Management consulting

In the first chapter of Give and Take, author Adam Grant features Adam Rifkin, who was dubbed Fortune magazine’s Best Networker (he has the most LinkedIn connections to Fortune’s 640 most powerful people). I decided to invite him to connect on LinkedIn.

Wanting to personalize my invitation to increase the likelihood he’d accept, I read his profile. He lives in Silicon Valley, 10 miles from me! He hosts a monthly meet up for start ups. I click on the link and discover the meet up is today in Palo Alto, 20 miles from me. I have the evening open, so I drive to the meet up.

Read more

People I admire strive to become better as a partner, parent, child, friend, boss, coworker or human being. They are continually looking for ways to improve, whether for their relationships, or to create more effective habits for themselves.

I’ve noticed three ways these people improve themselves.

Read more

Identifying one’s “superpower” has become a hot topic. We are encouraged to identify where we excel. This is not always an easy task. Most of us are either oblivious to how we stand out, or at the other end of the continuum, think have more competence than we actually do.

Thus it’s a challenge to figure out our brilliance. It helps to ask a cross section of friends, peers and your boss or clients to see if a trend appears.

Read more

Have you ever been told you are difficult?

When I’ve labeled someone difficult, they have been some of these:

• obstinate, uncooperative, inflexible, demanding, dictatorial
• undiplomatic, blunt, condescending, arrogant, caustic, hyper-critical, argumentative (often just for the sake of it, not because they believe their arguments).
• incongruent, dishonest, passive agressive, uncommunicative, inconsiderate, insensitive, unreliable, defensive, petty

So imagine my surprise to be told by a colleague, Peter, that Jim, whom I rarely work with, felt I was difficult.

While I am not fond of feedback from a third-party because specifics are minimal, if any, I take any negative feedback seriously. I use such feedback to explore how much, if any, of the feedback could be truthful, and how I can correct any dysfunctional behaviors.

It left me wondering what “difficult” really means.

Read more

The morning was spectacular—a warm Gulf breeze brushed my cheeks. Waves scampered across the beach.

Meditating on the waves’ delicious sound, color and dance, I observed that even as they were approaching the shore, they were retreating.

A small berm lay between me and the surf. A few waves crossed the crest and scurried toward me. But most were spent before reaching the top.

I tried to discern which wave would make it over the top. At first, I thought I could tell by the size of the swell. Surely the largest would make it over. No.

Turning when I heard a loud crash, I thought, “That one will surely make it over.” No.

Then it hit me.

Read more

Many disagreements are caused by misunderstandings. These can be as simple as someone not accurately hearing what the other said. Or they can be misinterpreting the other’s actions in the worst possible way.

Two words can head off escalating the misunderstanding into a full-fledged argument, with loud voices, emphatic inflection, and accusatory words.

Instead of declaring inaccurate conclusions, condemning perceived motives, and mischaracterizing behaviors, try these two words instead.

Read more

These days we have to be careful about touching people, yet we still want to embrace others, to show them we care about them.

Try a verbal hug* instead.

Read more

Photo: Rebecca Morgan, Gualala, CA

You may have heard the term “microaggression”—a form of bullying defined as brief exchanges that send denigrating messages to individuals because of their group membership. I believe we can broaden the definition to any subtle bullying—eye-rolling after someone’s comment, verbal digs and zings, ignoring someone’s suggestions in a meeting, and other disparagements. These can happen even when both parties are part of the same group.

We’ve all received these kind of disrespectful behaviors. They are designed to dismiss us, to put us down, to signal we don’t have value. Some of us have even perpetrated these, perhaps when younger and not conscious of the effect they have on others.

Read more

Photo: From the Mermaid Academy, Boracay, Philippines

Odd. Different. Weird.

Have you been called one (or more) of these? If so, you’re far from alone.

This may be a key to your success.

Read more