Joelle K. Jay

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Cycling Your Way to Clarity

Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock.com, is a leader I’ve come to admire. He contributed to the book, The Inner Edge, and in fact, endorsed it. (To read his review, click here.)

In my workshops, I often use Patrick as an example for the First Practice of Personal Leadership: Get Clarity.

I like to distinguish between clarity and vision. Vision is the desired, ultimate end result; clarity is the ability to keep that vision alive day after day. Both are essential to succeed in any endeavor.

Patrick once told me he has had cancer three times, and each time he recovered, he has ridden his bike across the United States, from California to New York.

Think about the vision Patrick must have had for these cross-country trips. Arriving on his bike in New York. Finishing the ride. Maybe symbolizing beating cancer. Or celebrating life.

Now compare that to the clarity Patrick needed to get through the ride. Imagine what must have gone through his mind when the road got long. Or cold. Or hot. In the middle of the prairie and through every little town, every flat tire, every hungry mile. Why am I doing this again? Oh yes. Celebrating life. That constant reconnection to the vision is what we call clarity. It’s a different process than getting a vision. It’s pulling yourself from wherever you are, no matter how distant or disconnected it may seem, back to that vision once again. It’s that process of reconnecting, reconnecting, reconnecting that got Patrick through those rides.

And although he didn’t say it, I imagine the same was true for the cancer.

Clarity takes time to cultivate; sometimes we come by it easily and sometimes it takes a little more effort. Patrick once said to me, “Bicycling, I used to think about the Atlantic Ocean. I thought, as long as I’m pointed east and I’m still pedaling, I have to be getting closer.” When you have clarity about what you want, even if you don’t know exactly how to get there, you will be getting closer to your ultimate vision in every step.

I like to learn from leaders like Patrick. If you do, too, you may be interested in a series of leadership profiles I offer called 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. For more information email Info@TheInnerEdge.com.

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The Inner View

Have you ever lost clarity on the way to your vision? You feel like you need the answers. Before you can gain they clarity you want, you need to take a preliminary step: you need to ask the right questions.

Your ability to ask yourself powerful questions will allow you to uncover thoughts and feelings that influence your ability to be successful. You don’t just answer the questions; you explore them. Exploration is not an interview. It’s an inner view.

There are three steps to exploring your “inner view.”

Step 1: Identify the Topic

As your first step to getting clarity, you identify the topic. What do you need to get clear about? What’s the issue, challenge, desire or goal that’s worth exploring now? What is your purpose for seeking clarity at this time? It could be a decision about your career, a particular outcome for a project, or a new way to approach a goal. You are going on an exploration; think of this step as defining the territory.

Step 2: Ask Open-Ended Questions

Once you’ve defined the territory you want to explore, you mentally walk around in it, allowing your mind to wander around as you find out what there is to know. You do this by asking open-ended questions.

Perhaps the most obvious place to start is with the all-powerful question, “What do you want?”

Here are some more questions to help you see what else there is to learn as you explore.
• What are the biggest challenges you face?
• What’s the best-case scenario? What’s the worst-case scenario?
• How would you like to see this play out?
• What else is there to know?
Open-ended questions like these help you find what else is important to you to keep in mind.

Step 3: Explore the Answers
After you have an idea of what you want and some questions to stir your thinking, give yourself time to explore your ideas. This could take the form of journaling, discussion with a trusted friend, colleague or advisor, or quiet reflection. Exploration (especially self-exploration) is a process. Give it time.

Remember: You don’t have to have all the answers. But you do have to ask the questions.

And for a free resource to guide your thinking, use the worksheet, Your Inner View. A copy of this worksheet is also available on the website (www.theinneredge.com).

Please join us for The Inner Edge Book Club! This month we will be taking a more in-depth look into of Your Inner View as one powerful strategy for gaining better clarity in your life and leadership. For more information, click here or email info@TheInnerEdge.com.

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Be a Better Leader, Lead a Better Life

Are you practicing personal leadership? How do you know?

As I wrote in my last post, lately I’ve been going back and rereading the interviews I conducted for The Inner Edge. I’m reminded as I do of the incredible wisdom of leaders, and I thought it would be valuable use of this blog to post excerpts from some of these interviews.

All of the interviews illustrate the Ten Practices of Personal Leadership. Perhaps it would be useful to review the practices now to kick off this series. Here they are:

1. Get Clarity. Connect clearly and instantly to your long- and short-term visions of success.

2. Find Focus. Focus your attention on top priorities even when the world around you is pulling you away.

3. Take Action. Stop spinning your wheels and start driving with direction—easily, swiftly, and in less time.

4. Tap into Your Brilliance. Identify what’s exceptional about you, both positive and negative, and use your uniqueness to your
advantage.

5. Feel Fulfillment. Discover what drives you—your values, meaning, and purpose.

6. Maximize Your Time. Think differently about time and learn to do more with less.

7. Build Your Team. Develop your own private team of supporters—not just fans, but advocates who will help you succeed.

8. Keep Learning. Keep adapting and improving in this world of unending change.

9. See Possibility. Take advantage of the hidden opportunities all around you—the ones most people miss.

10. All . . . All at Once. Align and integrate your life so you can enjoy and excel in every moment of being a leader and leading your life.

Remember: in order to effectively lead your organization, you also need to lead yourself.

Be sure to visit the website, www.TheInnerEdge.com, where you can find out about getting a copy of The Inner Edge. You’ll also find an extensive collection of free worksheets and audios, plus workbooks, eBooks, a thriving community of leaders like you, coaching services, complementary articles, and more.

I’ll be back soon with the first interview – my conversation with Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock.com!

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Leading a Life – Not Just Living One

Are you leading your life or just living it?

When you’re just living life, you experience the everyday frustrations of most people. Maybe you work too much, but you still don’t feel like you ever really get on top of things. You get stressed. You don’t work out as much as you should, or you might not have any down time at all. You get testy in traffic and short with your kids. You don’t get to spend as much time with your spouse as you might want. As a result, you often feel guilty. When you’re at home, you think you should be at work; when you’re working, you think you should be at home. But this is a busy time, you tell yourself. Right now life’s a little crazy and I just have to get things done. Even though you’d say you’re happy enough, most of the time anyway, there are plenty of times you wonder if life is passing you by.

When you’re leading your life, you experience everyday as a gift to be opened. You know what’s coming today, because it will be just as you planned it – or even better. You spend your time on the things that are most impactful and most important to you. At work, you’re able to tackle the challenges with confidence and ease. You feel focused, accomplished, and relaxed. At home, you feel content and at peace. No need for guilt, because you’ve made your decisions wisely and in alignment with your values. You spend time with the ones you love, and you still have time for yourself. You may be busy, but it’s a good busy. Best of all, you’re having fun! You’re invested in your life, and you feel rewarded every day.

Whether you’re the CEO of an international organization, a business owner or executive, an entrepreneur working out of your home, a stay-at-home parent, or a person just trying to get along in the world, you have a choice. You can lead your life or you can just live it. If you choose to just live it, you are leaving life to chance and risking a life of less than: less than you’d hoped for, less than you could be, less than you wanted. If you choose to lead your life – to really take responsibility for it, to take charge, to take control – you are choosing a life of possibility. You discover that you have more time, more joy, more success, more happiness, and more peace of mind. When you choose to lead your life rather than just live it, you experience a life of more than you ever thought was possible.

Learning to lead your life – what I call personal leadership – won’t just improve your leadership. It will help you expand your life.

You can test your Personal Leadership IQ by taking the survey, Your Inner Edge: A Self Assessment, available for free at www.TheInnerEdge.com.

Please join us for The Inner Edge Book Club! This month we will be reviewing all ten of the Practices of Personal Leadership – an overview of exactly what you need to do to be a better leader and lead a better life. For more information, click here or email info@TheInnerEdge.com.

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What’s the Edge?

There’s a little confusion about this simple word, the “edge.” When I say getting an edge, I don’t mean elbowing out the crowd or being edgy or going over the edge. I mean, as I say in The Inner Edge, being your best. Not the best – your best.

You don’t get to be an exceptional leader by trying to be like someone else. I don’t want you to become a great leader by changing who you are. I want you to become a great leader by becoming more of who you are.

So remember, you’re looking for your edge. As my mentor Dr. Heidi McKenna used to call it, your “growing edge “- the place where you have the opportunity to be malleable, to be changed, and to grow.

Getting an edge means understanding what will give you the edge at this time. It might mean sharpening your vision. It might mean shoring up your weaknesses. It could mean developing your strengths. It could mean getting a promotion. It might mean starting a business or gaining more market share with the one you have.

If this helps you achieve what you want to achieve better and faster, and in a way that’s more natural and enjoyable for you, then you’re getting the edge.

And if you’d like to learn more about how to get an edge and be your best, join us for the Inner Edge Book Club. Just go to www.TheInnerEdge.com and click on Community, or just click here. We’d love to have you.

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Don’t Throw the Oars out of the Lifeboat

Adapting to a new reality is hard work. It involves loss and risking incompetence and disorientation and discomfort. People need support to do that.

Those words come from one of the principals of Cambridge Leadership Associates, Marty Linsky, and he should know. He’s an expert in Adaptive Leadership.

During the economic crisis of 2009, Marty noticed that many leaders in failing companies were just trying to survive. Trying to bail themselves out, they frantically threw things overboard. They cut overhead. They fired employees. They cancelled travel. In some cases the things they threw out were the very things they needed to survive.

I’ve noticed the same trend among individual leaders and executives. Frantically trying to do (or keep) their jobs in a tough time, they neglected the support systems that could help them succeed.

Marty was talking with a senior administrator in a large foundation one day. The administrator reported, “The first thing that was cut was professional development for the senior people in the foundation.” In his view, it was “crazy.”

This is the time they really need coaching. Those folks need a structured opportunity to step back from what they’re doing and adjust their skills and adapt their orientation. They need the learning and the strategy. But when people are looking at where to save money, that kind of coaching feels like a frivolous expense.

Sometimes in our haste to manage change, we change the wrong things. We throw the oars out of the lifeboat. That doesn’t lighten the load, it makes you sink.

What do you need to be your best? What keeps you strong? What helps you think? What are the elements of your life that buoy you up?

No matter how busy you are, no matter how crazy life gets, hold onto those oars. That way even if it’s hard you can keep rowing in the direction you want to go.

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Make it Happen – Let it Happen: Experience the Possibilities

The 9th Practice of Personal Leadership, which we’ve been discussing this month in The Inner Edge Book Club, takes us on a path where our action-oriented business ideals almost seem to clash with a spirit of possibility.

But the ability to see possibility is how we often find the greatest opportunities in life.

When we’re going down the road to success in our culture, we often adopt the mindset of “Make it Happen.”  Our thinking in this mode (the “active” mode) is rational, strategic, goal-driven, and with it, we push forward at all times, relentlessly pursuing our goals. We’re focused and logical.

There’s another option – the mindset of “Let it Happen.” Our thinking in this mode (the “receptive” mode) is open to possibilities at all times. We’re not giving up our place at the front of the pack, but we’re allowing space there for possibilities to emerge. In this state, we’re accessing our intuitive natures — our optimism and insight.

Where these two modes converge is where the magic happens. It’s where new possibilities emerge. These may be business opportunities you’ve never considered or noticed. They may be solutions to problems you’ve been working through. They may be terrific insights.

We’re exploring the convergence of Making it Happen and Letting it Happen this month in The Inner Edge book club. And we’re learning strategies (“invitations” as I like to call them) to “let it happen” more easily and with better results. If you’d like to join us, please email me.

You can also learn more about how the book club works by clicking here for a description of The Inner Edge Community.

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Your Inner and Outer Edges – Your Möbius Strip

People are often curious about the large yellow image on the cover of The Inner Edge. Is it an 8? Is it the sign for infinity? Actually, it’s neither. That mysterious image is actually a geometrical shape, a Möbius Strip.

What’s unique about a Möbius strip is that as you trace your finger along its sides, you will find that where you may start on the outer edge, as you move your finger you will end up suddenly on the inner edge. Keep tracing and you’ll be on the outer edge again.

I chose a Möbius strip as the cover illustration for The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership, because it symbolizes for me the inner and outer aspects of your leadership. As I studied the Möbius strip, I was struck by the continuous movement, from inside to outside and back again to inside — what a perfect metaphor for the infinite value of our inner and outer harmony!

When you delve further into The Inner Edge, you’ll find that I focus almost all of my attention on the personal, internal aspect of leadership, and I do that intentionally because I know that that’s the core of any outer success you’ll find, either in your business or at home.

The Möbius strip reminds me that effectiveness as a leader is intimately related to personal thoughts and feelings.

As you work on your Inner Edge, developing clarity, focus and vision, you’ll find these personal strengths correlating with your team management, planning and business leadership. In fact, you’ll find that they are one steady stream.

This is leadership from the inside out. It’s creating a continuum from your inner world to your outer. When these two are humming on the same Möbius strip, you’re in alignment, and great things happen.

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Leadership is for Everyone: You Are a Leader

Leadership does not live solely in the corner office anymore, and it’s not just for business executives either. Everyone is a leader in some way. You are a leader.

When I began to speak about leadership, I met some people who truly believed that leadership was not relevant to their lives. They didn’t manage an office, didn’t lead a construction crew, and didn’t have children. How could leadership be applicable to them?

My intuitive answer then is the same as my well-studied answer now: leadership is relevant to each and every one of us. Think of all the ways you interact in life, whether some of those are in a business role or not. I’ll wager that you’ll find that you are a leader in some of your roles.

Here’s something from The Inner Edge that I’d like to share with you: Beyond business leaders, professionals, teachers, and other obvious leadership roles, you’ll find leadership in many aspects of life. Look for it in community activities, families, amongst friends, and in categories such as inspirational and thought leaders.

Look around you, and think of how you are spending your day. You’ve been a leader for others at some point today, and beyond that, you’ve been a leader of your own life all day.

No matter who you are or what you do, you get to take the lead in your life. No one else will do that for you. No one else can. You may or may not have a fancy suit, a nameplate on the door, and an assistant just outside. But every single one of us is leading a life, which may be the most exciting kind of leadership of all.
Excerpt from The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership by Joelle K Jay

Lead your life well: lead it from your Inner Edge.

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Join Me for an Inner Edge Teleseminar

Good news! I received a phone call recently from The Organized Executive – a publication that helps business leaders like you stay effective in the midst of a busy life. They have invited me to present a Teleseminar with them. What a terrific way to work with you on a personal level, while also reaching out across virtual space to connect with all interested leaders! It’s titled “Seven New Shortcuts to Add Minutes to Your Day and Hours to Your Week”.

If you’ve already read The Inner Edge, then you know that I encourage you to look for possibilities and to be open to them when they arrive. I see this Teleseminar as one of those serendipitous possibilities in life and business. It’s one more way I can share insights with you directly.

The “Add Minutes to Your Day” Teleseminar is on maximizing your time. You’ll recognize some of the concepts in this Teleseminar from the Sixth Practice of Personal Leadership in The Inner Edge. We’ll have a chance to discuss putting this practice to work for you; also, I’ll be showing you how time strategies free you to focus on creating success.

One of my primary desires in launching this blog, the Inner Edge Facebook page, and in providing Teleseminars is to use today’s tools to create a virtual space for all of us to connect. I hope to get to know you along the way, and I hope you’ll be checking in and getting to know me and your fellow Inner Edge participants.

Explore with me a deeper level of leadership, one that leads from your own, unique Inner Edge.

Pick up a copy of The Inner Edge here.
Learn more about the Organized Executive Teleseminar, “Add Minutes to Your Day and Hours to Your Week” here.