How to guides

3 Common Traits of Incompetent Leaders & How to Work with Them

by

Unfortunately most of us spend at least 50-75% of our life working for incompetent leaders! Why? Four reasons:

  1. The working world in general continues to promote the wrong kind of people to leadership positions.
  2. It sometimes take us awhile to realize we are working for incompetent leaders.
  3. Finding a new job is hard work. Sometimes it’s just easier to stay working for a crappy leader vs find time to find a better job.
  4. There is no guarantee the next job we find doesn’t have an incompetent leader. It’s not easy to tell if your future manager is any good.

3 Common Traits of Incompetent Leaders

There are 3 common traits of incompetent leaders. Your leader could have one of these traits or worse all three.

Trait 1: Absentee leader – this leader “lets” the team do all the work and doesn’t really set strategy, lead, or coach others. Their style is often to outsource any or all efforts that a leader usually need to do to one of his or her team members. ...  read more

How to Stay Committed to Your New Year Resolutions – 5 Tips

by

I know it’s March. I intentionally waited until now to talk about New Year Resolutions. We are usually super committed in January and perhaps still a bit in February on our New Year Resolutions. March is when we start slipping. I am hoping this post can reinvigorate our efforts 🙂

It’s human nature to stay waning on our commitments. Life gets too busy or it gets too hard. Here are 5 tips to stay the course or recommit to your New Year Resolutions. ...  read more

Why and How to Manage Stress to Work and Live Better

by

Two months ago, I was super stressed. Both my well-being and my work performance took a toll. I couldn’t rest well and kept waking up with headaches. Day and night, I found myself fretting about things I couldn’t control. I discovered many things at my new job that were suboptimal and outside my influence to change it. In life, we were anxious to move to a large space as we were busting at the seams in our 2 bedroom 1 bath with two growing girls. Working at home all day made the situation worse.  ...  read more

Impostor Syndrome – Definition and How to Use it To Your Benefit

by

I had no idea what Imposter Syndrome was for many years. However I clearly remember feeling like a fraud when I graduated from college. Even though I graduated with honors in Electrical Engineering, I was convinced someone was going to find out that I didn’t know anything. What was worse was I took a strategic consulting job with McKinsey. What did I know about strategy or business? Nothing. I believed that I passed the case interviews only because I got help from a McKinsey associate on how to ace case interviews and I read the Mind of the Strategist.  ...  read more

How to Be Self-Confident – Listen to Ted Lasso & “Be a Goldfish”

by

I am addicted to Apple TV’s show Ted Lasso. It’s about an American football coach, who moves to England to manage an Elite soccer team. Ted Lasso has no experience in soccer whatsoever. You don’t need to love sports to love this show. It’s funny, inspiring and entertaining. Most of all, every episode is a master class on leadership.  ...  read more

First 90 days of a New Job – Strive to Achieve These Five Goals

by

8 years ago, I wrote this post – Starting a New Job – 6 tips for your first 90 Days. All of the tips still apply. I want to add to it with more details

  • What should be your goals for the first 90 days – focus of this post
  • How to ramp up quickly – I came up with a 4C framework to help you remember all the areas you should learn about in your first 90 days – I will write this post in a week

As long as you have a “white collar” job, I believe these goals would apply. I just started a new job at a new company a week ago, and they also apply to me. After working 4 jobs over 10 years at a major bank, I decided to move to smaller company where I have broader role in a more fast paced setting. I will tell you more about my move across a few posts in the coming month.  ...  read more

Steve Jobs Didn’t Say These Words, But You Should Read Them Anyway

by

A few months ago, “Janet”, one of my best friends, sent me a shocking message. She was diagnosed with nerve deafness! “What the heck is that?”I asked. It meant she is mostly deaf in one ear and only salvages the hearing in her other ear with strong drugs and mandatory rest. 🙁 She added her doctors did not know the root cause.  ...  read more