When I meet people and they ask me what I do for work, I say I'm a leadership development consultant and coach. The questions that come forth are "What does Leadership Development mean? What does development mean? Why should I invest in my development?  These are all great questions. What is development and how does it relate to our human potential?

I just finished reading "Can't Hurt Me" by David Goggins. David is one of those people who pushes himself to physical limits. He explores and maximizes the potential of the human body. And most of the time while he is pushing his physical body, he is fighting against his inner "protecting" voice--the reptilian part of the brain that enabled survival and evolution all these years. It's the voice that wants to keep us safe, but is seated in the perspective of fear. This inner voice is just doing the job it knows how to do, But it is not deep in wisdom of what you can do to push yourself more. You can do more than this voice will tell you.

A few years ago I read the memoir of a woman who won the Ironman in Kona several years in a row. Up until reading her book, I assumed athletes who achieved these great and insurmountable feats had physical talent that I was not born with. What I realized, while genetics or "talent" does play a factor, it's really about the mind game. Can you keep going even when your mind tells you to stop? It requires courage, bravery and support to move beyond the inner voice that is trying to protect you. It tells you to stop or gives you many, many reasons while taking a leap of faith or chance to do more is not a good idea or you are not good enough to keep going.

In the end, everything in life is a mind game. Whether it is pushing yourself  by your own choice or enduring something physically or mentally hard. It is all a form of development. In the end, we can handle more than we think we can whether "voluntary" or not. Are we not amazed and inspired by people or experience rough challenges and keep going and come out stronger? Are we not inspired by people moving beyond (or through) this inner voice dialogue telling them to stop or "you can't do this" to accomplish more than we think we can handle? 

​What's possible for you if you found a way past (or through) that inner voice?  What would you achieve?

Personal and professional development is the mainstay these days and into the future, it is how you create a DREAM TEAM. A Dream Team believes in the company vision, feels valued by their contributions and together, both the business and employees thrive--its a win/win.

-->so, how do you begin to develop the DREAM TEAM?

The challenges with a lot of leadership development programs is they are not always personalized, and instead, employ a one-size fits all design. In some cases, especially large organizations, this style works! 

But what about the small but mighty, family-oriented organizations?  Sometimes a customized and adaptive approach works best and truly maximizes learning for the individual, especially those employees who have no idea about their true potential, but just need someone to believe in them, 

-->so, Where do you start?

 1) First and foremost: Everything stems from the top---leadership skills scale down, not up. You can "talk" leadership development all day, but in reality? Actions always speak louder than words:

-->Are YOU investing in and committed to your own development? Do you work with a coach? Are you attending trainings/workshops? Are you networking with other entrepreneurs who value having a DREAM TEAM? Do you have a mentor?  Do you have a development plan? Are you putting it into action? Are you aware of your strengths and development areas? In what ways are you building on them?

2) Launch a discovery: it is all about questions and curiosity!
Ask yourself these questions:
-->What is your vision for the company moving forward? Do you want to continue to grow revenue? Increase size of company? Become National or Global? or stay local and committed to the community focus? What type of employees do you have? What characteristics do you value from them? How are they similar or not similar to you?  In what ways does this work effectively? In ways does it not work?

Ask your employees: 
​---> What types of training do they find most helpful?  What are their unique and individual learning styles? What do you they want to learn and develop? What are their aspirations and dreams? What inspires them in general?  What does a good day at work look like for them?

-->This Discovery is the most important part of the process. By knowing what will be the most effective and gaining clarity on what works and does not work you are moving towards maximizing the success of individuals in their effort of development
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3) Map the commonalities and choose the trainings.  Once you find out the commonalities between your employees needs/potential, what the short-term and long-term vision of the organization is and then connecting the common pieces and values, --> determine what areas you want to continue to strengthen and what types of individual training, workshops and other development programs including coaching that you want to invest in.  There are many to choose from,

Stay tuned for my next post where I will share advantages/disadvantages of different types of development trainings

All of us need support in our life. When going through life traumas, relationship stress, or mental suffering (beating ourselves up, feeling insecure, bothered by what someone said about us), having a support system is important. Oftentimes, this support system takes the form of your significant other, family, and close friends. Take a second to think about your support system. Who do you talk to when you have a bad day, when your coworker is driving you up the wall, when you’re having relationship problems, or when you’re feeling insecure about a situation you’re in?

This is Part 2 of my Compassion blog posts. In Part 1, I shared what it feels like to offer yourself compassion. When you are able to offer yourself compassion, you find yourself feeling at peace and in acceptance of what is currently happening. So, the next question is how do you offer yourself that compassion? Sometimes telling yourself to cut yourself some slack just doesn’t seem to take the stress level down. In Part 2, I’m going to share a technique that has made a significant difference in my life: Voice Dialogue.

As much as we think we are in control of life, it isn’t the case.  Life is really the one in charge.  

When we attempt to control life, we are being motivated by fear.  “Whoa!” you might say, “What?”  

For example, when we are in traffic, we want everyone to drive like us (follow all traffic rules---but we ALWAYS follow ALL traffic rules, right??? ha ha).  We don’t want any traffic jams and want to reach our destination on our timeline.  But, we all know traffic laws are not always followed.  Drivers are distracted (texting/talking on phone), and some are just bad drivers. We can’t control this, and this makes us vulnerable every time we get into a car.  Someone could hit you and cause major damage to the car and worse, yourself and your kids.  It’s very scary. Yet, do we acknowledge this vulnerability?  Most of us do not.  Instead, we attempt to control our environment.

Living an authentic life means you are aligned with your values.  We all have 5-10 top values, that influence our decisions. I don’t mean religious or political values per se, but more comprehensive:  integrity, beauty, freedom, inspiration, etc.  For a more complete list of values, go here.

I invite you to review this list and pick out your top ten, then your top 5. Take those top 5 and determine how often your decisions and actions are in alignment with them.  If you notice that your decisions and actions  are not in alignment with these top 5-10 values, you aren’t being true to yourself.

When we are aligned with our life purpose, we fully feel alive. It means living a life of intention and making choices that align with our values.  You hear the same thing when people talk about a mission statement or vision statement - it’s getting to the heart of what your legacy is.

Ask yourself:

• What will I leave behind?
  
• What difference will I make in the lives of those I interact with?

Life purpose is a path.  Along this path you will experience internal and external voices that will tell you to go in different directions.  You are most vulnerable to these voices when you are unsure of your purpose.  Claiming your life purpose gives you a powerful sense of direction.  The truth in your life purpose statement can make you virtually unstoppable.