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Career Coaching Leadership coaching

Vision Boards, for when SMART goals aren’t your thing

There’s plenty of research which supports the S.M.A.R.T approach to developing goals. However, it’s not for everyone, so I thought I’d share some posts with alternative approaches, starting with vision boards. As a disclaimer, I’m not guaranteeing success with any of the methods I share, they’re just tools which you might like to try.

Achieving goals

There are many elements involved in successfully achieving a goal, for example;

  • Deciding on your goal
  • Thinking creatively
  • Planning how you’ll achieve it
  • Visualising the goal and the steps to reach it
  • Paying attention to/being affected by relevant cues
  • Exercising willpower or self control
  • Helpful habits
  • Monitoring progress and adapting
  • Inhibiting internal distractions (emotions)
  • Inhibiting external distractions
  • Taking action

List from Amy Brann – Neuroscience for coaches

What is a vision board?

A vision board, or action board, is a visual representation of your goals, dreams and intentions.

If you google vision boards you’ll see that there is much debate about the pro’s and con’s! So to give you a balanced view here’s some research for and against them. What there seems to be agreement about is the importance of visualising the steps needed to reach your goals, so make sure you don’t miss this bit out!

What are the benefits of using a vision board?

Sometimes coaching clients feel stuck when talking about goals. When we explore it they’re often being held back by assumptions, beliefs and the voice in their head which is saying ‘I should do x…’ Visualising their desires can help them to think creatively – they start talking about the ‘what if’s…’ Their eyes light up at the possibilities, suddenly they feel motivated to take action.

During my coach training I experimented with a vision board. This was my experience:

  • The act of creating the vision board helped me to clarify my goals and dreams
  • It acted as a visual reminder of what I was aiming for. Research into goal maintenance shows that there could be benefits in keeping a goal in mind externally, rather than relying on working memory.
  • I found it helpful to portray goals beyond my work life e.g. financial, travel, wellbeing, hobbies. It helped me to think about the intrinsic motivation behind my goals, which drove me to achieve them (the ‘why’.)
  • As mentioned above, an important step for me was focusing on elements on the board and thinking about the steps I’d need to take to achieve them (the ‘how’.)

How to create a vision board

  1. Reflect on your goals or dreams.
  2. To help you develop your vision board ideas source images, metaphors, quotes and words which reflect your goals. You might also like to portray how you want to feel.
  3. Add the images to a board, this can be a physical pin board, or a piece of card. Alternatively you might want to create your vision board digitally using Canva, Miro or Mural. Unsplash is a great website for finding images.
  4. Looking at the different elements on your board, reflect on the following:
  • How might it feel if you achieve that goal?
  • Visualise the steps you could take to achieve it, what milestones are there along the way?
  • When might you get to those milestones?
  • Who can help you?
  • What might get in the way?
  • How could you overcome it?
  • On a scale of 1 to 10 how committed are you to the goal?
  • What would move you up the scale by 1 point?
  • What’s one small step you can take tomorrow/this week/this month?

In summary, my personal experience is that vision boards can be a useful tool for unblocking thinking, enabling you to think more creatively. They can be motivating, particularly when combined with reflection on the steps that you need to take to achieve the goals.

Have you used vision boards? What’s your experience been?

Once you start working towards your goals you may face challenges which de-motivate you. You might find this blog post helpful – 5 Resilience Boosting Techniques To Help You Move Forward

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Leadership coaching

Prevent Employee Burnout With These 10 Questions

Your staff are exhausted. They’re under pressure at work. Deadlines are hurtling towards them. You’ve just been asked if they can take on more responsibility. You’re worried it might tip them over the edge.

You’re not alone. ‘Burnout’ was recognised by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as an ‘occupational phenomenon’, in 2019. The Coronavirus pandemic has drastically changed our work-life balance and working environments.

1 in 5 UK workers felt unable to manage pressure and stress levels at work

YouGov Plc – March 2021

Burnout is a state of physical and emotional exhaustion.

  • Tired or drained most of the time
  • Feeling helpless, trapped and/or defeated
  • Having a cynical/negative outlook
  • Feeling detached/alone in the world
  • Self-doubt
  • Procrastinating and taking longer to get things done
  • Feeling overwhelmed

Burnout doesn’t go away on it’s own and it could cause more harm if you don’t take action.

46% of workers feel more prone to extreme levels of stress compared with a year ago

YouGov Plc – March 2020

How can I manage staff overwhelm as a leader?

Here are some questions which you can ask your direct reports.

  1. What does good wellbeing look like for you?
  2. How do you feel and behave?
  3. What would others notice about you?
  4. How do you maintain good wellbeing?
  5. Which situations cause you stress?
  6. How can I lessen the impact?
  7. What are the signs that you’re experiencing stress?
  8. How can I tell that it’s all got too much?
  9. What will you do, if you start to experience signs of burnout?
  10. What can I do to help you if I notice you’re feeling overwhelmed?

Good wellbeing

Understanding what good wellbeing looks like, before someone reaches burnout, helps you to support them. For example, if exercise is important to them and you notice they’ve dropped their daily walk, you can mention it and see what’s impacting it.

Burnout early warning signs

If you know what causes your employees stress and how they respond to stress, you can prevent burnout, or spot the early warning signs.

We all have different strengths. For example, how you feel about giving a presentation to a large audience, not having accurate data to inform decision making, or networking, will differ to how someone else feels. What causes you joy may cause them high levels of stress.

By having an awareness of your employees stretch areas you can ensure you’re providing the right support – whether that’s by using the strengths of other team members, or helping them to step out of their comfort zone in a supportive manner.

Burnout support

Help employees to think about what they can do if they experience stress. If you have access to an employee wellbeing programme, or details of charities who may be able to support them you can pass these details on.


In summary, if you hope burnout will resolve itself you may be at risk of causing further harm to employees’ wellbeing and productivity. These questions provide a framework for a supportive discussion with your employees. They enable you to address the underlying causes of burnout and put actions in place to prevent it.


You or your employees may find my ‘Circle of Control’ workbook useful in managing feelings of overwhelm.

If you’d like some help in identifying your employees strengths and stretch areas I offer Clarity4D personality profile reports. I also offer 1-1 coaching, team coaching and a range of workshops. Get in touch to find out more.

I’d love you to join my free Facebook group for leaders. It’s a really supportive community and I pop in regularly to share tips and ideas.

Categories
Leadership coaching

How To Build Trust As A Leader

As a new leader you want to build trust and credibility with your colleagues. You want them to feel that they’ve made the right decision in hiring you for the role. You need them to have faith in your ability to deliver on promises.

Whilst it can take time to build trust in the workplace, there are actions which you can take to help. Inspired by The Trust Equation, developed by Charles Green, I’ve written a series of articles on LinkedIn. Follow the links below to read each article.

4 variables of trust

  • Credibility – If there’s a disconnect between words and actions it affects the level of trust, which in turn impact commitment and engagement. This article gives 3 steps to increase credibility and therefore build trust.
  • Reliability – This article helps ensure that your colleagues know that you value their time, and recognise the impact that your behaviour has on their work. It includes some questions for you to reflect on.
  • Intimacy – Intimacy in this context is about how safe and secure people feel in sharing information with you. To create psychological safety you need trust. This article will help you put actions in place so that your staff feel that their opinions are valued.
  • Self orientation – If you’re self oriented you’re primarily concerned with your own needs. We may all like to think that we have low levels of self orientation. However, it’s worth reflecting on the subtle ways in which self orientation can show up.
The Trust Equation, developed by Charles Green.

I hope that the articles help you to reflect on ways to increase trust as a leader. If you’d like some help building trust in the workplace I’d love to hear from you. I offer a range of coaching packages. Book a free discovery call so we can chat about what you’re looking for.

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Leadership coaching

Hybrid working – How to get the best from your team as a leader

As the debate about the return to the office vs. a hybrid working approach vs. remote working continues what can you do to prepare yourself as a leader?

Having exploratory conversations with your team will help you to understand their productivity drivers. Discuss which elements of their work require a more collaborative approach. Then you can intentionally design working practices with thought given to outcomes, place, time, energy, wellbeing and opportunities to learn and develop.

The demand for a hybrid working approach

The CIPD’s Embedding new ways of working post-pandemic report shows that some 40% of employers said that they expect more than half their workforce to work regularly from home after the pandemic has ended. Data from the Office of National Statistics, prior to Covid showed only 5% of the workforce worked mainly from home.

A recent Boston Consulting Group (BCG) study of 2,000 UK employees demonstrated employee demand for a hybrid working model. 67% of those working remotely since COVID-19 want to be able to split their time between the physical workplace and home working in the future.

How can leaders balance employee needs and aspirations around how they want to work with business objectives?

The focus needs to be on how to support employee aspirations and needs, whilst delivering the required outcomes. To do this effectively leaders need to understand their staff, what motivates them and how they deliver the outcomes expected of them. This will help to intentionally design successful hybrid working models.

For the majority of leaders, this will be a new way of managing staff. Whilst you could argue that leaders have been managing staff remotely for the past year, the hybrid approach raises different challenges.

There are many instances where remote working hasn’t been successful. Leaders have struggled to engage their teams, or manage performance effectively. Staff have given leaders some lee-way, on the basis that it was new for everyone and people were just surviving. However, the new normal needs a planned approach if it’s going to be successful.

Questions to reflect on as a leader

Outcomes

By focusing on the outcomes that your team need to deliver it switches your attention from traditional ways of working to a focus on productivity. Engage with staff to understand how tasks are best completed. This can inform decisions around place and time, to support your hybrid working model.

  • What outcomes does your team need to deliver?
  • How are those outcomes achieved?

Time, place and energy

Remote working has enabled staff to gain flexibility around their working patterns. In many cases employees have benefitted from the reduction in commuting and time with their family. Staff have been able to work at times that match their individual energy levels.

  • In your hybrid model are staff going to work chronologically, based on a specific schedule?
  • How can you be flexible to individual’s energy levels?
  • What extent will colleagues’ schedules coincide to encourage collaboration?
  • How much autonomy will be given about working hours?

Wellbeing

Your goal is productivity. People are more productive when they have energy and good levels of wellbeing. Working habits can become unhealthy when employees are exhausted or stressed. The pandemic drew attention to the need for wellbeing and it’s important that it’s not lost. There is a risk that boundaries get blurred when employees are working from home. For instance, they may start earlier, work through lunch breaks and struggle to step away from their work in the evening.

Create a transition period before and after work. For example, replace your daily commute with a walk around the block. This will provide your mind with a mental transition, which makes it easier to switch between roles. (Research by Kristen Shockley and Malissa Clark, University of Georgia)
  • How can you encourage and support good staff wellbeing?
  • What role do you play?
  • What might hinder your team?

Performance management

The challenges of home schooling demonstrated just how important it is to work in an environment without distractions, where you’re not interrupted or multi-tasking.

However, when you can’t see your staff it can lead to a feeling of a lack of control over their workload and performance. This can result in micromanagement and resentment.

  • How can you support staff to create an environment where they can focus?
  • What can you do to manage your own assumptions about productivity?
  • How can you create a focus on outcomes in performance management?

Collaboration, connection and teamwork

There are certain tasks which require teamwork, either in coordinating tasks or in sharing ideas to innovate. Inefficiencies and divides are created when teams aren’t aligned. To work effectively as part of a team colleagues need to develop trusting relationships.

People have a need for social connection so that they don’t feel isolated, so you need to think about how you can build opportunities to connect into your hybrid working model. In a CIPD survey in Summer 2020 almost half of all of the people surveyed reported that social connections at work had worsened. 

In 1992 BT adopted large scale work from home trails, resulting in a positive impact on call centre energy, well-being, and productivity. Since then, BT has steadily introduced new technologies to support its remote workforce. Culture and management style is essential.

“We have used our communication platforms to build lots of virtual team check-ins so people don’t feel isolated, and we engineer virtual encounters like ‘virtual coffee’ so people have a chance to chat with people they don’t know so well.” 

BT home workers have been able to succeed in this model. “We’ve really learned that focusing on outcomes rather than being present in the office is crucial,” said Millard. That has meant developing processes for virtual performance management that include regular team check-ins, one-on-one conversations, and monthly reports to management. (Dr Nicola J. Millard, Principal Innovation Partner at BT)
  • How can you enable staff to work collaboratively?
  • How can you support staff in building trust and rapport?

Inclusivity, learning and visibility

There’s a risk that hybrid working creates a ‘them and us’ feeling, between employees in the office and those at home. The office environment creates opportunities for emerging talent to be noticed. Serendipitous moments to get involved in projects, join meetings or job shadow may be missed.

  • How will you ensure that your approach is inclusive?
  • Can you create opportunities for staff to learn from each other?
  • How will you encourage staff to gain credibility, visibility and influence?

In summary, there’s going lots of learning along the way. Be willing to experiment as a leader, listen to your staff. Use this as an opportunity to develop a new, more flexible way of working.

Do you want some help in exploring the questions above, or the leadership behaviours required? Please get in touch. I’d love to help.

Categories
Leadership coaching

Practical Tips To Improve Your Influencing Skills In The Workplace

Influencing skills are a key leadership behaviour to develop. There are many instances where you need to demonstrate influencing and negotiation skills within the workplace. They’re not just skills for people who lead a team. Developing your influencing skills is a great way to increase your credibility in your workplace.

Influencing skills examples

Here are a few influencing skills examples, but there are many more!

  • Motivating a team
  • Running a project
  • Persuading others to help you
  • Gaining resources
  • Negotiating a pay increase or promotion
  • Getting people to accept change
  • Changing someone’s behaviour
  • Resolving disputes
  • Gaining commitment for an idea

People often associate influence with power. The Collins English Dictionary definition even mentions power. However you don’t need to have authority over others to be able to influence them. In fact telling people what to do from a position of power can often lead to resentment, with people feeling coerced.

If you influence someone, you use your power to make them agree with you or do what you want.

Collins english dictionary

You may have experienced times where you’ve been manipulated into doing something. You’re unlikely to trust the person who takes this approach, or be so willing to support their requests in the future.

Building rapport and trust is key to influencing others. How often have you had what you think is a great idea, then excitedly shared it with someone else, only to be disappointed by their lack of enthusiasm?

When they’ve raised concerns or objections how have you responded? Often we react defensively, yet we’ve shared the idea based on the benefits it will bring us, not taking their perspective into account. Does the conversation switch from one where you wanted to gain their buy-in to you trying to assert why your idea is right?

Power is  capacity to get others to act based on  positional authority that is exercised over others; often leading to resentment 

Influence is the ability to modify how a person develops, behaves, or thinks based on relationships and persuasion; often leading to respect

McIntosh & Luecke (2011)

How do you improve your influencing skills?

The good news is that you can develop your influencing skills.

Identify who you need to influence

Draw a mindmap of the people that you need to influence. Who are your key stakeholders, internally and externally?

How well are you influencing them?

Give yourself a score out of 10 for how well you’re influencing each person on your mindmap.

For those that you’re influencing well, what did you do to achieve that? How have you engaged them? How do they respond to you? Are there opportunities to use the rapport you’ve built with them to help you build other connections?

Where do you need to focus your energy?

Where you’re not influencing well how can you focus your energy on building your influence? It’s natural to play it safe and focus our time on influencing those we already have good rapport with. Have you asked them what their goals, motivations and challenges are? Do you have any shared objectives? How can you help them? Have you asked for their help and advice?

Demonstrate active listening

By questioning and listening to understand, we can learn more about the perspective of others -this will help us when we try to influence them. When we know what their goals, motivation and challenges are we can plan how to pitch an idea.

Ask for advice and ideas

Sometimes when you’re in a leadership position you can feel that asking others for advice may make them question your ability. If you don’t engage others in sharing their strengths and skills how does that hinder you and others? Think about when people turn to you for advice or ideas how does it make you feel?

Vulnerability is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change.

BrenE Brown

Build your self awareness

One way of building your self awareness is to reflect on the influencing style you tend to use. There is an influencing model called the ‘Push and pull model.’ The model is helpful for understanding how much we ‘push’ – by telling people what’s happening for us, versus how much we ‘pull’ – asking people what is happening for them.

Both styles are useful in different scenarios.

  • Push – “Here are my thoughts on how we can do X…”
  • Pull – “What do you think is the best approach?”

As a general rule it’s best to ‘pull’ more than ‘push.’ Ask questions to build engagement.

Reflect on the approach that you tend to take. If you think of push at one end of a scale and pull at the other where on the scale do you rate yourself?

Think about how each style may make the people on the receiving end feel. As I said they’re both useful, so think about instances where one style is more suitable than the other. If you tend to use a push approach, how can you take a pull approach?

Notice the impact of your approach on others

Look for signs of whether your approach is being positively received. Watch the body language of those you’re trying to influence. Are they becoming defensive? Does their body language tell a different story to their words? What’s your body language towards them?

Need some help?

There are many elements to influencing, but influencing skills can be developed. If you would like some help in building your influencing skills, including strengthening your self awareness and confidence please get in touch.

Categories
Leadership coaching

Feeling Overwhelmed? A Quick Way To Gain Control

Are you feeling overwhelmed at work? As a manager you can have the greatest intentions of leading with a clear vision, building an effective, engaged team, and ending each day knowing that you’re achieving your goals.

Then you open your emails in the morning and all your great plans for the day go out the window. Suddenly everything is a priority. Everyone needs your time. You’re being pulled in a hundred directions.

You’re not able to do the things you planned to do. You start to feel overwhelmed, stressed and irritated. Conversations go badly, you react rather than respond. You start to doubt your abilities as a leader and feel like you’re not doing a great job. You end the day with a ‘To Do’ list that’s longer than it was in the morning.

So what do you do?

Many of us start to work longer hours to try to catch up. Working late into the evening, tired and exhausted, hitting deadlines at the last minute. Yes, you can do that for one off situations, or to clear a backlog, but it’s not sustainable. It’s a recipe for burnout.

How to stop feeling overwhelmed

You might think that booking in some coaching is the last thing you need to do. It’s just going to take up more of your precious time! However, coaching gives you time, it speeds up the process of you:

  • Gaining clarity about what needs to be done now, what can be left until later and what doesn’t need to be done at all.
  • Increases your awareness of which tasks play to your strengths and when in the day you should focus on them.
  • Enables you to identify which members of your team have strengths that compliment your weaknesses, allowing you to delegate the tasks which drain your energy, but would enable your team to develop.
  • Builds confidence in your negotiation skills.

If you want to stop feeling overwhelmed at work, like your days are spiralling out of control drop me an email, or book in a free 30 mins discovery call. I’d love to chat to you about it.

How do you manage your time and energy?