Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 23, 2012

Lots of us grew up believing in the idea that if you just do good work, the work will speak for itself. That’s one of those beliefs that’s true until it isn’t. When it isn’t is that when so much is going on that top management probably won’t notice good work unless you speak for it. The more senior top management is, the more likely this is to be true They simply have too many things to pay attention to to recognize or acknowledge all the things that are going right.

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Management Organization Leadership 248

Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 30, 2012

While the impact of Hurricane Sandy in the U.S. spread far and wide, the New York/New Jersey area definitely took the worst hit. The scenes of flooding, fires and dangling construction cranes on Monday night and Tuesday morning were truly stunning. In the run-up to the storm, a friend of mine wrote that we were likely to see lots of. Click headline to continue.

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Crisis Construction Definition Leadership 242

Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 4, 2012

Almost immediately after the first U.S. presidential debate on Wednesday, practically every major news outlet from Fox News to MSNBC to the Financial Times of London declared Mitt Romney the outright winner over Barack Obama. Having watched it myself, I have to agree. Romney cleaned Obama’s clock. As I was watching it, I thought of that scene in The Untouchables where Kevin Costner’s Eliot Ness says to Sean Connery’s Malone, “I want to get Capone.

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Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 25, 2012

Anyone in the market for a 24” by 36” signed color portrait of Lance Armstrong leading the Tour de France? I’ve had one on my office wall for four or five years but I’ll be taking it down now. Over the past several weeks, Armstrong has experienced one of the most dramatic self induced falls from grace ever. The guy who thrilled and inspired millions of people and raised millions of dollars for cancer research has been stripped of his seven Tour titles, lost his endorsement deal with Nike and for

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Armstrong Leadership Marketing 222

Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 4, 2012

My friend and colleague Dan McCarthy recently shared this finding on his Great Leadership blog. According to a 2012 Corporate University Xchange Leadership study, 81 % of surveyed organizations have “significant” concerns about their leadership bench strength and their ability to support future growth. That’s a pretty stunning number when you think about it.

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Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 17, 2012

Have you ever noticed what doing something for the first time does to your confidence level? If you’re like most folks, it gets a little shaky when you're doing something new. Especially if that something new has stakes that seem or actually are high. If you read this blog earlier this month, you might think this observation was inspired by President Obama’s performance in his first debate as an incumbent.

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Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 9, 2012

Lately, I’ve been doing a lot of flying. Yesterday was Los Angeles to Washington on United. When you do something over and over again, it’s easy to take it for granted. Sometimes I hear the pre-flight safety announcements in my sleep. For some reason, though, yesterday, I pulled out of my automatic pilot mode (no pun intended) and started paying attention to what was really going on.

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