Kent Blumberg

Strengths Engagement

I have written here before about your talents, and how effective it can be to focus on investing in those talents in order to create unique strengths.  Back in February, during my series about the book 12: The Elements of Great Managing, I wrote about data that show that the more your employees are playing to their strengths every day, the better your business results will be.

Last month, Marcus Buckingham released his new book, Go Put Your Strengths to Work: 6 Powerful Steps to Achieve Outstanding Performance (Free Press, New York, 2007, 320 pages).  Buckingham takes the next step, by helping us measure how much we use our strengths at work today, and how much that is likely to change in the future.

Alligator Bayou evening

Alligator Bayou, March 17, 2006 at 6:30 pm.  Canon EOS 20D, ISO 1600, 1/200 second at f/5.6, 75 mm lens.

Photoshop CS2:  levels to get contrast and brightness, empty layer blended at multiply at 52 percent opacity to deepen colors, saturation adjustment layer with saturation pumped up +5, unsharp mask.

Two minute listening drill

I spent the last two days in a wonderful coaching clinic, taught by Jodi Jan Larson, MCC, of CorporateCoachU and sponsored by DBM's Houston office.  Perhaps the greatest shift for me came as a result of a simple two minute listening drill.  Here's how to try it yourself.

Sit down with your practice "coachee."  Ask her to talk for two full minutes on a topic she is passionate about.  Your job is to listen.  Don't say anything.  Avoid reactions (like head nodding, smiling, raising your eye brows).  Don't think about what you will say when the two minutes is up.  Don't take notes.  Just listen from a neutral position.

After two minutes - and only after the two minutes is up - summarize what you heard in ten words or less. 

What this exercise did for me was to quiet my mind and open it up more fully to the other person. I was able to listen with my ears and my eyes, and pickup up what was said and what was not said.  I thought I was a good listener, but this exercise showed me how it feels to listen at an entirely different level.

Give it a try and let me know how it works.

Simple Solutions for new leaders - book review

Are you a first-time manager, new to leading others?  If so, you could do worse than to read Simple Solutions: Harness the Power of Passion and Simplicity to Get Results, by Tom Schmitt and Arnold Perl (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ, 2007, 220 pages).  The book will do a good job of giving you an overview of the skills and passions the authors believe are key to leadership success.

Have you been leading for some years?  If so, you don't need this book.

13 Ways to Make Valuable Contributions in a Meeting

I have been reading  Close the Deal: 120 Checklists for Sales Success, by Sam Deep and Lyle Sussman (Basic Books, New York, 1999, 310 pages).  List #18, "Thirteen Ways to Make Valuable Contributions to a Meeting," would be useful to anyone who attends meetings.

Sometimes it's all about me

This is a heavily cropped photo of a sign in Bangkok, Thailand.  I no longer remember what the full sign said -just liked this tight bit. 

Models - shortcuts to business learning - if used carefully

I reported recently on Merrill Lynch's efforts to be more inclusive in order to increase diversity of thought.  Ferdinand Reinke suggested that I might want to find a better model, citing his negative experience as an employee.  His implication was that ML's poor past performance should cause us to reject any lessons from how they do business.

I disagree, and said so in my response.  But the comment format did not give me enough room to fully explore the idea of using models in business.  That's what today's article is about:  why we need models in order to succeed in business, how to find them and how to use them.

Inclusion is good for business

I am a member of Jones Partners, a group of professionals striving to increase collaboration between the Houston business community and the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management at Rice University.  Last night, as part of the Partners' Thought Leadership Series, we had the opportunity to hear from Larry Stuart and Subha Barry about why diversity and inclusion matter to business.

Personal Ethics

Do you have a personal ethics statement, detailing how you deal with the world?  I recommend adopting one.  It can provide a touchstone in times of stress, a compass to keep you headed in the right direction.

Here's my personal list.  What's on your list?

Simba - rescued Pomeranian

Meet Simba, one of our two rescued Pomeranians.  Although we aren't sure, we think he was a breeding stud before being abandoned.  It took months before he would let us pick him up, but he now comes asking for it.  Great little dog.

Captured on a Canon EOS 20D, 1/60s at f/5.6.  ISO 100.  55mm lens.  On camera flash.

Processed using Adobe Photoshop CS2.  Cropped, levels to get contrast, then unsharp mask.