Browse published articles attributed to Jane Cranston, with full-archive search.
My last Competitive Edge Report article “Is the Key Still in Your Ignition?” hit a sweet cord with a number of you and sour note with others. I thought I’d continue the discussion this week by looking back as well as forward.
Bob Sheppard, the announcer for the New York Yankees, for more than almost six decades, applied three simple principles to his extraordinary delivery. Surely his beautiful baritone made him highly listenable and memorable; however, it was his discipline that made him a lifetime member of the team and a much loved part of the game for spectators. To become a good communicator Bob Sheppard believed you had to abide by three simple, but important, rules—be clear, concise, and correct.
In contemporary psychological terms, “extrovert” is used to describe a individuals whose temperament type or preference directs and receives their energy from exte al sources. In the practical sense, they are action people who plug into others for their juice. They’re not generally drawn to reflection, they are “doers.” Talking things out is an extrovert’s way of understanding, solving problems, reducing stress, sharing, and communicating. I am less likely to say to myself, “what are they really thinking?” when working with an extrovert.
How do you predict the outcome of a behavior, project, or idea? A few days ago, an executive career-coaching client came to a session with an interesting PowerPoint presentation. It was a proposal to a potential employer. My client hoped the company would gain a better appreciation of his expertise and ability to transfer his skills to their industry sector as well as demonstrate a talent for addressing their specific challenges and opportunities. It was very effective. His outline was based on the SWOT template.
“Love my work, hate my job” is the lament of too many people. Since layoffs appear to have reduced in numbers and the workplace seems to be settling into the new normal, people have the luxury of contemplating whether they're happy in the workplace.
I learned the W-A-I-T acronym in my graduate school training. I’ve always posted a small note on my wall, out of the client’s view, as a reminder. The letters stand for “Why Am I Talking?” Why do people talk too much in business situations? - They’re anxious. Maybe the gathering is about a difficult subject or has important leaders present. Most people don’t want to be the center of attention, yet they’re afraid they’ll be ignored or negated. So they talk and talk. This is the anxiety speaking and it often isn’t pretty or welcome.
In modern behavioral terms, “introvert” is used to describe individuals who are most comfortable in the inner life of the mind, come across as more reserved, and are less likely to seek numerous or large interactions. They represent approximately half of the population. In the workplace their presence is less obvious and misunderstood, though their ability to actively listen at a very deep level makes them major idea contributors. There’s risk in confusing their self-containment with a lack of ambition.
Diseases, disorders, and conditions seem to go in and out of public favor. Not so long ago everyone seemed to have dyslexia, and then it was ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity disorder). Charlie Sheehan put mania back on the radar. With the widespread success of the movie “Social Media,” “Does he have Asperger’s or doesn’t he” became a popular debate. Speculation by specialist in the field (true gamesmen) has thrown names like Gates, Einstein, Beethoven, Jefferson, Mozart, and yes, Mark Zuckerberg onto the “yes” list. Not bad company.
Too quickly, and too often the answer given to this question is “yes.” “Of course you have to move to get to the next level, make more money.” “Everyone knows home-growns are paid less.” True? Not necessarily, according to Monika Hamori, professor of Human Resource Management at the IE Business School in Madrid, Spain. In her July-August 2010 article for the Harvard Business Review, she discusses the myths and facts she deciphered in her eight years researching the global financial industry’s employment records using the data of a large international executive search firm.
No one likes having the difficult conversation whether it is in his or her personal life or at work. Unfortunately they often are essential. What makes the interaction scary is the unpredictability of the response and reaction of the receiver as well as your issues about the topic at hand.
You just heard the news - you were passed over for the big promotion. Now what should you do? Here are some simple steps that might ease the frustration, give you some insight and help you plan your next career move. Step 1 – Take a deep breath, assess the situation and ask yourself this dozen questions. 1) Did I really want the job or did I just think I should want it? 2) Were the decision makers aware of my aspirations? If not, why not? 3) What are their factors, within and beyond my control, which influenced the choice?r
Are you envious of people who can go on vacation and not give work, home, or other obligations a thought? I use to be but then decided it really wasn’t the right mindset for me.
No matter how much individuals like their jobs, they’re entitled to be paid. Years ago the company my father was an executive with was purchased in a hostile takeover. The new owners were unable to deliver the paychecks on payday. Their response was, “They’ll just have to wait ‘til Monday.” “My people can’t wait until Monday, they have kids to feed!” was my father’s angry response. He then took matters into his own hands. A town meeting of the 50 staff members was called.
The word civility is surely not new to the language, yet it is not a term you hear spoken every day. It took a “shellacking,” a tea party, and a deadly shooting for a few people to step back and ask “is this really the way ‘we’ want to treat one another?” Of course, most of us, myself included, are quick to blame others before we monitor our own boorishness, but there is something that rings true, at this time, in this world, which says maybe there is a lesson to be learned. Since the workplace is often an arena for change, a microcosm of the bigger community, I would start there.
I see it over and over again, a client goes on an interview, makes it past HR (in my book the highest hurdle), is sent up to meet the department head, onto the hiring manager with a stop by the top person, and then no offer. What happened? Ruling out the circumstances beyond your control, such as they were going to hire from within from the get go, a hiring freeze was put in place, or they chose not to fill the position, what can you do to make sure you get the offer, promotion, or key project?
The tone and stiff upper lip image the phrase “Keep Calm and Carry On” portrays tells a lot about its origins. It’s 1939 and Hitler’s forces are bombing England day and night. The government prints motivational posters telling the people “Keep Calm and Carry On.” And they did.
We’ve all had our share of poor or mediocre bosses, but what qualities do most great supervisors seem to have? I would argue three of the essentials are transparency, flexibility, and leadership. Here’s what they look like in action.
I’ve never understood why it is so difficult for some people to say “thank you.” It begs the question, “Are we really grateful?” and, “For what and whom?” And most important, “Can we admit it to ourselves and share it with others?”
I was walking in the Times Square area the other day when I spotted a person wearing a very graphic tee shirt. It read, “No such thing as off-season.” While I'm sure he was thinking NFL, NBA, or MLB, my wheels turned toward the workplace. I can't tell you how many times people have told me, “Let's wait ‘til after (name the holiday)” or “I can't network now, no one is in their offices.” As a person with a perch that must overlook the offices of thousands of people, I can tell you with certainty — people are at work.
Over this past weekend, I had my annual “lunch on the lawn” party, big long tables in the garden laden with fresh food from the local farms and the ocean. It is an event people look forward to, so no one ever turns down the invitation. Note to readers — invite people to lunch on weekends. They are rarely booked, more relaxed, eat less, drink little, and stay for no more than three hours. It's also memorable because no one else does it.
I’m standing on line at the supermarket behind a mother and her five year old son. Bored, tired, and cranky, the child wants out, as does the mother. The boy starts asking questions and for things. “No!” says the mother. “No” is the answer so many time that she is ahead of her son’s requests. Finally, in frustration she yells, “Don’t even bother asking me because the answer is going to be ‘no.’” We’ve all witnessed this type of scenario and probably are guilty of participation now and again. For some reason the scene stuck with me.
My first kindergarten assignment was to go home and find out the family home phone number. The next day we practiced memorizing those digits. As I recall the teacher helped us put the number sequence to some kind of rhythm not dissimilar to those 800 ads that help you remember where to buy a mattress or donate your car to charity. To this day, I still remember the Longfellow Street number.
We all have attended presentations. I’m sure you will agree most were terrible – boring, redundant, and/or visually offensive. I am guilty of giving a few myself. You too? To improve my knowledge base and skills, I started studying the product launches of Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, Inc. I then began listening and reading Carmine Gallo, columnist with Businessweek.com. Gallo teaches presentation skills to top executives. He is also a self-proclaimed expert on the techniques and genius of Steve Jobs.
As most of you know, I’m a strong advocate of everyone having an updated resume and bio. It prevents you from being placed in the embarrassing situation of being asked to “shoot me over your current resume” and having to say you don’t have one or lying and scrambling to create something. The bonus of this discipline is you are forced to reevaluate your job and career on a regular basis as well as update the document’s format to meet ever-changing standards.
First let me correct my title — I would prefer the phrasing, “Are you the boss people want to work with?” because “with” sends a message of partnership and collaboration rather the servitude. Let’s hope we’re past the later. I’ve spent most of my career(s), be it in a corporate environment, the not-for-profit arena, and as an entrepreneur, observing and aspiring to the behavior of people I saw as excellent leaders, managers, and supervisors, aka bosses. While they may have been different in their styles and skills, they had a number of things in common. They all were...
Have you recently observed the steam coming out of the ears of a few women over forty? Not sure what’s up and what started it all? Let me clue you in. It’s a reaction to a just published McKinsey & Company report in conjunction (some would say cahoots) with The Wall Street journal. In the spirit of full disclosure, I must admit I am a WSJ subscriber and have been quoted by the publication a number of times.
It shouldn't surprise me anymore, but it does. When a potential coaching client contacts me, I often ask two questions, "How did you find me?" and "What made you interested?" Ninety percent of the time, the answer to the first question is "I Googled 'career coach.'" No surprise, I work hard to make it easy for people to find my business and me. It's the second answer that's shocking, "Well you were the only person who called back." What?
Has someone IM’d you recently? I don’t mean someone down the street or in another region, I’m talking about the person sitting next to you. Is every “conversation” you have with your boss on e-mail? Gotten a text condolence note lately? (I did, no kidding, can’t say it was very consoling.) Have one-word answers been elevated from grunting to an acceptable reply? My favorite is the “yup” response to a 20-word question sent from an associate to a higher-ranking executive.
The job market in many parts of the United States and the world is shifting for the better. I have a number of clients and colleagues who are voluntarily choosing to make a move, often for more money and a better title. It should put all of us who work with and for others on constant alert. It always amazes me when people say they had “no idea” when a valued employee informs them they are leaving the organization. Here are some tried and true indicators. In the next issue I will discuss some potential rescue remedies.
The statistics speak. Most people spend more time at work than in any other activity; more than hours with their family, eating, sleeping, or interacting with friends. That said, wouldn’t it seem logical that we would spend an hour and some effort making our workspace as conducive to the job at hand and our temperament and personality? But no, we have the biggest and the best TVs, golf clubs, cars, whatever, while our office furniture, cubicle, office vehicle is less than pristine, barely functional, and probably downright ugly.
You’ve heard people say again and again, “I learned more from my mistakes than my successes.” My reply is “I doubt it.” They’ll spend hours, days, and endless energy trying to correct (or worse defend) a mistake by analyzing and dissecting in post mortem, generally producing a patched up version of the mess they had. If you didn’t like model 101 what are the chances 201 will meet your needs any better? We see it in relationships all the time; people unsuccessfully date or hire the same type, over and over, hoping for something different and better. How often does that work out?
Turnover, voluntary or forced, is part of the workplace cycle. As in nature, some changes take place a leaf at a time while in other instances a hurricane performs the serious pruning. This article addresses some things you should consider when an employee enters your office and says, “I quit!” Let’s start off with a bit of prevention.
Executive coaching clients wanting to enhance their role and impact in their current workplace continuously ask me, “How do I get greater recognition?” “Make sure my boss doesn’t get all of the credit?” “What’s the best way to be found by potential employers and thought leaders in my field?” My answer is often “brand yourself.”
I came upon a survey by Universum, a global employer branding company. They asked more than 65,000 college students to list what they considered to be the top 250 employers. No surprise Google ranked #1. Consulting companies such as McKinsey, Bain, and Boston Consulting were high on the list as were brand names such as Coca-Cola, Disney, and Proctor and Gamble. Just like workers in other age and education groups, the students rated job security and an ability to advance in their careers as very important.
I recently had the opportunity to invite a friend and her grandchildren to a local fair. I’ve been going to the event for years and like the predictability and tradition; plus it supports a good cause. The carousel is always in front of the big house, the face painting under the elms, and you can count on the stampede to the rummage sale and vintage clothing tent. There is something remarkably calm about the entire experience and the kids, young and old, love it.
Money is tight everywhere. Even people doing well are feeling the impact of local, national, and global slowdowns in the economy. That said, it doesn’t necessarily mean no one is getting merit increases, promotions, and salary adjustments. Whether you work for a company that has a very structured compensation review process or are employed in a more entrepreneurial setting where salaries are handled in a less formal manner, you have to have a strategy and approach to making sure you are getting what you have rightfully earned without jeopardizing what you have.
s I see it, there are really three places you can exist in your career--Comfort, Growth, or Fear zones. Let’s assess where you are. Think of a work issue, your current status, or even take a bird’s eye view of the recent past. Ask yourself “Where am I?” “Am I operating mostly in my comfort zone?” You know the comfort zone—the place where there are no surprises, few challenges, not too much pressure, and a tolerable pace. Before you scream “I wish!” Think about it as a day-in, day-out routine.
In the Business section of the New York Times (August 8, 2010 ), the author, Stephanie Rosenbloom, wrote about people who had successfully downsized their lives, sometimes to a level many of us would deem extreme, particularly when it came to possessions. Whether by choice or circumstances, such as lay off or divorce, they own less, work less, and seem to be living happier lives.
No matter what type of workplace you choose to operate in, you undoubtedly have to manage people. They might be direct reports, clients or customers, interns, freelancers, vendors, colleagues, and of course the often most challenging of all, your boss or business partner. Here are a few tips on how to manage behavior and time while reducing everyone’s stress and avoiding conflict: Article:
The story tells of an interaction between a parent and his high school-age child. The adolescent presents with a report card of four As and one D-. Because of our prejudices and experiences, we the reader are inclined to think the parent is going to either lecture or at least focus on the low grade. We’re fooled. The father applies another strategy with an approach that I think is applicable to leading and managing others, and useful in our own self-management.
One of things I love about being a coach is the variety of people and situations that come to my office or call on the phone. In no particular order here are some of the presenting challenges brought to coaching sessions. You will note—I fired no one.
Do you have days when you feel like you’re getting nowhere or sense a project will never end? Worked on initiatives where you were only part of the solution and would never see the finished product? Wonder what happened to that suggestion that received such a positive reception and now seems to have disappeared? Join the crowd. So many of us are not privy to or given access to much of the work and decisions that are made in our workplace. What we also lack is any kind of regular feedback that would motivate, inform, and engage us to carry on.
I am fortunate to work as an executive coach with people at many levels, in different stages of their careers, and in a variety of industries. Even though there is significant variety and diversity in my client base, I am often struck how similar their thought processes and experiences are. This is particularly true when it comes to discontent. You’d think everyone would be complaining about wages, or lack of vacation time, the long hours, or the tight spaces in which they work — no.
Over past decades the issue of diversity has taken a very visible place in the growth and structuring of the workplace population. Whether it was caused by mandates or natural shifts in population, the job sites look quite different. The challenge, as I see it, is not only to continue to push for more diversity in the two major categories — gender and race/ethnicity — but also in less obvious areas such as education, energy, and temperament. It is these less noticeable areas where, I believe, the most opportunity and riches exists.
I had a boss, I’ll call him, Ted. Ted was very political and used his high emotional intelligence to play all sides of every issue just to make sure he was always covered. I heard him lie by fact and omission. So clever was the man that when opinions were asked, he was able to shift positions 180 degrees before the final vote, especially if he saw the tide going against him. He bragged about accomplishments that were fantasy and made commitments he never intended to keep, while espousing values he violated on a regular basis.
When working with managers and executives in a coaching relationship, I’m often struck as to how naïve some are to the realities of the day-to-day operating on the job and the politics of the workplace.
Malcolm Gladwell made a name for himself by writing three bestselling books “Blink,” “The Tipping Point,” and now “Outliers.” His latest is currently number 5 on the bestseller list. The word outlier refers to “a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from others of the sample.” Gladwell’s focus is on extraordinarily successful people (Bill Gates, the Beatles, NHL players to name a few), and what it is about them, their environment, and the luck that made them what they are today.
A behavior common among very successful people is setting high standards for themselves as well as others. Whether the actions are going to be seen by friends or colleagues, or done strictly in private, doesn’t seem to matter, high achievers place the bar at the top rung for almost anything and everything.
The April 2013 issue of Inc. features Tim Ferriss, the author who brought us “The 4-Hour Workweek” and other productivity books, blogs, and seminars. Ferriss’ 80/20 rule says that “eighty percent of one’s productivity comes from 20% of one’s efforts and likewise 80% of your wasted time comes from 20% of the possible causes.” I started to look at the twenty-percent possible causes. 1. Support system has not grown or flexed. When I speak of support system, I am referring to many factions.
Recently, my assistant, Naomi, shared a TED lecture with me. The speaker told an incredible story of a childhood riddled with extreme poverty, homelessness that was saved by love and encouragement. He spoke of taking bold moves to create an adult life of true abundance, contribution, and intellectual stimulation and financial reward. The word he constantly used was “bold.” When I was growing up one of the worst things you could be called was bold. It implied brazen, outspoken, bucking the system, and not a team player. It was alien to my culture, gender, and family messages.