Speaking of Leadership® Blog

Phil Holberton

Phil Holberton

Dedicated to helping you achieve your maximum potential



Was Gladwell Wrong?

Reading Time: < 1 minute Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Outliers”  posits that Bill Gates, the Beatles and other very successful persons attained that status by adhering to the “10,000 Hour Rule” of committing at least that much time to honing their skills.   This brief but important article from the Smithsonian takes issue with Gladwell’s claim and holds that

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Pick One: Change or Improvement?

Reading Time: < 1 minute Most C-level executives find themselves besieged by those with a vested interest in changing things.  Often consultants, new hires, academics and others often seem to be proposing change for change’s sake before looking at the reason why existing processes, institutions, traditions and protocols came to be in the first place.

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Hiring Like Warren Buffet

Reading Time: < 1 minute We know Warren Buffet can pick stocks…but how does he pick the  people who help him make the picks?  Buffett is well known for doing his homework on stocks with a focused, disciplined approach on getting the right data.  He does the same when he hires; focusing on intelligence, energy and integrity.

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12 Minutes to Persuasion

Reading Time: < 1 minute John D. Rockefeller once remarked that “The ability to deal with people is as purchasable a commodity as sugar or coffee and I will pay more for that ability than for any other under the sun” .   Dr. Robert Cialdini only asks 12 minutes of your time to give you

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A Jobless Future?

Reading Time: < 1 minute Technology has always changed the nature of employment, but it’s never eliminated it…until now, perhaps.  In a brief article a venture capitalist recounts a conversation with futurist Ray Kurzweil that predicts a coming world of abundance with little work required.  Take a minute to find out  why  “We’re Heading into

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Trends: Hard vs Soft

Reading Time: < 1 minute Being a C-level executive requires having a point of view about the future. Do you know how to acquire one?  Technology futurist Daniel Burrus has a suggestion that may help you with your primary job and get your team to help you do it.   Specifically, Burrus says you have to build a

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Following Your Storyboard: Key to Effective Presentations

Reading Time: 3 minutes Putting your storyboard together is one of the most important activities of preparing to give a presentation. Each storyboard should contain the following elements. Opening Main Points Supporting Points Details – For Clarity Closing I’m often amazed when I see corporate business plan presentations. They look like the preparer took

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Do We keep Our Non-Performers Too Long?

Reading Time: < 1 minute Spring Training is well under way and along with it no lack of metaphors about baseball and business. Here’s one from Jeff Weiner, the CEO of LinkedIn, one of the most successful technology companies of the past decade. When asked what has been the most valuable lesson he’s learned as

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Helping Your Teams Grow Through Coaching

Reading Time: 2 minutes As team leaders, we evaluate our team members and expect them to do the job up to our standards. Sometimes our standards are out of sync with their ability or training. After all, these individuals have not traveled in the same shoes as we have and may not have the

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D is for Don’t Give Up

Reading Time: 2 minutes How often are we in the middle of a struggle, trying to get an undertaking or objective achieved, when we just want to give up. “There is no way I can accomplish this,” we say to ourselves. “I’m just not going to be successful.” Whether you are a sales professional

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Set the Tone for a Successful Career

Set the Tone for a Successful Career

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