The digital age comes with constant change and therefore, you need to be adaptable as a leader so that your team’s sense of normal is flexible. Today on the Work Smart Club podcast, we are discussing why the idea of ‘normal’ changes all the time and how you can manage differently to suit our changing world. Tuning in, you’ll hear all about why you need to think in processes, not people, the importance of knowing your value stream, including your team in problem-solving, and how to evaluate your processes to solve problems. We even discuss the importance of remaining curious as a leader and having curious employees before we delve into how you can combat any resistance to uncertainty you may be experiencing. To hear more about how you can lead in a world where even the way you change things is changing, join us now!

Key Points From This Episode:

• The opposing demands leaders have to manage. 
• The mindset shift leaders have to make in business structures and management. 
• The importance of thinking in processes and not people. 
• Why leaders need to know their value streams. 
• Questions to consider when learning about your value stream. 
• Why leaders are burning out faster nowadays. 
• A way to think differently about how to manage: bring the team into the problem-solving effort. 
• How to evaluate your processes and challenges as a leader to make changes. 
• Why the digital age brings constant change and, therefore, ever-changing normality.
• Why you want to have curious employees. 
• A reminder to look inward and see if there is any resistance from within. 
• How you can handle uncertainty.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network

Your perspective is guaranteed to influence how you approach situations. In this episode, Dr. Cynthia Howard comments on the four core perspectives any leader needs, regardless of where you are on the company ladder. We discuss the impact of our early life experiences, our shifts in perspective, and how this all connects when you try and leverage your leadership. Dr. Howard goes on to define leadership, what leadership means to her, and the attributes a good leader holds, as well as the four key perspectives: mindset, organization, balance, and process perspective. Plus, she talks about looking forward to the future, managing the all-time high levels of distraction, checking in with yourself by doing a perspective inventory, and more. Tune in to hear why perspective is the biggest factor contributing to a leader's success!

Key Points From This Episode:

• Dr. Howard defines leadership: vision, modeling, encouraging change, and focus.
• Factors to consider when developing your leadership skills.
• Consistency: the biggest factor towards success. 
• The importance of good people skills.
• Four key perspectives: competency, organization, balance, and process. 
• What competency means within a business.
• A system-wide view as a method of organization.
• How communication differs in specific situations and business settings.
• What it means to have balance, why it is a critical skill, and the different areas it is necessary.
• Why you need consistent, quality processes in place.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network

You may, somewhere deep down, know that relationships are the most important thing in your life. In this episode, Dr. Cynthia Howard shares information about the lasting impact of relationships on the success of our lives and how staying focused on them will be what you need to stay grounded when life feels like it may be falling apart. Dr. Howard talks about the different kinds of relationships you can have, how you can look after them, and why they are so important to make time for. Reflecting on the pandemic and how it shifted our sense of normal, Dr. Howard comments on keeping your sense of balance, spending time doing what matters most, and why your relationship with God and Jesus is of the most importance. Plus, you will hear about how to manage a change in your normal, keeping your heart open to the supernatural, the power of faith, and where to place your focus. Tune in to hear Dr. Howard's Psalm of the year and how, at the end of the day, everything in life comes down to love!

Key Points From This Episode:

• Dr. Howard shares some research on the impact of relationships on life.
• Dr. Howard's experience working in hospice.
• Different kinds of relationships you can have.
• Why relationships are the most important part of your life.
• The different stages and phases in a person's life: building and sustaining.
• Why the pandemic disrupted the population's sense of balance and shift in sense of normal.
• How to stay grounded/balanced when the world is shaking.
• The importance of God and your relationship with Him and Jesus.
• The meaning of love and heaven on earth.
• The Psalm for the year!
• How to deal with fear and why we should ‘fear not’.
• Dr. Howard shares her beliefs on faith and how to enter/grow a relationship with Jesus.
• Love as a future-focused, progressive state of mind.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network

Everyone wants to make a difference, but how do you actually see your dream become a reality? It all begins with defining the difference you want to make: spell it out so clearly that the people around you can feel it happening. Not sure how to get there? Luckily, Cynthia Howard has questions and advice to help you create your vision and avoid being stuck in the grind of making more money. Cynthia discusses how to cultivate ownership, raise the standards, and ensure a culture of excellence, all while explaining how to avoid falling into the trap of complacency. Plus, she explores three important relationships you need to focus on, prioritize, and intentionally build.

Key Points From This Episode:

• Four tips to make a difference and positive impact.
• How to avoid forgetting the difference you want to make.
• Questions to help you define the difference you want to make.
• How to create your vision.
• The importance of accountability to build a culture of excellence.
• How to manage mistakes and make intuitive decisions.
• Three critical relationships to build on.
• Why you need to prioritize consistency.
• How to successfully create a network.
• Why making an effort is never wasted energy.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network

Leverage is all about putting the right amount of pressure on the right spot at the right time. Leveraging your leadership is much the same as it requires you to constantly evaluate what your team needs and when, and then deliver to them what is required to ensure the entire group’s success. Today we will be taking a look at how you can build high-performing teams in three steps, how creating and adhering to one standard will give you the advantage, why it’s wise to constantly shift your focal point, and how creativity and innovation flourish in environments that are standardized and disciplined. We then debunk some myths about coaching in leadership as we come to understand why consistency is non-negotiable, before learning that success isn’t really magic and that every good leader always gives their team a clear direction to follow. To find out why self-evaluation should be constant and why progress matters more than perfection, tune in now! 

Key Points From This Episode:

• Introducing today’s topic: ways to leverage your leadership.
• Creating standardized systems to ensure repeated success. 
• Learning to operate in line with your strengths. 
• Constantly moving the focal point to whatever is most important at that time. 
• Focusing on processes instead of personalities.  
• Having the discipline to adhere to the company standard. 
• How creativity and innovation flourish in environments that are standardized and disciplined.
• The often misunderstood function of coaching in leadership. 
• Why leaders need to establish formulas in their workflow. 
• Building consistency into standardized processes. 
• The reasons why success is not magic.
• Why it’s vital for a leader to give clear directions and how it benefits everyone involved.  
• The importance of always evaluating and reevaluating your performance and systems.
• Progress versus perfection. 

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network

In the uncertainty and ambiguity of the information war that we find ourselves in, only one thing in the workplace remains constant: rapid change. “Normal“ is now a distant memory as every day we are faced with new obstacles and challenges that test our every resolve.  The key, then, is resilience, and more specifically, building systems of resilience that will allow us to successfully navigate every unforeseeable twist and turn.  Resilience is often overlooked, misunderstood, and as a skill, underused. So today, we will be breaking down 5 key steps that will allow you to measure and monitor resilience in your workflow. We discuss the importance of planning and prioritizing, the ripple effect and how it pertains to workflow, the undeniable value of optimism, and why we need to change the very way that we think and problem-solve. If you have emotional agility, a clear understanding of KPIs and other metrics, and accept that rapid change is the new normal, then you’ll be one step closer to building a system of resilience that will allow you to triumph over the unknown.  

Key Points From This Episode:

• The uncertainty and ambiguity of the information war that we find ourselves in.
• Why “normal” is no longer possible. 
• Resilience as an understated and underused skill. 
• Why resilience is often overlooked and misunderstood. 
• Creating adequate systems of resilience. 
• The importance of setting aside time to plan and prioritize. 
• How Dr. Howard defines resilience.
• Planning for disruptions and taking time to think things through. 
• The ripple effect and how it pertains to workflow. 
• Collaboration as a skill that should be learned. 
• How curiosity can help you achieve your objectives. 
• Why optimistic thinking is a precursor to resilience. 
• Learning to think differently. 
• The importance of listening to new ideas and implementing the ones that work. 
• How to think in terms of systems. 
• Having a standardized approach to problem-solving. 
• Why leaders in the workplace need to be flexible and have emotional agility. 
• Analyzing and understanding KPIs and other metrics. 
• Recognizing that (rapid) change is the new normal. 

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network

Most of us would agree that email is not always an effective way to communicate. Of the 300 billion emails that go out every day, a staggering 55% is spam. Even the emails that we opt into are usually inconsequential and only serve to distract us. And yet this mode of communication continues to dominate our working lives, with the average office worker receiving roughly 120 emails a day and researchers estimating that a full 28% of our working hours are spent on email alone. But what if we could challenge this outdated mode of communication? In today’s episode, we discuss the rise of email, how the age of information overload is affecting us, and how we can radically rethink communication in the workplace. We delve into harmful email practices, how to be intentional about the emails you send, and the importance of building a sense of connection in the workplace. For a new perspective on email and radical ways to manage communication in the digital age, make sure you tune in today!

Key Points From This Episode:

• An overview of the current state of email communication. 
• How communication in the workplace has changed since the 1950s.
• Examples of how we are living in an age of information overload.
• How information overload is affecting our cognition.
• The important role that data visualization plays in managing information.
• The proliferation of emails in the workplace. 
• How email steals your time and distracts workers.
• Why email harms momentum and dulls your thinking.
• How we can rethink communication in the workplace.
• Advice on how to manage email in the workplace.
• How to be intentional about emails.
• Radical new ways to manage communication in the office.
• Why having friendships in the workplace is beneficial.
• How to discern which email practices are productive and which are destructive.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network

How can you lead a company if your employees are constantly positioned with one foot in and one foot out? How can grit help you to fortify yourself as a leader? On this episode of Work Smart Club, Dr. Cynthia Howard shares strategies aimed at building grit and tenacity in your teams. We talk about the dilution of vision and how leading without vision can impact the outcomes you are working towards. Listeners will hear about the relationship between grit and flow and how grit can enhance your ability to focus. Dr. Howard also discusses why we should be working towards building a continuously learning culture rather than a constantly upgrading culture where we throw out what doesn’t work and trade in for the newer model. Let’s focus on building cultures and employees with grit and tenacity so that leaders and teams can find success! Don’t miss out, tune in now!

Key Points From This Episode:

• How Grit and Flow are similar but different.
• How building grit and tenacity in your team will help you [as a leader].
• A short story on the impact of having grit as a characteristic. 
• How grit is the muscle that makes courage work.
• Research on grit; characteristics and skills associated with having grit.
• Grit and hiring: consider rethinking grit when hiring employees.
• The relationship between flow and grit.
• How grit can help with focus and ultimately satisfaction. 
• Why, as leaders, we need to stop letting outside influence dilute our vision. 
• Understanding what vision is.
• Why failure doesn’t mean you should stop.
• A note to leaders!
• The intention behind having grit. 
• How to unify around one purpose.
• Four questions to understand your employees' experience at work.
• Why you need to let your team figure out how to solve their own problems.
• The importance of holding regular debriefs with your teams.
• What review processes should and should not look like during your debriefing sessions.
• How support can help build grit.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Grit by Angela Duckworth

Cynthia Howard on LinkedIn

Work Smart Consulting

Work Smart Club Network