CategoryTalent Management

Use this Richard Feynman Technique to Increase Your Team’s Productivity

By Sean P. Murray
September 20, 2018
3 Min read
U

As World War II broke out, the physicist Richard Feynman was recruited to Los Alamos to assist in the development of the first atomic bomb. He was tasked with calculating the energy released by the nuclear explosion. Machines were brought in from IBM to assist in the task. Although state of art in their day, they were crude mechanical calculators that used punch cards to execute complicated calculations. The Army dispatched a group called the Special Engineering Detachment to operate the...

Read onRead later

What Baseball Can Teach Us About Team Chemistry

By Sean P. Murray
September 10, 2018
5 Min read
W

In the movie, Miracle about the 1980 US men’s Olympic hockey team, there is a scene where head coach Herb Brooks is evaluating talent. At one point he turns to his assistant coach Craig Patrick and says: “I’m not looking for the best players, Craig. I’m looking for the right ones.” Brooks was searching for that elusive element: Team Chemistry. What is Team Chemistry exactly? It is something that has vexed coaches, players and fans for ages. It appears that successful teams have Team Chemistry...

Read onRead later

How My First Boss Saved Me From Failing

By Sean P. Murray
June 12, 2017
4 Min read
H

I was 23 years old, in my first professional job and I was failing big-time. My boss had recently handed me a list of five-hundred names and phone numbers and instructed me to cold call them. I picked up the phone and started dialing. I felt a palpable sense of fear and anxiety as I reached for the phone to make each call. I experienced a wave of rejection the likes of which I had never before seen. I was demoralized. My boss could see I was floundering and ready to quit. After a few days, he...

Read onRead later

Good Leaders Promote Emotional Well-Being

By Sean P. Murray
January 27, 2017
5 Min read
G

Things don’t make you happy, but experiences and relationships do. Highly productive people understand this and apply it in their own lives to maintain spiritual and emotional well-being. Great leaders also leverage this truth to create a positive culture and get the most out of their people. If you survey the happiness literature, one theme you’ll find is that happiness depends on one’s ability to accept the world for what it is, and to be content with what you have today. From the ancient...

Read onRead later

7 Leadership Lessons from a CEO

By Sean P. Murray
May 3, 2016
6 Min read
7

I recently had an opportunity to hear Gail McGovern speak to a group of high-potential leaders at the American Red Cross headquarters in Washington, DC. She shared her personal history from her early career at AT&T where she started as a computer programmer and rose to Executive Vice President. There were a lot of lessons learned along her career journey, and here are seven she shared with the next generation of leadership at the Red Cross: 1. Pick the best people. Attract, retain and...

Read onRead later

Leadership and EQ

By Sean P. Murray
July 2, 2012
3 Min read
L

In the past, it might have been true that leaders could succeed simply because they were smart. But that’s no longer all it takes. While technical skills remain important, our emotional intelligence (referred to as EQ or EI) is just as important as our IQ. In fact, research shows that a leader’s emotional intelligence has a direct impact on the success of an organization. Daniel Goleman, a thought-leader on the topic of EI, says this about emotional intelligence: “If your emotional abilities...

Read onRead later

5 Steps to Business Impact

By Sean P. Murray
May 13, 2011
2 Min read
5

  I will be speaking at the 2011 ASTD International Conference in Orlando (May 22nd – 25th) on how to achieve business results from training. The following is a description of the presentation and learning outcomes for the event. Those of us who have been in and around the learning  industry a long time know that the quality of instructional design, materials, delivery, and facilitation of training has steadily increased through the years and continues to improve.  In addition, technology...

Read onRead later

The 8 Most Important Qualities of Leadership at Google

By Sean P. Murray
March 15, 2011
3 Min read
T

For most of Google’s history, and especially in the early years, it took a laissez-faire policy toward leadership. The company hired smart engineers, promoted the most brilliant into leadership positions and then pretty much left them alone. The assumption was that they were smart and would figure it out or ask questions if they needed help. As Google evolved, it became apparent that some managers thrived in this environment more than others.  In a recent article, Laszlo Bock, Google’s...

Read onRead later

Move Over LMS, Here Comes the Learning Portal

By Sean P. Murray
January 14, 2011
3 Min read
M

The Learning Management System (LMS) was originally designed for “managing” learning across the enterprise. That is, the true customer or end-user for the LMS is the training department, often charged with keeping track of who has taken what course. To use the analogy of a university, the LMS is the administration office. You remember, the face-less bureaucracy that tracked courses and credits earned.  The administration office is not what inspires college students to achieve higher levels of...

Read onRead later

Urgency for Leadership Development is Growing

By Sean P. Murray
August 9, 2010
2 Min read
U

Leadership development has long been considered a discretionary expense.  During economic downturns it is often one of the first budget line-items to be cut.  However, there was a different feeling this time around.  As we entered the recession in 2008 and 2009  there was hope, and some evidence, that  companies had learned from past downturns.  Eliminating leadership development only left them further behind when the economy did start picking up again, as it inevitably does. In the Wall Street...

Read onRead later

Recent Posts

Archives

Categories