In an industry heavy with regulations and rules of what you can and can’t do, she tenaciously brings the attitude of "FIND A WAY" for her customers’ benefit.

1. Blame is not accountability.

2. While blame can be conferred on someone else, accountability is engagement and ownership we impose on ourselves. I cannot hold you accountable if you do not do so yourself.

Inevitably, things pile up, and I end up not keeping a commitment. When this happens, I notice a loss of personal power and a reduction in my happiness and self-expression.  Basically, I feel bad for not keeping my word.  The biggest trap here is that all the attention is on myself.  I can hear my inner critic judging and evaluating myself for not being good enough.

Brain science reveals a lot about how we interpret life, especially to fit our personal worldview or reality. Some of those distinctions are:

1. Conformational bias: Looking for qualities and behaviors that confirm your beliefs about someone or something while ignoring those that contradict your beliefs.

2. Halo/horns: When a positive or negative impression of someone carries over into all future interactions with that person.

3. Stereotyping: making assumptions based on appearance, or grouping people to assume they are all the same

4. Similarity effect: Having greater confidence or trust in someone because they are like us.

5. Motivational blindness: the tendency to not notice the unethical actions of others when it is against our own best interests to notice. (this is a wicked one!)

If we are having fun in what we are doing, we are going to be more motivated to complete the task, be more engaged, and relieve stress.

So, why are top leaders in top organizations having trouble being heard?

Altruism - unselfish regard for or devotion to the welfare of others - can:

1. Feel good – altruism has been proven by studies at NIH to promote changes in the brain associated with happiness.

2. Reduce isolation and impart a feeling of belonging .

3. Reduce stress and feelings of negativity .

4. Give perspective .

5. Be contagious.

Serving the Customer also means doing the right thing. This is a review of a Future Frontiers meeting with Conscious Capitalist John Mackey and the premise of doing the right thing in business as a service to the customer.

If you treat people with consciousness and a concern for your impact on them, in business or in life, you will get a higher return on your effort than if you do not!

Workplace / office safety requires:

1. Presence

2. The ability to be present with each other

Are you doing things with excellence? Really? Are you really doing your best? Try this on and see if it does make a difference in everything.

All our life, we learn to make decisions and conclusions, then defend them. Once we determine we are right, we cling to that “rightness”, often despite evidence we may be wrong. Our egos get in the way of changing our minds. 

Needing to speak up at work? Here are some tips:

1. Start with your commitment to the person, the department, and to the outcome of the conversation, with an intention to forward the action.

2. State the facts of the situation. Separate the facts from your interpretation. 

3. Share the impact the situation or their behavior has had on you. Frame what you have to say from your own perspective and point-of-view.  

4. Be authentic and believe it or not, you can’t lose if you speak straight from the heart. It helps them to listen generously, especially if they have had an unintended impact on you. 

5. Leave the conversation with a resolution. It may not be fully resolved, just start somewhere and go from there. You may have to make a request or two and possibly negotiate some new promises between each other.  Focus on finding a solution, not who is at fault.

In the world of business... profit, advancement, proving oneself, etc., can often blind us to bringing decency into the equation.  It is our intention to demonstrate such thinking is short-sighted! 

You start with learning how to listen. The first step is to understand that we are typically listening to the conversation we are having in our head about what the other person is saying.

Curiosity is one of my core values and I enjoy practicing it, through:

1. Proactive reading, listening, questioning and conversing

2. Thoughtful sifting, consideration, and discussion of new information

3. Planning as to appropriate applications

Organizations that choose to build their success on the sound principles of economics and the practices of decency can lead the way to return our society to a more collaborative and harmonious character.   

It’s hard to catch your own errors. This can be something as trivial as transposing the letters in “the” to “hte,” or something as significant as omitting the core explanation of your article.

Our brain generalizes words & letters as we re-read our work in favor of creating sentences and meaning, and this is where a partner is crucial to double check your work

We all have opinions, desires, and ideas. We will unconsciously look for similar beliefs and common preferences in every conversation and interaction we have with others. If we don’t have that alignment, it’s automatic to form some judgment about what the person is saying.

When we know we have a good clean-up tool at our fingertips we are free to communicate openly. Walking on eggshells in any relationship can restrict creativity, productivity, vitality, love and a host of other things we hold dear.