Leadership Blog
From Incite to Leadership founder and CEO Jo Ilfeld, read the latest on strategic vision, leading change amid complexity, and honing the way you communicate and collaborate with others. Get resources, practical strategies, research, and more.
I’m sure you have those times when you know you need to think more deeply about something, you know it needs more strategy and work. How can you improve strategic thinking? If you’re like me, you probably tell yourself, “I’ll think about it when I’m in the car picking up the kids from school.” Or…
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Is self-compassion more important than self-esteem? Well, research shows it can be. But practicing self-compassion is hard. On Valentine’s Day this past year, I broke my ankle (better than a broken heart perhaps?), and as I was reflecting back on that time, it made me think about self-compassion. Self-esteem makes us feel like “I can…
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How do you make time for self-care when your to-do list overflowing? I don’t have any wisdom to offer you on how to manage your to-do lists but I do have one thing to share that I believe is very important in times of increased stress and overwhelm. It’s okay to cut back on your…
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Work relationships are something that as a leader or team member you always need to be working on. Recently, I was talking with a client who described a problem he had with one team member because he would never know how upset she was until she would lose it. We talked about how he can…
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Sometimes you need to put your big-picture thinking aside and adopt tunnel vision in order to give your complete attention and focus to a project and be productive. But what is the price you pay for that? What happens when your vision becomes so focused that you stop paying attention to what’s happening just on…
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Do hard-driving leaders get better results? I’ve been thinking about this question a lot recently, only to open the newspaper recently (yes, we still get a physical newspaper) to an article about lauded UC Berkeley swimming coach, Teri McKeever, who also served as the US Olympic team coach, in which it detailed how she bullied and…
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All of us develop habits, both in our personal and work life. Yet are they still serving you? Are they still helping you? I challenge you to pick one habit that you have had for a long time and ask yourself, “Is this habit still doing what I want it to do for me?” These…
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This article first appeared in Forbes An amazing leader I’ve worked with over several years just gave notice. It was time for a short sabbatical before finding her next purpose-driven pursuit. When she gave notice, members of her team cried when they heard, her org tried to delay her departure as long as possible, and…
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Do you ever find yourself astonished when you get the results of a company feedback survey or performance review? What it comes down to is that as a founder, leader, or manager, you should be checking in regularly enough with your team members or direct reports so there are no big surprises when the final…
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Being clear and knowing the outcome you want before you embark on something is key. It’s key to successful meetings, giving a presentation, and coaching your team to higher performance. Are you in the process of hiring someone new for your team? Then knowing the outcome is very important here, too, so that you can…
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