Some executives  are uncomfortable using power or office politics, viewing them as the dark side of workplace behavior. They believe morale and commitment erode when politics dominate the environment.

But research clearly shows that being politically savvy and building a power base pay off.

Sources of Influence

There are three sources of influence in an organization: positional, relational and personal:

1. Positional power: Your title and job status confer some level of formal authority.
2. Relationships: Informal power stems from the relationships and alliances you form with others. If you do a favor for someone, the law of reciprocity impacts your relationship.
3. Personal: Some people generate influence based on their knowledge, expertise, technical competencies and ability to articulate ideas or a vision that others will follow. Your communication skills, charisma and trustworthiness help determine your personal power.

Open to Influence

Executives and managers who are open to peers’ and subordinates’ input garner greater respect than those who resist others’ influence. An openness to influence demonstrates trust and respect, which become reciprocal and contagious.

You can offer goods and services to a potential ally in exchange for cooperation: technical assistance, information, lease of space or equipment, a plum assignment and the like. Understanding what others want or value is crucial.

Avoiding Power

Jeffrey Pfeffer, a professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business and author of Power: Why Some People Have It—And Others Don’t, cites three barriers that cause executives to shy away from using power to extend their influence.

This article examines three ways people avoid power, why power is so important to success, persuasion tactics, and practical steps for leveraging office politics in an ethical manner.

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You may also modify it and add your personal experiences and perspectives.

The complete 2,000 word article includes these important concepts:

• Sources of Power
• Open to Influence
• Currencies of Exchange
• Power without Authority
• Avoiding Power
• Fair Play?
• Persuasion
• Office Politics

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Power, Politics, and Persuasion
Sept10-105a  2000-word article, reprint rights

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Power, Politics, and Persuasion
Sept10-105b  1000-word article, reprint rights

The No. 1 reason why most Americans leave their jobs is the feeling they’re not appreciated.

In fact, 65% of people surveyed said they received no recognition for good work in a previous year, according to Tom Rath and Donald O. Clifton, authors of How Full Is Your Bucket? Positive Strategies for Work and Life (2004).

According to newer Gallup research, what employees want most — along with competitive pay — is quality management. When they feel unappreciated and disapprove of their managers, they leave or stop trying.

Almost 25% of U.S. employees would fire their bosses if given the chance, and about 50% of actively disengaged workers would follow suit.

Because of current economic realities, people may not be leaving their jobs. Instead, they join the growing ranks of the disengaged and “missing in action.” It rests upon managers to learn better ways of interacting with the people on whom they depend.

Based on a great deal of previous research, positive managers practice these three leadership behaviors:

1. Use a strengths-based approach
2. Provide frequent recognition and encouragement
3. Maintain a positive perspective when difficulties arise

Past studies have shown these practices have a direct effect on employee engagement, and each is an observable and testable behavior.

None of these characteristics are innate, but all can be learned. Very few executives intuitively know:

1. How to work with people’s strengths
2. How to automatically give frequent credit where due
3. How to respond with your best game face when the going gets rough

This article examines the bottom line results of a positive, strengths-based approach to improving performance.

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This is a brief synopsis of a 2000 & 1000-word article suitable for consultants’ newsletters for executives and leaders in organizations. It is available for purchase with full reprint rights, which means you may put your name on it and use it in your newsletters, blogs or other marketing materials. You may also modify it and add your personal experiences and perspectives.

The complete 2,000 word article includes these important concepts:

• 3 Steps to Positive Leadership
• A Strengths-Based Approach
• Focus on What Works
• The Problem-Seeking Mindset
• The Brain Power of Negativity
• When Things Go Wrong
• Positive Results

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Positive Leadership: Real Results -

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Positive Leadership: Real Results, condensed version –

To effect change, you must do something differently.

It starts with you. Do it right, and you’ll enjoy a snowball effect that helps your team, direct reports and even family members implement change.

While many books have covered organizational change, business school professors Chip and Dan Heath cover the patterns all successful change efforts have in common in Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard (2010).

The Heaths avoid looking at the history of failed changes. Instead, they share stories of spectacular changes that worked because execution built upon prior achievements.

In researching significant social, educational, governmental, marital and organizational changes, what are the patterns that emerge that anyone can apply in real-world business situations?

In many ways, the first small steps you take to change your behavior are the most important. Once you initiate change, it seems to feed on itself.

Perhaps the famous Stephen Covey maxim, “Begin with the end in mind,” needs to be revised: Start with the beginning and the end in mind.

Here’s how to get started and unleash the snowball effect.

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The complete 1,000 word article includes these important concepts:

•    First Steps
•    The Snowball Effect
•    The Problem with Problems
•    Follow Your Bright Spots
•    Start with the Beginning in Mind
•    Unleash the Snowball Effect

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Snowball Effect – Start Change Now

Today, rapid changes in technology, the economy and the way business is conducted call for robust leadership. To paraphrase Dickens, it is the best of times and the worst of times.

In the quest for leaders who can “save” us, we turn to strong charismatic CEOs, in spite of the inherent risks of narcissistic personalities.

For the most part, executives from the 1950s through the 1980s kept low profiles. When they did make comments, they were carefully edited by corporate PR and legal departments.

Today’s CEOs, however, emulate superstars like Bill Gates, Andy Grove, Steve Jobs and Jack Welch. They hire their own publicists, write books, give interviews and actively promote their personal philosophies. They strive to become shapers of their unique brands of leadership style.

We are all somewhat narcissistic, or self-centered. If we lacked this tendency, we couldn’t survive or assert our needs. “Healthy narcissism” allows us to lead a company and its people to greatness.

But as narcissists become increasingly self-assured, they act more spontaneously. They feel free of constraints, and ideas flow. They believe they’re invincible, which further feeds into feelings of grandiosity.

Of all personality types, narcissists run the greatest risk of isolating themselves, especially during moments of success.

While narcissistic leaders can be visionaries who enthusiastically engage their followers, there’s a dark side worthy of examination.

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This is a brief synopsis of a 2000 word article suitable for consultants’ newsletters for executives and leaders in organizations.

It is available for purchase with full reprint rights, which means you may put your name on it and use it in your newsletters, blogs or other marketing materials. You may also modify it and add your personal experiences and perspectives.

The complete 2,000 word article includes these important concepts:

Narcissists and Times of Crisis
Narcissism Defined
Strengths of the Narcissistic Leader
The Dark Side of the Narcissistic Personality
Lack of Empathy
Street Smarts
Avoiding Narcissism’s Traps
Narcissists Leading the Future
Dealing With a Narcissist Boss

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4 Uncommon Leadership Qualities & 5 Common Myths

Everyone agrees great leaders have vision, energy, authority and good strategic direction. Leaders must also have enthusiastic followers; leadership requires skills in persuading others to commit to company goals and embrace initiatives determined by others.

In today’s environment of Gen-Xers and Millennial workers, it isn’t that easy to engage “empowered” people.

For all the leadership training workshops—and despite the thousands of business books published every year—very few people can confidently explain how they take charge, engage others and develop their leadership skills.

To be inspirational, leaders need four essential qualities besides vision and energy. These traits are probably not what you’d expect, but they can be honed by those willing to dig deeply to find their inner values.

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This is a brief synopsis of a 2000 word article suitable for consultants’ newsletters for executives and leaders in organizations. It is available for purchase with full reprint rights, which means you may put your name on it and use it in your newsletters, blogs or other marketing materials. You may also modify it and add your personal experiences.

The complete 2,000 word article includes these important concepts:

Reveal Your Weaknesses
Refine Your Sensors
Practice Tough Empathy
Dare to Be Different
Leadership in Action
Five Popular Myths About Leadership

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Patsi Krakoff, Psy. D.

Before making an important decision, prudent managers evaluate the situations confronting them — and often fall into one of the eight traps of faulty thinking.

Some managers are too optimistic and overconfident: They overestimate success and underestimate the range of potential outcomes. On the flipside, other managers are cautious to a fault: They take costly steps to defend against unlikely outcomes.

These are just two of the well-documented psychological traps that ensnare most managers at some point in their careers. Other pitfalls that distort our reasoning abilities and cater to our biases are identified:

• We have a tendency to stick with the status quo.
• We only look for evidence that confirms our preferences.
• We are likely to throw good money after bad to defend our position and avoid admitting a mistake.

The way a problem is framed can influence how you develop solutions. To avoid this trap, you need to reframe the question in various ways to see how your thinking may change based on each version.

We can’t always avoid the distortions ingrained in the way our minds work, but we can build in tests to make our decision-making processes more reliable, thus improving the quality of the choices we make.

There are two versions of this article: 2000 words and 1000 words (approximate word counts). The full article covers the following sub-topics:

The Brain Science of Decisions
The 8 Traps:
The Anchoring Trap
The Status-Quo Trap
The Sunk-Cost Trap
The Confirming-Evidence Trap
The Framing Trap
The Estimating and Forecasting Traps:
The Overconfidence Trap
The Prudence Trap
The “Recallability” Trap
There Are No “No-Brainers”

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All word lengths are approximate.