The Positive Energy Workplace

Recently I did some on-site work with one of my favorite executive clients. Brilliant woman, tons of stuff going on, major impact happening through her organization. From the outside, things were humming. But... She was having a challenging time making everything hum while still having a bit of inner peace, a personal life, and something left over for her husband and kids at the end of the day.

I spoke in Boston this last week at HubSpot's #InBound2015 where I got to hang out with 14,000 high energy marketers, agency owners, and entrepreneurs. My session was "Showing Up for Your Agency: Your Presence is Your Impact". The highlights? All sorts of stuff on what leadership needs today, how our presence is what creates more of our impact than we realize, how to optimize how you show up for everyone—including yourself, and 6 things for these guys to start doing NOW, individually and as a team, to enhance the effectiveness and energy of their leadership and culture.

I was recently in Costco with my daughter. We stocked up on water, TP, her favorite ice cream bars, that extra kitchen gadget we absolutely had to have (and more things that weren’t on our list), and we headed to the checkout.

We stood in line. It was packed. Lots of people loading up their baskets with water, TP, and ice cream bars. Everyone seemingly in their own worlds. On their phones. “Killing time.” (I don’t love this phrase. Do you?) Waiting out the line. Not a lot of presence, connection, or intention happening in the grocery store line.

It was our turn. I handed my card to the guy and asked him to do two separate rings. He asked me for two cards. I was confused.

I was leading a session with a group recently when the topic of feedback came up. The room froze. "What's your relationship with feedback?" I asked. "Fear, avoidance, dread, ineffective" were words that came up while the energy of discomfort and heaviness permeated the room.

"I just don't think they can do it without me." I was having dinner with a client of mine who was talking about his frustration about how slowly his team was moving an initiative forward.

"Why do you think that?" I asked.

"It's just the sense I get. I feel like I need to be more involved in it so it's done the way I want it." He wasn't clear on why his team wasn't stepping into more of a leadership role and taking the initiative they needed to take in order to rock this project.