Humans are biologically hardwired to respond to threats and opportunities, through two channels that trigger emotions, neurons, chemicals, and, ultimately, actions. We call these channels the Survive Channel and the Thrive Channel. As the famous biologist of Hungarian origin, Janos Selye observed we all go through 4 stages as we experience stress. First there is an “alarm reaction,” in which the body prepares itself for “fight or flight.” No organism can sustain this condition of excitement, however, and a second stage of adaptation ensues (provided the organism survives the first stage). In the second stage, a resistance to the stress is built. Finally, if the duration of the stress is sufficiently long, the body eventually enters a stage of exhaustion, a sort of aging “due to wear and tear.”

Amy - my client - is a successful CEO. She is amazingly effective in most areas of her life. She wants to get coaching and advice on how to improve her priority management. She is using multiple tools and apps to keep herself on track and is seeking a time-management expert to help her overcome her laziness. She is increasingly anxious and angry with herself as she is delaying the start of a key project, that she is personally very passionate about yet unable to start. The project has great strategic significance and could lead improved relationships with key customers.

Some people lead a two-mountain shaped life as Peter Brooks describes it in his article on the perils of moral meritocracy. First, they go through the motions of graduating from school, beginning a career, starting a family. They want to become successful in ways society sanctifies it and conditioned them. They want to earn a lot, buy a home, raise a family and be happy by achieving all this. This is the first mountain they are eager to climb. Nothing wrong with that, unless your focus stops there.

Formal performance reviews are inaccurate and have no impact on productivity. Simpler solutions like everyday feedback conversations can provide a better understanding of the value of employees, but there is no silver bullet.  We have long been an advocate of ongoing coaching and setting qualitative Objectives combined with shorter term, more precise Key Measures.

The practice of everyday coaching and feedback can really contribute to understanding the value of employees.

Does it make you wonder if you’ve been doing it all wrong? Having a purpose doesn’t make you sound tough enough? The data is in. Purpose pays off. DDI’s 2018 Global Leadership Forecast – one of the several studies that have piled up data on the fact that formulating and acting on a purpose is a winning strategy – highlights that there is a strong and positive financial bottom-line benefit to both defining and acting with a higher sense of purpose.

A new landmark study by neuroscientists at the University of Geneva (UNIGE) has uncovered the role of synaptic feedback systems in shaping the brain’s learning processes in the cerebral cortex. The cortex – the brain's outer and largest region – is important for higher cognitive functions such as speech and decision making, complex behaviors, perception, and learning.

So many companies seem to have fallen victim to Corporate Anorexia (CA): blindly cutting resources to the bone with the noble aim of increasing efficiency at the organization. Most of us have firsthand experience of it. Unfortunately,  this often leads to lower internal and external customer satisfaction, missed opportunities due to lack of appropriate resources, and higher attrition rate triggered by anxiety and lower job satisfaction.

Systemic Intelligence (SIQ) is the number one sought after skill of a 21. Century leader. We see that leaders need to operate in a more and more complex, network and matrix based global environment that is constantly changing and involves multiple stakeholders. SIQ is this “virtuoso” intelligence of navigating your ship with a full crew in awareness of the larger system and systems that you are also part of. A simple example is that if you are a UK citizen in Gibraltar, you are also part of a larger system called the UK, but and you are part of larger geographical and cultural entity called Europe…

One of my favourite movies is the Swedish Turist (Force Majeure). Without revealing too much, it is about a Swedish family with two kids who go on a ski holiday. In one of the opening scenes they are sitting together on a terrace having lunch when the father notices an avalanche slowly roaring down the mountain. First they think it is a controlled one, but within seconds it becomes clear that it is real. Everyone jumps up from their seats and panic breaks out. The father flees with the crowd, leaving his wife and two children behind. Eventually, the avalanche misses the restaurant, and people start slowly appearing from under the snow. The father, too, returns and without saying a word they continue having lunch as if nothing happened. From this moment on, the parents try to explore and digest what actually happened, with no success as the father’s immaturity and childishness prevents him from taking any responsibility and reflecting on his own behavior.

Are you being happy in your life? Are you being happy about your life? Can you truly immerse yourself in the ‘here and now’ or you’d rather make sacrifices to delay happiness for the sake of long-term satisfaction?

The answer to these questions depends on two main factors. Thousands of people, both Westerners and Easterners aged between 18 and 81, have been asked about their preference between experienced and remembered happiness in a series of studies recently published in The Journal of Positive Psychology.

Experienced happiness is when you feel happy on a moment-to-moment basis. Remembered happiness, on the other hand, is being able to look back and remember a time as happy.

Shying away from navigating conflicts will only deepen problems in the long-run, so you’d better be able to handle them competently when they arise. Here are a few key tips on how to approach challenging situations in your workplace. A while ago I wrote an article about how avoiding conflicts can build careers. One strong characteristic of those who prefer to avoid conflicts is saying yes to the right people. The people who are good at this tend to be slave runners with their subordinates and very agreeable to their bosses. I remember a story about a leadership development program, where I was told several times by trainees that the top leadership of the company is acting in total opposition to the values, they claim they want. I was hired to train the middle managers to be more ambitious, outspoken and authentic. In one of the groups I got into an argument with the most senior person, who was directly managing most of the people present. He said that the senior leadership in the HQ cares only about their careers and short term goals/financial gain and they are not to be trusted. He said that it was pointless to even try to influence their decisions. But he still wanted the managers who worked for him to be more authentic and assertive with their team members. Was he speaking from experience? Could be. But we are all facing a choice. Are we going to live according to our values and be authentic?