Reaching Our Goals through Situational Leadership by Bob Garvey Reaching Our Goals through Situational Leadership If you were promoted to manager in your company and you managed other people the way you manage yourself, would you be out of a job? As a manager, you cannot treat all of your employees the same. Each of your employees has different needs, different skills, different talents; you must tailor your management style to each employee. In fact, you cannot even manage the same individual in the same way on every task because each person has a different level for each task. Author Ken Blanchard calls this concept, "situational leadership." In his book, "Leadership and the One Minute Manager: Increasing Effectiveness through Situational Leaders," Blanchard discusses the "Situational Leadership II model. How does situational leadership apply to individual goal setting? Very simply: the same concepts that are used to teach executives how to lead and manage others can be used to teach us how to lead and manage ourselves. Situational Leadership teaches that when learning any new task, people fall into four different development stages: The Enthusiastic Beginner, the Disillusioned Learner, the Steady Contributor, and finally, Expert. We start any new task as the Enthusiastic Beginner, filled with excitement and energy. As we move to the next stage, the Disillusioned Learner, the excitement begins to wear off; we think to ourselves, "Wow, this is harder than I thought." In the third stage we begin to get better at the task and become the Steady Contributor. In this stage we can do the task but still need some support and encouragement. Finally, as we master the task we become the Expert. Obviously, individuals have different needs as they reach each of the different stages. Just as obviously, when we set goals for ourselves, we too, go through different stages and we need different types of assistance, support and motivation at each of these levels. The difference is, that instead of having a manager to supply that support, in individual goal setting, we must find it ourselves. Read the remainder of this article... Focus on the Positive for Success by Bob Garvey If you donít understand the role that passion and direction play in your career you are running your engine without oil. No matter what your job, whether you are an entry-level employee or the CEO of a large corporation, you can find something in it to be passionate about. If you are a manager, are you helping your employees to follow their passions? Or are you pigeon holing your "round employees" into square stereotypes? As the corporate world encroaches on every aspect of life and work/life balance goes the way of the Pet Rock, the most prevalent corporate myth of all is that you have to lose yourself and become "corporate" to succeed, that you must look the same and act the same as everyone else. Given the pace of business today, companies that do business the same way they did it yesterday are already a step behind. The pace of change is exponential. For a company to remain on the cutting edge operationally, it cannot afford to force its employees into old stereotypes. Read the remainder of this article...