Leadership

Susan M Barber Coaching & Consulting, LLC > Blog > Leadership

Want To Be The Best Leader In Your Company?

Leading a team seems so straightforward at first. There are tactical activities to manage and there needs to be a focus on strategy too. You also need to develop people, ensure they get their work done, and hold them accountable too. Sounds easy, right?   Here is where the challenge comes in. Not every person is the same. Every person that you lead has different learning styles, personalities, interests, experiences, beliefs, and ideas. You may think that they will shift to your style, but you actually…
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How Can You Make a Difference For Your Team Right Now?

Leading others during this pandemic requires creativity and flexibility. It is an ever-changing environment and things will be done differently to adapt. It isn’t always easy, but it is necessary. We are five months into the shift to leading teams remotely and at this point, it looks like it will be a lot longer. The ways of working are different, but your priorities are the same. Focus on the development of the team, deliver on your goals, and influence/communicate with clients…
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Are You Ready to Lead Other Great Leaders?

As you progress to higher levels in an organization, you will inevitably not only be the leader of a team, but you will begin to lead other leaders. While this may seem similar in scope, leading other leaders requires a different mindset to be effective. These high potential leaders may already have strong skills, experience, and the respect of their teams. They are looking to be further developed and stretched even more. How will you set these leaders up for success? You will need to leverage your…
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What Is Helpful To Know About Your Manager?

There are some key things that you need to know to have an effective working relationship with your boss. What are your manager’s strengths and opportunity areas? No leader can know or be good at everything so it is important to do some of this research. How can you help support your manager in the opportunity areas? Look for the things that will increase the value of your relationship and will provide ways that you can build trust. It is also…
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Are You Tired of Being Frustrated?

Are You Tired of Being Frustrated?

Are expectations causing confusion when you want to create a culture focused on accountability? Think about the expectations that you may have of one of your team members. You may be making assumptions about the things that you are asking the person to do for you. They are making their own assumptions from the conversation and you are both heading down the path of frustration. Brene Brown talks about this concept in her book Dare to Lead. She calls it…
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What Do You Need to Know About Leading Change for Yourself?

leading change

I have posted articles this month on helping leaders understand what they have to do to help their team go through change. Today’s focus will be on helping the leader as they navigate the change for themselves. I talked about the stress of change on people going through a workforce reduction or reorganization, but for the leader of a team, it is even more stressful. Here are some of the reasons why and what they can do to help themselves….
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Can You See Change as a New Beginning?

Change can be scary because it is full of unknowns.  You want to keep things the way they are even if they aren’t the best, because you already know what you are dealing with.  It is natural to feel that way.  What if you could shift the way you think about change and not see it as scary, but exciting?  I found this quote from Joyce Meyer that made me think about how change could be perceived differently.  She said, “Don’t be afraid…
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What Should Be On Your To Do List When You Are A Leader?

to do list

I have been leading some manager workshops over the past year to help them learn how to be leaders to their teams.  There seems to be a common thought process that occurs (it happened to me too) when you take over your first team: “I am the leader of the team and I need to have all the answers.”  Giving your team all of the answers is not helping them grow and it is actually the opposite of what you…
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Monday Morning Leadership Q&A – 5/14/2018

Client Question: “I want to grow as a leader, but I am not sure where to start?” How do you define this for yourself?  What does it look like when you reach it? Is it a certain level that you want to reach or to be perceived in a certain way?  Defining this for yourself is the key to determining what actions you want to take to reach that outcome.  In general, growing as a leader takes time and multiple types…
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What Happens When You Become a Leader?

Taking a more senior role in an organization is a big change to go through.  Even though you have all this new responsibility, you still basically feel like the same person.  What is interesting is that everyone around you may start to treat you differently.  They may become “yes” people and just tell you what they think you want to hear or make assumptions that you know more information than you do, simply because of your title. This happened to…
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