mindfulness Archives - Kadabra | Leadership Teamwork Change

Planning and Visioning for 2022…Differently

Imagine for a moment that it is mid-December in 2022 and you are in a meeting to discuss year-end results with your team. Depending on your role, you might spend the first part of the meeting reflecting together on what happened in 2022 for your team, functional department, and/or the organization as a whole. You might go into the meeting already having a good sense of what team goals for 2023 will be based on 2022 results and your multi-year strategic plan.

Include Adaptive Leadership in Your 2022 Plans

As we round the final curve in November bringing us to the end of the journey that was 2021, I’ve found myself reflecting on what I thought would happen vs. what actually did happen this year and how I can adapt my leadership going forward. Like 2020, 2021 certainly wasn’t anything like the year I thought we would have—whether we’re talking about my experiences as a newly published author, my family life, Kadabra, or the wider world.

Evolving Your Business Ecosystem

All businesses today operate within one or more recognizable ecosystems. Ecosystems look like patterns of regular exchanges between individuals and organizations through which they acquire new customers (lead generation), generate revenue (selling products and services), and reduce their operating expenses (outsourcing, automation, and fractional work arrangements). Exchanges can be information-based, currency-based, or relational. All three types of exchanges can be valuable contributors to your business’s success.

Conversations Around Your Organizational Culture

Every organization has a culture, whether the leadership team has tried to build it intentionally or not. That culture sets the tone for everything that happens within the organization, from who is hired and how people are rewarded and retained to customer satisfaction and ultimately, profit. The good news is you do have a choice to build yours intentionally.

We are Better Together

At Kadabra, our team has an unofficial mantra: “We’re better together.” I don’t remember who said it first, but every time we put our heads together to solve a problem, work on content, or do strategic planning, we affirm that we are certainly better together.

It’s more than the old adage that two heads are better than one. There’s a synergy that happens when we work together. It’s as if, together, we’re able to tap into a higher wisdom; like Napoleon Hill’s concept of the mastermind principle.

What’s Your Return to Work Plan?

It’s been over a year since we all began to shelter in place, and now everyone’s buzzing about returning to work. An internet search of “return to work” yielded over fifteen billion hits in .6 seconds…with nearly as many opinions about what to do.

At Kadabra, we’re not fans of a “one size fits all” approach. Those don’t typically fit anyone very well.

Inclusion and Belonging with BRAVE Cultures™

This blog is the first of a series of articles on inclusion and belonging and our BRAVE Cultures(™) model. You can read the second post in this series here.

Maslow was wrong: physical safety isn’t at the base of the needs pyramid: belonging is. Without belonging, the animal body knows there is no hope for safety.

An existential fear arises when we try to differentiate. We betray ourselves to belong. We abandon our own selves to belong.

Too much…too loud…too emotional…all the things.

Shifting Your Mindset from Looking Good to Doing Good

This year we’ve seen powerful movements for social justice. Many brands have jumped on those bandwagons only to fall off (or get pushed off). One reason social justice messages aren’t landing well with organizations’ audiences is a perceived lack of authenticity on the part of the brand. If your organization isn’t solidly walking their talk, it’s time to think about shifting your mindset from looking good to doing good.

Now more than ever, emotional intelligence is the most important skill a leader can learn.

And yes, anyone can learn how to be more emotionally intelligent. People call emotional intelligence a soft skill, but we consider it an essential skill.

The so-called soft skills are the prime differentiator between great leaders and mediocre ones in the coming years. Senior leaders are aware of this, and they lament the lack of proficiency they see in candidates. In a recent LinkedIn study, 89% of executives reported that it’s difficult to find people with soft skills. And virtually every soft skill—from conflict management to teamwork, communication skills to problem solving—is related to emotional intelligence.

Emotional intelligence is the ability to be aware of, manage and express one’s own emotions.

It’s also the ability to handle interpersonal relationships with wisdom and empathy. There are four aspects of emotional intelligence, also known as EQ. They are: self-awareness, self-management, other/social awareness, and relationship management.

mindfulness

Tag: mindfulness