“Although Jefferson left the cabinet voluntarily, Washington never forgave him for his actions, and never spoke to him again.”
The wikipedia article on Jefferson, while detailing his time as Washington’s Secretary of State, shared how staunchly opposed he was to Alexander...
I have no doubt that you could put together a list of Jefferson’s strengths that’s significantly longer than what I’ll touch on here - and that’s OK by me. My goal here isn’t to be complete and comprehensive but to highlight a few key attributes he brought to the...
Before we pick up by looking at a couple of Benjamin Franklin’s peers, and specifically their leadership characteristics that you and I still benefit from today, I’ll share one last invitation to join us on Friday, December 8 (likely around 3p or so on Zoom) to get the specifics on...
With all the characteristics that worked in Benjamin Franklin’s favor to earn influence ( and the leadership that comes with that earned influence), he certainly wasn’t perfect; no one is - not even you or me! In his presentation at Grand Valley State University, Whitney mentioned...
As I mentioned before, Benjamin Franklin’s voice as a Founding Father didn’t carry such significant weight because of any particular position he held, although he did make a significant impact in several different roles. His influence was largely something he earned throughout the...
While many think of him with quotes like “a penny saved is a penny earned” or “early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise,” I’m quite fond of the response he gave Elizabeth Willing Powel when she asked, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a...
Having worked through what felt like a fairly comprehensive list of ways ineffective leadership and poor communication kill profitability in far too many businesses over the last several months, let’s change gears a bit and revisit an idea I introduced in this series in early 2020 - one I...
Make no mistake, knowing what our team members are looking for from us is not terribly complicated! They will definitely make a point of telling us. That will generally (but not always) be direct and/or verbal early in our process of working to earn leadership with them, but it will get harder...
I completely understand how many issues demand the attention of a business owner, an executive, a manager, and even front line supervisors every single day! But if we’re going to be the leader that truly does provide our team members with what they’re looking for - and deserve - from...
After a couple of references to a song so new as 2016, I feel like I need to mix in something from the hair band era to maintain my street cred so let’s think in terms of Shelter Me by one of the most talented bands ever included in that genre, Cinderella. After naming a list of vices...
As we build a top down leadership model that has a positive impact on recruitment and retention throughout our facility, we can expect that same leadership style to drive results in our areas too as long as we understand the difference between servant leadership and subservient leadership. I...
One of the most powerful lessons I learned in the fifteen or so years I worked in behavior-based safety had nothing to do with safety and was only indirectly related to human behavior… That lesson was in how much the act of serving others impacted the influence an individual could have on...
