I’ve been writing in a journal occasionally over the past 20 years.  Recently I’ve started writing almost daily for the past five months.  Sometimes I write personal reflections/recollections of what happened, or how I’m thinking about the present situation, or I look to the future.

Today, I posed a challenging question to myself:  What is the most important, greatest impact, longest lasting activity or objective I could get involved with right now? (more…)

It’s common to think of top talent as people who are just plain smarter than the rest, the really bright people who stand out.  There are obviously some linkages, but they aren’t as hard and fast as they first appear.  Smart people who don’t really apply themselves can’t be classified as top talent.   There is also a case for different talents, not all of which are cognitive.  One reason for the interest in Daniel Goleman’s notion of emotional intelligence is because he explained how many top achievers differentiate themselves because of a particular form of social intelligence or personal mastery, not because of traditional measures of IQ or intelligence.

New discoveries in brain science seem to greet us almost every day.  How the mind and brain work is a fascinating field that just gets more interesting with each new discovery. 

We’re learning about different types of memory, the different regions of the brain where they are stored or accessed, (more…)

Is anyone out there scratching your head trying to remember the last time you were in a “strategy meeting”?  For most readers of this blog, the problem is not that you are rarely in a strategic situation, but that you probably don’t recognize it as often as you should.

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“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”  Vince Lombardi

“How do I stop the headaches without firing my people?”

You own the business and so all the problems that can’t be solved by others end up in front of you.  You have someone who handles personnel matters, but that means the transactional side of HR.  The personal issues, interpersonal conflict, lack of performance, all of the soft, squishy (but really difficult) stuff comes to you.  And you wish you could make it go away without needing to fire someone.  Maybe you can… (more…)

50 Classics

For those of you intently focused on developing your top talent I recommend the following resource as a guide.  It tells you where to look for inspiration, original ideas, the great thinkers.

Tom Butler-Bowdon has put together 50 Classics of Success, Self-Help, Spirituality, Psychology and now Prosperity.  That’s 250 books total… (more…)

One thing I’ve observed is that top talent tends to be active in networking.  Whether it is intentional and on-purpose or something that seems to naturally happen, leaders are active in forging and nurturing relationships in an ongoing way. 

If you are a general manager, company owner or executive, you of course need to be active in networking within your industry and in the larger community.  That is part of honing your own edge and staying sharp.  You also need to be aware of what your top talent is doing and how well connected they are.

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I was looking through some notes in my personal development notebook today and I was transported back over ten years ago to an experience I had listening to a development program.

I was living in another town and very early in an entrepreneurial venture, which is another way of saying I didn’t have much money at the time.  I listened to a program by Earl Nightingale, a classic motivational speaker who had already passed away back in 1989.  The program was called Lead the Field and I can still remember being struck by Earl’s statement that the vast majority of people never dedicate themselves to excellence, to leading the field in their chosen endeavor.  Whether that be education, business or social service, most people start with dreams and ideals and then abandon the goal before realizing them. 

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The aikido dojo I train in had a significant event over the weekend.  Five of our members took a test, and I was one of them.

I won’t go into all the background here about aikido (*see the footnote below if you’re interested).  Since we don’t have competitions or tournaments in aikido, testing (and the training that leads up to that) is one of the times when we are able to assess what we have learned and how much more there is to learn.  Besides demonstrating specific techniques that are called out early on, the last part of the test involves multiple attackers coming at you from all directions and you have to effectively deal with each attack without injuring yourself or anyone else.  It is a true test of poise under pressure.

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Here’s a personal anecdote that happened to me that I think says something about talent, how we assess it and factor it into our decisions.

I’ve wanted to start working with a personal trainer for some time.  Last year I talked about it with my doctor and she made some recommendations to me.  We worked on my diet and I spent most of last year getting the nutritional picture right (my doctor has an emphasis–and expert training–on functional medicine, which is exceedingly rare to find in my experience).

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