We’ve been talking recently about our collective experience with communication challenges in the various places we’ve all worked. One topic that keeps coming up is how often what seems like a problem with process, productivity, or achieving benchmarks ultimately turns out to be a communication issue. We’ve put together a list for leadership to think...
read more
What We Assume An episode of This American Life from several years ago featured “Chainsaw” Al Dunlap, the CEO who was brought in to restore the Sunbeam corporation back to profitability in the 1990s. While he’s now on several “Worst CEOs Ever” lists, at the time, he had his admirers. This got me thinking about...
read more
In other blog posts, we’ve been talking about hybrid meetings: how to lead them successfully, how to practice good participation behaviors, and even how to dress and set up your space to look professional on Zoom. This led us to think about what an organization’s leaders can do to ensure an efficient, effective, and equitable...
read more
If your organization is like many others, you’re worried about the spread of Coronavirus and what it means to your people and your business. It’s an uncertain, disquieting time for everyone. As we are already seeing, many organizations are making commonsense decisions to reduce travel and asking employees to work remotely. What that means, of...
read more
Praise for All the Leader You Can Be: The Science of Achieving Extraordinary Executive Presence There is no doubt that communication is a skill that must be developed by everyone who wants to move into leadership roles. It’s no surprise then that my colleagues and I have been working with business leaders to improve their communication...
read more
If you are a trainer or a SME who delivers training, one of your major responsibilities, and possibly one of your major challenges, is knowing how to use the conversation that takes place during training delivery to meet your learning goals. Some trainers welcome unplanned, spontaneous interaction with learners. Others prefer a more controlled Q&A...
read more
When we wrote about Turpin’s culture in the fall of 2016, we had no idea who it might lead us to. As friends do, they lead you to their friends, and the next thing you know, you’re being interviewed for an article in Success Magazine! Thank you, Barbara Egel, for introducing us to Melissa Balmain, the author of the...
read more
Communication is an Essential Leadership Skill I recently watched a TED talk by Simon Sinek called “Why Good Leaders Make You Feel Safe.” His talk motivated me to buy his latest book, Leaders Eat Last. In both the talk and the book Sinek defines effective leadership in ways that reminded me that the work we do...
read more
As a leader, you expect your employees’ business communication to be effective and efficient. But is it? Too often, it’s not. (I’ve written about the business implications here.) However, it doesn’t have to be that way. To be effective and efficient, business interactions must succeed on two levels. Helping your employees understand this concept is the...
read more
Facilitating a group discussion always brings with it a unique set of challenges. Every group involves different personalities, perspectives, and needs. Facilitators have to work hard to create an environment in which a productive conversation can take place. When the facilitator is also the boss, the process gets even more complicated. The atmosphere in the...
read more