Leadership Lessons from Tiger Woods

First let me say, my heart is very sadden by the public display of the dismantling of a public image and there in is the reason why I decided to write this post.  There are many lessons  here for professional success, professional credibility and leadership and management success. The grace of it?….we are learning from someone’s mistake, other than our own. I invite the readers of this post to do so humbly.

Usually I don’t use this blog to discuss sensationlized news, yet I felt compelled to comment on this particular occurrence and even more so after reading a thought-filled blog post that I found very instructive.  You can read the entire post from the other blog, Orin Woodward Leadership Team,  provided at the end of this post.  What I want to do is submit my thoughts in light of that post.

My Thoughts:

One of the guiding themes of my practice and any coaching and training I do is leading, managing, living from the inside out.  Who we are on the inside dictates the kind of person we’ll be on the outside. This truth proves itself out, time and time again.

That’s why it’s so important to work on our insides more than any other area.  There are many managers and leaders who want to fix the people around them rather than consider, “what about me has allowed these circumstances to occur.”

I do carry the belief that people of great talent, those in high levels of leadership and influence need to be especially attentive to what’s going on on the inside and have someone in their life they deeply trust to help them effectively deal with their own inner activity no matter how unpleasant it might be.

To stay grounded and truthful with the good and the bad about ourselves is essential to a successful life and complete health.

It’s very common to talk to a leader of an organization and discover they feel isolated and that there is no one in their life that they can talk with about deeply intimate issues, that in some cases they are embarrassed about.

Perhaps that was true in Tiger’s case.  Perhaps he has struggled with sexual addiction (if this is true) from an early age or it surfaced after his father’s death to fill a emotional hole left with his Dad’s profound absence.  These are all assumptions of course.

What is not…we all need to continually practice internal honesty as the first source of living a meaningful, productive, successful life. How we do that will be reflected in every activity and relationship we have in every context.

This post serves as my summary of the following points from the post referenced above…truly profound and worth a read.

Key Points:

I. Leaders need to build their lives upon the solid foundation of good character and morals, not on gifts and abilities.

II. Leaders must understand that having great career success does not cause us to experience or feel internal significance and satisfaction

III. Leaders need to develop good coping skills so they can courageously confront reality instead of escaping from it.

IV. Leaders must not feed an ego-driven lifestyle.

VI. Leaders must understand that money, material possessions and a beautiful spouse cannot fill the vast empty space of an unhealthy emotional soul.

VII. Leaders need to understand the underlining motivation behind what drives them.

VIII. Leaders often equate performance with acceptance.

Eight Lessons Leaders Can Learn from Tiger Wood’s Life

Please pass on to colleagues and friends.  To our personal and professional success! JoAnn

It Bears Repeating – Facebook Firings are Real

So…be vigilant in managing your personal brand on line. See other posts regarding this as well.

It’s a fact – EVERYBODY…every entity, potential employers, work comp lawyers are checking, researching, dare I say spying on you!

It is also a fact that ANYTHING on line about you is fair game.

If you google the phrase “facebook firing,” you’d be amazed at the amount of links that show up.

I want to bring two stories of late to your attention.  First a woman whose disability compensation was canceled and a Georgia teacher showing pictures of an overseas trip where she was innocently tasting and drinking wine….and yes ….she was fired for that!

1. Disability Piece

2. Georgia Teacher

Coaching Tip: Assess the pictures on your site.  Is there ANYTHING that could be misinterpreted regarding your employment.  Get feedback from others or a career advisor.

If you’d like a independent eye, I’d be happy to look at your site – just contact me here: joann@joanncorley.com

Effective Communication Tip – Use Targeted Feedback

This blog is underwritten by Management-in-Minutes, a portable learning resource for the busy professional that uses “laser learning” to accelerate building a knowledge base. The lessons are short (usually 2-4 minutes) and on each lesson page there is an audio clip with it’s text version and an mp3 download link for portability.

Every so often a lesson will be posted in this blog for you to sample. This lesson is in the Sample Library, which you can access here: Sample Lessons

The Human Side of Project Management

Whether you use this phrase or not, we are all managing projects on some level….we are all a project manager. This is a key attitude to professional success.

There are 3 core components of managing a project: the process, the tools we use, and how we manage the human side of it.

What’s the human side?….how you manage yourself and the team members you’re working with.  As I said in a previous post, professional success is all about effectively managing the critical components of any endeavor…we are all managers.  Here’s the link if you’ve not read that post: post title – A New Way of Looking at Management.

I ran across a post on a project management blog entitled Integrity in Project Management.  I found this so curious.  The post addressed how one relates to those involved in the project with a spirit of integrity in the following 3 ways:

Be Impartial, Be Thorough, Be Focused on the End Business Results.

I would like to suggest an additional component to this list and that is… in managing the human side of project management and what should be included in every project management training is understanding and the honoring the work style of each team member.

The reality is each team member will have a different relationship to how they work with people, information, technology, and tasks.  Some will work with each of these with much more ease than another. If you want to build and maintain an effective rapport with each member, knowing and honoring their natural work style is critical!

Also included in the natural work style and an essential element to know is the natural decision making style. There are 4 common styles: decisive, methodical, spontaneous, inclusive.  How each team members works with information, works towards deadlines, their style of collaboration is influenced by their natural decision making orientation.

So here’s your coaching tip: Take the time to observe the behavior and assess your team members work styles and ask yourself these questions:

– What’s their natural orientation in relation to working with people, tasks, information, and technology?

– What do you observe about their decision making style

–Make a plan on how to incorporate this knowledge to increase your effectiveness.

If you need any advice or help, don’t hesitate to contact me.  You can go to my Management Life Line and get free advice there.

A New Way of Looking at Management

As we move forward in this “new economy,” I think it would serve us well to give new definitions to many common areas of our professional lives.

One key area of note is that of management…how we see it, how we define it, and our relationship to it.

I would like to propose a new way of looking at management. Here’s what I suggest…let’s look at the concept of management as one in which everyone is engaged…everyone is one and doing it! What do I mean? Upon closer inspection, the word manage or management goes way beyond a title and using it that way limits the use of the potential of every employee.

In fact when you look at the primary definition of the word manage, here is what you’ll find: to handle or direct with a degree of skill. In looking at this definition, you’ll determine that in order to be a successful professional in any content you need to effectively “manage” whatever is required.

Management is not necessarily a title – it is a behavior…a behavior that is done with a needed level of skill…by everyone!

Now with that said, in order to ensure professional success, the question then is what key areas should be considered to be managed…where do the essentials skills need to lie? Here is my core list:
Your ability to manage…
1. Yourself
2. Information
3. Stuff & Work Space
4. Time
5. Priorities
6. People/Relationships (which includes your boss)
7. Your role in a process
8. Your knowledge and use of technology
9. Your career/work-life

In future posts, I’ll expand on each of these and in my Management-in-Minutes Library there are plenty of tips and lessons that will help you build effectiveness in each of these areas. A sample of one is included in the link at the end of this post.

Coaching Tip: Review this list… assess on a scale of 1-5 (5 being the highest) where you are in your skill set. Where there are gaps, create a PDP (Personal Development Plan) which creates a plan for you to gain knowledge and increase your skills in these key areas.

Here’s a lesson from the Management-in-Minutes Library that addresses area #1 – Managing Yourself.  The lesson is entitled: Your Power Point (and that doesn’t mean the slides.)

Career Advice – What About the Way You Dress?

I’ve been thinking alot lately about professionalism in this new 21st century workplace….what it is now as opposed to what it was when I was growing up in the workforce as a now baby boomer.  In my day, it was a big deal and there was an understanding about its basics.  I think great career advice would be to at least consider this topic and how it translates into your career success.

Today, I’ve concluded it’s a much different story.  I have had the opportunity to travel all over North America conducting public seminars on a variety of professional development topics over the past 8 years.  In that time I have been a bit amazed at the casualness in which some attendees come. Now by casual it’s even more than business casual , it’s as if they were dressed for the gym…really…sweats, hair undone….you get the picture.

Please know my blogging on this today is not about judgement. For those who know me, if I bring something up, I will talk truth in the spirit of helping and that is what this post is about today.

So I’d like to pose/post the question, does what we wear to work matter? Does our appearance say something about us? This is what I was taught growing up that. You know…to the point where (and I’m not sure how many of your moms said this), “Don’t wear torn underwear in case you have to go to the hospital.”

Back to the question…now obviously the answer to this depends on the kind of work you do.  So let’s say this question may be more applicable for those who hold “office” or white collar jobs.  Although even in uniform I’ve seen a few look as if they just rolled out of bed.

So, does your appearance say something about you, particularly in terms of your capability and credibility?..the care in which you will do what’s asked..?

What prompted this thought?  An article I read today indicated that in this current competitive employment climate, folks in the office are kicking it up a notch in this area….at least in England.

Here’s a clip:

“Key findings revealed seven out of ten British workers turn to a smart black suit and a crisp white shirt when they need to “dress to impress” within the work and business environment.

Leading UK psychologist, Corrine Sweet, said: “Due to the economic climate, 2009 has been one of the toughest years in decades within the work and business environment. Rivalry amongst workers has never been so fierce, therefore in a bid to stand out amongst co-workers, British workers have opted for ‘power dressing’ by wearing black and white.”

Click here to read the entire article: http://www.recruitmenttoday.net/News/Story/?title=Workers%20follow%20%27gangster%20chic%27%20dress%20code%20to%20be%20seen%20as%20powerful%20leaders&storyid=854&type=news_features

So…would dressing differently, make a difference in any way in your work environment?…as a career strategy?…give you a “leg up?”

Personally, I think this is a valid consideration.  We as a society, (sad though it may be) are conditioned early on to read people based on their appearance.  And though we’ve collectively become more casual in a variety of contexts, I do believe this still holds true.

Give it some thought.

The remainder of the article suggests that “black and white” are the new power colors.  Hey, why not give it whirl! Tomorrow go into the office with your best black and white and see if there is a difference consciously or unconsciously in how you’re treated. Are your treated differently?  Do your colleagues take you more seriously?

I’d love to hear from you about your experiences.

Blogging for your success!

JoAnn