The Change Curve

Too often "The Dungeon of Denial" is where people tend to dwell when going through a difficult period of change.

Have you ever challenged someone when they are in denial?

What is the usual response?

"No I am not!"

Some Thoughts On Leadership

Click here>>>>>Some Thoughts On Leadership

Short video 1m 15secs

Scott's View On Icebreakers

Click here>>>>>Why Icebreakers Are Not A Good Idea

Very good short message. Make the icebreaker relevant and something that your audience can use right away!!

Situational Leadership II Mind Map

(click on image to enlarge) For those of you who have studied Situational Leadership, here is a Mind Map of the key areas to remember. The Development Levels - D1 to D4. The Leadership Styles S2 to S4 and the descriptors of the levels of Competence and Commitment in each Development Level.

You will also note the amount of Direction and Support which should be given by the Leader in relation to the Development Level and brief descriptions of some of the behaviours one would expect to see within Direction and Support.

Training Delivery

(click on image to enlarge)

Here are a few tips for people who may not have much experience in putting together a training session.

Begin with the end in mind. What behaviours or results do you want to influence or change?

What processes and measures will you put in place to confirm the success of the training?

Make sure that you identify the key or critical messages and the individual components that you wish to impart to develop either... knowledge and/or skill or to influence attitude. (You can't train an attitude). Then....

Ensure that it is delivered in a logical sequence. Think about your audience and remember the saying "I hear - I forget. I see - I remember. I do - I understand." You will have a mixture of learning styles within your audience, therefore it makes sense to integrate a variety of learning delivery to accommodate those styles.

Too much theory may put off the Pragmatists* (who prefer to learn when there is a link between the subject and implementing on the job)) and Activists* (those who prefer to try new and different things. They like action based learning). Launching people straight into role-plays and getting them involved in the "doing" with minimal input may not be the best way of engaging the Theorists* (who need to explore and test theories before implementation. They are rational and logical) and Reflectors* (who prefer to observe first and think about what they have learned before application).

Think about your audience in respect of their "Readiness" for the the training. Where are they in relation to their Competence - (Knowledge, Skill and Relevant Experience) and Commitment - (Confidence and Motivation)?

Have you linked the training to your diary and is it relevant to what is happening now in the business?

* (Honey & Mumford - Learning Styles)

Active Listening (courtesy Anne Marie Sheridan)

Active Listening:

You can actively listen by using the following:

Non-verbal noises:
Allow the speaker to know that you are really listening to what they are together with the appropriate facial expression – a smile for example, head movement, body posture. The skilled use of these ‘hmm’ ah oh uhh can encourage the speaker to speak indefinitely

Supportive statements
These are the verbal equivalent of non-verbal noises. These are ways of saying ‘I’m with you’… keep going.
You can also use listening questions to support the speaker… can you give me an example? It seems as though?

Key word repetition
If you really are listening these can be picked up and can be used to encourage the speaker

Reflective statements
This is used to help the speaker see that you are with them and that you want to add on to what they have said. The most usual form of reflection is expressed as a statement and tends to begin with ‘you feel that…?’ ‘it seems to me that?’ These words indicate to the speaker that you are interpreting the emotional undertones of what is being said – and you are putting your finger on the deeper emotions behind the words and showing a real understanding of speaker’s feelings.

Physically demonstrate that you are listening:
This shows the speaker that you are ‘with’ them. Consider how you feel if you are talking to someone and they appear to be half asleep… who don’t look like they are listening. The trick in attending physically is to let people see that you are listening.

Lovely Sunset (taken with Finepix F410)

A Wonderful Sunset

Last night taken from my bedroom window. It was a quite stunning sunset and guess what? It is a beautiful day today, so there must be something in the saying.....

"Red sky at night, shepherds delight."

Surely I am not like him!

Recently for a laugh, I completed a free online character profile and this is who I came up as! Honest, it must be wrong!!

How is your General Knowledge? 1 point for each correct answer.

1. Which kind of dancer was Mr. Bojangles?

2. Which William featured as a team captain in Question Of Sport?

3. Where did William III defeat a French army in 1690?

4. What does hydrogen combine with to form water?

5. Where in The House of Lords do peers with no party loyalties sit?

6. What is the northernmost point of the British Mainland?

7. Which branch of medical science is concerned with muscle?

8. Which actor’s real name was Reginald Carey?

9. Prince George of Denmark was the husband of which English Queen?

10. What was the true vocation of the detective in the stories by G. K. Chesterton?

11. Which TV programme has Judith Harn & Carol Vorderman presented?

12. Who was the first woman elected to the British Parliament?

13. Where on the human body is the skin the thinnest?

14. Which French writer lived with the composer Chopin?

15. On what day in 1939 did Britain declare war on Germany?

16. Which advertiser said “We care because you do”?

17. What is the most abundant gas in the atmosphere?

18. Whose real name is Bernard Schwarz?

19. What did the “D” stand for in Franklin D Roosevelt?

20. Who bought Elizabeth II her first corgi?


See Comment for answers! How did you do?

THE ‘PESOS’ SKILLS DEVELOPMENT MODEL

PREPARE

This involves preparation in terms of:
· Any materials required
· Identification of the development need
· The coach’s understanding of the behavioural changes required

EXPLAIN

The coach needs to explain in detail the behaviours that they are about to demonstrate in “Show”. The objective is to give the individual a clear understanding of the behaviours they have to change prior to seeing the demonstration

*
SHOW

The coach demonstrates the skill required as explained

OBSERVE

The individual attempts to replicate the demonstration they have observed. The coach makes notes for use during feedback

SUPERVISE/SUPPORT

The coach provides feedback on how the individual’s performance compares to the explanation and the demonstration given. The objective is to build the individual’s confidence and where appropriate give ideas for improvement

*
There is a limit to how much can be explained and shown in one go. Break the behaviour in to component parts as necessary.

Selling Isn't Telling. It is all about turning needs into wants. It is about understanding what the needs and preferences of your customer are and then turning those needs into wants and making sure that you either make them money, save them money or improve their life by your recommendation. You do that by asking questions, checking understanding, ensuring that the customer knows that you understand. Making sure that you really do understand. By seeking and giving feedback. Trial closing. Inviting questions. (APIAC) Acknowledging concerns, Probing to understand, Isolating that concern ("If we can resolve this issue, is there anything else that would prevent you from buying this product/service today?"). Answering their concern (to their full satisfaction) then Confirming the purchase with the customer (closing the sale).

The Indispensable Man - A litttle reminder for those who think they are!



Sometime when you’re feeling important,
Sometime when your ego’s in bloom,
Sometime when you’re feeling quite certain,
You’re the best qualified in the room.

Sometime when you feel that your going,
Would leave an unfillable hole,
Just follow this simple instruction
And see how it humbles your soul.

Take a bucket and fill it with water,
Put your hand in it up to the wrist,
Take it out and the hole that’s remaining
Is the measure of how you’ll be missed.

Leadership Quotes

Having the power to get things done My Way, the captain’s way, can be exhilarating, and seductive. It is also terribly limiting. It limits the team to being the reflection of the one in charge. ~ Jim Thompson, Shooting in the Dark

Anyone can become angry – that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way – this is not easy. ~ Aristotle

God grant me the serenity to accept the people I cannot change, the courage to change the one I can, and the wisdom to know it's me. ~ Author Unknown

Individual commitment to a group effort: this is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, and a civilisation work. ~ Vince Lombardi, Former Green Bay Packers Coach

Simply doing more of what worked in the past - will be too incremental. More than that, it will be too slow. The winners of the future will be those who can develop a culture that allows them to move faster, communicate more clearly, and involve everyone in a focused effort to serve more demanding customers. ~ Jack Welch, General Electric Company

Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape. ~ Michael McGriff, M.D.

There is only one time that is important – NOW! It is the most important time because it is the only time that we have any power.” ~ Leo Tolstoy

Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though chequered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the grey twilight that knows not victory nor defeat. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

Excellence is doing ordinary things extraordinarily well. ~ John W. Gardner

Dependent people need others to get what they want. Independent people can get what they want through their own efforts. Interdependent people combine their own efforts with the efforts of others to achieve their greatest success. ~ Stephen Covey

The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

A leader is best when people barely know he exists, not so good when people obey and acclaim him, worse when they despise him. But of a good leader who talks little when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: We did it ourselves. ~ Lao-Tzu

The boss drives people; the leader coaches them. The boss depends on authority; the leader on good-will. The boss inspires fear; the leader inspires enthusiasm. The boss says "I"; The leader says "WE". The boss fixes the blame for the breakdown; the leader fixes the breakdown. The boss says, "GO"; the leader says lets, "GO!" ~ H. Gordon Selfridge

Too many managers don’t realise that when you become truly participative, you get into a lot of uncomfortable conversations in which you hear things about the situation and about yourself that you might not like. ~ Peter B. Vaill, Managing as a Performing Art

One of the true tests of leadership is the ability to recognise a problem before it becomes an emergency. ~ Arnold Glasow

The Learning Curve: I use this model extensively when working on Leadership Development and delivering the principles of Situational Leadership. The measures are Commitment & Competence and the four key points in the journey towards competence are: Unconsciously Incompetent (you don't know what you don't know): Consciously Incompetent (The light switch has gone on! You realise you are not as good at this as you thought!): Consciously Competent (You have to think about what you are doing): Unconsciously Competent (The task has become second nature to you).

You will notice that at each point the leadership style needs to change. At the first point on the learning curve (Unconscious Incompetence), you need to be Directed, given clear instructions, shown what to do and when and closely monitored and supervised.

At the second point, when you realise that you are not as good as you think you are (Conscious Incompetence), the Leadership style needs to change slightly with less tell and more asking questions.

As the Leader, you would still own the task or goal and the responsibility for helping the follower to climb the learning curve. Here you would provide high direction, but your supportive behaviour would increase , this is known as Coaching style.

As competence increases to Conscious Competence, the direction diminishes and the Support increases. Eventually you become Unconsciously Competent and are able to perform the task with little or no supervision. Here the Leadership style changes to Delegating, which provides low direction and low support and allows the self reliant person to get on with the task.

One of the dangers is of course slipping back into Unconscious Incompetence.

Think about these 4 stages as learning to drive a car.

How many of you would pass your driving test if you had to take it again tomorrow morning at 9 a.m.? Not many I would imagine, as you have (and I have), picked up some bad driving habits along the way. Might it not be the same with everyday tasks we perform at work and at home?

Training:
Training refers to the acquisition of knowledge, skills, and competencies as a result of the teaching of vocational or practical skills and knowledge that relates to specific useful skills. It forms the core of apprenticeships and provides the backbone of content at technical colleges and polytechnics. Today it is often referred to as professional development.
Physical training is more mechanistic: planned suites of regimes develop specific skills or muscles with a view to peaking at a particular time. A specialized field of training often used in sports is autogenic training. Another type of training is fartlek training which is a flexible training type which can be adapted to suit almost any athlete.

Many early American astronauts trained extensively in Iceland's central highlands due to its similarity to an extraterrestrial planet.
Training & Development is the field concerned with workplace learning to improve performance. Such training can be generally categorized as on-the-job or off-the-job. On-the-job describes training that is given in a normal working situation, using the actual tools, equipment, documents or materials that they will use when fully trained. On-the-job training is usually most effective for vocational work. Off-the-job training takes place away from normal work situation which means that the employee is not regarded as productive worker when training is taking place. An advantage of off-the-job training is that it allows people to get away from work and totally concentrate on the training being given. This is most effective for training concepts and ideas.
In military use, training means gaining the physical ability to perform and survive in combat, and learning the many skills needed in a time of war. These include how to use a variety of weapons, outdoor survival skills, and how to survive capture by the enemy, among others. See military education and training.
In religious and spiritual use, training means purifying mind, heart, understanding and actions to obtain a variety of spiritual goals such as closeness to God or freedom from suffering. Typical of institutionalized spiritual trainings is the Buddhist Threefold Training.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Training"
Categories: Training Education

Leadership Development:
In organizational development, leadership development is the strategic investment in, and utilization of, the human capital within the organization.
David Day (2001) distinguished between leader versus leadership development.
Leader development focuses on the development of the leader, such as the personal attributes desired in a leader, desired ways of behaving, ways of thinking or feeling.
In contrast, leadership development focuses on the development of leadership as a process. This will include the social influence process and the team dynamics between the leader and his/her team at the dyad level, the contextual factors surrounding the team such as the perception of the organizational climate and the social network linkages between the team and other groups in the organization.
Both forms of development may mutually influence each other, as exemplified in the concept of "Deep Change" in Robert E. Quinn's 1996 book of the same title.
Typically, leader development has focused on 3 main areas - providing the opportunities for development, stimulating the ability to develop (including motivation, skills and knowledge for change), and providing a supportive context for change to occur (see Cynthia D. McCauley, 2001).
Leadership development can build on the development of individuals (including followers) to become leaders. In addition, it also needs to focus on the interpersonal linkages between the individuals in the team.
In the belief that the most important resource that an organization possesses is the people that comprise the organization, some organizations address the development of these resources (even including the leadership).
Leadership development can encompass any number of developmental processes including:
talent identification and management
individual development planning
management development
360-degree feedback
succession planning
mentoring
coaching
Conflict Style Inventory
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References
David V. Day (2001). Leadership Development: A review in context. The Leadership Quarterly, 11, 581-614.
Cynthia D. McCauley(2001). Leader training and development. In The nature of organizational leadership. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Robert E. Quinn (1996). Deep change: Discovering the leader within. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
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External links
Conscious Leadership
Leadership Simulator
Carter McNamara's Free Online Library
Governance Focus issues in governance worldwide, in English & Español
Leadership Development WIKI
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leadership_development"

Kenneth Blanchard is an American businessman, as well as a consultant, speaker, trainer, and author on management and leadership.
He owns the Ken Blanchard Companies, a family-owned business in San Diego, California, and is well-known for developing the Blanchard and Hersey Model of situational leadership theory, together with Paul Hersey. He and others have extended it as Situational Leadership® II. With Spencer Johnson, he developed the One Minute Manager concept, and co-authored a series of books on it. His One Minute Manager Library has collectively sold more than 7 million copies and has been translated into more than 20 languages. He has also tied in Situational Leadership with team development, which he calls Highly Performing Teams.
Dr. Blanchard received his B.A. from Cornell University in government and philosophy, an M.A. from Colgate University in sociology and counseling, and a Ph.D. from Cornell in educational administration and leadership. He maintains a faculty position as Professor of Leadership and Organizational Behavior at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a visiting lectureship at Cornell University, where he is also an elected member of the Board of Trustees.
He has been a guest on a number of national television programs, and has been featured in Time, People, US News & World Report.
Contents[hide]
1 Works
2 In Education
3 References
4 External links

A Nasty Internet Experience! Beware of SpyNoMore.com

On Sunday, 1st October my PC was infected with a virus which took over my home page and slowed my computer down considerably.

I did a Yahoo search to find the best spyware remover and was led to SpyNoMore. They offered a free scan of your computer but you had to pay for the removal of the spyware. The scan revealed 84 infections! I bought a 3 machine licence (I have 2 laptops as well as the PC) for $39.95 + tax.

When I paid SpyNoMore sent me a registration number to activate the download and to remove the offending viruses. Unfortunately when I entered the registration number I got the message "Invalid Receipt Number". I contacted their Help Desk over the Internet and within a couple of hours got a message to tell me to uninstall the programme and then reinstall it and all would be fine. Hmmm! Not so. I did as they asked and got the same message.

I tried 5 times altogether and still received the same message. I did get one further message from the Help Desk basically telling me to do the same again. Since then, I have sent a further 6 or 7 messages asking for help and have not had one reply!

So anyone who reads this I would strongly urge you not to be fooled by SpyNoMore. They are charlatans! I have also complained to Clickbank who authorised the payment and they have replied and said that they have no record of such payment, yet my bank statement clearly indicates that it went through them.

Be warned DO NOT PURCHASE SPYNOMORE!!!