Posts by Jennifer Eggers
How To Get The Most Value from an Executive Coach
Do you have an executive coach? Are you thinking about it? Do you want to be sure you get your money’s worth from the investment? How will you know it will be a valuable use of your time? Coaching has been a part of my practice for nearly 30 years. I’ve coached at every level…
More informationWhy Every Senior Leader Needs a Networking Plan
Do you actively spend time focusing on your network? Do you have relationships in place to get things done at every level? Is the thought of adding networking to your already full plate a bit overwhelming? For many of us, networking is one more pain in the xxx to think about while we’re busy doing…
More informationTwo Secrets To Success At The C-Level
Congratulations. You’ve got a seat at the proverbial table! Whether you’ve got a c-level title or not, your seat on the leadership team gives you quite a bit of influence as well as a lot of responsibility to balance. I’ve been coaching and consulting with C-Level leaders for nearly 30 years and have seen two…
More informationHow To Get Promoted Sooner
It’s a tough competition for roles at the top. In nearly 30 years of coaching and consulting with the c-level and those who want to get there, I’ve seen more than a few interesting tactics for climbing the corporate ladder. Some work. Some make people angry and destroy trust. And some have an element of…
More information9 Questions to Ask Before Hiring A Coach
Are you integrating into a new executive role? Are you an executive looking to bring in a coach to help you get to the next level? Are you an HR business partner who wants to be absolutely sure their next big hire hits the ground running and is a great culture fit? An executive coach…
More informationHow To Choose A Virtual Meeting Facilitator
Are you planning a leadership team meeting early this year to get everyone aligned? Are you disappointed that it will likely not be in person or that some folks won’t be able to travel to join you? Have you thought about who will be the best virtual facilitator? Or have you given up because this…
More informationTop 4 Executive Onboarding Mistakes
If you are starting a new executive role or onboarding executives into roles where it is important that they hit the ground running and contribute quickly, there are a few things you should know. Data shows that rigorous executive onboarding programs can reduce time to full productivity by 40% and improve new hire retention by…
More information3 Strategies Organizations Need To Succeed In 2021
As we face another year of adapting to disruption and driving growth in a landscape of rapid change organizations and leaders need these 3 strategies to set themselves up for success.
More informationHow to Ask for an Onboarding Coach for Your New Executive Role
As the excitement of landing a new executive role sinks in, the pressure begins. How will you come in and demonstrate visible leadership in your first 100 days? How will you make a significant enough contribution early on to validate the company’s choice in hiring you? How will you build the necessary ‘street cred’ to…
More information3 Ways To Stop Killing Resilience
Here are 3 ways to build resilience by minimizing power struggles and equipping people to feel safe, heard, and able to give their all.
More informationSecrets To Building The Bedrock Of Resilience
A Foundation For Resilience This is the Spit Bank Lighthouse. It doesn’t look like much, but this structure has stood in the middle of Ireland’s Cork Harbour since 1853 and there is an awful lot we can learn from it as we recover from a pandemic. In 1833, the lighthouse was but a dream in…
More informationCOVID-19 Proves Resilience Is Not About Bouncing Back
This season of uncertain times with no clear end in sight has reinforced my belief that resilience is the single most important character of a leader. Now more than ever, we all need resilience. As we drift farther and farther from what we knew as normal, it seems increasingly unlikely that whatever ‘normal’ was, will…
More information5 Ways To Accelerate Leadership Recovery After COVID-19
As the debate on when to ease restrictions wages on and we all get tired of hearing about this ‘new normal’ we can’t seem to define, many leaders are struggling with a lack of things they can control about their organization and team’s future. I hear, ‘we just don’t know’ from clients multiple times a…
More informationHow To Build Resilience In The Midst Of Disruption
There’s no question, for most of us, these have been some tough weeks. For some, the impact has been minimal. Maybe you’re adjusting to working from home and dealing with the challenge of moving meetings around and trying to do things virtually. For others, the stress of quarantine, impacts on family members, and economic hits…
More information5 Strategies to Build Resilience While Leading Virtually
Leading virtually through disruption is tough. If you’re currently in that situation, there’s no easy way to get through it. It’s even more difficult if people are not on the same page, working in different spaces, dealing with their own family challenges related to the crisis, and you’ve got to ‘herd the cats’ to make…
More informationHow Teams Unconsciously Sabotage Results
Have you ever been driving a car headed towards your new home, having recently moved, only to find yourself suddenly turning down the familiar street towards your old home? How did that happen? I’ll tell you how. You were so busy thinking about something else – your conscious mind was so “off-line” – that your…
More information5 Strategies To Give Negative Feedback People Actually Want To Hear
Have you had that moment when you have to tell someone they aren’t performing well? When they pride themselves on being good at the very thing you’re about to tell them they aren’t? It’s that moment when you swallow hard, your mouth goes dry, and secretly you pray that they’ll listen and won’t come up…
More informationWhat Every Leader Needs To Know
It is no longer enough to do things better, faster, and cheaper. The challenges leaders face today are more complex and don’t have a simple solution.
More informationHow To Prepare For Disruption
Predictions tell us that 2020 will be the year of disruption. Is your team prepared? If your confidence is a bit shaky, now is the time to get ready.
More informationAre You Wasting Time On Competency Models?
Do You Really Need A Competency Model? I’ve had a lot of conversations about competency models and I’ve built a lot of them but frankly, I’m not sure I have seen the value-add. When I asked our clients why they are considering investing the time to build a competency model, here are the responses I…
More informationFood: The Secret Barrier to Organizational Resilience
Inclusion is About Food (and other things) There has been a lot of talk lately about inclusion. What is it? Do we need it? Do we have it? Well, if you’re trying to increase the resilience of your team, there is no time for debate. Building a resilient organization cannot happen without inclusion. When we…
More informationIs your team inclusive enough?
Creating An Inclusive Culture We don’t know what is going to happen in the market in the coming years, but we do know this: it will be disruptive. Whatever happens in 2020 with the election, tariffs, and the global economy, there is a good chance it will require extra effort on everyone’s part to adapt.…
More informationCan Resilience Be Learned?
Today’s landscape is one of unprecedented, rapid, disruptive change. With little margin for error, leaders and teams are expected to adapt to change and react to setbacks quickly. In our experience, the only way to tackle these challenges and come back stronger is by building resilience yet very few people are actively preparing to do…
More informationHow To Stop Coping and Start Building Resilience At Work
Defining Resilience Chances are when discussing the topic of resilience you have heard various definitions that paint a picture of “bouncing back” from stress, crisis, setbacks, etc. To test this concept, I tried bouncing a ball and realized something significant: After it hit the ground it rarely came back higher than where it had started.…
More information3 Simple Steps to Increase Team Resilience
“An organization without purpose manages human resources, whereas an organization with purpose mobilizes people.” – Juan Carlos Eichholz Resilience Starts With Alignment Any healthy organization is formed with a specific purpose in mind. That purpose is usually defined by the organizational mission, vision, and values. However, over time an organization’s purpose can get clouded by…
More informationUsing Corporate Politics To Drive Change
Change Starts With Alignment The need to have people on the same page is huge when implementing a major change. This is particularly true when the change involves thinking differently to solve a problem that can’t be solved by doing things better, faster, or cheaper. Enabling leaders to get people aligned is always necessary, but…
More informationHow To Choose Resilience
Resilience Begins With A Choice How many times have you made a choice that did not result in the outcome you intended? Did you even know you were making a choice? Often we unconsciously choose the path of least resistance. We default to what is comfortable and requires the least amount of change. Improving our…
More informationHow To Kill Your Team’s Resilience
Guilt & Resentment Are you tired of corporate politics and drama? Some of us are better or more strategic in dealing with it and some organizations are more ‘political’ than others, but it’s not uncommon for there to be an unspoken or hidden layer of politics just close enough to the surface to keep us…
More information8 Signs You Need A New Organizational Structure
When To Rethink Your Organizational Structure “Is it time for a new organizational structure?” This question does not always have an obvious answer. Organizational restructuring, by definition, can be disruptive, even when handled as smoothly as possible, and even with the best of intentions. There is always a risk that the new structure will bring…
More informationAuthenticity: Fuel For Resilience
“Authentic leadership is revealed in the alignment of what you think, what you say, and what you do.” – Michael Holland Resilience Takes Authenticity When life is hard or any sort of disruption hits, we have a finite amount of energy with which to deal with it. Think of this as a gas tank in…
More informationCorporate Restructuring That Drives Strategy
Corporate Restructuring That Works Starting a business, whether a lemonade stand or a consulting firm with a new approach to corporate restructuring, begins with a realization that something is missing in the market. Often, an entrepreneur feels so strongly about the missing piece that they are willing to drive a stake in the ground. A stake…
More informationThe Key To Building Adaptive Leadership
The Case For Adaptive Leadership Do the challenges you face today seem more complex than they did, say, five years ago? Does it seem like they involve more people or that it takes more involvement from stakeholders to build a solution that works? Is it starting to feel like managing stakeholders is as complex as…
More information3 Qualities of Resilient People
Why Resilience? Most athletes spend about 90% of their time training to be able to perform at peak levels 10% of the time. For example, professional football players train six days a week to play one game on Sunday. Business leaders are a different story. They are expected to perform 90% of the time with…
More informationIt’s Time To Think Differently
Adaptive Challenges Have you ever wondered why things are a bit more difficult at work recently? Do the types of challenges your team faces every day somehow just seem harder and more complex? Ever feel like it’s taking longer to get things done because you just can’t get people’s attention on the real issue? Well,…
More informationRedefine Your Comfort Zone For Breakthrough Results
“Before anything great is really achieved, your comfort zone must be disturbed.” – Ray Lewis Comfort Zones Have you ever struggled to get out of your comfort zone? At one point or another, we are all acutely aware of our comfort zone – usually when we’re bumping up against it head first. We know we…
More information4 Qualities of Aligned Organizations
“The task of leadership is to create an alignment of strengths, making a system’s weaknesses irrelevant.” – Peter Drucker Imagine a company where everyone – from the CEO to the newest intern – shows up knowing EXACTLY what they need to do every single day, even on those days where plans fail and…
More informationThe Secret To Alignment
What Alignment Looks Like Is your team 100% aligned around your organization’s goals for 2019? Are you absolutely certain that you are making the right or “bests” projects to drive change and build organizational muscle? Can you deliver with what you have been budgeted, or less? If you are not 110% aligned and committed, 2019…
More informationHow Personal Fulfillment Drives Business Strategy
“Define success on your own terms, achieve it by your own rules, and build a life you’re proud to live.” – Anne Sweeney The Path To Fulfillment If you plan to take a long journey, you need a compass or a map (or at least a GPS). The journey from overweight to healthy and fit…
More informationPurpose: The Key To Better Decision Making
“Efforts and courage are not enough without purpose and direction.” – John F. Kennedy Your Purpose As an avid outdoor kid, one of the first things I remember asking for at Christmas was a good multi-purpose tool. Back then it was a Swiss Army knife called the Huntsman. It had two knives, a little saw,…
More informationNo One Said It Would Be Easy: Business Architects In The Digital Age
Defining Business Architecture Today, many organizations still struggle to define what the role of a Business Architect should be and how to clearly articulate the value of Business Architecture to leadership. So let’s start by dispelling some popular myths about Business Architecture. Business Architects are NOT: assigned the next ‘hot potato’ project that has been…
More information