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The Greatness of Gratitude

November 10, 2023

This is the time of year my thoughts turn to being thankful for the abundance in my life. It is the Thanksgiving holiday, of course, but November is also the month I’ve suffered great tragedy and loss in my life. Through this tragedy and loss, however, I’ve been able to find grace and a focus on what I have rather than what I’ve lost.

As I’ve written about previously, Thanksgiving is the time of year when we are reminded to express our gratitude, yet certainly shouldn’t be limited to only this time of a year.

In fact, many studies have found that having a grateful outlook and regularly expressing gratitude to others has positive effects on our emotional health as well as our relationships. Some studies have further discovered that our physical health can also benefit by expressing gratitude.

“Gratitude heals, energizes and changes lives,” says psychologist Robert A. Emmons. “It is the prism through which we view life in terms of gifts, givers, goodness, and grace.”

Some studies asked participants to write letters of thanks or list positive things in their lives. The effects of those acts revealed mental health benefits such as reduced symptoms of depression and anxiety, increased self-esteem, and overall greater satisfaction with life.

What is especially profound is that not only does this expression of gratitude improve the well-being of the giver and receiver, but it may also be good for those who simply witness it. Observing an act of gratitude between people can cause the one watching to feel warmth towards the others.

Here are some suggested ways to express gratitude:

  • Write a handwritten note of thanks to people you are grateful for. This can have a dramatic effect as it is so rarely done in this age of electronic communication.
  • Thank your direct reports and colleagues for their contributions. Be specific on what you are grateful for as this dramatically improves its impact.
  • Perform random acts of kindness: use your turn signal when changing lanes or making a turn, open or hold a door for a stranger, simply make eye contact and smile when passing someone on the street.
  • Write down what you are grateful for each night before going to sleep. This will help you sleep better and improve your outlook in the morning.
  • Create a gratitude jar and provide slips of paper where you can easily write down what you’re grateful for and drop it in the jar. Watching the contents grow will continually remind you of the abundance in your life.
  • Catch yourself when you find you’re feeling jealous of others’ good fortune. Avoid comparing yourself to others by limiting your time on social media.
  • Remember to appreciate what you have rather than what you lack. This could be your health, family, friends, job, or your freedom.
  • Take a walk in nature and be grateful for all that cannot be adequately simulated by technology: Physically moving your body, breathing fresh air, taking in the sights, sounds, and smells of all that surrounds you.

Regardless of how you express gratitude, find ways to do it regularly as this will sustain your good health and well-being.

“I think the benefits of gratitude activities truly unfold through long-term habits,” said Joel Wong, a professor of counseling psychology at Indiana University’s School of Education. Dr. Wong has a list of 100 questions as prompts for expressing gratitude. These include both micro and macro gratitude questions, as well as those that are interpersonal and redemptive.

The greatness of expressing gratitude is how simple and meaningful it can be. It’s good for your health. It doesn’t cost anything. It will likely improve your relationships. And expressing gratitude may benefit even those witnessing it from the sidelines. Be grateful for yourself and for others.

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Success in Behavioral Change

September 14, 2023

Bringing about behavioral change is often at the root of what it means to successfully lead others. This is because leading often requires helping shift the way people act to produce the desired results. Helping others to change their behavior is not always easy, but you can certainly grow to be more successful at it.

Much of my coaching work begins with data gathering where I ask probing questions of my client and the people they work with and around. This fact finding begins the process of more fully understanding the strengths and opportunities for my client to grow in their leadership.

This inquiry often reveals my client needs to improve their ability to actively listen, demonstrate empathy, build rapport, and effectively influence to bring about behavioral change in how they lead. Turns out these are the very components of the Behavioral Change Stairway Model developed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to negotiate with violent felons.

The FBI hostage negotiation techniques can be just as helpful for leaders to bring about a change in the behavior in those they lead. These techniques need to be conducted in the following order so let’s look at them in detail.

  1. Actively Listen – Seek first to understand, then to be understood as author Stephen Covey wrote years ago. It’s about making the other person feel heard. And truly listen for both what is said and what is not said.
  2. Show Empathy – Join with the other person to demonstrate that you are not there to judge but to help support them as they face this situation. Put yourself in their shoes so that you can really feel and relate to them and their predicament.  
  3. Build Rapport – When rapport is present, the other person also feels your empathy, which leads to greater trust. Try to create an equal give-and-take between the two of you despite the power dynamic that is always present between a boss and employee.  
  4. Create Influence – With trust you have now earned the right to begin to offer solutions to a problem and/or recommend a course of action.   
  5. Initiate Behavioral Change – The previous four steps enable the action of initiating behavior change. Once this is initiated, it is then necessary for you to encourage and support so the change is sustained.

Demonstrating that you care personally can bring about change in a professional setting. This is true in our professional lives just as it is in our personal lives. As a leader, you need to appeal to both thoughts and feelings to change people’s behavior.

“It’s a road map for satisfying people’s social-emotional needs that nudges them toward a solution drawing on their cognitive abilities,” according to Ethan Kross, author of the book Chatter: The voice in our head, why it matters, and how to harness it. “While law-enforcement negotiators are naturally trying to defuse dangerous situations and arrest criminals, their work bears some similarities to coaching someone we care about through a problem. In both cases, there is a person who can benefit from the right kind of verbal support.”

Succeeding with behavioral change is vital for leaders. Following the steps in the Behavioral Change Stairway Model developed by the FBI for dealing with hostages can make leaders in organizations successful with bringing about behavioral change with their employees too.

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ABG: Always Be Growing

July 9, 2023

Many professionals finish their undergraduate or master’s degree and conclude they can rely on that institutional knowledge alone to thrive in their careers. Yet those most likely to reach personal and professional goals are always growing and learning.

This includes not only book (articles, podcast, lectures, TED Talks, etc.) learning, but also experiential learning that is available to you all the time. This means learning from setbacks by making changes, so you don’t repeat mistakes in the future. It means continually taking a “beginner’s mind” perspective so that you remain curious and open to innovation and ideas.

A huge part of this continual growth comes from knowing yourself so that you can continually recognize where you are in relation to where you want to be. Welcome both positive and critical feedback as information to help you better understand how you’re showing up.

“Become the world’s greatest expert on yourself so that you can become the very best version of yourself.” This is the advice of Greg Harden, author of the book Stay Sane in an Insane World. Harden, the executive director of athletic counseling at the University of Michigan, has a track record of working with high profile athletes including Tom Brady, Desmond Howard, Charles Woodson, Michael Phelps and many others, who were able to use his advice to reach incredible athletic goals.

Harden’s guidance includes the idea that you should practice, train, and rehearse by giving one hundred percent, one hundred percent of the time. “Because if you make this your mindset, then on your absolutely worst day,” he writes, “you’re still going to be better than the average person on their best day.” Harden sees no shortcut to greatness.

This doesn’t apply only to Olympic and professional athletes. Giving one hundred percent one hundred percent of the time can be applied to everything we do on or off the field.

And all too often we can be our own worst enemy by being overly critical when we should practice self-love and self-acceptance. By doing so, we’re more likely to welcome the opportunities we face every day to learn and grow.

According to Harden, it is our attitudes and behaviors that can either support or detract from our growth. We should recognize that:

  • Self-defeating attitudes and behaviors hold you back from reaching your goals.

while . . .

  • Self-supporting attitudes and behaviors help you cultivate reaching your goals.

All too often our self-talk is critical or dismissive of our efforts. This can undermine our ability to grow. Instead, we should treat ourselves the way we would counsel and support a close friend or family member. We should be compassionate and supportive.

“Become the very best friend you ever had in your life, because your very best friend has to be you,” writes Harden.  

To always be growing means taking this advice and using it to assist you. Reduce your self-defeating attitudes and behaviors; embrace your self-supporting ones. Be your own very best friend and give one hundred percent one hundred percent of the time. Do so and you will always be growing and reaching your goals.

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Making the Most of Feedback

June 4, 2023

[This is an excerpt from my book Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace, which is currently available at Amazon and wherever you buy books. It was previously posted in March 2021, but seems appropriate to post again as a good reminder.]

Leading others in the workplace requires a combination of successfully receiving and giving feedback. At a very basic level, receiving feedback is about learning what you are perceived as doing well and should continue doing; understanding what you should not do and stop doing; and learning what you don’t currently do, but should begin doing.

Similarly, to give feedback effectively, you need to state what the other person is doing well and encourage them to continue; inform them of what they should not be doing and redirect as necessary; and communicate what they need to begin doing in order to be more effective in their role. Effectively receiving and giving feedback are essential in every career, but especially when seeking to lead by example.

It’s important to look at the feedback you receive as a gift by valuing the perspectives others have for how they see you showing up in the workplace. Ideally, this would come in the form of a 360-degree feedback appraisal, so you can learn how you are perceived by people up, down and across the organization. This collective perspective provides an overall picture in how you show up. It may differ from how you perceive yourself, yet this helps you gain an external perspective to increase your overall self-awareness.

When a comment is from one individual, you should see it as an opinion; when it is from two, you should treat it as a trend; and when it is from three or more people, you should view it as factual and especially important to consider.

Don’t dismiss the positive comments as these represent your strengths that helped you reach where you are today. Embrace this positive feedback and own it as part of your overall reputation and personal brand. Receiving feedback effectively means you are able to hear and accept both positive and critical information without dismissing, overreacting or becoming defensive. Developing self-awareness is based not only on how well you can accurately see yourself, but also on how aware you are of how others see you. This can come only through feedback from others. And it’s vital you are able to receive it well, determine what it means for you, and choose to act where appropriate in order to bring about any necessary changes to help you grow.

Getting feedback can be difficult in many workplaces because it may not be embedded into a performance evaluation process. Many companies that deploy annual performance appraisals find them dreaded by both supervisors and employees, which further undermines the potential for success in receiving useful feedback.

The best organizations deliver feedback as often as quarterly in order to course correct and pivot more quickly. This enables tighter communication, so employees can more immediately take corrective action and continually improve. The 360-degree feedback method can be especially helpful, but may not be used throughout your organization or used consistently. Regardless, top-performing leaders are those who regularly seek out feedback on their performance, according to Tasha Eurich in her book Insight: The Surprising Truth about how others see us, how we see ourselves, and why the answers matter more than we think.

“If anything, we are socially and professionally rewarded for seeking critical feedback,” says Eurich. “Leaders who do are seen as more effective, not just by their bosses, but by their peers and employees.” It’s important that you get the feedback you need in order to succeed in your role and throughout your career. Just as importantly, you need to receive it with a growth mindset so you can take appropriate action on what you get.

“If we can receive feedback with grace, reflect on it with courage, and respond to it with purpose, we are capable of unearthing unimaginable insights from the most unlikely of places,” she says.

The 3R Model

Eurich developed the 3R Model on how to best stay in control regarding surprising or difficult feedback. Using this 3R Model enables you to receive, reflect upon and respond to such feedback effectively.

  • Receive – Mine the insight potential by seeking specificity on where the particular behavior shows up and examples of when it was seen.
  • Reflect – How well do you understand the feedback? How will it affect your well-being? What affect will it have on your long-term workplace success?
  • Respond – Do you want to act on this feedback, and if so, how? Can you develop and communicate a plan for how you will go about this action?

Feedback should not be taken as judgment, but only as information that can be helpful to your growth.

“When faced with feedback in an area that plays into our self-limiting beliefs,” says Eurich, “merely taking a few minutes to remind ourselves of another important aspect of our identity than the one being threatened shores up our ‘psychological immune system.’” Using the 3R Model will help you make the most of the critical feedback you receive.

If you can be courageous enough to seek feedback, be sure you are also capable of receiving it well, reflecting on what it means, and responding in a way that helps you to grow.

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Leadership Begins with Integrity

March 30, 2023

Think of an outstanding leader. He or she is likely charismatic, effective and a great communicator. And no matter who you’re thinking of, this leader very likely demonstrates integrity as part of their character. Without integrity, there can be no great leader.

Leadership takes many forms and is defined in different ways. But to become a great leader, there needs to be a foundation of integrity above and beyond all else.

Warren Buffett, chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway with a current net worth of $104 billion, has had a long and successful career demonstrating integrity. He also promises to give away 99 percent of his fortune to philanthropic causes.

“We look for three things when we hire people,” said Buffett. “We look for intelligence, we look for initiative or energy, and we look for integrity. And if they don’t have the latter, the first two will kill you, because if you’re going to get someone without integrity, you want them lazy and dumb.” In other words, don’t hire anyone without integrity.

Integrity is about the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles. It’s about doing the right thing even when no one is looking. Those with integrity are the people you want to surround yourself with—both in the workplace and in your personal life.

When I was interviewed for one of my first professional jobs, the president of the company told me he was looking for two characteristics in the people they hire: integrity and a sense of urgency. Years later, after leaving the company, I discovered how rare it was to find both characteristics in the people I worked with at other companies.

Many use the word “integrity” indiscriminately when describing the values that are important to them or to spice up their resume. But integrity is less about what people claim in words and more about what they demonstrate in their behavior. “I can’t believe what you say, because I see what you do,” wrote James Baldwin. Your actions speak louder than your words, as the saying goes.

The best leaders are those who continually demonstrate integrity in the way they conduct themselves and they demand it in those they hire.

Integrity is revealed in character traits such as being responsible, honest, respectful, and trustworthy. It shows up in expressing gratitude for other people.

Those with integrity, model it by:

  • Taking responsibility for their actions
  • Treating everyone with respect
  • Seeking to learn at every opportunity
  • Remaining humble regardless of their position
  • Being accountable always
  • Helping others without expecting something in return

Think of leaders in your own workplace. Do they model this behavior? The ones who do are those you should emulate if you want to continue to grow as a leader yourself. If you can’t find someone within your company, seek to find one in another company who you can model yourself after. And maybe consider moving on to another company where you’ll find leaders with integrity.

In the workplace, you can demonstrate your own integrity by:

  • Doing what you say you will do—be dependable and follow through on your commitments.
  • Communicating in a way that is transparent and true to your word.
  • Owning up to your mistakes and holding yourself accountable.

These three things will help you to grow in your leadership capacity. They will also help you demonstrate that you are a person with integrity. And nothing will propel your career more than demonstrating integrity in all your behavior.

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Living an Intentional Life

December 26, 2022

With the coming of a new year, this is the perfect time to take greater control of your life and career. This is not limited to signing up for a new round of exercise or diet programs but living a more intentional life by being proactive and taking responsibility for the progress in reaching your goals.

Many may believe there is little to do to control their life and career, and this is certainly true for some. Most of us, however, have a great deal of agency for steering the direction we want our lives to go. Intentionality means accepting, embracing, and exerting this agency.

I’m embarrassed to say this, but throughout my twenties and thirties I was merely a passenger on the passages in much of my life and career—simply waiting for an enticing offer, opportunity, or path to present itself. Yet I now see that when I am intentional about my daily decisions and choices, this can lead to the most beneficial outcomes.

Such decisions included pursuing a master’s degree in applied behavioral science, starting my own coaching and consulting business, and writing this bi-weekly blog for more than 15 years that led to business opportunities as well as writing a book on emotional intelligence. In my personal life, I chose to ride a bicycle across the country twice, climb to the summits of Washington’s three highest mountains and continue telemark skiing into my sixties.

Each of these accomplishments required consistently planning and working to reach them and would not have happened without being intentional in my pursuit.

Choosing to be intentional about your life and career means you are proactive. This doesn’t mean you control everything, but you are no longer passive and simply hoping to reach what you want to achieve. It means you have a clear goal or north star, yet you can be influenced and inspired by supporting opportunities and take advantage of them when they arise.

Intentionality means taking responsibility for your progress through discipline and persistence. It is also about holding yourself accountable.

It’s especially important to Identify and stay true to your values as they can serve as guardrails to inform you of when you stray from what is most important.

Accept that short term pain can lead to long term gain and reaching your goal is even more satisfying when you have worked hard to attain it.

Roman philosopher Seneca once stated, “luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” Certainly, luck plays a part in reaching any goal, so it’s important to prepare for the opportunities that are certain to come about. This means being more intentional in your daily decisions.

Make this new year more intentional by identifying what you want, aligning it with your values and who you are, and then being proactive and persistent to reach your goals. By this time next year, I’m certain your intentionality will bring you closer to what you want in your life and career. Happy New Year!

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Trust Before Progress

September 28, 2022

“Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters.”  – Albert Einstein

In my work as a coach and organization development consultant, a common concern I encounter with my clients is a lack of trust among colleagues. This includes team members, peers, and even senior executives. A lack of trust means little progress can be made.

Author Patrick Lencioni discusses the absence of trust as a foundational aspect in any well-functioning team in his book The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team. Without trust, there can be no progress as this serves as the basis for the psychological safety necessary for any group of people to collaborate well.  

The previous President of this country reportedly told more than 30,000 false or misleading claims while in office. He was defeated when running for re-election, yet because of his continued lies as well as the misinformation of his backers, 70% of Republicans still don’t believe Joe Biden was the legitimate winner of the 2020 election.

When our Facebook and Twitter feeds contain false information, rumors presented as facts, and clear lies, we need to question the value of social media. When talking heads on cable TV spout misinformation simply to spike viewership, we should turn the channel. And when politicians lie, they need to be held accountable and voted out of office. If we normalize this lack of trust in the people we follow, tune in to, or vote for, we are doomed to be continually misinformed, misled, and swindled.

For some reason the search for truth no longer seems foundational in forming our own opinion. Have we gotten lazy and given up on the notion of thinking for ourselves?

This lack of trust is due to many factors, but perhaps began when we stopped paying for subscriptions to trusted news sources and allowed social media, cable news shows, and talk radio to tell us what we should and should not believe. We can certainly find confirming data on any given conspiracy theory on the internet. That doesn’t make the information true.

In our work lives as well as in our personal lives, it’s vital that we build and maintain trust in those around us. This is about integrity, and it is becoming all too rare.

To restore and build trust in our lives, we must begin by examining ourselves and see what sort of example we are showing to others:

Behaviors that Diminish Trust:

  • Stating your opinion as if it’s a fact
  • Accepting others’ opinions as fact
  • Failing to evaluate your news source as reliable for honesty and fairness
  • Retweeting unvetted things on social media

Behaviors that Build Trust:

  • Walking your talk: Do what you say and say what you will do
  • Being accountable and holding others accountable
  • Questioning the reliability of what you see, hear, and read
  • Choosing to be accurately informed and allowing to rethink what you believe

I choose to enter all my interactions both personal and professional with a trusting attitude. By extending trust first I know I could be taken advantage of, but I do so regardless because I want to expand rather than contract my world. And, in my experience, I have not been swindled often.

However, while I choose to trust first, this doesn’t mean I trust always. When someone proves to be untrustworthy by being unreliable, dishonest, or misinformed, I adjust my trust meter to no longer take them at their word. Their trust then needs to be restored.

I take this approach with people in my personal and professional life as well as those I don’t know but follow and look up to. This includes politicians, public officials, athletes, celebrities, and others in the media. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

We need to restore and build trust in order to make progress in our workplace as well as in our democracy. Nothing is more important than trust.

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Regards for Regrets

March 29, 2022

Do you have regrets? Perhaps your immediate reaction might be no, but—if you’re completely honest with yourself—you probably regret at least some things you’ve done or haven’t done. It’s part of being human and having free will.  

Like all emotions, regret can be extremely helpful if we are able to learn what it reveals to us. There is wisdom when we reflect on what this regret means on a deeper level.

Regret can occur when you believe your past action or behavior, if changed, may have produced a better outcome. We all have regrets about something at some point in our lives and it’s best not to deny feeling it. Regret can often be closely associated with feeling guilt or shame and can then be expressed to others in an apology.

According to Daniel H. Pink, author of The Power of Regret: How Looking Backward Moves Us Forward, there are three options for responding to regret. Acknowledge that 1) feeling is for ignoring, which results in delusion; 2) feeling is for feeling, which results in despair; or 3) feeling is for thinking, which results in better decisions, improved performance, and deeper meaning.  

This third option is all about emotional intelligence and welcoming the information derived from your feelings without dismissing or getting overwhelmed by them. It means recognizing and responding to what you’re feeling in a way that helps you navigate your life, particularly when regret surfaces.

Pink says the deep structure of regret can be about the human need for stability, growth, goodness, or love. For example:

If you find yourself saying things like “if only I’d done the work,” this is likely a foundation regret that reveals your need for stability. Or when you find yourself thinking “if only I’d taken the risk,” this is about boldness where you are perhaps concerned about growth. When you think “if only I’d done the right thing,” this is likely a moral issue where you are concerned with goodness. And when you think “if only I’d reached out,” this is very likely a connection issue where you are missing the love that passed you by.  

To learn what regret is telling you, it helps to write about it or talk about it with others. Pink suggests that you relive and relieve regret to reduce some of the burden and begin to make sense of it.

“Writing about regret or revealing a regret to another person moves the experience from the realm of emotion into the realm of cognition,” says Pink. “Instead of those unpleasant feelings fluttering around uncontrollably, language helps us capture them in our net, pin them down, and begin analyzing them.”

This ability to analyze your regret means you can learn what the feeling is trying to tell you. Perhaps you need to apologize to someone who you’ve offended. Or maybe you need to reach out to someone with whom you’ve lost touch. You could act now to relieve your regret and likely unburden you with the weight you may be carrying as a result.

Other regrets such as not choosing a different career path may be difficult to reconcile, but it doesn’t mean there isn’t something to be learned from what you’re feeling. You could certainly choose to look at it differently. That is, you may believe that a different career path would have been better, but how do you know? Rather than ruminate on what might have been, maybe you could celebrate all that you have, which may not have been possible with another career.  

So often it is only after the passage of time that we can see the thread that connects the events and people in our lives. If you embrace the feeling of regret and learn what it can teach, you are more likely to regard it as meaningful and move it from a debilitating feeling into meaningful action.

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Delivering Quality Feedback

October 14, 2021

To help direct reports improve and grow as leaders, it’s essential to provide quality feedback to best illustrate what they do well and what they do not do so well. When this feedback is behaviorally specific and delivered effectively, direct reports are more likely to receive the message well and take meaningful action.

Most importantly, you should begin with humility. Your recipient will be much more receptive when you connect as human beings first as it demonstrates that you acknowledge and accept that we are all perfectly imperfect.

The Center for Creative Leadership recommends the “situation-behavior-impact” methodology to help leaders be more precise and show up less arrogant when giving feedback. This method focuses on: 1) the situation, 2) the behavior (i.e., what the person did, either good or bad), and 3) the impact. Sticking to this methodology helps you avoid making judgments regarding the person’s intelligence, common sense or other personal attributes. And keeping it based on the events you observe, means you are less likely to sound judgmental or arrogant.

The CCL further recommends follow up inquiry to understand the person’s intent. Rather than assume, ask the person if what you witnessed was their intention. In this way they can potentially see how there may be a disconnect between what they intended and what transpired. This is a way to open the conversation and that’s where learning and potentially corrective action can occur.

Coaching Conversation

This is more of a coaching conversation, and it can help clarify the delta between intent and impact, which can result in a change in behavior. This type of conversation can also serve to increase trust and understanding. Ultimately, by inquiring in this way to understand the intention or motivation behind the action, you will both find it less disciplinary and more instructive.

Providing feedback is often a delicate area, but it need not be. It’s simply a matter of explaining what you observe and the resulting impact. When this impact is detrimental, it’s important to determine if that was the intention. And when the intent is different than the result, you can be helpful in corrective action and ensure there is learning so it doesn’t happen again.

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Three A’s of Successful Behavioral Change

September 14, 2021

An important part of what I do as an executive coach is help leaders discover what they should keep doing, what they should stop doing and what they should start doing to raise their leadership capacity. And behaviors can be difficult to change without awareness, acceptance, and sustained action.   

When making the transition from manager to leader, there is usually a need to better understand what needs to shift. That’s why my coaching typically begins with a 360 Feedback process to provide necessary insight to both me and my client. Very often the very behaviors that made you successful in managing may need to be tweaked when it comes to leading.

While working as a manager, among other things, you need to manage tasks and direct the work of people doing these tasks. You create and achieve short term goals, manage risk, and generally work within the organizational structure you find yourself in.

To become a leader, you need to make decisions despite ambiguity, engage in areas outside your area of subject matter expertise, build and sustain collaborative relationships with your peers, create and effectively communicate a long-range strategic vision that can move the organization forward. And you don’t manage other people so much as coach them.

Though some people may be able to shift their behaviors seamlessly, many emerging leaders need to raise their awareness of them, accept that they need to be tweaked, and make sustained action to make new behaviors consistent.

Awareness

Behavioral change requires first becoming aware of what needs to shift. This can come about only through effective feedback through candid conversations, effective evaluations or a 360 Feedback report. If these aren’t available to you, ask a trusted colleague for honest feedback. Once you have this awareness, you have taken an important step forward.  

Acceptance

To successfully change requires an acceptance of this awareness. All too often we dismiss what we discover and say: “well, that’s just who I am and it hasn’t held me back, so I guess I don’t need to change.” This is a mistake as executive coach Marshall Goldsmith so eloquently put it in the very title of his book What Got You Here Won’t Get You There. Small “transactional flaws” performed by you against another can lead to negative impressions that hold you back. While these may not have been a problem up to now, it’s critical that you tweak them to grow into an effective leader.

(Sustained) Action

Finally, it’s all about what you choose to do with this information. Tweaking behaviors may not seem so difficult, but just look at the challenges people face with behaviors such as quitting smoking, losing weight, eating right, or sleeping enough and you can see that it takes a lot of effort and willpower. Taking meaningful action is vital and it requires constant attention.  

“Study after study (mine included) has shown that achieving transformative behavior change is more like treating a chronic disease than curing a rash,” writes Katy Milkman in her book How to Change: The science of getting from where you are to where you want to be. “You can’t just slap a little ointment on it and expect it to clear up forever.” She describes obstacles including temptation, forgetfulness, under-confidence, and laziness like symptoms of chronic disease. “They won’t just go away once you’ve started ‘treating’ them. They’re human nature and require constant vigilance.”  

To successfully tweak behaviors and grow your leadership capacity means you keep them top of mind in all your interactions. Though an executive coaching engagement may help you become aware, learn to accept and take action on behavioral change, it is up to you to sustain the change. Remain vigilant by shifting your mindset from one and done to more of a lifestyle approach.

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Cultivating Purpose

August 31, 2021

In the early 1960s, while on a tour of NASA, President Kennedy saw a man walking in the hallway with a broom and bucket. The President walked over to him, introduced himself and said, “what do you do here?” The man, who was clearly a janitor, replied, “Sir, I help put a man on the moon.” This was a man with a sense of purpose.  

What about you? Do you feel your life has a clear direction? Do you feel your daily activities are important?

While meaning is about looking back on your life, purpose is about looking forward. Purpose is about guiding you as you make choices in what you do and how you live.

Research has shown that purpose offers direction in life in the same way a compass provides direction when trying to choose the right path. This is essential as having a sense of purpose is sustainable unlike happiness, which is fleeting.

Purpose isn’t something to be found, but something we can only develop from within, and needs to be cultivated, according to Cornell University psychologist Anthony Burrow. He says a sense of purpose is not an objective truth, but more of a subjective experience. You can’t outsource it to someone else.

While you can’t hold your company responsible for you finding or fulfilling your sense of purpose, there are certainly things it can do to help cultivate it in you. But you too have responsibility as well.

Organizations can help foster a sense of purpose by connecting what the employee does to the impact they are having, says futurist and author of The Future of Work, Jacob Morgan, and when the employee shows up with an open mind, ready to contribute and give it their all.

There are physical and cognitive benefits of those with a sense of purpose as you’re more likely to have reduced stress, better coping skills and choosing health-promoting behaviors. And when you’re pursing something that is meaningful to you, it actually can make you more attractive to others. Individuals reporting a sense of purpose in life report being viewed as a more likeable persona.

What if you don’t have a sense of purpose? Burrow suggests three ways to help you to cultivate purpose. These are:

  1. What do you find yourself pursuing whether it’s an activity, passion or hobby? This may be something where you ultimately lose track of time and you do it primarily for intrinsic value. This is a pro-active approach.
  2. An event may happen that causes you to be called into a certain pursuit. Perhaps a family member gets sick, and you pursue something initially to be helpful, but ultimately find it more fulfilling. This is more reactive.
  3. You see someone else who inspires you to follow a certain direction. This is a social learning pathway where you find yourself identifying with someone and cultivate your own purpose by learning from them.

Burrow says when cultivating purpose, it’s not so much a mental exercise, but more typically by actively engaging with the world. It takes some effort, but ultimately will fulfill and sustain you unlike anything else.

When you cultivate purpose and pursue work that aligns with it, you will have greater satisfaction in your career and very likely your entire life.

Is Your DE&I Training Really Effective?

May 26, 2021

Though companies across the country recently created or increased diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) programs, to what degree have they been successful? Turns out, without significant investment in time and behavior-based training, much of this may have little long lasting value.

Most DE&I programs focus on half-day or one day sessions where the content is about increasing knowledge (what we know) and attempting to alter attitudes (what we believe). But with regard to our long-held beliefs and perspectives, failing to take the time to incorporate true behavioral change, such new knowledge may be quickly forgotten and beliefs will tend to revert back to where they were before the training.

Organizational psychologist and author Adam Grant says research shows programs are most effective when they focus on behavior—not just raising awareness and changing attitudes but emphasizing what you can do. Sustainable behavior change means treating bias as a bad habit and one to break.

Grant says one of the strongest predictors of moving towards a more inclusive organization is appointing a chief diversity officer. Fighting systemic bias then requires creating a management structure for diversity and inclusion, which ultimately changes its composition leading to a change in the organizational culture.

BAE Systems, an aerospace and defense company with a workforce of 90,000 employees across 40 countries, created a series of initiatives to make anti-bias work an ongoing experience. For example, they have a Courageous Conversations program where alums from the bias training discuss race and racial equity with employees from underrepresented groups. They provide a Mentoring Program where they pair a white person with an employee of color. And BAE plans to make leaders accountable by building diversity and inclusion objectives into performance reviews.

“We’ve seen a 15% increase in those leaders, hiring women and people of color,” says Tyece Wilkins, a diversity and inclusion senior advisor at BAE. “We also see an 11% increase in their inclusive leadership skills. So, it’s not them saying, Hey, I’m a more inclusive leader. it’s their direct reports. The people who work with them every day saying this person is more inclusive.”

Glassdoor lists the 20 Best Companies for Diversity and Inclusion and includes Visa, Medtronic, Gap, HP, Nestlé, Merck, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Proctor & Gamble, and Microsoft. Such diverse companies as these demonstrates what is possible.  

It seems that the best DE&I training programs are those that are able to increase knowledge, influence beliefs and change behavior. To do this, it can come down to a combination of awareness, acceptance and action.

  1. Awareness – Provide ample time and opportunity to interact with those throughout the organization that includes diversity in race, gender and job title; actively listen to others’ perspective and experience; keep a beginner’s mind and learn to unlearn as necessary.
  2. Acceptance – Realize and accept without becoming overly defensive that you may have privilege simply because you are white, because you are male, because you are educated, because you were born not having to worry about where your next meal was coming from, or any number of factors that you probably couldn’t control. No need to apologize for this, but simply acknowledge it and learn from others.
  3. Action – Call out behaviors that are inappropriate in a manner that doesn’t embarrass or shame people; ensure that new desired behaviors are measured and rewarded; provide consistency throughout the organization so everyone is held accountable.

Training to unlearn a behavior (such as unconscious bias) means rewiring the way you think about and categorize that action. The challenge in rewiring those connections is that behaviors like bias are learned over a lifetime, and it simply takes time to unlearn them.

Effective DE&I training programs should be long enough to make a difference. They absolutely need to include all leadership from the very beginning. They need to provide not only increasing our knowledge and our attitudes, but also our behavior. Only then will we see a more equitable workplace.

Renovating Corporate Culture

May 14, 2021

The influence of corporate culture on an organization’s ability to effectively execute on strategic objectives is well recognized. Yet all too often when culture is misaligned with strategy, leaders are unable to alter their organization’s culture and then fail to reach their objectives.

One of the most important thinkers on management theory and practice, management consultant and author Peter Drucker expressed the view that company culture constrains strategy and can even defeat it. This has often been summarized as “culture eats strategy for breakfast.”

Culture plays a huge role in the success of a business as it governs people’s organizational behavior and ultimately the execution of strategy. And culture increasingly plays a vital role in attracting and retaining talent. According to a recent Glassdoor study, 77 percent of people would evaluate a company’s culture before applying for an open position. Fifty-six percent stated an organization’s culture was more important than compensation.

When your company’s culture is unable to fully support your strategy, it’s time to renovate your culture.

“Successful companies recognized that certain elements of their organization, just as in any home renovation, are the core—the foundation of what made them great to begin with,” writes Kevin Oakes, CEO of i4cp and author of Culture Renovation. “Similar to a house where you want to improve the value, companies recognize that to better compete in the future, to continuously improve shareholder return, and to attract top talent, they need to renovate.”

However, Oakes found only 15 percent of companies that embark on culture change were able to succeed. After extensive research and executive interviews, his company defined 18 steps as a blueprint in order to initiate and maintain culture change. Referencing stories from well-known companies such as Microsoft, T-Mobile, Ford and Starbucks, Oakes outlines these steps in three phases: plan, build and maintain.

In the planning phase are things like figuring out what to keep, defining desired behaviors, and determining how progress will be measured, monitored and reported. The building phase includes clearly communicating that change is coming, ferreting out skeptics and nonbelievers early, and establishing a co-creation mindset. In the maintaining phase Oakes prescribes making onboarding about relationships rather than red tape, changing performance management practices and leveraging employee affinity groups.

And similar to any change initiative, success is directly tied to the level of active and engaged executive sponsorship.

Renovating is an apt word for this work with regard to corporate culture. It is about preserving the unique elements while updating or adopting “next practices” to better meet current conditions. Similar to renovating a house, renovating an organization’s culture means determining what is essential and building upon that.

“For a renovator, a house is not an artifact locked in time, but a distinct being with a character and history that should be upheld even as the owner’s needs are taken into account,” writes Erica Bauermeister, author of House Lessons: Renovating a Life. Unlike remodeling, Bauermeister says renovating requires a certain respect for what is there and what should remain in order to successfully transform.

So too with renovating corporate culture. Listen and learn what is to be kept. Gather a team of effective influencers. Clearly communicate early and often. Create a compelling vision. Provide training on desired behaviors. Promote those who best represent the new culture.

“Culture is critical, and changing it is difficult,” writes Oakes. “Whether renovating a house or overhauling the culture of a century-old organization, it never goes as planned. The process demands optimism, patience, and perseverance.”

Renovate your culture to align with your strategy and your company will become unshakeable.

Habits Help Determine Success

April 30, 2021

To reach your goals—professional or otherwise—you need to be persistent and disciplined. You need to strive to make a little progress each day and expect that you will stumble and suffer setbacks. In many ways, habits help determine your ability to succeed.

Whether you are talking about dieting, preparing to run a marathon or getting that next job promotion, your habits can either keep you on track moving you closer to reaching your goal or prevent you from it.

Habits are what we do automatically and without deliberation, according to BJ Fogg, PhD, author of Tiny Habits: The small changes that change everything. He suggests that breaking new habits down to very small behavioral changes and tying these to habits you already do can drastically improve their adoption.

“Emotion creates habits,” says Fogg. “When it comes to behavior, decisions and habit are opposites. Decisions require deliberation, habits do not. Emotions can make behavior more automatic.” Ensuring that there is emotion around the behavior you’re looking to start will enable automating the habit.

“A range of positive experiences can reinforce a new behavior that leads to a habitual response,” says Fogg. “For example, anything that gives you instant pleasure can reinforce a behavior and make it more likely to happen in the future.”

Being Present

Let’s say you’re looking to create a habit to be more present and less distracted in meetings. You often multitask and have a hard time accepting that this is not the most productive use of your time. Perhaps it has even increased during COVID times as you are able to check your phone and tend to other tasks while on Zoom calls.

But others noticed and said they feel you don’t respect them enough to be engaged. That by not being fully present you are preventing the meeting from being most productive.

Acknowledge, Acceptance & Action

First there’s the need to acknowledge that it is noticed by others and it is having a detrimental impact on how you show up. Then you need to accept that this is something you need to change. Finally, you need to determine a plan of action. This is where habits come in.

In order to stay fully present, you must quiet your mind. Turn off your monkey mind so that you can remain focused. Suspend the desire to do this other thing at the same time, so you can check it off your list. Resist the urge to think you can fully listen while doing something else.  

A habit for this could be making time for 60 seconds prior to the meeting and take a few deep breadths. Then ask yourself: what will it take for me to be fully present? This alone could help you prepare to resist distractions and stay focused during the meeting.

Tie this behavioral change to the habit you may already have using a calendar alert for the meeting so that you are alerted a couple minutes early. In the same way that after your commute from work it can be helpful to take time to transition between the workday and your personal life, so too can this brief reminder to transition between what you were doing and what you’re about to do.

Make this a habit by using your calendar alert to perhaps include a note such as: “Take a few minutes to transition.” Rather than just being pinged that you are needed somewhere, have the alert bring to mind your desire to be fully present for this event.

Any behavioral change takes time before it becomes a habit. By breaking it down into something small such as a reminder to be fully present for a meeting and tying it to something that already is a habit (a calendar alert), you may find it will be easier to adopt this as a habit.

Success requires persistence and discipline. Adopting new habits that are tied to those habits you already have can greatly help you reach your goals.

Making the Most of Feedback

March 9, 2021

[This is an excerpt from my book Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace, which is currently available at Amazon and wherever you buy books.]

Leading others in the workplace requires a combination of successfully receiving and giving feedback. At a very basic level, receiving feedback is about learning what you are perceived as doing well and should continue doing; understanding what you should not do and stop doing; and learning what you don’t currently do, but should begin doing.

Similarly, to give feedback effectively, you need to state what the other person is doing well and encourage them to continue; inform them of what they should not be doing and redirect as necessary; and communicate what they need to begin doing in order to be more effective in their role. Effectively receiving and giving feedback are essential in every career, but especially when seeking to lead by example.

It’s important to look at the feedback you receive as a gift by valuing the perspectives others have for how they see you showing up in the workplace. Ideally, this would come in the form of a 360-degree feedback appraisal, so you can learn how you are perceived by people up, down and across the organization. This collective perspective provides an overall picture in how you show up. It may differ from how you perceive yourself, yet this helps you gain an external perspective to increase your overall self-awareness.

When a comment is from one individual, you should see it as an opinion; when it is from two, you should treat it as a trend; and when it is from three or more people, you should view it as factual and especially important to consider.

Don’t dismiss the positive comments as these represent your strengths that helped you reach where you are today. Embrace this positive feedback and own it as part of your overall reputation and personal brand. Receiving feedback effectively means you are able to hear and accept both positive and critical information without dismissing, overreacting or becoming defensive. Developing self-awareness is based not only on how well you can accurately see yourself, but also on how aware you are of how others see you. This can come only through feedback from others. And it’s vital you are able to receive it well, determine what it means for you, and choose to act where appropriate in order to bring about any necessary changes to help you grow.

Getting feedback can be difficult in many workplaces because it may not be embedded into a performance evaluation process. Many companies that deploy annual performance appraisals find them dreaded by both supervisors and employees, which further undermines the potential for success in receiving useful feedback.

The best organizations deliver feedback as often as quarterly in order to course correct and pivot more quickly. This enables tighter communication, so employees can more immediately take corrective action and continually improve. The 360-degree feedback method can be especially helpful, but may not be used throughout your organization or used consistently. Regardless, top-performing leaders are those who regularly seek out feedback on their performance, according to Tasha Eurich in her book Insight.

“If anything, we are socially and professionally rewarded for seeking critical feedback,” says Eurich. “Leaders who do are seen as more effective, not just by their bosses, but by their peers and employees.” It’s important that you get the feedback you need in order to succeed in your role and throughout your career. Just as importantly, you need to receive it with a growth mindset so you can take appropriate action on what you get.

“If we can receive feedback with grace, reflect on it with courage, and respond to it with purpose, we are capable of unearthing unimaginable insights from the most unlikely of places,” says Eurich.

The 3R Model

She developed the 3R Model on how to best stay in control regarding surprising or difficult feedback. Using this 3R Model enables you to receive, reflect upon and respond to such feedback effectively.

  • Receive – Mine the insight potential by seeking specificity on where the particular behavior shows up and examples of when it was seen.
  • Reflect – How well do you understand the feedback? How will it affect your well-being? What affect will it have on your long-term workplace success?
  • Respond – Do you want to act on this feedback, and if so, how? Can you develop and communicate a plan for how you will go about this action?

Feedback should not be taken as judgment, but only as information that can be helpful to your growth.

“When faced with feedback in an area that plays into our self-limiting beliefs,” says Eurich, “merely taking a few minutes to remind ourselves of another important aspect of our identity than the one being threatened shores up our ‘psychological immune system.’” Using the 3R Model will help you make the most of the critical feedback you receive.

If you can be courageous enough to seek feedback, be sure you are also capable of receiving it well, reflecting on what it means, and responding in a way that helps you to grow.

Adapting Work Habits That Demonstrate EQ

January 27, 2021

[This is an excerpt from my book Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace, which is currently available at Amazon and wherever you buy books.]

The behavior you demonstrate at work speaks volumes with regard to your overall emotional intelligence, and this behavior shows up directly in your habits. A habit—good or bad—is simply routine behavior repeated continually and without thinking. And because habits are automatic, you may not necessarily be aware of the impact they have on you or on others.

If you’re not clear which of your habits may be holding you back, you could scan past performance reviews for clues. There may be an indication of some habits that were identified as inappropriate and they may need to shift. You can also learn which habits are holding you back by directly asking your supervisor or a colleague you trust. Just remember to control your reaction, so that they feel comfortable fully sharing what they observe.

For example, let’s say a colleague says you have a tendency to look away when people are talking to you and this makes them feel you are not trustworthy. Knowing this habit is undermining your need to connect with others, you could try to keep longer eye contact with others instead of looking away.

Of course, if you’ve ever tried to break a habit or create a new one, you know it can be difficult to do. This can be due to a lack of self-discipline, but it is also likely that you haven’t broken the habit down small enough, so you can see incremental progress to keep you motivated and moving forward. Take the example of not looking people directly in the eye. This could be broken down so that you can work on looking just one person in the eye when he or she speaks to you. Get comfortable with that single interaction before attempting to do it with everyone.

“Habits should be small and easy do,” says James Clear, author of the book Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results. “If you make changes that are small and easy to do, and layer them on top of each other like units in a fundamental system, you can get powerful results.” Clear calls habits the compound interest of self-improvement because over time these incremental steps compound and help you end up in a very different place.

Three important lessons Clear has found to help break bad habits and form new ones:

  1. When you perform a habit, you execute a four-step pattern: cue, craving, response, reward.
  2. If you want to form a new habit, you should make it obvious, attractive, easy and satisfying.
  3. You can use a habit tracker to measure your progress and maintain your motivation.

It can also be very helpful to recruit someone to observe your efforts and provide support as you make progress on your habits. Perhaps you can find someone at work who is also looking to break a habit or create a new one. You may want to partner with that person to keep you both motivated.

There are many estimates for how long it takes to develop a new habit. I’ve heard claims of 21 days to 30 days to 66 days to 254 days. The fact is that it’s going to take as long as it’s going to take. Rather than pinpoint a specific date on the calendar when you are done, look at habit forming or habit breaking as a continual process. If you embrace a growth mindset, you’ll recognize that you are never really finished with the learning involved.

By focusing on your habit daily, it will become ingrained and begin to lock in. Stay at it, acknowledge gradual progress, and don’t give up because of the inevitable setbacks you’ll encounter along the way. Before long, you won’t even be thinking about it because it will have become automatic. That’s when the habit becomes, well, habitual.

Your overall level of emotional intelligence in the workplace is demonstrated through your habits. The behavior expressed in these habits either enable or prevent others from connecting, trusting and working with you effectively. Habits are foundational to the personal and social competencies of emotional intelligence.

Human Behavior at Work

October 27, 2020

As an executive coach my focus is on helping clients raise their leadership capacity in order to lead more effectively. This typically involves tweaking certain behaviors, so leaders can to bring their best selves to the workplace.

While changing one’s behavior can be extremely difficult, it is crucial in order to become a better leader. Keep in mind that behavioral change is not an event, but a process. It requires diligence and patience. It often means that you stop behaving in a certain manner in order to start behaving differently.

“People will do something—including changing their behavior—only if it can be demonstrated that doing so is in their own best interests as defined by their own values,” wrote Marshall Goldsmith in his book What Got You Here Won’t Get You There. “The higher you go in the organization, the more your problems are behavioral. The higher you go, the more your issues are behavioral.”

As much as we may recognize that our current behavior is holding us back, it can be difficult to change because that knowledge alone is not enough to move us forward.

According to Plato, human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion and knowledge. It’s important to keep these elements in mind when trying to understand why we behave the way we do and in how we can change certain behaviors.

Desire

This is about the longing or craving you may have for something that will bring about greater satisfaction or enjoyment. In the workplace, desire drives the expression of your behavior even when it may not serve your best interests. Think about inappropriate comments regarding attraction to another person. Unfiltered desire may actually threaten continued employment. Desire can also provide the motivation or passion you need to initiate a change in behavior.

Emotion

This affective state of your consciousness enables you to experience joy, love, anger, hate, etc. Though some may think they can ignore emotions while at work, to be human means to be emotional and this is true wherever you are. But experiencing emotions at work doesn’t mean simply reacting to them. Instead, you should learn to leverage the information emotions bring about, which means not reacting to them in a way that may undermine your goals but responding to the wisdom they provide in order to behave appropriately. Understanding and practicing this can aid in your ability to initiate behavioral change.

Knowledge

Your knowledge informs how you behave. Though your intentions may be entirely clear to you, that doesn’t mean they are clear to others. Understanding that certain behaviors may be holding you back is very important, but it is not enough. The knowledge you have of your emotions and the desire driving them enables you to behave in a certain manner. This helps you understand how to bring about changes to behaviors that better serve your goals.

More than what you say, it is your behavior that demonstrates most clearly how you show up in the workplace. This behavior can either reflect well or poorly on you. When it undermines your what you intend, it is time for change.

I will be sharing an exciting announcement next week! Be sure to stay tuned and keep an eye out, I can’t wait to share this news with you!


Photo by Letizia Bordoni on Unsplash

Emotions in Decision-Making

October 15, 2020

Emotions impact our decision-making whether we admit it or not. These emotions are actually available to assist in evaluating an experience and then propel us to take some action upon it. We are informed through felt sensations in our body resulting in feelings that ultimately shape our views and perspectives.

While the US Senate is currently in the process of confirming Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, many are trying to determine how Barrett’s personal views will impact her decision-making as a judge on the highest court in the land. Judge Barrett has been very careful to state that she will rule based on the law and not on her personal views.

However, if we can agree emotions impact our decision-making ultimately leading to better decisions and that emotions help shape our personal views, won’t this mean that Judge Barrett and in fact all judges make rulings that are indeed influenced by the emotions they feel? Afterall, none of us are Spock-like characters devoid of feeling. 

Total objectivity was the goal yet impossible to achieve, I was taught as a journalism student. I suspect total impartiality for a judge is equally impossible to achieve. Experienced criminal lawyers say the outcome of a case is largely determined by the judge one gets. Exercising complete impartiality is a worthy goal, but should we really believe it’s possible to achieve and realistic to find?

According to American Nobel Laureate scientist Herbert Simon, emotions influence, skew or sometimes completely determine the outcome of a large number of decisions we make each day.

We shouldn’t rely solely on our gut instinct to make important decisions, nor should we deny the emotions we feel while deliberating with only rational thinking. Emotions, when correctly interpreted, can actually assist in making the best decisions. Trust your gut, but back it up with facts and data to support it.

Psychologists differentiate between integral (e.g., envy and regret) emotions and incidental (e.g., sadness and anger) emotions. Integral emotions are those caused by the decision, such as thinking about the implications of a decision causes anxiety. This anxiety is actually very useful information for you to consider and you may need to be more cautious.

On the other hand, incidental emotions should have nothing to do with your decision-making. For example, it you’re about to make a financial transaction, being sad or angry should play no role in this very rational decision and yet it often does.  When you are angry, it’s extremely important to take a breath and pause because you are probably not in a good space for making a rational decision and could very well result in a costly mistake.  

Because of the many ways our emotions can affect us, it’s important to be aware of them and take them into consideration whenever we are in a deliberative frame of mind. Emotions are there to assist or undermine us, but they can’t be ignored.

“When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but with the creatures of emotion,” said American writer and lecturer Dale Carnegie. Use the information your emotions provide to help you make the best decisions.