Tag: L2

Why Leaders Are Learners – Part II

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Inspired Leaders Have GRIT

On October 10, 2014 I was blessed to be a host for L2:Learn-Lead, the new annual leadership simulcast produced by the John Maxwell Company.  In the last post, I shared the opening keynote by John C. Maxwell to initiate this series.  Today, I want to share some of the thoughts from Linda Kaplan Thaler.

About Linda

Linda Kaplan ThalerLinda is the co-founder and head of Publicis Kaplan Thaler, a marketing and advertising firm.  She is definitely a leader within her industry; creative and innovative.  She knows how to get things done.  Among the many claims to fame she has is the creation of the Kodak Moment, the AFLAC Duck, and the Toys R Us Kid jingle.  She is also co-author of a few books, including The Power of Nice: How to Conquer the Business World with Kindness.

GRIT Creates Extraordinary

Linda spoke on GRIT: How Ordinary People Become Extraordinary.  GRIT is an acronym for Guts, Resilience, Industriousness, and Tenacity.  Here are some of Linda’s thoughts from her talk:
  • 98% of highly successful people were considered average.
    • Walt Disney was fired from his first job for being “uncreative”
    • General Colin Powell was a C- student
    • Michael Jordan wasn’t good enough to make his high school varsity basketball team
    • What makes the difference is their GRIT.
[snaptweet]Anyone with perseverance and pluck can go from ordinary to extraordinary. -Linda Kaplan Thaler[/snaptweet]
  • If you are brave enough, stop dreaming and start doing!
[snaptweet]I never spent one minute dreaming about success. I worked for it. -Estee Lauder[/snaptweet]
  • Overprepare and outwork everyone else
  • We get easily distracted and need to refocus on where we are going.

Four Keys to Help Stay on Track

  1. SOLVE SMALL PROBLEMS – when you resolve the small problems that pop up regularly, it prepares you to solve the big problems.
  2. MAKE YOUR BED – Military recruits are taught early on how to make their bed first thing every morning and to make it neat and precise.  Part of the reason is discipline but a good deal of it is that you accomplished something immediately.  If you accomplish nothing else that day, you made your bed.
  3. FINISH WHAT YOU START – With busy schedules and competing priorities, it’s easy to jump from one thing to another and not really finish anything.  Successful people finish.
  4. FORGET WILLPOWER – No one has enough willpower to stay the course consistently simply based on their will.  Develop habits and create situations that take willpower out of the equation.
Next post will cover Tim Sanders thoughts from L2:Learn-Lead.

Action Items:

  1. How will you apply this to your life?
  2. What do you need to change?
  3. What should you share or teach to others?

Why Leaders Are Learners – Part I

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Leaders Open Doors

This past Friday, Oct. 10, was the inaugural L2:Learn-Lead event that was simulcast around the world.  I had the privilege as a Founding Partner in the John Maxwell Team to be a host for the one of the simulcast locations.  While many were in attendance, many could not make it or did not make it.  I wanted to share with you some of the great content and knowledge shared with us at this fantastic event.

John C. MaxwellJohn C. Maxwell was the first (and last) speaker.  In his first talk, he shared ideas from his new book Good Leaders Ask Great Questions.  Here are some bullet points I gleaned:

  • Leaders make great connections through questions
  • Leaders open doors through questions, sometimes doors that would not have opened any other way.
You are only a few questions away from achieving your dream!
  • Questions let you direct the conversation.

John Maxwell encouraged everyone to find great people who do what they want to do or are what they want to be.  He mentioned getting his start the same way and listed some questions for you to ask great people to truly learn from them.

  1. What is your greatest lesson?
  2. What are you learning now?
  3. What has been your greatest failure?
  4. Who do you know that I should know?
  5. What have you read lately?
  6. What have you done that I should do?
  7. How can I add value to you?

Learning to ask questions helps leaders get answers.  They help us to DISCOVER!  We discover the concerns others have, we discover what things they care about, what their dreams are.  When we know these things, we can help them grow and from that our influence grows.   Then we can lead them more effectively.

In the next post, I will outline some points from Linda Kaplan Thaler.  In part 3 it will be from Tim Sanders talk, and then finally in part 4 the second teaching by John Maxwell.

What are your thoughts about leaders and questions?  Have you used questions effectively?  What are some questions you ask consistently?

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