Blog

What to do When the Boss is Your Dad

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

I coach a lot of business leaders these days. Many of these individuals are successful Directors and Vice Presidents who want to take it the next level – and fortunately for them report to bosses who believe they can!

Oftentimes, the boss is not just the boss for these leaders though. In the family businesses I support, the boss is also these leaders’ fathers. As you can imagine, this creates a very rich work environment where people tend to have very deep and intimate relationships with one another. With that said, this parent-child relationship can present certain challenges to an otherwise less complicated hierarchical structure. Read more ›

Posted in Bosses, Children, Executive Coaching, Family, Family Business, Far Side, Identity Management, Leadership, Leadership Coaching, Parent, Role Clarity, Son

Catching Spring Fever to be a Better Leader

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

I was just in Minnesota with a couple of coaching clients and was thrilled to see – and feel – the sun shining again. I’ve been supporting the leaders in this family business since November, about the same time the sun disappears every year yielding way to grey skies, extremely cold temperatures, and oh yea lots of snow! It’s a recurring event for those who live in the area that lasts for several months. I believe they call it “winter”. Just because we have a name for the season does not mean that it doesn’t have extreme impacts on everyone, their attitudes, and especially their behaviors though.

I remember the first time I heard about – and discovered first-hand – winter depression (also known as Seasonal Affective Disorder or SAD) during my freshman year at Northwestern, a prominent university in Chicago where they also experience extreme winter weather. Read more ›

Posted in Exercise, Fitness, Inspiration, Leadership, Minnesota, Motivation, SAD, Seasonal Affective Disorder, Spring, Winter, Winter Depression

Getting Your People in the Right Seats on the Bus with RASCIs

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

In his book “Good To Great”, Jim Collins taught us that one of the principal reasons why great companies achieve such greatness is because they have the right people on the bus. No matter how great a leader is, he/she can’t do it alone. No matter how great a company’s product or service may be, companies don’t just make great products or deliver great services. It takes great people to be great.

Well, I would offer that in addition to having the right people on the bus great companies successfully put those right people into the right seats on the bus. I’ve consulted to and supported countless companies – for profit, not for profit, large, and small –  over the years, and one thing is a constant no matter where I go or who I work with. Every company has at least a few of those top-performer A-players who will go the extra mile pouring their own sweat equity and individual perseverance into their work. Unfortunately, having a few A players rarely makes a championship-caliber team. It might win you a few games, but more often than not that’s about it.  Read more ›

Posted in Good to Great, Jim Collins, Leadership, Organizational Alignment, Organizational Performance, Performance Improvement, RACIs, RASCIs

Plus Delta’s CEO to Lead Two High Impact Workshops in Phoenix – April 17th-18th

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

Are you ready to improve performance in your organization and with your consulting clients? Are you looking for a good professional development opportunity to up your game this year? If you live or work in the Phoenix area, ASTD Valley of the Sun and the Arizona Organization Development Network have partnered with Plus Delta’s CEO and Chief Architect Dr. Jeremy Lurey to bring you two high impact workshops this month you don’t want to miss.

  • Low-Tech Leadership Practices for the High-Tech Era – In today’s high-tech environment where text message chats seem to outnumber good-old-fashioned phone calls, more and more of our leadership seems to be happening via email and iPhones. That clearly is not conducive to leading others, so in this workshop we will explore people’s differences and practice using a proven framework for communicating with and providing effective feedback to others in a way that is less contentious, less confrontational, and best of all produces better business results. The program is based on a fun and engaging Work Style Profiles inventory that participants will complete at the beginning of the session and then practice applying together. Wed April 17th, 5:30-9:00pm Read more ›

Posted in American Society for Training and Development, Arizona OD Network, ASTD, Coaching, Consulting, Consulting Practice, Consulting Skills, Feedback, Leadership, Leadership Development, OD Network, Organizational Performance, Phoenix, Professional Development, Soloing, Solopreneur, Training

3 Keys to Success with Succession Management

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

Many see the key to success in succession management as identifying and then developing the CEO successor. Sure that’s important. It’s not just grooming your next-generation leader that makes succession management a success though.

Over the last few years, I’ve come to realize that there are two other critical elements to succession management. First, you have to engage the Board in the process and continuously guide them through the leadership transition. Second, you must also help your current CEO not just accept his/her retirement but actually embrace his/her “third act” in life. Oftentimes, these leaders have served their organizations for years – if not decades! – so letting go and moving on requires their embracing a new beginning. Read more ›

Posted in CEO, Leadership, Leadership Coaching, Leadership Transition, Retirement, Succession Management, Succession Planning, Third Act

How Addictive is Your Cell Phone?

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

Earlier this year, I attended a keynote presentation delivered by Simon Sinek. While Sinek released the book “Start With Why” in 2009, he may be most known for his TED talk “How Great Leaders Inspire Action“, which is one of the most viewed TED talks ever with well over nine million views to date.

 

During his Vistage conference keynote, Sinek shared a prelude to a book he’s currently writing about how certain chemicals affect the human body. It was a fascinating conversation during which he highlighted the affect four specific chemicals – Endorphins, Serotonin, Oxytocin, and Dopamine – have on us. What really struck me in Sinek’s talk was the affect dopamine has on our bodies. Read more ›

Posted in Addiction, Cell Phone, Dopamine, E-mail, Human Body, productivity, Simon Sinek, TED Talk, Vistage

Super Charging Your Company with Smart Goals

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

Over the years, I’ve consulted with organizations large and small and across industries more diverse than I can even remember. The one thing that has always been a constant though is that the people who define their strategic intentions always achieve greater results than those who don’t.

This may seem like a simple concept. Well, it is! If you don’t know where you’re going, then you are far less likely to ever get there. As I tell people all the time, it’s actually dumb luck and circumstance that produces your outcomes if you aren’t mindful about them yourself. Read more ›

Posted in Accountability, Alignment, Goals, Innovation, Motivation, Organization Development, Organizational Change Management, Performance Improvement, SMART goals, Strategy

Plus Delta’s CEO Leads Another HR.com Webinar on The Essentials of Change Management

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

Nearly 250 people registered for last week’s Performance Management virtual conference hosted by HR.com, the largest social network and online community of HR executives in the world. Plus Delta’s CEO & Chief Architect Dr. Jeremy Lurey has led several webinars for the organization over the past year, and this time he facilitated another well-received and well-attended event. Click on the following link to view an archive of his presentation Essentials of Change Management: Five Critical Steps For Greater Project Success

The Essentials of Change Management workshop is a short 1-hour webinar that helps participants learn about change and resistance to change from an individual, group and organizational level to develop the critical skills they need to effectively lead organizational change efforts. The workshop focuses on the basic fundamentals of Plus Delta’s proven Positive ChangeSM approach, an approach which is based on today’s leading research as well as decades of applied consulting experience, not only to ensure project success but also to achieve extraordinary outcomes. Participants also discussed several effective strategies for leading individuals through large-scale organizational changes to produce greater return on their investments. Read more ›

Posted in Change management, Group Workshop, HR.com, Learning, Organizational Change Management, Professional Development, Resistance, Return on Investment, ROI, Webinar

Great Leaders are Just Like Great Parents According to Daniel Pink

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

While I do not have any blood relatives as members of my firm making it a more traditional family business, I have always known that my intention for my business was to have it be more than just a company. That’s why best-selling author Daniel Pink’s words resonated so strongly with me during his keynote address at this year’s Vistage International Member and Chair conference in Dallas. As Daniel shared with the nearly 1,100 business owners and chief executives in the room, it’s time to stop saying our companies are like families. They are families!

Pink likened the employment experience to a father giving his daughter away at a wedding. In that moment, that father literally entrusts the future care of his daughter to her new life partner. Similarly, parents do this same thing with their children by entrusting us as leaders to care for and protect their children as long as they are with us. Read more ›

Posted in Children, Commitment, Corporate Governance, Corporate Sustainability, Daniel Pink, Engagement, Enron, Family, Family Business, Family Values, Leader, Leadership, Parenting, Vistage, Vistage International

Plus Delta’s CEO Leads Another HR.com Webinar on Communication Excellence

Posted on by Jeremy Lurey

Nearly 250 people registered for this week’s Performance Management virtual conference hosted by HR.com, the largest social network and online community of HR executives in the world. Plus Delta’s CEO & Chief Architect Dr. Jeremy Lurey has led several webinars for the organization over the past year, and this week he facilitated another well-received and well-attended event. Click on the following link to view an archive of his presentation Communication Excellence: Being a Multi-Dimensional Leader to Achieve Better Business Results online.

The Communication Excellence workshop is a short 1-hour webinar that covers the first half of Plus Delta’s executive program Low-Tech Leadership Practices in the High-Tech Era. In this highly interactive and engaging session, participants reviewed several proven techniques for adapting their natural communication approaches and learned to leverage their individual strengths and unique talents to be more successful multi-dimensional leaders. The webinar is appropriate for C-level executives and HR generalists alike across all industry and organizational types as it delivers the tools and skills these leaders need not only to better understand organizational culture but also to positively influence it to produce better business results. Read more ›

Posted in Communications, Group Workshop, HR.com, Leadership, Learning, Multi-Dimensional Leadership, Professional Development, Webinar

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