June 23, 2022

Think it, Act it, Become it. You Are Whoever You Think You Are

brian smith-pld, Coaching, Entrepreneurship, Ethics, Leadership Development, Management, Mentorship, Personal Development, Personality Types, Professional development, Reformed Control Freak, Self-Help, small business owner, Soft-Skills Training, Teacher, Uncategorized

Your internal dialogue has everything to do with the image you project externally. You are whoever you think you are – it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you think you can – or can’t – you’re usually right. If you feel you can’t, you’re beating yourself before you even start. David believed he could defeat Goliath. He had confidence in his ability to get the job done. Great managers and leaders aren’t born – they’re made. You need to believe in yourself and have confidence in your ability to be a great manager or leader

Worth Remembering … “Dress how you want to be addressed.” – Unknown

Image is everything. How we dress and present ourselves projects what we think of ourselves and who we are. People will judge you based on how you look and how you behave. I knew within 20 seconds of an interview if I was going to hire the person or no. Was it fair? No, I let my unconsciours bias influence my perception, and I may have missed the opportunity to employ a star performer – but our gut feelings and intuition are right more often than they are wrong. Being a great manager or leader is looking and acting the part.

Worth Remembering … ” I don’t want to be liked. I want to be respected because if you like me, you can throw me away too quickly. If you respect me, you may not like what I have to say, but you’ll say I respect that.” – Ray Lewis

Awe and respect are two completely different thngs. We all have a fundamental need to be liked and accepted – Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Some people need to be liked more than others. The danger for managers and leaders is wanting to be liked rather than respected. You aren’t participating in a popularity contest. I didn’t like everyone I worked with, and I knew everyone didn’t like me. And trust me; everyone won’t like you. But you can’t let wanting to be liked rather than respected get in the way of making decissions that not everyone will agree with. Being a great manager or leader is about making decisions based on what is the right thing to do.

Worth Remembering … “Fear and self-doubt have always been the greatest enemies of human potential.” Brian Tracey

Imposter syndrome. We all feel insecure and unsure of ourselves at times. We all have self-doubt – especially if we are doing something we’re uncertain of or doing it for the first time. No one wants to look silly or make a mistake. If we had a choice, most of us would rather back into the future instead of turning around and facing challenges head-on. We take comfort in the familiar. The error is not in taking action – the error is in inaction. Not everyone will agree on the direction you’re heading and the changes you make. Great managers and leaders are agents of change.

Think it, act it, become it. You are whover you think you are.

Copyright (c) 2022. Brian Smith – Power Link Dynamics. Not to be reproduced without permission. To find out more about Brian and what he can do for you and your organization visit – https://briansmithpld.com or email Brian directly. – brian@briansmithpld.com

June 4, 2022

Educate Don’t Terminate

brian smith-pld, Coaching, Entrepreneurship, Leadership Development, Management, Mentorship, Personal Development, Personality Types, Professional development, Reformed Control Freak, Self-Help, Soft-Skills Training, Teacher, Uncategorized

Educate don’t terminate. Terminating someone is taking the easy way out. You shouldn’t terminate someone unless you’ve done everything in your power and used all the resources available to you to turn that situation around before you let them go. You rarely get to hire someone fully trained. Your number one task as a manager or leader is to teach someone what they need to know to complete the task to reach the goal. If you haven’t done that – you aren’t doing your job.

Worth Remembering … “Do you hire stupid people or do they just get stupid after working for you?” – Unknown.

Managers and leaders will not be judged by what they know. They will be judged by their ability to teach others. Trust me when I tell you that teaching someone else what you know is not easy! If that was the case, superstar athletes would have successful coaching careers after their playing days were over. In most cases, that doesn’t happen. Teaching requires a different set of skills. Think of the most informative class or training session you have ever attended. What distinguished that learning experience from other classes or sessions? What helped motivate you to learn something new?

Worth Remembering … “There is no such thing as a dumb student, only dumb teachers who wouldn’t use everything at their disposal to help the student learn.” – Brian Smith

Malcolm Knowles, a subject matter expert on adult learning, believes that we are born with a particular learning style, which dictates or at least heavily influences how we like to learn. Think of learning styles as personality characteristics that affect our preferences for learning conditions. Adults will learn in an environment that they prefer – in an environment that they believe is conducive to learning.

Worth Remembering … “If you think education is expensive – try ignorance.” – Derek Bok

Managers and leaders need to understand the person’s learning style they are trying to teach and incorporate that understanding into the way they are teaching them. Are they auditory learners who learn by hearing key points and asking questions? Are they visual learners who prefer to have it in writing to refer back to their notes later or do they learn best hands-on?

Copyright (c) 2022. Brian Smith – Power Link Dynamics. Not to be reproduced without permission. Are you looking for a keynote speaker, planning a lunch-n-learn or training session? To find out more about Brian and what he can do for you and your organization, visit https://briansmithpld.com or contact him directly at – brian@briansmithpld.com

May 6, 2022

Trust Is Not A Given – You Have To Earn It Every Day

brian smith-pld, Coaching, Entrepreneurship, Leadership Development, Management, Mentorship, Personal Development, Professional development, Reformed Control Freak, Self-Help, small business owner, Soft-Skills Training, Teacher, Uncategorized

Do your team members trust you? Just because you’ve been given the title of manager or have taken on a leadership role doesn’t automatically mean they will trust you. It takes time to establish trust. You’ve got to earn it. Building trust is an ongoing process that requires you to be reliable and confident.

Worth Remembering … “In organizations where people trust and believe in each other, they don’t get into regulating and coercing behaviours. They don’t need a policy for every mistake. People in these trusting environments respond with enormous commitment and creativity.” – Walter Wriston.

Here are six strategies for building trust.

1.Be predictable. Team members need to know how you will react in any situation, especially if they are the bearer of bad news.

2. Stay true to your word. Whatever you say you are going to do – do it. Your word must be your bond. If they can’t trust what you say – they won’t trust you.

3. Build rapport. People like to work with people they like. Go out of your way and get to know your team members for more than just their job. Create a genuine relationship that goes beyond the confines of the office or shop floor.

4. Treat everyone the same. I know we all have our superstars that will do anything and everything we ask of them. However, you can’t show favouritism. You must be fair and consistent and treat everyone the same.

5. Always do what is right. Being a manager or leader is not about being liked. It is not a popularity contest. Sometimes you have to make tough decisions that not everyone will appreciate or agree with.

6. Establish open and honest communication. Put all your cards on the table. Tell the truth. If they catch you in a lie – they will never trust you again.

Worth Remembering … “We are not a team because we work together. We are a team because we respect, trust and care for each other.” – Robert Peterson.

Trust can inspire your team, boost productivity, encourage engagement and motivate others to perform at their personal best because they don’t want to let anyone down. As a manager or leader, it’s up to you to build and maintain trust in your workplace. Trust is not a given – you need to earn it every day.

Copyright (c) 2022. Brian Smith – Power Link Dynamics. Not to be reproduced without permission. To find out more about Brian and what he can do for you and your organization, visit: https://briansmithpld.com or contact him directly at: brian@briansmithpld.com

April 16, 2022

Get Ready – Your World Is About To Change. The Zoomers Have Arrived

Are you ready for the most significant workforce shift in over 100 years? Undoubtedly, moving forward, this shift will dramatically affect how we communicate and interact. For the first time in our lifetime, we have the potential of working with four different generations in the same workplace. (Four if you include Boomers who don’t want to retire and the Traditionals, Gen X who can’t afford to.) In each generation, the Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z communicate, interact with others, and are motivated by different values, wants, and needs.

Worth Remembering … “We need to remember that there is as much to learn as to teach across generations.”

If you thought Millennials were challenging – think again. You haven’t met Generation Z – the Zoomers yet. They are very different from Millennials. Generation Z, born between 1996 and 2004, is the newest generation to enter the workforce in mass. (Representing 22% of the population.) They are the first to grow up in the digital age – the first generation to grow up with the internet, smartphones, text messages and social media. Think of the Zoomers as the hyper-connected generation. Gen Z has a unique culture and working style that can baffle Millennial, Gen X and Boomer managers. The days of working long hours for little pay, feeling dissatisfied, unappreciated and burned out are over. For Gen Z, life outside of work is just as important as life at work. Living a balanced life is not a slogan to them. It’s their way of life.

Worth Remembering … “All generations have similar values; they just have a different way of expressing them differently.”

Your success as a manager or leader working with Gen Z will hinge on your ability to work with them in a style they like. If you can adapt your management style to be more in tune with how they like to be managed, they will be more receptive because you are working with them in the way they like. If you want to be more successful working with Zoomers, consider that they are intelligent, highly educated, bold, enterprising and entrepreneurial. They like to communicate face-to-face via WhatsApp. Gen Z is socially well-informed and prepared to fight for what they believe in. They are committed to making a difference in the world. They prefer a flexible work schedule, not your typical 9 to 5. They are self-starters but crave constant and immediate feedback. So get ready – your world is about to change. The Zoomers have arrived.