Less than 60 days after the diagnosis, Cindy’s mom passed away in mid-January 2018. That was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever seen Cindy go through, and the helplessness I felt was like nothing I had ever experienced. I’m a fixer and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to fix that. I was,...

As I approached the one-year mark in my new role with that small, family-owned business, I received my first annual performance review. My immediate manager and the owners of the company were keenly aware of all I had taken on in that position as well as in my time away from work. They saw tremendou...

When I threw my name in the hat for the 5S implementation role, it was far more about getting anything that resembled climbing the company ladder and had very little to do with improving the productivity or profitability the process was geared at achieving. Truth be told, my interests in behavior-ba...

Not long after making the decision to stop drinking completely, Ron (who I now reported directly to in my 5S implementation role) decided to step away from the behavior-based safety facilitator role and return to a manufacturing supervisor position. I don’t remember why but I distinctly remember bei...

I’ve based everything we’ve looked at to this point on the idea of Leveraging Leadership Growth and the strength you and I can each gain through great professional relationships. The framework for relational leadership is crucial, intentionally integrating humility and investing appropriately so we ...

When we see others’ worth and we’re humbly willing to make ourselves available to them, the time we invest supports their growth in ways we may never fully comprehend. We can easily count the seeds in an apple, but we can’t count the number of apples that come from one seed. By valuing others and be...

Earlier, we looked at the importance of mentoring through influence rather than attempting to mentor through control. We may be able to use control for a while, at least as long as the chain-of-command reporting relationship exists, and pretend we’re providing mentorship. But that ship will sail soo...

Practicing the art of responsiveness can earn the kind of influence that enables swift, effective decisions - even under pressure. But the higher the stakes, the more important it will be to have made ongoing investments into each of those relationships. Like any sound investment strategy, the time ...

The art of responsiveness isn’t based on how quickly we can reply. There are plenty of people I respect deeply who don’t provide an immediate answer when I reach out. However, those folks have intentionally invested into our relationship - just like I have - in a way that’s built grace. When our sch...

I’ve mentioned barely graduating high school several times to this point. I also shared that neither Cindy or I had graduated college when we started our leadership journey (and still haven’t). While my less than stellar performance in high school was more a factor of me being bored, our lack of col...

I’ve emphasized the idea of legacy as we wrapped up almost every aspect of our look at building strength through great professional relationships; that hasn’t been accidental and it will continue. I’ve mentioned a few times to this point how I feel a heavy obligation to pay forward the many blessing...

As I closed our look at Knowing Your Worth by sharing a few steps for crafting a lasting influence, I mentioned how something as silly as a complimentary email series (known today as A Daily Dose Of Leadership) that was initially meant to help our new business stay top-of-mind with the executives an...