How Respect and the Quality of the Relationship Impact Results
By John R. Stoker
People often talk about improving their results through conversations, but what they don’t talk about is the connection between respect and relationships. And yet, the results we receive are directly affected by the respect between two people and the quality of the relationship.
I recently spoke at a leadership conference of general managers for a national transportation company. One of them told me this story which I will relate from his perspective.
One Saturday after reading your book, I went to a shop to have my windshield replaced. I arrived...
8 Tips for Increasing Team Unity
By John R. Stoker
Before the start of the college football season, the head coach of the local university’s football team announced that he had decided to take the football players’ names off of each of their jerseys, not uncommon in college football. However, in place of their names, he proposed having the team’s motto of “Tradition. Spirit. Honor” printed instead.
Because the team members were unhappy with this change, they called a team meeting to express their displeasure at the coach’s decision. The players told the coach they believed that displaying their last names on their...
I recently met with a friend and asked him what his current greatest challenge was. He responded that managing a number of remote employees was proving to be harder than he anticipated.
Recently, a friend who works as a keynote speaker sent me some feedback that he received after speaking at a conference. It went something like this:
This speaker was very rude and offensive to one of his support staff. This guy promotes himself as a leadership and communicator guru and yet he was rude and condescending to others. What a hypocrite! I will be spreading his name around as a fake. NOT sure where you got this guy!
One afternoon as I was passing through the airport on my way home, I ran into a colleague of mine, Stephen M. R. Covey, the author of the book, The Speed of Trust. We stopped and exchanged a few pleasantries. I could tell that he needed to get through security, so I bid him safe travels. As he was hurrying away, I yelled after him, “I know something faster than the speed of trust.” He yelled back, “What’s that?”
I recently spoke at a multi-day educational conference on different aspects of emotional intelligence. At the end of each presentation, people came up asking for some advice or coaching in situations where people are bullied.
This summer, two of my sons traveled to Long Island in New York to sell pest-control services. This job requires their employees to work in teams and go door-to-door doing summer sales.
Due to an increase in employees working in off-site locations, one of the biggest challenges for leaders in recent years is managing these remote employees.
Why do we make mistakes? We are human--that’s how we learn. Hopefully we learn not to make the same mistake again, but do we? Many times there are situations when we don’t know what we are doing because we can’t see clearly or understand how to fix the situation.
During a radio show interview about my book, Overcoming Fake Talk the interviewer was very much intrigued by the notion of the energy that we portray as we express our thoughts and opinions. Understanding the dynamics of the energy that accompanies your conversations is a great way to improve the power of your message.
That’s a contradiction in terms. When I was a boy, my brother and I would get into arguments over some dumb thing or another. Rather than having us talk the issue out, our Dad would make us put on boxing gloves, then take us out in the backyard where we would duke it out. Since I was three years older than my brother, I won every argument.
At the end of the sixties, I was a young college student, the Vietnam War was finally ending, and I had the opportunity to leave the country and venture to France. On my first weekend in the north of France, a large group of us decided to ride our bikes from Lille to Dunkirk. After traveling over 100 kilometers to our destination, we parked our bikes and ran down to the beach to relax. As we walked down the beach, we noticed a large hill of sand
We are sending ourselves messages. Often we don’t receive them until it is too late.
A couple of weeks ago, I had blocked out an entire Friday to write an article for a magazine. Just as I got into the car, my cell phone rang. It was the dentist reminding me of my appointment that was to occur in ten minutes. Because it had been awhile since seeing the dentist, I decided to keep my 8:00 a.m. appointment.
Somewhat frustrated and numb, I returned home to pick up my laptop and head to the library. Big mistake! As I pulled up to...
Find out how our conversations have many parallels to experiences running the river. Sometimes when we least expected it, the river would grab our boat, throw it against sharp rocks, and cut the rubber tubes that kept the boat afloat.
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