more effective.

“See possibility” is another practice. One technique you call is “Let it be easy.” Would you elaborate on this practice for us?

10 Practices of Personal Leadership

  1. Get clarity.
  2. Find focus.
  3. Take action.
  4. Tap into your brilliance.
  5. Feel fulfillment.
  6. Maximize your time.
  7. Build your team.
  8. Keep learning.
  9. See possibility.
  10. All. All at once.

Especially for highly-driven achievers, goal-attainment is all about making it happen.  That can be exhausting.  Sometimes a better answer can be found by sitting back and observing, watching for patterns, being open to opportunities. The answers may simply present themselves.

To give one example, a client of mine who was toiling endlessly to try to get herself promoted worked herself into a frenzy of activity with no result.  She decided to stop pressing so hard for a while.  When she did, she was able to see a unique and exciting opportunity (that she had been ignoring) as a possibility.  Maybe this was actually an opportunity she’d enjoy.  She opened her mind to the idea, and soon she found herself being swept into a new adventure in her career that not only got her promoted but led to a renewed sense of enthusiasm.  It all happened when she stopped trying so hard and took advantage of the opportunity before her.  She let it happen.  She let it be easy.

 

 

“Good leaders are, by definition, voracious learners.” -Jack Welch

 

 

“Take the complexity out. Make it simple.” -Howard Putnam

 

Time to Re-energize

Leaders need time to reflect and re-energize.  Would you share just one technique that you have seen work for busy, overworked professionals?

The easiest – and also, sometimes, the hardest – shortcut to peace is to power down.  We power down when we literally turn off the power of our devices to distract us.  (Yes, that smart phone has an “off” button.)  We also power down when we unplug ourselves by closing our eyes for a moment and sitting in silence. Take a few minutes to close the door and rest for a moment.  Give yourself the gift of a few minutes of solitude.  Gaze out the window or walk into the yard.  Even amidst the constant din of daily life, we can find a sense of peace by shutting off all the input and reconnecting with ourselves.

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The 5 Ds

Do you have a stack?

You know the one. The stack of files waiting for your attention. The stack of messages. The stack of emails in your inbox.

How will you ever get through them you wonder? Never fear – You now have a solution. Allow me to introduce to you “The 5 Ds.”

I originally learned the 5 Ds come from business coach Kevin Lawrence, and they go like this:

1. Do It
2. Delete It
3. Delegate It
4. Decide on It
5. Date It

The “it” in this case is usually some small task or action item. Every time you have to get through a stack of email, a stack of paper, a stack of voice mail messages, or just stacks and stacks of work, The 5 Ds work especially well. You will drastically cut the time you need to get through the stack, and you can then get to the other high-impact activities that make the best use of your time.

Do It means do it now. Use this for any task that takes fifteen minutes or less.

Delete It means there are some things that do not require your response. Just because someone sent you the message/document/suggestion doesn’t mean you have to reply. If an item doesn’t advance a relationship or achieve an important goal, get rid of it.

Delegate It means pass it on to someone else who can handle the job. They don’t have to do it better than you; they don’t even have to do it as well or as fast. They probably won’t. But unless it’s a top priority or specific result that you and only you can deliver, you’re not the right person. Pass it on. Don’t abdicate the responsibility; you still need to be sure the task gets done. This is not a game of hot potato. It’s a way of reorganizing work so the right people do the appropriate jobs for maximum efficiency and results.

Decide On It means no more moving items from one stack to another, telling yourself, “I’ll get back to that.” Will you attend the meeting or won’t you? Will you agree to that request or won’t you? Make a decision. Move on.

Date It means you get to choose when you will give big-ticket items your undivided time and attention. Figure out how much time you need and block it out in your schedule. You can forget about it until then.

Exercise

Write a mini-version of the 5 Ds on a sticky note and put it near a stack of papers, projects, emails or administrative tasks. Set aside some time to tackle the tasks using the 5 Ds. Notice how the 5s cut down the time it takes to finish the tasks.

The ideas in this article are drawn from The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership and the accompanying eBook called The Extension. The eBook is designed to give you simple, engaging personal leadership exercises and activities to help you be a better leader, and lead a better life. Get your copy today! Click here for a Preview and to Order.

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Where is the Secret of Happiness Hidden?

There’s an ancient Hindu story about the gods arguing over where they should keep the secret of happiness. Afraid that humans didn’t deserve or couldn’t handle this secret, they debated where to hide it. At first they considered putting at the top of a high, high mountain, but reasoned that humans would eventually be able to find it. Likewise, they might find it in the darkest forests or at the bottom of the ocean. Finally, an idea struck one of the gods:

“I know the perfect place. We will hide the secret of happiness in the deepest depths of their own hearts. They will never bother to look there.”

The question, “What fulfills you and makes you happy?” is one of the central questions in the book, The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership. To learn more, go to www.TheInnerEdge.com. You’ll find an overview of the book, endorsements by such thought leaders as Marshall Goldsmith and Stephen Covey, and more.

It’s not easy to find the secret of happiness and fulfillment. But you have the ability to do it; the answer lies within you.

 

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The Value of Values

Values are the cornerstone of fulfillment. When you live in alignment with your values, you experience harmony. When you live out of synch with your values, you experience dissonance and stress. But how do you even find out what your values really are?

Here’s an exercise you can try to discern what’s really important to you, way down deep.

  1. Mine for your values. Think of a time in your life when everything was just right. What was true for you at that time?
  1. Identify the values that were being honored at that time. What was present that was so meaningful as to make it a memorable time?
  1. Work with those values a bit more. Name them, define them, rank them.

With this kind of thought process, you can get a preliminary list of the values that make your life worth living. You can use your newfound clarity about those values to make better decisions and align your life to what really matters in your heart.

To take this values clarification process further, you might be interested in participating in a FREE visualization exercise I’ve posted on my website. You will hear me guiding you in my own voice through the visualization in Step 1 above, which will help you connect more deeply to your ideal experience and uncover the values more easily.

Here’s how to find it. Go to www.TheInnerEdge.com and click on Worksheets and Audios (on the left). Scroll down and find the FREE audio called The Values Visualization Audio. You can get started immediately!

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Let Them Hit You

When you go looking for feedback, do you get feedback from the people who will give you the bad news?

Go ahead. Let them hit you.

Don’t worry – it’s not as bad as you think. Actually, one of the smartest things we can do is to ask for feedback from the people who don’t think all that much of us. The ones who are mad at us. Who are thorns in our side.

It’s not just because you’re going to get an enlightening perspective. (And oh, you will!) It’s also because the simple act of asking for feedback can improve the relationship.

Says Dave Norton, a senior vice president at The New York Times,

It’s so disarming. When you turn around and ask feedback from the people who wreck havoc in your world, it facilitates dialogue. It’s hard to be mad at someone who’s genuinely asking you for your opinion. Just the act of asking communicates trust.

When you go to look for feedback, ask yourself, who around me will give me the best feedback? Who will give me the worst? Who will give me a perspective I’ve probably never heard before?

Then go ask them. Easiest way: ask three questions.

  • What am I doing that’s working?
  • What am I doing that’s not working?
  • What one thing do you think I should work on to improve?

You may find those enemies were on your side all along.

Did you enjoy this profile? You may be interested in the eCourse, Getting an Edge: 21 Ways World Class Leaders Share Their Secrets for Leading and Living Well. Each of 21 profiles just like this one comes in a separate email – once a day for 21 days. Click here for more information.