Skip to main content

Time To Check In On Your 2021 New Year's Resolutions

Now that we are halfway through 2021, it's time to check in on your progress with your 2021 New Year's Resolutions. As a reminder, here is a list of 70 possible resolutions for leaders. 

Congratulations if you selected some of these earlier and are making progress on them. Feel free to select some additional ones now to complete throughout the rest of the year. 

  1. Don't micromanage
  2. Don't be a bottleneck
  3. Focus on outcomes, not minutiae
  4. Build trust with your colleagues before a crisis comes
  5. Assess your company's strengths and weaknesses at all times
  6. Conduct annual risk reviews
  7. Be courageous, quick and fair
  8. Talk more about values more than rules
  9. Reward how a performance is achieved and not only the performance
  10. Constantly challenge your team to do better
  11. Celebrate your employees' successes, not your own
  12. Err on the side of taking action
  13. Communicate clearly and often
  14. Be visible
  15. Eliminate the cause of a mistake
  16. View every problem as an opportunity to grow
  17. Summarize group consensus after each decision point during a meeting
  18. Praise when compliments are earned
  19. Be decisive
  20. Say "thank you" and sincerely mean it
  21. Send written thank you notes
  22. Listen carefully and don't multi-task while listening
  23. Teach something new to your team
  24. Show respect for all team members
  25. Follow through when you promise to do something
  26. Allow prudent autonomy
  27. Respond to questions quickly and fully
  28. Return e-mails and phone calls promptly
  29. Give credit where credit is due
  30. Take an interest in your employees and their personal milestone events
  31. Mix praise with constructive feedback for how to make improvement
  32. Learn the names of your team members even if your team numbers in the hundreds
  33. Foster mutual commitment
  34. Admit your mistakes
  35. Remove nonperformers
  36. Give feedback in a timely manner and make it individualized and specific
  37. Hire to complement, not to duplicate
  38. Volunteer within your community and allow your employees to volunteer
  39. Promote excellent customer service both internally and externally
  40. Show trust
  41. Encourage peer coaching
  42. Encourage individualism and welcome input
  43. Share third-party compliments about your employees with your employees
  44. Be willing to change your decisions
  45. Be a good role model
  46. Be humble
  47. Explain each person's relevance
  48. End every meeting with a follow-up To Do list
  49. Explain the process and the reason for the decisions you make
  50. Read leadership books to learn
  51. Set clear goals and objectives
  52. Reward the doers
  53. Know yourself
  54. Use job descriptions
  55. Encourage personal growth and promote training, mentoring and external education
  56. Share bad news, not only good news
  57. Start meetings on time
  58. Discipline in private
  59. Seek guidance when you don't have the answer
  60. Tailor your motivation techniques
  61. Support mentoring - both informal and formal mentoring
  62. Don't interrupt
  63. Ask questions to clarify
  64. Don't delay tough conversations
  65. Have an open door policy
  66. Dig deep within your organization for ideas on how to improve processes, policies and procedures
  67. Do annual written performance appraisals
  68. Insist on realism
  69. Explain how a change will impact employees' feelings before, during and after the change is implemented
  70. Have face-to-face interaction as often as possible
Labels:

Comments

  1. Tiffany WaltonJune 12, 2021 at 1:49 AM

    I am finishing my doctorate degree in business psychology and the focus of my dissertation is leadership styles. I hadn't thought about resolutions related to my professional development as a consultant but this list really helps. Some items on this list can be applicable both professionally and personally. I appreciate this.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How To Improve The Way Teams Think, Collaborate And Make Decisions Under Pressure

  “Great decisions don’t happen by accident—they happen by design,” shares Dr. Ricardo Valerdi , author of the new book, The Five-Tool Team: Bringing Out The Best In People To Make Better Decisions .  This book is not about finding perfect answers. It is about building a framework that allows you to make good decisions repeatedly, even when conditions are imperfect, information is incomplete, and outcomes are uncertain.  More specifically, Valerdi reveals a practical framework for improving the way individuals and teams think, collaborate, and make decisions under pressure.   Drawing on lessons from sports, business, engineering, and real-world experience, Valerdi shows how the most effective leaders build teams that question assumptions, analyze consequences, and make choices grounded in clarity rather than instinct or urgency.  “Writing this book has been a phenomenal journey that started in 2018 when I was a visiting professor at the United States Military Ac...
Post a Comment
Read more

How To Build A High Performing Sales Team

  Based on Stephanie Friedman 's 20 years of sales experience, her new book, Built to Grow: A Handbook For High-Performance Sales Teams , is the perfect step-by-step, go-to-market field guide for startup founders.   Friedman offers readers a structured and repeatable methodology for building a high-performing sales function from a company’s earliest days. The book is divided into three phases of startup growth— Experiment, Build, and Scale.   Within each of the three phases, Friedman covers: Sales Playbook Hiring Revenue Management Customer Success Compensations Culture Internal Collaboration   Some of my favorite takeaway tips from the book include:   No matter how experienced your salespeople are, any high-performing sales organization should follow one simple but important rule: No call without an agenda. This helps reinforce the necessary discipline around call preparation and ensures your customers have the best possible experience when talking to your...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Playbook For CEOs To Lead Under Pressure

“Most CEOs spend years mastering strategy, finance, operations, and execution,” says author Andrea Petrone , “Far fewer spend time defining who they are as leaders.” He adds that all too often the leadership style that got a CEO to the top becomes the very thing holding them back.   More specifically, after more than two decades coaching CEOs and senior executives at Shell, Unilever, Takeda, EssilorLuxottica, and PwC, Petrone noticed a pattern: sustained pressure was pulling leaders away from who they were. Fortunately, in his latest book, Reinvention at the Top: The Playbook for CEOs to Lead Under Pressure , Petrone introduces the Throughline, an architecture that helps leaders align their identity, message, and presence so they can lead powerfully under pressure. Whether stepping into a new role, navigating a crisis, or reinventing an organization, Throughline offers CEOs a practical roadmap for leading without losing themselves.   As you read the book you will discover: ...
Post a Comment
Read more

3 Things To Avoid When You Give Your Next Speech

If you don't want to get your speech off to a bad start, the communications experts at Speechworks suggest you: Don't apologize (particularly about your anxiety or lack of preparation. Apologies put your audience on the defensive. Don't start by telling a joke (which may not be all that funny, or is irrelevant, or that may even be offensive to someone in your audience). Don't beat around the bush (including, don't list off a lot of people you want to thank. Don't waste your audience's valuable time) Instead: If you need to deal with your anxiety, practice like crazy . Rehearse particularly your first line over and over. Start your presentation by laying out for your audience a key issue that they are facing in their business . If you must thank someone, do it at the end, or thank your introducer briefly, pause, and then start right into the meat of your message .
Post a Comment
Read more

High-Performing Teams Are Made Of This

According to Ron Ricci and Carl Wiese, authors of the book,  The Collaboration Imperative , high-performing teams have the following characteristics: People have solid and deep trust in each other and in the team's purpose--they feel free to express feelings and ideas. Everybody is working toward the same goals. Team members are clear on how to work together and how to accomplish tasks. Everyone understands both team and individual performance goals and knows what is expected. Team members actively diffuse tension and friction in a relaxed and informal atmosphere. The team engages in extensive discussion, and everyone gets a chance to contribute--even the introverts. Disagreement is viewed as a good thing and conflicts are managed.  Criticism is constructive and is oriented toward problem solving and removing obstacles. The team makes decisions when there is natural agreement--in the cases where agreement is elusive, a decision is made by the team lead or executiv...
Post a Comment
Read more

How To Make One Bold Move A Day

  Shanna A. Hocking ’s new book, One Bold Move A Day , is all about meaningful actions women can take to fulfill their leadership and career potential.   Specially, Hocking reveals the transformative mindsets needed to make one Bold Move a day. Those are: Gratitude Mindset And Mindset Happiness Mindset Progress Mindset   “Each of these four mindsets individually plays a special role in the process of continuously showing up for yourself and others,” explains Hocking. “Each mindset contributes in a different way to your success, but they all complement each other and together they will become the foundation to your Bold Move Mindset.”   Hocking explains in her book that a Bold Move is one that challenges you to grow . “Sometimes it’s about capitalizing on an opportunity, and sometimes it’s about creating that opportunity for yourself,” explains Hocking.   Keep in mind, too, that a Bold Move for you might not be the same as someone else’s.   ...
Post a Comment
Read more

How To Be A Tough Enough Leader

    Tomorrow brings a compelling and timely book about how tough enough you need to be as a leader to lead your team to greatness without being a jerk. The book is Tough Enough , by leadership coaches John Baird and Matt Hunter .   The authors explain that building a high-performing team requires a new form of toughness―not based on bullying and bravado, but rather pushing for exceptional results in a way that is firm, fair, and respectful.   Drawing on decades of coaching top CEOs, elite founders, and ambitious leaders, Baird and Hunter break down seven specific habits that define the strongest, most effective leaders, from being clear about the company culture to strategically unleashing emotional thunder. They set the record straight on when to prioritize understanding and empathy, when it’s time to be direct―and, most importantly, how to do both at the same time. Their no-nonsense approach gives readers the tools to calibrate their toughness and compassion in a ...
Post a Comment
Read more

How To Become A Catalyst CEO

Catalyst leaders are individuals who accelerate decision-making, empower teams, and spark innovation. To improve your catalyst leadership skills, you’ll want to read the new book by Constantine G. Alexandrakis , which provides a hands-on guide for building leadership teams and cultures that ignite business transformation.   The book is The Catalyst CEO: Why CEOs Can’t Lead Transformation Alone―And What The Best Do Instead . Drawing on decades of experience advising world-leading companies, Alexandrakis challenges the cult of the hero CEO and offers a powerful new paradigm on what it truly takes to make business transformation happen―and stick.   Alexandrakis defines transformation as more than change. “It’s a deliberate reinvention of how a company creates value through its people, its business model, and its place in the world.” He adds that “Real transformation depends on teams that are willing to argue clearly, and directly, while still finding a way to decide and move ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Powerful Quotes From The Book, Just Listen

Just Liste n is the book to read to learn the strategies to make you more compelling, and break down the walls that keep you from getting through to the people you need to buy into your ideas and goals. Some of my favorite parts of the book are the following compelling quotes author Mark Goulston includes throughout the book: Good management is the art of making problems so interesting and their solutions so constructive that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them. - Paul Hawken Don't be afraid of sharing your vulnerabilities.  Vulnerability doesn't make you weak, it makes you accessible. Know that your vulnerability can be your strength. - Keith Ferrazzi Humility is the surest sign of strength. - Thomas Merton Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning. - Bill Gates Good management consists of showing average people how to do the work of superior people. - John D. Rockefeller The secret of getting ahead is getting started. - Agat...
Post a Comment
Read more

Decide

Many years ago, I worked with a person who could not make decisions.  Neither big nor small decisions. That indecisiveness paralyzed our business in many ways. Unfortunately, the book, Decide:  Work Smarter, Reduce Your Stress, and Lead by Example , had not been published.  Had it, I would have shared it with my co-worker. Decide , published this past February, teaches readers how to make better decisions based on the real results they want to experience. The author, Steve McClatchy, explains how to use the two forms of human motivation -- Gain, or Prevent Pain , to make more effective decisions.  For example, he demonstrates how inserting a Gain task in the middle of a Prevent Pain day can give you the energy you need to move forward and make the Prevent Pain tasks take less time through motivation. Deeper into the book, you'll be reminded about not only the problems with procrastination, but also about the benefits of procrastination, and, if you are ...
Post a Comment
Read more