Joelle K. Jay

personal leadership

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Go to the Calendar

Having trouble getting everything done? Come along with me on a trip. We’re going to the calendar.

“Going to the calendar” is a strategy I often recommend for leaders who want to make changes but aren’t quite sure they’ll be able to stick to them. Going to the calendar means literally

  • opening up your calendar,
  • turning on the PDA,
  • getting out your schedule,

or in any other way physically putting in front of you the written, concrete system you use to organize your life. Then you write down the commitments you’ve made, transferring them from your head to the page where they become real.

For example, Gloria wanted to set up what she called “Customer Contact” hours five hours a week, during which the only thing she would do would be to circulate among the customers in the winery she ran to discover what their experience was like. After three weeks of “flaking out,” as she put it, I made her go to the calendar and schedule those five hours a week. She wrote “Customer Contact” between four and five o’clock each day for the rest of the year. From them on, customer contact wasn’t just a good idea, it was an appointment she was scheduled to do. Her calendar never let her forget.

This strategy is most helpful if you use a calendar system that matches your strengths. Most calendars are arranged into tidy hour-sized boxes into which you’re supposed to compartmentalize your life. When you go to the calendar, give yourself permission to break out of the boxes. Just as you can control your time, you can also control your calendar. Don’t let it control you. Some examples:

Ann:    Every year I get a fresh paper calendar. I claim the days I want for myself and block them out with an opaque permanent marker. Then I use those “blackout dates” however I choose.

Nico:   Once I took a whole month of pages out right out my calendar. I had been wanting to take a vacation, but somehow it always got bumped. When the pages weren’t there, the time stayed free and for once I actually took that vacation.

Rick:    I gave a list of times to my assistant that I wanted to keep free for working on projects. Now my assistant turns down all requests for my time that interfere with those parameters.

Mitch:  My PDA locked me into a very linear way of thinking. Now I do all of my planning on a white board where I can scribble and draw and make diagrams; later I pin the ideas down into the system.

Peter:   I don’t like calendars at all. I think in terms of projects. I started a project wall where I can pin up all my action plans instead.  If you want to maximize your time, you do need to keep track of it by going to the calendar. You decide what that calendar should be.

Exercise

Think of something you’ve been wanting to do to achieve your vision. Go to the calendar now and figure out how you can make it happen. Be sure to put it in writing.

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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Moving from Chaos to Control

It’s 3:00 in the afternoon. You’re standing in the middle of your office. Hands on your hips, you deliberate about what to do now. Do you sit down and sling out a rash of emails? Do you return a few phone calls? Or do you close your door and somehow try to concentrate on the big project you really need to work on? Frozen, you are immobilized by the possibilities. You drift off for a minute, staring off into space. Then you catch yourself and snap back into action.

The rest of the day you spend busily working. You pull out a project, then the phone rings and sets you off in another direction. You keep on top of your emails and other people’s requests as best you can in an attempt to keep the deluge at bay. Head down, you fly through tasks and manage the crises, barely looking up to notice the time until finally, the day comes to an end.

Driving home, you’re spent. The day has been intense and full; you take satisfaction in enumerating all you’ve done. Then you realize even though you’ve been busy all day, you haven’t really done anything. You’ve been so buried, you’ve lost sight of your grander vision. You find yourself being haunted by vague, unanswerable questions. Could I be doing better than this? Is this what I wanted for my life? Am I making any difference? Somehow answering these questions never gets to the top of the list. Why is that? Your mind drifts off, hypnotized by the traffic and whirring about what you need to do tomorrow.

Have you ever had this experience? Ironically, even though you may be working all day, you never feel like you get anything done. You’re busy but not necessarily productive. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you wonder if you’re doing the right things. Not that you have a choice; you’re too swamped with what you have to do today to dwell for long on what you want to do or ought to do to be more effective. Still. You know there’s something wrong with this picture.

And you’re right. There is. What’s wrong is that when you bounce along from task to task, you’re not choosing where to put your attention. You’re living by chance and not by choice. You may be ignoring the most valuable parts of your life – the parts that are going to help you achieve your vision, possibly in the long term and definitely for today. Or, you may be doing many of the right things, but you’re not really sure. You haven’t stopped moving long enough to check. Plus, there are so many priorities, you find it hard to keep them all straight, much less stay on top of them all at once.

In order to get what you want, in order to be who you want to be, in order to live the kind of life you want to live and lead the way you want to lead, you need to be more strategic than that. You need to find focus.

Finding Focus is one of the ideas I share with leaders 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.

By finding focus, you’re going to pull your thoughts out of the crowded rabble of your mind and give them the attention they deserve. Get ready to move from chaos to control.

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Snapshots

In my work as an executive coach, I often work with leaders around their visions – their visions for their companies, their teams, even themselves. However, in the stress and striving over the years, sometimes that vision can seem awfully far away.

Here’s a process you can use to rediscover to your long term vision and connect it to your reality today. I call it “taking snapshots,” because the process is akin to taking in a panoramic view and then snapping a photo to take with you as a reminder.

  1. Remind yourself of the long-term vision you want for your life and leadership in the future.
  2. Zoom in on the near-term vision of your life today.
  3. Ask yourself, how does what I’m doing today connect to the overall picture of my vision?

You can even take this one step further. Ask yourself a handful of questions as a follow-up.

  • Where am I now with respect to my long term vision?
  • How will things be different then – when I reach this vision?
  • When I do finally reach my vision, how will I know? What will be the indicators that I’ve arrived where I wanted to be?

In the same way you can snap a photograph to get a concrete reminder of something you’ve seen, by writing these answers down you can have a concrete reminder of your vision. This is your “snapshot” of your vision.
There’s a FREE Worksheet on my website that you can use to organize your thoughts. You’ll find it at www.TheInnerEdge.com – click on Worksheets and Audios (on the left) – and scroll down to the Worksheet called The Snapshot.

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The Road to Heaven is Paved with Good Intentions

“Intentions” have gotten a bad rap, no thanks to that old saying, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” There’s actually something quite heavenly about setting an intention and having it fulfilled.

In coaching jargon, an “intention” is a concise statement summarizing a state of mind about who you intend to be, even in the midst of the changes and challenges of leadership. It starts with “I am” and ends with a value. A few examples:

“I am independent and confident.”
“I am courageous.”
“I am generous and compassionate.”

Each of these intentions describes a mindset you might choose at any given moment.

Leaders often set intentions when they need to stay cool in an intense situation, when they’re too busy to stay focused on what’s important to them, or when they are trying to make changes in their thinking. As you go through the stormy parts of life, your intentions anchor you to your values.

Why set an intention? Intentions shift your thinking away from negative self-defeating or counterproductive thoughts, and replace them with a mindset more aligned with your values. They also help you reframe a situation so you can choose how to act, think, and be for the best possible result. To give a few examples of leaders who have chosen intentions:

  • When Ryan, a corporate CFO, had to cut expenses, he set the intention to be resourceful and creative.
  • When Lei, a business owner, had to confront an angry customer, she the intention to be calm.
  • When David, an exhausted new dad, had to make an important presentation, he set the intention to be alert and focused.

An intention reframes the way you see a situation so that you can approach it in the best possible way – consciously choosing how to act, think, and be. Your intention has the power to change your perspective, open your mind, and shift your experience.

To create your intention, start by asking yourself, Who do I want to be as a leader? How do I want to experience my life? How do I want other people to experience me? What mindset or perspective do I want to hold? By purposefully choosing who you want to be, you enter leadership with the best of intentions.

Exercise

Practice setting an intention for an upcoming event – anything from your next meeting to a difficult interaction, to an evening at home. Use the Your Intentions worksheet in The Extension as a guide.

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 or Order Now.

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Having the Clarity to Get What You Want

William

In the heart of the Silicon Valley, deep in the middle of an office park, a lone light shone in an office on the 17th floor. Inside, William sat alone at his desk. He looked at the clock. Ten p.m.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he thought to himself. “This is ridiculous.” He’d started his day at four this morning. Another eighteen hour day.

He turned back to his computer. Staring back at him was the report he’d been working on since six. After seventeen years at this high-tech firm, William had become a regional general manager for product development. At his company, he had both power and prestige. Most days William had an enviable job: flying the company jet from coast to coast, dining with powerful people in fancy restaurants, and trying out flashy new gadgets. But tonight, all of that seemed empty. He thought regretfully of his ten-year-old soccer player at home and the game he’d missed this evening. He loved his job, but at the end of the day, he felt like just another suit working away his life.

Elizabeth

Elizabeth, the new head of her accounting division for a pharmaceutical company, dashed into her office. The nine-thirty meeting she’d just left had been exciting, but it had left her with plenty to do. Since she’d just gotten this promotion, she felt eager to impress, but suddenly she felt like she’d overcommitted. She wished she could just sit down for half an hour and collect her thoughts, organize her notes, and make sure she hadn’t missed anything. But no time for that. She dumped the stack of papers she was carrying onto the desk.

“Ugh,” she thought. “The pile grows!” She grabbed another stack and hurried out. Onto the ten-thirty meeting.

Grant

Grant had a lot to be proud of. The founder and chief cardiologist of the Southwest Center for Heart Health and Wellness, he was totally invested in its success. The Heart Center had been his idea. He’d dreamed it up, secured the funding, and built the organization from the ground up. Now doctors were seeing patients and the research was underway. Three years after opening its doors, the center was a respected organization for care and research. Grant was as inspired as ever.

“What’s next for us?” Grant wondered, his mind buzzing with ideas. “A bigger grant, a research breakthrough, a new wing? Maybe we need new staff or a high-profile teaching fellow…”

With so many possibilities, Grant barely knew where to start. Suddenly he felt overwhelmed. His heart started to race. He could see so much potential, and he wanted to do it all, right now! But he was only one man, and a cardiologist at that, not an organizational expert. He knew he needed to find a way to make the Heart Center thrive.

“But,” he asked himself, “how do I do that?” He stopped walking. “Seriously. How do I?”

What William, Elizabeth, and Grant have in common is that, despite their success, they all want something more. William wants something more for his life. Elizabeth wants something more for her job. Grant wants something more for his organization. The problem is none of these leaders exactly know what their “more” is. So they keep doing what so many people do: slog through the work with their heads down, ignoring that vague, unsettled feeling that they are not truly being the leaders they could be or leading the kinds of lives they want to live.

Perhaps you’ve felt the same way. You can be motivated, driven, and extremely busy and yet still not be as clear as you could be about exactly what it is you want.

What do you want? A promotion? Time for yourself? Better relationships with your friends and family? That ever-elusive work/life balance? None of these are possible unless you stop moving long enough to figure out what you’re after. Explore your ideas. Envision a different reality. In order to achieve success in your life and as a leader, you need clarity about what you really want.

How to get that clarity is one of the ideas I share with leaders 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.

In The Inner Edge, you will get that clarity. Ultimately, you are not just going to become clearer about what you want. You’re actually going to get it.

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Identification, Please?

Who are you as a leader? I don’t mean your title, I mean, what kind of a leader are you?

At IBM, Senior Vice President of Human Resources Randy MacDonald shares this advice: “Do not cast yourself in the image of what a leader is supposed to do.” What makes you powerful is developing the image of who you want to be as a leader.

As an individual, it’s important for you be clear about what kind of a leader you are. Everyone is a leader in some way. Throughout this eCourse, I will be referring to “leaders,” and I do not just mean presidents and CEOs. I mean you.

A business or corporate leader. Corporate leaders often hold leadership positions in their organizations: president, vice president, director, manager, or supervisor. You may even own the company. But you can also serve as a leader in your company even without the fancy title by the way you act and interact.

A professional leader. You can be a leader in your profession whether you are a consultant, entrepreneur, or an independent professional like an attorney, speaker, or physician.

A community leader. You may have a leadership role in public service, as a non-profit board member, in your church, with the Girl or Boy Scouts, or in your neighborhood.

A family leader. As a mother, father, sister, brother, son, daughter, grandparent or cousin, you may take an active part in creating your family environment.

An inspirational leader. You may be a leader among your friends, family and fans by the way you conduct yourself – as reflected by your character, your choices, and your demeanor.

A thought leader. You could be leading change with original ideas and new ways of thinking.

An action leader. Maybe you’re the one with the energy to make things happen and the charisma to get others to do the same.

The leader of your own life. 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 name plate 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.

In what ways are you a leader?

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 to order.

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Look for the Perfect

“Everything works out for the best.”

“If it’s meant to be, it will happen.”

Have you ever uttered these words? While many people believe at some level that “things happen for a reason,” they act as though they don’t trust the idea. If it really is true that that everything works out for the best, then every situation is perfect in some way.

Here’s an example.

Zach, an attorney, discovered this when he learned his business partner, Kareem, was leaving the practice. Zach and Kareem had built a business from scratch; he thought growing it big was what they both wanted. But people change. Kareem changed. He didn’t want a business anymore. He didn’t want the headache and the pressure. Now he just wanted to join a bigger firm, not build one.

Zach was determined to talk him out of it. He tried everything to help Kareem see the possibilities, and he tried to see every possibility for himself. But Kareem’s answer was no. He had decided. He was leaving.

After the emotions subsided (anger, resentment, denial, and determination), Zach took the practice over by himself.

“Well, at least one positive thing came out of this,” Zach thought as he signed the documents. “Now I get to be president.”

But Zach got to be a lot more than that. As he started to shoulder the practice on his own, he became more confident as a businessman. He took the practice in his own direction. He made bold decisions, branched out and hired more attorneys. The business grew, as did his reputation and profits. Best of all, he maintained a friendship with Kareem, who stayed in his corner – no longer employed by the business but still rooting for its success.

Zach didn’t know when Kareem said “no” to the business that the business was saying “yes” to Zach. A situation that at first seems to be a disaster can actually turn out to be perfect.

Looking for the perfect is especially helpful when you get an untimely surprise.

  • Benjamin got the promotion he wanted a year before he felt ready.
  • Enrique was awarded a giant contract the same year he was planning to retire.
  • Martina, the next-in-line for a public office, had to step into the job when an elected official had to step down for personal reasons.
  • Neal found out that after years of family planning, he and his wife were about to have not one, not two, but three babies.

In each of these situations, leaders were able to reframe a situation that initially felt wrong by believing it must have to be right. They looked for the perfect.

Believing life might be perfect as it is doesn’t mean you play a passive role in your life. You are still leading your life; you are still becoming the leader you want to be and creating your vision. But you’re doing so with an open mind, realizing that for reasons we don’t understand, some things might be “right” for us that we wouldn’t have chosen for ourselves. Other things might be “wrong” for us even if we thought they were right.

Sometimes we find the opportunities we’re looking for, but other times those opportunities find us.

Exercise

  • Recall a time in your life when you got a “no” or “yes” that you weren’t expecting – maybe unanticipated (good or bad) news or a surprising change in direction.
  • How did the situation work out?
  • In hindsight, what was perfect?

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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“I’ve been robbed!”

Recently I read a letter that started like this. See if you can relate:

“I was feeling robbed of my personal life. Even though I was physically present, my mind was a million miles away.”

The sentiment is rather heartbreaking, but it certainly isn’t uncommon. Someone else recently told me,

“I find myself wishing I could check into a hospital, because then I’d finally get some rest.”

Here’s another one:

“You have to race to keep up with everything. It’s all about getting ahead. If you slow down, you’ll get behind. I’m just so afraid of being in the backwater.”

If any of these comments resonate with you, you’re probably starting to feel a familiar twinge – that little squeeze in the heart that tells you, “I don’t want to live this way.”

Well, of course you don’t. And you don’t have to.

You can learn to lead your life in a way that preserves your talent while enhancing your quality of life. You can succeed without the sacrifice. Success without the stress.

You see, “getting ahead” has less to do with time and effort than it does thoughtful, reflective consideration: the kind of “inner work” that allows you to choose who and how you want to be. There are ways to win at work that also support your personal life. You can have it all without doing it all. Quality work and quality time at once.

I’ve written about all of this in The Inner Edge.

The Inner Edge is a book for high-achieving business leaders who aspire to reach the highest levels of leadership but want to do so without sacrificing themselves along the way. Instead, it shows leaders how to find the ideal strategy for achieving their vision and goals in a way that preserves their talent and protects the quality of life that keeps them at their best.

Every year, I take people through The Inner Edge in The Inner Edge Book Club. Would you like to read it with us?

Click here to read more about The Inner Edge Book Club

I’ll give you a little preview here. There are ten practices of personal leadership, and we look at them one at a time – one per month in a group teleseminar format.

As you read the book, you will:

• Get clarity about your vision
• Find focus so you can pursue that vision
• Take the most effective action to achieve your vision
• Learn to leverage your talents, teams and time
• Learn to lead in way that’s in alignment with who you are and who you want to be.

In short, you’ll learn how to achieve your vision and goals without sacrificing the quality of life that keeps you at your best.

Then you’ll find yourself saying what some of our book club members told me when they finished the book:

“Now, I’m more relaxed! My sense of humor is back, and I’m enjoying my kids more. I’ve learned how to set better boundaries.”

“I’ve stopped working 16 hour days! I’m much more focused and relaxed.”

“With the book club, I’ve been getting the extra hour I need to focus on myself. As a busy executive, I don’t have any extra time. It’s very hard for me to find the time to sit down and be thoughtful about what I’m doing. This opportunity gave me an hour once a month to focus on what’s most important and give it my full and undivided attention. As a result I am very clear about where I’m headed, and I know I’m on track to get there.”

Does that all sound good to you? Then come join us!

Here’s the link again to learn more about The Inner Edge Book Club.

When you join, you’ll also get bonuses with your membership, including 25% off all Inner Edge products and services and access to dedicated leadership coaches. Plus, since the Book Club happens month by month, you can unsubscribe whenever you like.

You have nothing to lose by learning to lead yourself. You do have something to lose if you don’t.

Come join us. Read The Inner Edge. Join the book club.

Learn to be a better leader…and lead a better life.

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FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!

Leah Zellner, the president of a national resort group, dashed into her office, throwing off her coat.

“I’m sorry I’m late!” she gasped. “It’s been a crazy day!”

For the next five minutes, she raced through a litany of concerns: leading her company as its first female president, finalizing a merger, launching a new global strategy, moving into a new office, speaking at a client conference, throwing her daughter a wedding, and expecting her first grandson.

“You certainly are busy!” I commented.

“You have no idea,” she wheezed. “Meetings, calls, invitations, a trip to New York…”

I watched Leah rush about her office. Here was a woman who seemed to have everything she wanted: a glamorous, high-paying job, exciting travel, and a happy growing family. But today everything that made up her charmed life seemed to be getting in the way.

I wondered, “Is this what our busy lives have come to? That our momentous life events have become items to check off a list?”

Leah flopped into the chair beside me. “You know, it used to be that it was Ready, Aim, Fire. Then it became Ready, Fire, Aim. Now it’s just FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!”

Leah’s life as a leader mirrors many I’ve seen in my years as an executive coach. Every day, I see talented, accomplished leaders struggling because they’re too stressed, too stretched, or too tired of sacrificing. As a result, many businesses are losing their leaders, and many leaders are losing themselves. It’s become a stubborn predicament: how to achieve success without sacrificing your quality of life.

There’s another way to be successful as a leader in today’s world that is more thoughtful. More strategic. More reflective. You can learn to lead in a way that preserves your talent while enhancing your quality of life. You can succeed without the sacrifice. Leading well and living well, both at the same time. In the pages of this book, you will discover a new way to be a better leader…and lead a better life.

Leah is one of many leaders I profile in the book, The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership. This book isn’t about leading your organization or leading your team. It’s about leading yourself.

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!

If you like what you read, join us in The Inner Edge Book Club! We’re starting a new year this month. To learn more, click here!

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Losing Your Edge

In a few hundred years, when the history of our time is written…the most important event historians will see is not technology, nor the Internet, not e-commerce. It is an unprecedented change in the human condition. For the first time – literally – substantial and rapidly growing numbers of people have choices. For the first time, they will have to manage themselves. And society is totally unprepared for it.

Peter Drucker

Do you think that’s true?

Is it true for you?

I spend a lot of time interviewing business leaders, and I’m often surprised at how disheartened they seem. Sometimes I wonder if this might be why: we have more to think about than ever, and somehow we have to be the ones to make it all work. When they feel disempowered, here’s what leaders tell me.

We are overwhelmed. Just juggling your workload fills every day; add in children, home ownership, personal finances, and the rest of your life, you can feel like you’re ready to collapse.

We are discouraged. Being a leader isn’t always all it’s made out to be. The pressure, the responsibility, and the poor models of leadership in corporate executives and public figures can sometimes make us wonder if it’s really worth it.

We are disengaged. Engagement is the degree to which you feel committed to your job, and it is a critical aspect of performance. Unfortunately, instead of gaining a sense of meaning from our work sometimes we just feel unmoved.

We are needed. As leaders we don’t always get what we need, but our businesses desperately need us. Nevertheless, we live in the Information Age, and business is driven by our knowledge. As leaders, we are needed to compete.

We are talented. The good news is that despite these challenges, it turns out we’re really talented. Years of Gallup research has proven that we are at our best when we are most ourselves and it’s clear there’s a lot more potential to be tapped.

We are leaving. Crowded by the pressures of modern leadership, we can’t seem to make it all work. That’s why so many leaders are responding in a quiet, decisive way: they’re taking their marbles and going home. With low set-up costs and instant access to global markets, we no longer need corporate infrastructure to fulfill our ambitions. We can do it on our own. We live in a free agent nation: going out on our own is flexible, it’s freeing, and it’s fun.

But having the opportunity to leave one’s job isn’t always the “win” it might seem. Businesses lose highly talented leaders, and leaders lose their home in the world of work.

What we need is a way for leaders to learn how to be better leaders while at the same time enhancing the quality of life that keeps them at their best. And we do. It’s called Personal Leadership – an aspect of leadership that honors the work leaders do as well as the people they are.

Are you practicing Personal Leadership? Take the quiz to find out! Go to www.TheInnerEdge.com and click on Worksheets and Audios (on the left). You’ll find a FREE Self-Assessment to help you understand where you already excel and where you need to put more attention to be effective in leading yourself.