Not a Dress Rehearsal

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.  Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.  Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice.  And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.  They somehow already know what you truly want to become.  Everything else is secondary. - Steve JobsI love this quote because it speaks to so many of us with the depth of truth. As we close out another year, let us honor and acknowledge the road we’ve traveled and with conscious intention, design our next chapter. This is not a dress rehearsal for life; this is it, your life now.Who are you and who do you want to be? Is there a gap between those two people? Who are you meant to be and what keeps you from living your purposeful life?  What resistance are you experiencing? Steven Pressfield refers to resistance in the War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles as “the most toxic force on the planet…the root of more unhappiness than poverty and disease.”Do you have a book inside of you, or a painting, or another calling? This is the year to break free from resistance and live the life you are meant to live. Here are five strategies for overcoming resistance:

  1. Use the 5-Why technique and peel back the layers to uncover your why, your purpose, your calling.
  2. Use the 5-Why technique to peel back the layers of resistance. Name it, and release it.
  3. Give yourself permission to dream without resistance.
  4. When you hear those negative voices inside of you saying, “Who are you to do that?” Simply reply back, “Who am I not to?”
  5. Visit and sit with your dream every day and soon enough you will be living it without resistance.

I love to hear from you. What is your big dream and what resistance are you experiencing?With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Secrets and Challenges

The secrets of leadership include awareness, mindfulness, intuition, power listening, and perception shifting. These five skills are innate, although they become buried for many of us based on our cultural upbringing. The great news is that they never go away!  Reconnecting with and developing these five leadership essentials are key to successful leadership. These skills help leaders know themselves better, enabling them to understand and influence others. Let’s face it: leadership is about influence. We cannot influence others in an authentic and effective manner without first understanding ourselves as well as those whom we lead.The challenges that leaders face take on many forms.  When we peel back the layers of challenges or problems, we find that in most cases the same root cause affects everything – fear. Manifesting itself in many forms, fear shows up as ego, micro-management, misunderstandings, and reactionary behaviors. When we learn to recognize the underlying cause (fear), we then will know how to rectify the real problem instead of just putting on a band-aid or superficial fix. When we only treat the problems superficially, we experience the same issues repeatedly.What is your biggest challenge with leadership and what secret solution do you have? As always, I love hearing your insight.With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Leadership Secrets: Unlock Your Potential

While some of us demonstrate leadership skills naturally, I do not believe that leadership skills cannot be learned. I have seen many leaders who innately have great leadership potential, but do not use it; and I have seen leaders who choose to learn to be great leaders. I believe the combination of our authentic innate skills and characteristics (whatever those may be) along with proper education and training, and coupled with heart-based thinking, will produce fabulous, irresistible leadership.

The secrets of leadership include awareness, mindfulness, intuition, power listening, and perception shifting. These five skills are innate, although they become buried for many of us based on our cultural upbringing. The great news is that they never go away!  Reconnecting with and developing these five leadership essentials are key to successful leadership. These skills help leaders know themselves better, enabling them to understand and influence others. Let’s face it: leadership is about influence. We cannot influence others in an authentic and effective manner without first understanding ourselves as well as those whom we lead.

With love,

Maria

Dr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

WIIFM?

What’s in it for me?  As an entrepreneur and leader of my own business, I often take this perspective of my clients when I write marketing copy and have client conversations. Framing thoughts this way helps me identify the benefits for clients and potential customers.

The funny thing about this thought, WIIFM is that it is not only on the minds of our customers, it is also on the minds of our team members and those we lead.  While they may not directly ask, “What’s in it for me?” they are definitely thinking it!

If we can frame our leadership guidance and requests with the mindset of what’s in it for them, we can open up new ways to motivate our teams, clients and customers for more engagement, commitment, productivity, and loyalty; resulting in tremendous benefit to our companies and organizations.

Don’t wait for our teams and customers to fill in the blanks of what’s in it for them, just communicate to them up front the benefits and results they can expect from joining you or buying your product or service.

Don’t you just love win-win scenarios?

With love,

Maria

Dr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Are you Tom?

For some of us, finding our passion may be an ominous task or we may wonder why leveraging our passion is even relevant.  However, when we find and leverage our passion, the magic happens.For example, for Tom, the cleaning and maintenance man for a homebuilder I worked with, it meant creating beauty. Tom worked by maintaining and cleaning model homes and guesthouses. He treated these homes as if they were his own home with great care and love. The models and guest homes Tom maintained were so immaculate and clean that you could eat off the floor.Tom passionately cleaned and organized homes in his care, giving the appearance that the homes were just completed and furnished that same day. He delighted prospective customers with all of their senses, from the special aromas he hand-selected, pillows he fluffed, blankets folded beautifully, to detailed floral and accessory arrangements.Tom was passionate about beauty and he shared his unique love by ensuring that those around him too, would experience beautiful sensations as well. The homebuilding company led the sales in our marketplace, due in large part to Tom’s passion.What entices passion in you? What makes your heart sing, your soul stir, and captivates you for endless hours? Where do you first when you go in a bookstore? What section catches your attention, your desire? If you had a day off, with nothing to do, what would be your first choice to spend your day? What would you teach to others? What brings you joy? The answers to these questions will give you some clues as to where you passions lay.What are you passionate about and how do you leverage your passion?With love and passion,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Leading on Purpose

To lead and live on purpose, we must become aware of our values. You may have heard of “values-based” leadership. Aligned with the concepts of love-based leadership, this idea of self-awareness around our values makes complete sense. Our values play such an important role in our leadership. Values are the foundation on which everything in our life is built. Our attitudes and beliefs, our thoughts and our behaviors, all stem from our values.

Knowing your values, helps bring clarity to what is significant to you. Take a look at your calendar and review how you spend your time. Do the activities on your calendar align with your values? If not, why not?Looking at our values is a conduit to our inspiration and our passion. We have developed our strengths, in part, because we value those behaviors, and at some level of awareness, we’ve felt passionate about those activities. With the alignment of our values, our strengths, and the flame of passion and inspiration, leadership effectiveness is certain.This is the road to fulfilling our purpose. Leaders who live and breathe passion are irresistible; they are inspiring others with vision and hope.What do you value and how do your values influence your leadership? I love hearing your thoughts.With great value and love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Leading with Fear Works!

Many of us learned how to lead with fear…and it works…sort of. Leading with fear comes with a price.Using fear as a motivation technique is sometimes effective, but the key to understanding the use of fear is that this method is not sustainable. When leaders and managers leverage fear in the workplace, it is important for them to understand that while it may move people immediately in the direction in which they want to go, it also immediately erodes trust.Know that when employees are motivated and moved by fear, employee movement continues both literally and figuratively. Employees start planning their escape. Literally, they escape by leaving the organization. Oops, there goes another one. We know the expense of employee turnover.Even more significant are the employees who escape figuratively…read “employee disengagement”. Employees disengage when they distrust. When people check out, they are not motivated, productive, or loyal. Think of the cost to your organization with a team who has checked out.Fear is not sustaining; in fact, fear is debilitating to an organization.We need to recognize that fear is the go-to method for many leaders and managers -- we learned it, cultivated it, and thought we perfected it. I challenge you to reconsider this technique due to the long-term destructive ramifications. Get your creative juices flowing for more innovative, value-centered, and love-based approaches to influence others.What are more effective techniques you use to motivate your team? Please share your comments below.As always, I love hearing your ideas.With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

No More Denial

I got on the scale this morning and I am 26 pounds lighter – woohoo! With this experience, I’ve had a profound awakening.For several years I tried many diets and different ways to increase my will power.  I did so much self-talk about the virtues of denying myself all of the foods that were “bad” for me.And you can probably guess the outcome…no success with weight loss.The Aha! moment came when I unexpectedly saw myself in an elevator mirror and did not recognize the woman looking back.  Now I’ve looked in the mirror many times and was not crazy about what I saw, but this time was different.  This time, it was not disgust; it was unconditional, overwhelming love.That was the shift. I loved myself more than the fear of lack or the fear of denying myself the foods I thought I wanted.I desired self-love more than I wanted a cupcake.I desired health more than I wanted potato chips.I desired wellness more than I wanted chocolate.The desire for what I wanted weighed more than the fear of denial.Whenever we can shift the scale (no pun intended) for love instead of fear…miracles happen.What do you fear more than you love? Shift your focus and watch for miracles.With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

From Chaos to Order

We are in the home stretch of this year, looking to complete the goals we set. Clearing the clutter from our space will support us in the last quarter stretch, taking us from chaos to order.Below are 7 simple steps my friend Dr. Dorothy Bonvillain and I came up with based on Gail Blanke’s book, Throw Out Fifty Things[1], to guide you as you move from room to room. You can use these same steps in your home, office, car, and any other space in which you spend time.

  1. Label each of your 5 boxes or bags:
    1. Donate
    2. Trash
    3. Sell
    4. Move to another room
    5. Unsure (only one box)
  2. Remember the rules of engagement:
    1. If you makes you feel bad, toss it
    2. If it adds nothing positive, toss it
    3. If you have to think about it too hard, toss it
    4. No room for fear, toss it
  3. Set a timer to one hour before you plan to stop, and stick to it!
  4. As you go through each space, put items in the appropriate container:
    • Donate. Many items that you donate may be a tax write-off.  Be sure to list everything you are donating and get a receipt from the charitable organization.  Be sure to check with your tax advisor on specifics.
    • Trash. Throw away those items that cannot be donated or sold.  Come on, you know those items when you see them – the single sock cannot be sold at the Salvation Army and no one is going to buy it for a rag!
    • Sell. These items may be sold in a variety of ways, depending on their value.  Yard sales, consignment shops, Ebay, and Craig’s List are some of the most popular ways to sell perfectly good items to someone else.
    • Move to another room. Don’t stop your momentum to take items to their appropriate room.  Put them in this container and use the last hour you committed to this process to relocate those items.
    • Unsure.  Only ONE box per room for this one!  These are items that you are truly torn about what to do.  The rules are very specific for this one:
      • One box per room.
      • Label the box with a date six months from now.
      • On that date, go through this same process and see what you can donate, trash, or sell.
  5. Use gallon zip storage and sandwich bags to hold and organize small items such as jewelry, makeup, screws, rubber bands, paper clips, etc.
  6. As you go through your spaces, “To Do” items are going to come up for you.  Write these items down so you can act on them after your timer is done.  Don’t let anything distract your momentum.
  7. Make the process and event, a celebration.  Turn on some music that energizes you, and celebrate the transition from the old to the new, un-cluttered space.

Congratulations on clearing your space and keeping your eye on the prize!With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.


[1] Blanke, G. (2009). Throw out fifty things: Clear the clutter, find your life. New York, NY: Grand Central Life & Style.

Clutter Stress

This is the time of year when we go through our closets, files, and other places that tend to get cluttered throughout the year. Perhaps this de-cluttering ritual exists to prepare ourselves for the holidays and many more guests in our home. In any case, it is always so freeing to go through the ritual of de-cluttering and taking back our space.When we are surrounded with clutter, our stress levels increase making it more difficult to stay alert and committed to our goals and tasks. Clearing is so helpful for us to stay focused on our work and reaching our goals in the home stretch of this year. It gives us the white space literally and figuratively to work with clarity and without distraction.In today’s blog, I want to share with you a book that has helped me tremendously with this process. The book, Throw Out Fifty Things[1], author Gail Blanke suggests Four Rules of Disengagement.  I like the simplicity of her rules and have simplified them even more!  These four rules are a powerful guideline for un-cluttering.Rules of Engagement:

  1. How you feel: If the stuff in your space hinders movement, makes you feel bad, feels like it weighs you down, is in the way of getting to something, get rid of it.
  2. Addition factor: If the stuff just sits there adding nothing to your life, saps your energy, does not give you joy, get rid of it.  Remember that standing still is not really static, while everything or everyone around you moves forward, standing still is just another way of moving backward.  Get rid of the negative to make room for the positive.
  3. KISS principle – Keep It Simple Silly:  There is no reason to make these keep or toss decisions complicated.  If you have to think about keeping or tossing too long, get rid of it.
  4. Kick fear to the door:  You are reclaiming your time, creativity, and productivity.  You are reclaiming your life!  This is not a dress rehearsal, this is it, your time, your life.  You can’t afford not to un-clutter.  As Nike has taught us, Just Do It!

In Thursday’s blog I’ll share with you 7 steps to guide you as you move from room to room. Good luck!With love,Maria

Dr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.
[1] Blanke, G. (2009). Throw out fifty things: Clear the clutter, find your life. New York, NY: Grand Central Life & Style.

Where Did the Time Go?

We are deep into the fall season and closing in on Halloween. Thanksgiving is just around the corner, kicking off the holiday season. So many joyful ceremonies, practices, and events fill the season with activity. The challenge for some of us is how easily time slips away during this very active time of year.You may want to consider a pause now, to refocus, plan, and strategize how you are going to enjoy this active season and still accomplish what you want. Be cautious and aware that activity does not necessarily mean productivity. We can easily busy ourselves with the actions of web surfing, shopping, and internet chatting. The illusion that accompanies this busy action is that we’ve been “working”. With awareness, you can guarantee this will not happen to you.A few simple steps can help you maintain you focus and accomplish what you set out to do:

  • Turn off your email notifications and only check it at scheduled times throughout the day.
  • If you enjoy social media, save it for the end of the day like a reward for staying focused.
  • Put your phone on “Do not disturb” when you are working on a task that requires your 100% attention.
  • Close your door for un-interrupted time each day so those around you know not to disturb you during those times.
  • Move your desk so it is not facing the door.
  • If people have a tendency to park themselves in the chairs in your office, remove the chairs and only bring them in for meetings.
  • Unclutter your mind by purging “to do’s” onto paper.

These very simple steps will help you focus with greater ease.What are some strategies you do to maintain your focus? I am sure we all would love to know!With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Lead Without Being Bossy

I often come across leaders who want to be strong leaders but don’t want to be bossy. Many of the leadership models and examples they’ve experienced are aggressive, pushy, and downright nasty…and they don’t want to be like that!Yet, this same group of people doesn’t want to be “weak” or considered pushovers. They don’t see strong leaders being taken advantage of, not listened to, or not respected.Well the great news is that you don’t need to lead at either end to be a great leader.Strong, powerful leaders all have something in common and it doesn’t hurt or require you to do something super-human.Follow these seven practices and you’ll be leading without being bossy in no time:

  • Ask questions before you talk. Find out what your team needs.
  • Listen, really listen to their responses.
  • Get dirty. Don’t ask your team to do anything that you would not do.
  • Walk the talk. Maintain your integrity and do what you say you are going to do.
  • Take responsibility for yourself and your team. When you honor them, they will honor you.
  • Care about your people, individually and collectively. Remember that actions speak louder than words.
  • Don’t rely on unspoken expectation. Be very clear what is expected of your team and of you.
  • Invite people to participate rather than telling. Rarely, if ever, will your team decline the “invitation”. If you are following these principles, your team will not only accept the invitation, they will probably follow you wherever you go!

What else would you add to this list of being a great leader without being bossy? As always, I love hearing from you.With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Analysis Paralysis

In my corporate career, I saw many afflicted with analysis paralysis. In our “show me” culture, we want to see empirical proof of everything. If you can substantiate something on an Excel spreadsheet, you gain instant credibility.Historically, ever since we entered the Science Age, we’ve not really given anything much significance or credibility unless we could “prove” it.The prove it mantra has served us well in some respects, especially for the skeptics, but this practice has also stifled us. When we only rely on evidence and proof, we may overlook something even more powerful. Our insight and intuition is also proof—only it is intangible. We know something to be real or true, sometimes with an even stronger compelling feeling than the physical evidence that is in front of us. So why do some of us become paralyzed and in the cycle of evidence and analysis?Fear.Fear is what keeps us paralyzed. We want more proof, more analysis, and more evidence to substantiate our decision. If we are afraid to make a decision, then we want even more analysis and proof. This paralysis causes us to miss opportunities in our business, organization, and life.When you feel yourself wanting more and more proof, stop and get serious about some reflection and stillness.It is time to move into action. Do your due diligences, your homework, tap into your insight, and stop long enough to listen to your intuition—then move into action.With love,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com. 

Imagine Leading in Peace

Imagine all the peopleLiving life in peaceYou may say that I'm a dreamerBut I'm not the only oneI hope someday you'll join usAnd the world will be as one. - John LennonYesterday would have been John Lennon’s 73rd birthday.When I look at lyrics from his famous song, Imagine, I am struck by the simplicity of his statements and the call to action. Living life in peace is possible in our world, our countries, our communities, our organizations, and our families. Peace begins with us, and feeling peaceful within ourselves. Of course, our internal peace is steeped in self-love.Feeling peaceful in our workplaces is sometimes challenging, but not impossible. To shift to peace, requires awareness and a commitment to live life in peace. Envision who you would be living and leading your life in peace and hold that vision until it becomes reality.Yes, it is true…I am a dreamer, but I’m not the only one. I hope someday you’ll join us.With love while holding the dream,MariaDr. Maria Church, CPC, is a leadership coach, speaker, and author of Love-Based Leadership: Transform Your Life with Meaning and Abundance and her upcoming book, A Course in Leadership: 21 Spiritual Lessons on Leadership, Love, and Life. Maria holds a doctorate of management in organizational leadership, teaches at several universities, and is CEO of Dr. Maria Church International LLC, a leadership coaching, development, and training firm. For more information, visit www.DrMariaChurch.com.

Bring on Resistance?

I just watched an interview by Oprah with writer, Steven Pressfield. A thought struck me during this interview and I had one of those “Aha!” moments. Pressfield wrote in his book, The War of Art, “Most of us have two lives. The life we live, and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands Resistance”.I felt a pang in my heart when I heard this. Was the pang for the unlived life or a deep knowing that resistance still plays a role in my life?Perhaps both.What I love about Pressfield’s teaching on resistance is his explanation that resistance is a force of in nature, a natural occurrence that exists when we have movement or action. The key is to recognize this as something that will happen as we evolve and grow; that it is not us (even though it takes form in our thoughts) and that we just need to push through resistance. One such way to push through resistance is meditation. Meditation can actually bring us up above the resistance, like a hurdle jumper on a track. The runner does not stop and turn back with a hurdle—she jumps over it. Meditation allows us to jump over resistance.The other aspect about this understanding of resistance is the positive side of resistance. Resistance can be a beautiful affirmation that we are moving closer to action, movement, and creating something significant. If we are not feeling some resistance, we are not growing and expanding. Woohoo – bring it on!As always, I love hearing your thoughts. What are you resisting and why?Without resistance or hesitation,MariaContent copyright 2012. Dr. Maria J. Church. All rights reserved.

Goals, Goals, and More Goals

Goal-setting will not only get you to a successful place, it is an absolutely necessary ingredient on the road to success. Setting goals may seem like a daunting task, but with a process or system to guide you, it can be quite simple.One of my favorite books, “Eat That Frog” by Brian Tracy offers such a process. Follow these seven steps for goal setting and you will find yourself on the road to success:

  1. Decide exactly what you want. Spend the time necessary to get very clear about what you want as an outcome.
  2. Write it down. The simple act of writing your goals on paper gives you a tangible form to remind you of your goals. I like to post my goals so I see them frequently throughout the day.
  3. Set a deadline on your goal; set sub-deadlines if necessary. This step helps you stay accountable.
  4. Make a list of everything that you can think of that you are going to have to do to achieve your goal. This act gives you mental “white space” so you can focus.
  5. Organize the list into a plan. You can organize your list by priority and sequence.
  6. Take action on your plan immediately! Do something – do anything because without action, you just have a really pretty plan.
  7. Resolve to do something every single day that moves you toward your major goal. Put time on your calendar each day to do a specific task on your list to reach your goals and commit to that time.

That’s it! You are on your way to goal setting, and even more importantly, goal achieving.

With love,
Maria

Content copyright 2012. Dr. Maria J. Church. All rights reserved.

Is it Freezing in Here?

I just got back from visiting a friend of mine that I worked with many years ago. He described an all too familiar phenomenon happening in organizations all across America. People are retiring and leaving organizations and they are not being replaced. Hiring freezes is a common practice in companies to maintain a shrinking budget and avoid layoffs. This can be an effective strategy, but the down side is the compounded strain the hiring freeze puts on the existing employees whose workloads are now doubled or even tripled.

Most people are willing to pitch in and pick up the slack – for a variety of reasons such as pride in product or service, loyalty to the company, the “roll-up the sleeves” American spirit, or other intrinsic and extrinsic motivators. These motivating factors are what make hiring freezes viable temporary options. Note the key word here is temporary.

The phenomenon happening today all across America is this “temporary” hiring freeze , no raises, and in many cases pay cuts is now going on 4 to 5 years and our people are FROZEN! They are numb and disillusioned from the cold, aloof ways they are being treated. They are told that they are “lucky” to have jobs and people are walking hallways like zombies.

The connection, enthusiasm, and engagement of the early days of the freeze have worn off and their hearts and heads are no longer connected in the workplace.

Why is this a problem?

When our hearts and heads are not connected, we are not present, not engaged, and far from productive.

How can we thaw out our people? Try the most bold, priceless action in the world – tell them “Thank You”. Gratitude and appreciation immediately connect us to the present moment and instantly connects our head and heart, melting away the frigid temperatures of yesterday.

What are some creative ways you tell your team “thank you”? I love sharing your insight.

With love and warmth,
Maria

Content copyright 2012. Dr. Maria J. Church. All rights reserved.

Accountability is SIMPLE

As leaders, seizing opportunities to develop our team is a smart leadership practice. One of the best ways to develop our people is to hold them accountable.

Somehow we’ve managed to complicate the idea of holding people accountable, and it is quite simple. My friend Dr. Dorothy Bonvillain and I created an acronym to help you remember how simple delegating can be, with the acronym, SIMPLE:

S = Set clear expectations – this is the number one complaint and stressors from employees – that the expectations are vague.
I = Invite commitment – some say gain “buy in” but I much prefer to invite commitment. With an invitation, there is a shared sense of ownership.
M = Measure progress – Super important to keep up on this. How you will measure is part of the description of setting clear expectations.
P = Provide feedback – again, super important. Far too often managers will wait until the project is finished to say that it isn’t done correctly.
L = Link to consequences – consequences are also identified in the setting clear expectations stage.
E = Evaluate effectiveness – Do this together and it becomes a powerful activity for you and the person who is accountable.

What are some techniques you use to hold people accountable and why do you think the strategies are effective?

As always, I love sharing your insight.

With love,
Maria

Content copyright 2012. Dr. Maria J. Church. All rights reserved.

LoveFest 2013

I am so excited to share with my latest project with you – LoveFest 2013!

Along with Laura Wilson, CPC, (Love Coach Laura), we are honoring 11 other people who integrate love into their work in BIG ways!

This FREE virtual event, LoveFest 2013, next week, September 16 – 19 demonstrates the exciting transformational shift from fear and competition modalities toward love and collaboration with heart-based methods.

Our speakers represent thirteen major areas of life (politics, leadership, business, money, health, sports, community, relationships, self, intention, networking, social media, sales, and education) experiencing the profound benefits of shifting to a love-based approach.

You will hear from money and business expert, Maria Simone, sales expert Carolyn Coradeschi, social media and marketing coach, Tassey Russo, the go to business coach for healers, Karen Monteverdi, bullying prevention expert, Vicki Abadesco, and several other experts bringing love to work in corporate America, communities, schools, business, health/wellness, weight loss, making money, sports, arts, and of course, relationships.

Not only will you hear 13 of us talk about this shift from fear to love, but you will hear about the incredible results that we and our clients are experiencing from this shift!

I sure do hope you will join us at our FREE virtual event, LoveFest 2013. Just click here to register!

Don’t miss Jone Bosworth, J.D.’s interview, “Unchain the Heart of Democracy”, or Sandy Zeldes’s interview, “Love: Your Weight-Loss Solution” and so much more!

Join us today!

Register at http://www.LoveFest2013.com

“See you” at the Fest!

With love,
Maria

Content copyright 2012. Dr. Maria J. Church. All rights reserved.

Have You Stretched Today?

The other morning, as I was coming into consciousness, I stretched my leg out, in a full stretch like a cat. Ouch! I pulled my muscle and got a cramp that made my calf feel like it was solid cement!

Now each morning, I am more conscious of how I stretch my muscles, and make sure I move about a bit before I have a full on stretch. I work out nearly every day and know the importance of stretching after my muscles are warmed up.

This got me thinking…how important the warm up is and how the deep stretches shouldn't happen until the body is warmed up and worked out.

This simple lesson can be applied to leadership and life.

When we jump in before we we’ve warmed up, we pull a muscle and experience pain. Leadership development is the warm up. 

If we put a title of “leader” on someone and expect that with the title comes the knowledge, skill set, and confidence to lead is setting one up for failure. They may not have the warm up but are expected to do the deep stretching that is required with leadership.

Great athletes never do the deep stretch until they are warmed up, and they always do the deep stretch after they work out.

Truly great leaders never stop learning and never stop developing…they are ready for the deep stretch.

How have you warmed up today?

With love,
Maria

Content copyright 2012. Dr. Maria J. Church. All rights reserved.