Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 18, 2016

If you haven’t already seen it, watch this video of a great white shark attacking a dive cage. It runs about a minute and a half and is straight out of Jaws. OK, now that you’ve watched it, we need to draw some leadership lessons from what happened there. (Great thanks and props to my client Brian Schools who CC’d me on an email he sent to his leadership team at Chartway Federal Credit Union in which he shared the video and some similar lessons.

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Next Level Blog

JULY 18, 2016

With everything that’s gone on and is going on in the world this year, it’s completely understandable if your fight or flight response has been on overdrive lately. As I’ve written here many times over the past couple of years, the fight or flight response is the effect of your body’s sympathetic nervous system working to protect you from a perceived threat.

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Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 24, 2016

If someone tried to force you to take a drug that was going to reduce your ability to mentally focus by 33%, you’d probably do everything you could to get away from them, right? Yet, the chances are you’ve already done that to yourself over the past several years. Your partner-in-crime is your smartphone. In a 2015 study commissioned by Microsoft , researchers found that the average human attention span has dropped from 12 seconds in the year 2000 to 8 seconds in 2015.

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Next Level Blog

MAY 2, 2016

With all of the different roles he’s played in the movies, Tom Hanks is as well qualified as anyone to speculate on what makes a hero a hero. From Army Ranger captain John Miller in Saving Private Ryan to astronaut Jim Lovell in Apollo 13 to the cargo ship commander Captain Phillips and, coming later this year, “Miracle on the Hudson” pilot Sully Sullenberger , Hanks has lots of experience going deep on what makes a hero.

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Next Level Blog

MARCH 7, 2016

If you’re in a leadership role of almost any type, the odds are high that you have to do some sort of public speaking on a semi-regular basis. It could be a staff meeting, a board presentation, a town-hall meeting or a conference keynote. Your public speaking possibilities are endless, really. Do you enjoy them or dread them? Nail them or muff them?

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Next Level Blog

NOVEMBER 28, 2016

As an executive coach , I often work with clients who don’t just have very full plates; it can feel to them like they’re spinning four or five full plates at once. (That sounds really messy.) When you’ve got so much to do that it’s hard just to keep track of what’s on the list, it’s really easy to start freaking out about how you are going to get everything done.

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Next Level Blog

OCTOBER 11, 2016

Before we go any further, this is not a post about the 2016 presidential election. I have nothing to add to the millions of words that have been written about the topic already other than, like lots of people, I wish it was over. So, this post isn’t about political talking points, it’s about leadership talking points. If your organization is like most of the ones I coach in and speak to, you’re likely undergoing some kind of significant change that affects the way people work,

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Next Level Blog

APRIL 18, 2016

Earlier this month, when I was speaking on mindful leadership to the Latino Leadership Summit of one of my client companies, I shared the graphic that accompanies this post. It shows what happens when the body is in the chronic state of fight or flight that comes from being constantly overworked and overwhelmed. Chronic fight or flight impacts your leadership effectiveness for sure, but, more importantly, it shortens your life and reduces the quality of it while you’re still here.

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Next Level Blog

FEBRUARY 1, 2016

In 15 years of coaching , I’ve worked with a lot of high-performing executives. When things go well, they run like a finely tuned Formula 1 race car. But life and humans being what they are, I’ve witnessed the occasional wipeout where, in spite of best efforts and intentions, an exec spins out and crashes into the wall. In the interest of helping you avoid a similar fate, I’d like to share three best practices that are common to the high performers I work with who run at a really high speed yet

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Next Level Blog

APRIL 25, 2016

This week I wrote a piece over at Fast Company about a “minor work habit” that is leading to burnout for countless workers, from junior team members to executives. What’s the habit? E-mail. Or rather, answering work e-mail after 7 or 8 PM. What I prove in the article is that there’s an extremely high chance that all those e-mails you feel obligated to answer from your boss are completely unnecessary — and I have numbers to prove it.

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Next Level Blog

MARCH 14, 2016

Every so often I have the nice surprise of talking with someone who was in one of my leadership programs a few years before. It happened again last week when I was conducting colleague feedback interviews for an executive coaching client. As I started one call with a guy named Ben, I said, “I don’t think we’ve had the opportunity to talk before have we?

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Next Level Blog

SEPTEMBER 12, 2016

Last week I was on the phone with an executive coaching client who, like many of the people I work with, was lamenting the insanity of her schedule. It was Friday and she was finishing up a week of back-to-back meetings every day, all day. (To her credit, she kept her coaching call with me!). In talking about her schedule, she described the impact in a way that I had never heard before.

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Next Level Blog

FEBRUARY 29, 2016

Last week, I had two reminders of how important it is to take some time to connect with other people and how we leave so much value on the table when we don’t. The first reminder was when I had a group of corporate leaders in a Developing Leadership Presence program we started last week take part in a transformational listening conversation on what they’re grateful for.

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Next Level Blog

SEPTEMBER 26, 2016

Two legends said goodbye yesterday. At age 88, Vin Scully, after 67 seasons in the booth, called his last home game for the Los Angeles Dodgers. Like the closing scene of a movie, the boys in blue clinched the NL West in the bottom of the 10th with a walk off homerun. After celebrating at home plate, the entire team, along with all of the fans in the stands, turned to the press box to salute Vin who stood there beaming and wrapping his arms forward as if he could hug everyone there.

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Next Level Blog

AUGUST 9, 2016

Last night, Diane and I were watching the U.S. women’s gymnastics team compete in the opening round of competition in the Rio Olympics. The floor exercises were the most astounding thing I saw. Tiny young women like Simone Biles, Laura Hernandez, and Aly Raisman stand at one corner of a springy floor, gather themselves, seemingly go from zero to 60 in about half a second and then launch themselves 8 or 9 feet in the air to do a couple of flips while they lay their bodies out flat in the ai

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Next Level Blog

DECEMBER 27, 2016

In working with and speaking to tens of thousands of leaders over the past 16 years, I’ve become convinced that if you want to lead at your best, you have to live at your best. The first goal is completely dependent on the second. That’s why I’ve become so passionate in encouraging my clients and readers to create and use their own Life GPS®. If you’re not familiar with it, the Life GPS® is a simple one page worksheet ( you can download one here ) that helps you ask, answer and follow through on

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Next Level Blog

JANUARY 4, 2016

As I write this, today, January 4, 2016, is the first full-on work day of the new year for many people. Most of us have hopes and dreams for how the year will go and what we’ll accomplish. Many of us have a long list of goals. Personal improvement, better health, professional accomplishments, stronger relationships, big projects, financial goals – any or all of those and others could be on your list.

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Next Level Blog

JUNE 6, 2016

A while back, I was coaching an executive who found herself getting emotionally hijacked. Like a lot of executives in large organizations, her job required her to work cross-functionally with lots of different people. That kind of work environment leads to lots of conversations, meetings, e-mail threads, presentations and the like. With all of that information flying around the matrix, there are lots of opportunities to get hijacked if you’re not watching out for it.

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Next Level Blog

AUGUST 3, 2016

There’s trust and then there’s trust. Sure, you and your team need to trust each other to achieve results over the long run, but you’re likely not working together at supersonic (and I mean that literally) speed to achieve peak performance. JV Venable has led teams that perform at supersonic levels and joins me in this podcast interview to explain how it’s done.

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Next Level Blog

FEBRUARY 15, 2016

What does it mean to really listen? As I’ve written here before , I’ve been focusing a lot on that question in my talks and workshops on mindful leadership. When I ask colleagues to sit with each other for just a few minutes to listen to each other speak about something important in their lives or something they’re grateful for, the process feels transformative for them.

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Next Level Blog

JANUARY 29, 2016

Like many, I was moved earlier this month by the news of David Bowie’s death and what he accomplished in his life. Last week, I shared some of my thoughts on Bowie’s innovative career and life on the Huffington Post. Thought you’d like to read them here in case you missed them there. While few of us possess the raw talent of a David Bowie, there are lessons about the practice and application of innovation that all leaders can learn from him.

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Next Level Blog

JANUARY 11, 2016

I’m always looking for great examples of simple things that any of us can do to be more mindful – aware and intentional – about how we approach work and the rest of life. Last week, I heard two great ones from my friend and colleague, Jeff Smith of Voltage Leadership Consulting. Jeff is a former financial services executive, runs a very successful business and is a member of our Conduit program for coaches and our Life GPS® certification program.

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Next Level Blog

MAY 23, 2016

Unless you have a bit of a sociopathic tendency (and none of my readers do!), you probably don’t enjoy delivering bad news. It could be announcing that the quarterly numbers aren’t on target, letting someone know that they underperformed, admitting that you made a mistake or telling someone that they no longer have a job with your organization. Working up the courage and intestinal fortitude to do any of those things can be tough.

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Next Level Blog

MARCH 1, 2016

With The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever , Michael Bungay Stainer has written a really useful book for anyone charged with leading and facilitating the work of others. Michael is a star in the coaching field and has distilled all he’s learned over the years into seven simple and sequential questions that practically guarantee really useful coaching conversations.

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Next Level Blog

FEBRUARY 8, 2016

It wasn’t a great game, but it was a win. For Peyton Manning, it was, in all probability, his last as an NFL quarterback. After 18 years of the sacks, injuries and surgeries that come with a career in the League, the soon to be 40 year old Manning managed the Broncos’ offense well enough to enable its defense to win the 50 th Super Bowl. There are Peyton Manning fans and Peyton Manning haters.

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Next Level Blog

MARCH 21, 2016

If you’re of a certain age, you likely recognize the name, Dr. Art Ulene. For 23 years, he regularly appeared as the medical expert on NBC’s Today Show. While he’s long since retired from that gig, the show still runs his 30 Day Weight Loss program every year. Today he’s almost 80 years old and is a role model for the healthy lifestyle that he’s been promoting for years.

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Next Level Blog

JANUARY 18, 2016

Last year, I spent some time talking with the colleagues for a new senior executive I was coaching. The point of the conversations was to incorporate their perspective into the coaching agenda for my client. The good news was that he appeared to be off to a strong start in his new role. Like a lot of new senior leaders, he was all in on doing a great job.

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Next Level Blog

FEBRUARY 9, 2016

When you think back on the best bosses you’ve ever had what stands out about those people? What do they all have in common? What makes a good boss great and a great boss a super boss? What does it take to be a super boss? Those are the kinds of questions that have intrigued Sydney Finkelstein, Steven Roth Professor of Management at the Tuck School of Business at Dart­mouth, for much of his professional career.

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Next Level Blog

FEBRUARY 22, 2016

Last month, I wrote a post about how reducing the amount of sugar in your diet can dramatically improve the quality of your life. Today, I want to share a follow-up post about what you should eat instead of sugar. You may be surprised to learn that the answer is fat. As Dr. Mark Hyman, director of the Cleveland Clinic Center for Functional Medicine, explains in his new book, Eat Fat, Get Thin , eating the right kinds of fats can have a big positive impact on your health and well-being.

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Next Level Blog

NOVEMBER 9, 2016

As I write this, it’s 6:30 AM on November 9, 2016, and, I think it’s fair to say, hundreds of millions of people around the world are asking themselves, “What next?” Millions are asking that question with excited anticipation and millions more with overwhelming anxiety. Whether you’re on one end of the spectrum or the other, somewhere in between or haven’t figured out yet where you are, it feels pretty safe to conclude that the election of Donald Trump as Pre

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