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Michael Michalko

Michael R. Michalko

Creating inside the box

The effects of restructuring

There are many books focused on career development in the ATD bookstore, but I thought I’d highlight a few that are on my summer reading list. What's more, ATD is having a Midsummer Book Sale! One day only—Tuesday, August 4—you can get 20% off all in-stock ATD books. And from August 5–14, all 2015 book releases will be 20% off. _The Self-Aware Leader_By Dan Gallagher and Joseph Costal The Self-Aware Leader was given to me by a friend before I came to work for ATD to use as a tool in my career coaching practice. I found its practical lessons on becoming more self-aware as a manager were beneficial for me as well as my clients. It offers insights regarding aspects of your management career, including which characteristics drive desirable leadership outcomes and personal success. **_Career Moves 3rd Edition_**By Annabelle Reitman and Caitlin WilliamsUpdated in 2013, Career Moves by career experts Caitlin Williams and Annabelle Reitman, shows you how to create your dream career by using practical planning exercises and techniques. Explore key competencies that professionals need to be successful, and learn how to make them work for you. Special bonus: If you have an iPad, don’t miss its app to make the book come alive. **_90 Days 90 Ways: Onboard Young Professionals to Peak Performance_**By Alexia VernonAlexia Vernon’s 90 Days 90 Ways: Onboard Young Professionals to Peak Performance demonstrates how to achieve the goal of getting new employees oriented, integrated, and trained within the first 90 days of their employment so they can make significant contributions to your business. **_Connection Culture_**By Michael Lee StallardMichael Stallard’s new book on developing a “connection culture” where employees feel valued and included is definitely worth a read. The book provides a practical and fresh way of thinking about leadership and offers recommendations for how to tap into the power of human connection. Inspiring and practical, this book challenges you to set the performance bar high and to keep reaching.  Coming Soon...Beyond Happy: Women, Work, and Well-Being  By Beth CabreraI’m also looking forward to reading Beth Cabrera’s new book, Beyond Happy, which is scheduled to come out on August 24. Why? Over the course of a decade, positive psychology authority Dr. Beth Cabrera has surveyed and interviewed more than a thousand women to gather insight into how to effectively balance career and family responsibilities. In Beyond Happy: Women, Work, and Well-Being, she gathers her essential findings and offers women proven strategies for living more authentic, meaningful lives. Helpful self-assessments guide you toward feeling good and doing good, and each chapter delivers tried-and-true tactics that real women have used to manage the difficulties of fulfilling their multiple, often conflicting, roles.

Your Career Development Summer Reading List

It’s ironic that successful self-leadership has more to do with others and less to do with self. I learned this later in life. The sooner you see it, the better for your career. Following are three lessons I learned from personal and professional experiences.Surprise #1: Serve a Cause Greater than SelfThe first surprise about self-leadership is that working for money, power, and fame is an unfulfilling pursuit. Frances Hesselbein says it succinctly: to serve is to live.Choose a career that helps others by bringing truth, goodness, or beauty into the world and you will find greater career satisfaction and contentment. From time to time, you will experience the joy that comes from seeing the efforts of your work directly improve the lives of others. Here are a few examples:The teacher who helps a student learn to read brings greater truth and goodness to the world.The landscape architect who designs aesthetically pleasing outdoor environments brings greater beauty to the world.The journalist who helps the public see both sides of a story brings greater truth to the world.The salesman who helps a customer find the right product or service to meet a real need brings greater goodness into the world.You should seek to serve others in these ways, too.Surprise #2: Get a Coach or Mentor(s)No world-class athlete gets to the top without the help of a coach or multiple coaches. We need other people to help us achieve our potential.For instance, each of us has blind spots. Your blind spot may be that you are argumentative or perhaps you don’t speak up when you should. Some people have a blind spot when it comes to not knowing when to end a conversation or meeting. Some managers have blind spots of being over-controlling, and others don’t interact enough with the people they are responsible for leading.The need for coaching and mentoring goes beyond needing to address our blind spots, though. We need experts to help us develop skills. When I left Wall Street to write a book and begin public speaking and teaching, I needed the help of Twyla Thompson, a top acting coach at the Actors Institute. Twyla taught me how to emotionally connect with an audience.On Wall Street, I had learned to turn off my emotions when communicating and I needed Twyla’s help to turn my emotions back on. She had me do exercises that included speaking to a group of acting students. I had to make eye contact with one student at a time and maintain eye contact until the student raised his or her hand to signal that he or she felt connected to me.Twyla’s colleague Gifford Booth would stand at the back of the room and yell, “Louder, louder,” as I spoke. He helped me see a blind spot I had: I was too soft spoken. I could never have learned these things on my own and I’m grateful that Twyla and Gifford helped me become a more effective speaker.#3: Be Intentional About Connecting With PeopleI learned the hard way that all people are hardwired to connect. Connect with God.  Connect with one another. When we don’t connect, we become dysfunctional. We feel lonely, which makes us more vulnerable to stress, anxiety, and depression.  Connection makes us healthier, happier, and more productive. It helps us grow in competence and character. It gets us through the inevitable difficult seasons we all experience in life, a lesson I learned as our family and friends helped us get through the three bouts of cancer my wife Katie experienced. Today, she is cancer free and thriving.Bottom line: You can be more successful in your career and life if you serve a cause greater than yourself, get coaches and/or mentors to help you learn and grow in competence and character, and be intentional about connecting with God, family, and friends. As you experience greater peace, hope, and joy that comes from having an abundance of connection in your life, you will discover wealth of even greater value.Is your workplace culture supporting your success with self-leadership? Join Michael Lee Stallard for the June 23 webcast, “Your Workplace Culture: Life-Giving or Draining the Life Out of You?” to learn about three predominant relational cultures in the workplace—and how each affects your productivity, health, and happiness.Editor’s Note: This post is adapted from Connection Culture: The Competitive Advantage of Shared Identity, Empathy and Understanding at Work. Read more on the Connection Culture website.

3 Surprising Ways to Succeed in Self-Leadership

ATD Facilitator Michael Dorsey talks about what you can expect when you take the ATD Training & Facilitation Certificate program.

Training & Facilitation Certificate: Transformative Learning

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