In the past eight months, I (most definitely) was in the RIGHT ROOM, and I’ve absolutely surrounded myself with much smarter people than me! I got the privilege to rotate into high-performance analytics team whose main responsibility is to combat card fraud and minimize losses to the organization.
Most of us don’t have that ‘master switch’ that activates our engagement with our team. The best we can do is to place ourselves into situations and prepare ourselves mentally, physically, and emotionally, so that our environment and our mindset are conducive for us to be fully engaged at our work, our personal life, and for the folks that rely on us as leaders.
Here are the top 10 books I’ve read in 2022.
With his relentless intensity to focus on his studies, he’s able to absorb and process the lessons much faster than usual. This allowed him to spend the rest of his day (outside of school hours) to read poetry, while jabbing on punching bags, and pumping those irons at the gym.
If success is sequential, it’s obvious that the past and the future have little to do on the now—the present. Let’s focus much of our energy on the present, and let’s be darn good at it.
As leaders of people, teams, and functions in an organization, it is our responsibility to ensure the highest possible return on the investment of our most valuable commodity—our time and attention.
Intentionally creating time to think is key to process thoughts, ideas, and knowledge.
In this post, I’ll quickly go over the 45 books by quoting/paraphrasing a line or topic, that I recall, from each book. Consider this a lightning round of things I picked up from each book. Please don’t fact check. I’m sure I’ll miss a few of these.
Conserving your personal bandwidth is important for your well-being, and it benefits the teams and services you manage.
A department head needs to find the right leaders and staff to be part their organization. In order to have highly effective teams, the department head needs to find ways to develop talent, nurture collaborations, and produce knowledge workers. The three pillars of highly effective teams—quality assurance, automation, and upskilling/cross-training—are crucial elements to have a successful organization. They ensure continuous improvement, optimization of resources, and the engagement of each team member.
Upskilling and reskilling are activities centered around learning new skills. May it be to develop an employee to be more valuable in their current role (upskilling), or to train new skills in order to prepare an employee to take on a new role within a company (reskilling).
Change helps the organization adapt to new markets and environments. Leaders of these organizations need to recognize what lies ahead in their industry. Sheer hard work and know-how are not enough to be successful at this. A leader must have the vision and creativity to anticipate change.
Shifting your mindset on the things you do—your job, your responsibilities, or your duties—can make a huge difference on how you approach tasks in the workplace and in your personal life.
Don’t rely on your past successes to move you forward. Your past successes have brought you to where you’re at now—this is now your new baseline and foundation. Master that foundation and keep building upon it.
To find your personal hedgehog, find what you can be passionate about, what you can be exceptionally good at, and what can advance your career or generate income.
If you’re a ‘workplace vampire’ it’s not your job that sucks—it’s YOU who suck!
Everyone needs coaching—the underperformer, the messy middle folks, and the superstars. The manner of coaching and who to pick as the coach have to match the specific needs of the individual.
Don’t hire brilliant jerks. The immediate boost in production is not worth risking the long-term performance and engagement of the team. Having these ‘bad apples’ in your team will eventually pull everyone else’s morale down, it will eventually affect productivity, and it will also deter good talent to join your team.
Avoid the line “We’re all in the same boat.” That is not true. We are NOT in the same boat. Yes, we are weathering the same storm, but we’re definitely not in the same boat.
Getting rid of technology is not the answer to distractions. You’ll have to find ways to control your impulsive urge to use technology when you get bored, feel discomfort, or when you hit those liminal moments.