Our daily Field Notes email is just the kind of jumpstart you need. A fast read. Maybe less than a minute. Because sometimes it just takes one insight to change the trajectory of the day.
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What Does It Mean for My Team to Win Today?
Asking team members to post whether they have accomplished this priority at the end of the workday is essentially requesting whether they won. Once team members rack up a set of daily wins, they enjoy highlighting their top priority for others and posting the outcome at the end of the day. Just knowing what team…
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When Multiple People Are Accountable to the Same Problem or Outcome
Asking a team to be accountable is a common mistake that frequently undermines performance and produces mediocre outcomes. By insisting that a team or group be accountable, no one takes control and owns the end result. Everyone on the team presumes someone else will drive the bus. When leaders address teams and explain the outcomes…
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Always Practice the Details Prior to Performance
In the early 2000s, a young Chinese pianist named Lang Lang was scheduled to perform at New York City’s Carnegie Hall in a highly anticipated debut. At the time he was considered by many critics to be the most exciting keyboard talent in a generation. In the months leading up to the concert, Lang Lang…
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Let People Discover Your Strengths
The humility of not broadcasting a signature strength, combined with the self-confidence it takes to allow others the luxury of learning about it on their own, enhances credibility in a way that strikes people like lightning. They come to believe that anyone who is modest about their greatest strengths might be extraordinary in so many…
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Why Everyone on the Team Matters
Great teams are never about any one team member. Instead, great teams depend on each team member to step up when they are needed. Even more distinctively, the best team leaders make sure every member is treated like a “starter.” Treated as a critical piece of the team puzzle, it is the team members who…
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The Flaw of Selecting People Before Deciding on Strategy
The Flaw of Selecting People Before Deciding on Strategy. Following the correct sequence of strategy to structure to people enables for objective and quality decisions regarding any reorganization. Doing things in the right order promotes clear thinking. Don’t attempt to put the house in order without putting strategy first.
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How Can We Improve Our Judgment?
“Good judgment comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgment,” or so goes the well-known quote.
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The Good, the Bad & the Ugly Behind the Desire for Promotion
To advance in their careers, good leaders ask to do more. The desire for the next role and a deserved promotion to a more senior leadership position seems to be a natural motivation in organizational life. In an ideal world, the best people and leaders rise and take on more responsibility and ownership for the…
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On Becoming More Aware
In a legendary graduation address, later turned into the book This Is Water, David Foster Wallace offered this allegory: “There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says ‘Morning boys. How’s the water?’ And the two young fish swim…