Experts Blogs

A month ago my daughter asked if I would be interested in playing Words With Friends with her. Becky lives in MA, and we are in CT and NY and we thought it might be fun. Instead it changed my life! I downloaded the App onto my iPhone, and away we went. Becky and I started playing. We emailed at night when we both had time to take a breadth from the long day, and we emailed in the morning to start the day. I found that I liked playing with Becky more than I realized. Not only did we play,...

Years ago and the day before my first visit to the Donna Karan Company to meet Donna and her senior leadership team, I spent a lot of time thinking about and planning what I would wear. At the time I did not own one piece of her line of clothing, although I would have loved to. Instead I would buy designer clothes only when they were on sale, and I did not have a favorite designer.

Mergers and acquisitions can seem too daunting when we view the merging entities as separate cultures, with separate norms, separate ways of doing things. Usually the small company is eaten by the larger and loses its persona. People leave the company in droves and, with that loss, goes much of the wisdom and human energy for creating the new entity. What is left is often a demoralized culture, a group of individuals who are riddled with fear over how the new parents will treat them-friend or foe-and who feel abandoned by those who left for "greener pastures." The new entity needs...

Want to be happier and more successful? First, it starts with being courageous. We're not talking about jumping from high buildings like Superman. We're talking about making smart choices and supporting yourself with self management techniques and good friends. Here are some discussion points and action items you can do alone or with friends:  Start Being • Start saying: “I declare my intention to be courageous,” then you will exhibit your personal courage. • Start being one hundred percent accountable for how you design your life. • Start perceiving yourself as courageous. • Start changing the way you organize your time. • Start something that...

If you are like most people, you are probably tired of reading the same information about goal planning over and over again and still never getting results. So what is the missing link?The answer is spirituality. “Goal planning with spirit,” as I put it. I am not talking religion here. I am talking about the universal elements that make up our lives and affect us whether we are aware of it or not.Bringing spirituality into your goal planning can create lightness and joy, and it allows you to flow with your goal achievement rather than struggling uphill to reach a difficult...

We all deal with clutter on one level or another, whether it’s the visual clutter of a messy room, the mental clutter of inner chatter filling our heads with past disappointments and pending dead lines; or the physical clutter of carrying too much body fat, which often goes unnoticed until one day you find yourself staring in the mirror at someone you no longer recognize.   As a success coach and fitness trainer, I warn my clients that clutter saps energy, intensifies stress, robs you of time and focus, and keeps you from moving toward your true dreams and desires. Often,...

What prevents us from making the changes we know will make us more effective leaders? Great question. I may be the only executive educator who actually measures whether the participants in my leadership development courses actually do what I teach--and then measures if they are seen as becoming more effective leaders. At the end of my sessions, I ask leaders (who have received 360-degree feedback) to follow up with their co-workers and ask for ongoing ideas about how they can continue to become more effective. A year later, about 70% do some version of this recommended follow-up (as reported by their...