to be featured on the Blog page
I’m continuing to think about issues where we coach leaders because they didn’t learn skills earlier in their careers. Executive presence is a great example of this. There’s really no excuse for an executive close to a senior leadership position to lack executive presence. Yet it happens all the time and we as coaches are…
About once a month, we get the same request: “one of our leaders is lacking in emotional intelligence, are you available to coach him on this issue over the next six months?” It’s amazing how prevalent this issue is and how many different companies make this request. I never say no, and the coaching engagements…
Earlier this month, Carolyn Carlson participated in a panel discussion on trends in the consulting industry for TheConsultantLounge. Carolyn was joined by two executive consulting leaders to: share personal insights on the consulting market, lessons learned as seasoned consultants and leaders, and answer the audience’s burning questions. The event was sold out with over 75…
The centerpiece of today’s HR service delivery model is the HR business partner role. These are the individuals who are charged with delivering strategic HR advice to business unit leaders. Great HR business partners can drive great talent decisions and enhanced business results. Yet, in so many companies, HR business partners are not performing their…
Recently, I met with a senior talent leader for a major company. We were talking about companies that are known for great talent practices. The name Walmart surfaced in our discussion as one of these companies, despite the fact that, to our knowledge, Walmart does not engage in robust development activities when compared to the…
The most rewarding thing about our work is that we are able to help people quickly become more effective in their professional lives. Recently, we have been asked by several smaller companies to help strengthen the abilities of their leaders. While most of our work is with larger companies, we really enjoy working with leaders…
It’s been years since Peter Drucker taught us that culture eats strategy for breakfast. On a more micro level, culture can quickly chew up and spit out even the most talented people who don’t understand and can’t navigate the culture. I saw a great example of this recently. A woman executive I know was hired…
Talent Minute: Moving the needle on accountability within your organization
About five years ago, the concept of focal jobs emerged. Advocates of this concept stressed the importance of identifying the most critical roles in a company and investing development dollars in these roles as well as rigorous planning for successors to the incumbents in these roles. Despite persuasive thought leadership in this arena, the focal…
Cultural deficiencies are often the biggest impediments to business success. Peter Drucker put it well when he wrote: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” Yet, despite these time-honored words, companies continue to design and launch ambitious strategies without seriously tackling the cultural obstacles to implementation, mostly because they don’t really know where to begin. There are…