leadership posts, articles, and infographics

Sales Leaders: Are You Really Training Your Sales People to Succeed?

February 7, 2012 by Bob Apollo
with 147 views

CSO Insights have just released their eagerly-awaited annual review of the state of sales performance - reflecting detailed inputs from over 1,500 sales organisations from around the world. Their latest report suggests that B2B sales leaders could and should do more to equip their sales people to succeed through more relevant and... [read more]

Generating Trust Is an Essential Leadership Responsibility

January 31, 2012 by Jonathan Farrington
with 69 views

Image courtesy of author's blog

A very good friend and ex-client of mine runs a highly successful information technology service in the South of England and his private-sector customers include many Times Top 100 companies. We often exchange opinions and I recently asked his views on leadership, because I have always been impressed with his commitment to “... [read more]

What Leadership Has Become …..

September 26, 2011 by Jonathan Farrington
with 37 views

Image: Courtesy of author blog

Leadership was once about hard skills such as planning, finance and business analysis. When command and control ruled the corporate world, the leaders were heroic rationalists who moved people around like pawns and fought like stags. When they spoke, the company employees jumped. Now, if the gurus and experts are right, leadership... [read more]

Invest in a Sales Leadership System to Establish Your Selling Process

September 19, 2011 by Matt Smith
with 90 views

Sales Reps following a formal sales process outperform others by 10% All companies need established, formal processes to operate efficiently – and sales organizations are no exception. High preforming sales teams all have one thing in common; they have well-established sales processes that they adhere to fanatically. A recent CSO... [read more]

The Secret Behind Getting People To Follow You.

September 6, 2011 by Dan Waldschmidt
with 169 views

Photo: Jeffreyw/Flickr (Creative Commons)

Perhaps that’s a mis-statement. Maybe leadership isn’t broken at all. Maybe what’s really broken is our understanding of leadership. And that’s certainly not because we haven’t tried to figure it out. [read more]

Question Regularly – But Never Doubt!

August 8, 2011 by Jonathan Farrington
with 59 views

Image source: Author's blog

One of the defining and most significant qualities of the most successful people we know is confidence. It is their inner belief that they can achieve anything they want to achieve, and enjoy as much success as they wish – however they personally define success. Success is different for all of us; some people use obvious material signs... [read more]

What About You: Left-Brained? Right-Brained? Or Something In The Middle?

January 15, 2011 by Jonathan Farrington
with 1,117 views

With all this talk about the death of selling, and predictions for 2011 this week, I decided to write about something a little removed – no doubt there is a joke about a frontal lobotomy there somewhere, but I am not deterred! So here goes … I have always known that the very best sales professionals are predominantly right-brained. I... [read more]

Millenials Define Leadership in Six Words Without Twitter

February 28, 2010 by Kevin Eikenberry
with 96 views

Yesterday I had the chance to speak with a group of aspiring leaders – high school freshmen from west central Indiana. Early in my session I asked them to write a definition or description of leadership in exactly six words. After they had done that individually, I split them into 3 teams to share their thoughts and create... [read more]

The Salesperson as Leader

January 5, 2010 by Skip Anderson
with 208 views

Leadership traits are always sought after in management and executive positions, but it's less common, and unfortunate, that all companies don't require leadership qualities in new hires within the sales discipline. One way salespeople can sell more is by acting as a leader. Leaders have the ability not only to lead, but also to easily... [read more]

Stocking Stuffer... Santa Knows Leaderhip...

December 25, 2009 by Kevin Eikenberry
with 103 views

It is Christmas morning, and my family is still in bed. Before we get into an amazingly wonderful day, I wanted to write a post that has been swirling in my head for a couple days (visions of a blog post rather than sugar plums? I’m not sure what that says about me, but here we go . . .) Remembering that there are... [read more]

The 4 Fundamentals of Leadership Gratitude

November 20, 2009 by Kevin Eikenberry
with 37 views

Gratitude is a positive emotion and studies have shown it creates a more positive attitude, reduces stress and provides many other benefits. But, c'mon, we don't really need studies to tell us this, do we? You know how it feels when you are grateful.This article won't restate the obvious (more than I already have). Instead, it explores... [read more]

Hey Boss, How are You Holding Up?

June 23, 2009 by GreenRoofs
with 82 views

Stress is a very hot topic in 2009. The global economy is falling or scratching rock bottom and record unemployment is sticking around.As a manager, you are not immune from these stresses. You may have had to lay off some of your staff. You may have seen some of your best customers go under or quit using your services. Your peers,... [read more]

Leading is Lonely and Other Thoughts

June 20, 2009 by Ed Batista
with 40 views

I recently rediscovered these lines in a notebook from 2007:Leading is lonely.Information-gathering is not decision-making.Position power is not influence.When I wrote them I had just begun working with a number of prospective leaders among my students at Stanford, and I was reflecting on my own leadership experiences, particularly... [read more]

Self-Coaching Guides: Communication, Leadership, Motivation

June 15, 2009 by Ed Batista
with 113 views

Several students I worked with in the Leadership Coaching class at Stanford this year raised the question of how to "self-coach" after graduation--how to continue the process of personal development without the resources of a graduate program at their disposal.Much of the writing I've done here over the past 5 years has been aimed at... [read more]

Five Ways to Serve Others as a Leader

May 15, 2009 by Kevin Eikenberry
with 35 views

Recently someone asked what I thought about "servant leadership." My short answer was that using the word servant is redundant. Don't misunderstand, I believe in the concept of servant leadership, and what you read or learn about leadership from that prism is extremely valuable. It's just that I believe being of service is an underlying... [read more]