Inspirational Quote

Every adversity, every failure and every heartache carries with it the seed of an equivalent or a greater benefit.

Napoleon Hill

Leadership Moments 3/2012: Reflections on COACHING & LEADERSHIP (Part 1 of 3)

I have dedicated almost 17 years of my professional life working, learning and studying effective leaders in my organisation. My organisation is a world class organisation filled with effective and caring leaders that I am very fortunate to work alongside with. After working with all sorts of leaders over my past 17 years (both good and bad), I have learnt that the fundamental distinction that separate the best leaders from the average ones was not necessarily IQ, technical expertise, charisma or even vision (but these traits are important). The fundamental difference the best leaders I have ever worked with are leaders who did not act like they are bosses or managers, they acted and behaved like 'coaches'.

For the past 2 months, my organisation has been sending broadcasts (on weekly or regular basis) to all staff sharing the various definitions and insights of various leaders in my organisation on what coaching means to them and how their coaches made a difference to their leadership development. I was one of those leaders who shared my take on coaching as well (please see Leadership Moments 2/2012). As I read these sharings, I reflected deeply and asked myself, "Why great coaches in organisations behave the way they do and what are some of their mental models when it comes to coaching?" "If I were to share with my leaders the essence of coaching and leadership, how can I share it in a very simple way (I love things to be simple)?"

In a series of 3 blog posts, I will attempt to distill coaching and leadership into 3 key stepsdedicated to all aspiring coaches and leaders. I hope my sharing will inspire you to become better coaches and leaders of the future. 

Step 1: Change the way you think and your behavior will change. When you behavior change, the results you get will change too!

I am a firm believer that if you master your thoughts, you can master your behavior and attitude. I have been in very difficult situations in my life. I have fallen or failed in many occasions and what helped me to pick myself up and finish strong after every failure is the ability to control and influence my self talk. Your beliefs and thoughts can influence how you behave. For example, as a leader, if you believe that your key role is to command and control, you are likely to manage your team in an autocratic manner giving orders and instructions.  Conversely, if you have a mindset that your main job as a leader is to develop your team in order to help them consistently perform to maximise their capabilities and potential, you are most likely to behave like a "coach". If you think like the latter, coaching and developing others will no longer be a task or an event. It will be an on-going process that should be linked to everything you do. As such, your mental model needs to be examined if you want to be a good coach.

When I took over the command of an institution in 2007 leading about 160 officers, I took time to reflect deeply and drafted a personal contribution and purpose statement on how I wanted to lead and value add my officers. This personal contribution and purpose statement was a very useful guide to align all my mental models and behaviours as a leader. Since then, I have been using this personal contribution and purpose statement for all my subsequent postings.

You need to change the way you think before you can change your behaviour as a coach. Coaching is not something you must do as a leader. Coaching is something you must become!If coaching becomes your idenitity and part of who you are, your behaviours will change automatically. This is the most important first step if you want to become a good coach (IMHO) and build an effective team.

Do share with me your thoughts and comments.

Step 2:  To be continued next week. Stay tuned.

Inspirational Quote

Performance during my magic club meeting on 15 Sep 2012

International Brotherhood of Magicians (IBM) Singapore Ring 115

Enjoy!

Inspirational Quote

Inspirational Quote

“Keep on going and the chances are you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I have never heard of anyone stumbling on something sitting down.”

Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958);

Inventor, engineer

Have you ever felt stuck? Couldn't get where you want to go? Couldn't break free of the confines of your situation?

This week has been a challenging week emotionally. Struggled with staff issues, work issues and felt that I'm pretty much stuck in the day to day event level stuff. Nevertheless, I managed to set aside some time to reflect and center myself before the weekend starts.

Have you ever felt stuck? Couldn't get where you want to go? Couldn't break free of the confines of your situation? Well, I'm sure many of us were in such situations before. 

"Jimmy, how did you do it? How can you be so positive and optimistic even when you face setbacks? What's your source of strength?" 

Many of my staff and colleagues asked me these questions. In fact, one of my managers asked me a similar question this week when he was down. "Boss, how can you stay so positive after all the setbacks you have faced and continue to give you best in everything you do? If I were you, I would have left the organisation long long time ago!"

My reply to him was, "Be mindful of your self talk. If you want to get out of your situation, you need to do something about it. If you allow yourself to stay in the rut for too long, it could mean a slow death of your dreams and future. I'm sure you don't want that!"

If you are in a bad situation, down and out, demotivated and demoralised, then I encourage you to take the following 3 key lessons in life. Yes, I have been there done that.

1. You are responsible. You have a choice...Always!

I believe that it is very natural for all of us to look elsewhere for our source of difficulties. But the reality is, the older we are, the more responsible we are for our circumstances. Well, some may argue that many things are out of our control and bad things do happen to good people. True in a certain sense. But we also make choices everyday that contributes to our situation. What we do today will always have an impact on what we get tomorrow. 

Reflect on your life. Have you ever run away from responsibility or play victim? Have you ever blame others for the bad choices you have made? Are you doing things that you should not have done? So to sum it up in one sentence: You are responsible! You are responsible for everything that happens in your life. For everything you are happy with and everything you are not happy with.

For the past few years, I have been spending a lot of time reflecting on how I am spending my very limited time on this planet of ours (indication that I am really growing old). I intentionally focus on what I have control and what I am responsible for and what I can change. My mental model is, even my past choices have led me to my current situation, getting out of it starts with taking responsibility and having the mindset that its up to me to make it better. So, if I want things to get better, I am responsible! So how can you move forward and take responsibility? May I suggest the following 3 simple steps.

1. Ask yourself “What things are holding you back the most in your life right now?” Ink it down on a list.

2. Say to yourself: I am responsible! And mean it.

3. Take action by starting to work on the first item of the list. Follow through.

There is this blog post "30 things that are holding you back" (which I shared on my blog last week) that I find useful when I reflect on the things that are holding me back in life. Do check out this post as you reflect on things that may be holding you back in life.

2. Always begin with the end in mind

All of us want to be successful. I'm sure all of you have dreams. But many of us don't go beyond our dreams. As the saying goes, hope is not a strategy. Always begin with the end in mind, know who you are and where you want to go in life. If you don't know where you want to go in life, you may end up somewhere else! Ha Ha.

You need to be clear and define what you want in life. Yes, it is not a guarantee that you will reach your goals and achieve your dreams, but if you don't define your goals clearly and begin with the end in mind, I'm certain you will never achieve anything.

I am very clear where I want to go in several aspects of my life. I have a clear mission statement of what I hope to achieve. I am also very clear how I am going to give back to society and help others along the way. This blog of mine is one of my small ways of giving back and sowing seeds to help others. 

Are you clear about Who you are? Where you want to go? and Why are you going there?

As you think about your goals and what you want to achieve, be reminded of this quote: "Begin with the end in mind." by Stephen Covey. Know where you want to be in your life and start working from your end goal to make the decisions now that will lead you there.

3. YOU are your asset. What you do to yourself matters!

To improve your situation and increase the options you have in life, grow yourself. You need to intentionally get better everyday. Growth always increases your capacity. Time will not make you better. Experience is not a guarantee for success. The only thing I know that will make my tomorrow better is growing and learning today. Did you know that where you are today is a result of the value you have added to yourself over time? The value you add to yourself co-measures with what you get in life. Don't remain where you are. Refuse the status quo.

I have a personal growth plan every year. Initially, I planned to take up another post-graduate programme on Organisational Development (OD) early this year. But an opportunity came when a 1 year (fully sponsored) OD Practitioner Certification Programme was offered to me by my organisation. I seized the opportunity immediately and I am now looking forward to this 1 year journey of capacity building. I am confident that by the time I complete this certification programme, my capacity and ability to make a difference will increase tremendously. I know for a fact that if I keep growing, learning and climbing higher, I will never get myself stuck. If I am stuck along the way, it will not be for long. :)

Friends, as you reflect on your situation and circumstances that you are in, ask yourself how have you contributed and what can you do about it to make it better. Know who you are and where you want to go. Grow yourself intentionally so that you will have more options in life.

As Jonatan Martensson said, "Success will never be a big step in the future, success is a small step taken just now." All the dreaming, planning and goal setting will not do anything for you if you don't follow through. The actions or small step you take today will help you to get out of your situation slowly but surely. It doesn't have to be a big or significant step. It just have to be a step in the right direction.

I hope my reflections for this week will offer you a different perspective of your life. This is not rocket science but a lot of common sense. But I know common sense is not common practice. So, this is just a gentle reminder from Jimmy who has been there, done that. :)

Have a great weekend ahead.

p/s: I would love to hear your comments and reactions :)

pic sources:

http://www.losethattyre.co.uk/are-you-stuck-in-a-rut-and-need-to-move-on/

http://ariseventures.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/bigstock_Responsibility_1068988.jpg

http://thearticulateceo.typepad.com/.a/6a0128763842f6970c0176153dbd12970c-800wi

http://www.matthewferrara.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/man-growing-arrow.jpg

Thank you Teachers...An inspirational Story Dedicated to all Teachers out there!

Pic Source: http://s1.smsnshayari.com/teachers-day/thankyou-teacher-message.gif

Teachers are special to me. They can really make a big difference in our lives. I was once a failure in school and one teacher believed in me and gave me a second chance. I am who I am today is because of wonderful teachers I had in my life. Today, I try to be a 'Good Teacher' to help the people I lead to be aware of their gifts and strengths. I will do my best to nurture and coach the people to the best of my abilities.

The story below is another wonderful example of how a teacher made a big difference to the life of one student. Click on the link to read it...

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/opinion/sunday/kristof-how-mrs-grady-transformed-olly-neal.html?_r=1

To all Teachers out there....Happy Teachers' Day.

Inspirational Quote

“It's not the will to win that matters-everyone has that. It's the will to prepare to win that matters.”

Paul "Bear" Bryant (1913-1983);

American college football player and head coach

30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself

30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself

Click to read: http://www.marcandangel.com/2011/12/11/30-things-to-stop-doing-to-yourself/