Three Distinguishing Characteristics of Elevated Leaders (and a common factor hinders one’s ability to possess these characteristics)
An “Elevated Leader” is a leader that operates with a high degree of cognitive and emotional sophistication. They have developed themselves to the degree that they are in the highest adult development level (research has found that only 1% of people and 8% of leaders operate here). Most prototypical great leaders—leaders like Abraham Lincoln, Martin […]
Vertical Development & Life Fulfillment
Do people at higher vertical development altitudes experience greater life fulfillment? That is a question that I partnered with Maurice Thibodeau to answer. Maurice is a the creator of a fantastic self-assessment called the Life Inventory Assessment, which is designed to help people gauge the degree to which they are fulfilled in their life across […]
How to Evaluate the Effectiveness of Leadership Development Programs
For a journal article I am working on, I have been combing through the academic research on leadership development. You might be interested to know that given the amount of time and money organizations spend on leadership development, there is relatively little research in academia on leadership development. It is definitely seen as a concern […]
The Value and Importance of Vertical Development
What I am going to present in this article is perhaps the clearest way to articulate (1) what vertical development is and (2) the value and importance of vertical development. To lay the foundation for these two points, we need to recognize that people have two sides to themselves. Two Sides of Ourselves We all […]
What is Character? And How Do Leaders Develop It?
Last week, I presented an idea that we have two sides of ourselves: a DOING Side and a BEING Side. The DOING Side represents our talent, knowledge, skills, and abilities. The higher we are on the DOING Side, the more capable we will be at performing specific tasks that are aligned with our talents, knowledge, […]
You Have a DOING Side AND a BEING Side
What do these people have in common: Bobby Knight, Michael Jackson, Lindsay Lohan, Shia LaBeouf, Naomi Campbell, Bill Clinton, Richard Nixon, Gordon Ramsay, and Tiger Woods? These are all people that are immensely talented, but have operated in a manner that reveals that they are perceived as having a flawed character. This similarity exposes an […]
Current State of Leadership Development
This week, Raymond Lee (President at CareerMinds) sent me a recently-released article published by Josh Bersin on the current state of leadership development. There are three key findings from Bersin’s research that I think are valuable for you to understand: What HR Investments have the Biggest Return on Investment? Of a long list of HR […]
The Connection Between Leadership, ADHD, and Vertical Development
If you haven’t followed my writings, here are some key things to understand: We have an internal operating system that dictates nearly all of our perceiving, thinking, and operation. Vertical development is a form of development that focuses on upgrading our internal operating system. The quality of our leadership is dictated by the quality and […]
Are You Truly Self-Aware?
In her TEDx Talk, Tasha Eurich reports that 95% of people think they are self-aware, yet only 10-15% are actually self-aware. That is such a huge disconnect! How can we explain that? It has not been until recently that I feel like I can clearly articulate why so many people are not nearly as self-aware […]
Want to Transform Yourself: Focus on Your Internal Operating System
Can you answer the following questions: Do people have an internal operating system (IOS)? Do you have a sense of what our internal operating system is? Do you think that the quality and sophistication of people’s internal operating systems differ? How can you tell? What are the signs that indicate this? In this article, I […]
