Joe Contrera is the Founder and President of ALIVE @ WORK LLC, a leadership development company dedicated to helping Extraordinary Leaders Achieve Extraordinary Results. He is the author of three books. His latest, Extraordinary Results: Mastering the Art of Leading, Coaching, & Influencing Others, is quickly becoming a must-have resource for leaders in organizations across the country. It will not only change what you believe about leading, it will help you build your leadership skills so that you can successfully influence others.
This past Fathers Day I found myself alone and in a reflective state … Translation~ I was lying on the couch with the remote in my hand navigating through 387 channels when I stumbled across Oprah’s Life Class. Her guest was T.D. Jakes, the pastor of the Potter’s House, a non-denominational, mega-church located in Dallas.
You’ve heard the saying, “garbage in … garbage out.” When it comes to your thoughts and your words, the same principle applies … what you think will determine what you do AND what you say. Most people have heard these statements before … what you sow is what you reap, be careful who you hang out with it is who you will become, thoughts become things, etc.
Having a purpose bigger than you is where it all begins … In business I believe that the key to motivating employee’s requires two things: Help them identify their unique contribution to the organization and consistently recognize them for it. Show them how they are a part of something bigger than themselves.
It’s a new year and everyone is thinking about their new goals. Health clubs are jam-packed with the New Year’s resolutionists who are starting off another year with the expectation that this will be the year they drop the extra 15 lbs. they have been carrying around the last few years. It’s a fact … health club membership’s jump up 65% in the month of January each and every year.
Listen, Do you want to know a secret? Do you promise not to tell, whoa oh, oh? The Beatles. Recently I had an online chat with a rep at Ally Bank. Here’s the transcript: Welcome to Ally’s Live Chat. Thanks for joining us! A Customer Care Associate will be with you in a moment. You are number 1 in the queue. Thank you for waiting.
This is a story about a book, a book about what happens when authenticity and risk collide. I started writing my soon to be released book, I Could Love No One Until I Loved Me in early 2009. At the time, I was going through a pretty traumatic time in my life. It was the onset of what some called the ‘second depression’ and my business had been significantly impacted. In what felt like a matter of days, we went from having our best year ever to having one of our worst … overnight.
With what seems like a continual flow of untruthfulness from our politicians and the media, is it any wonder that we have become numb to truthfulness. “Reality” television shows retake scenes until they get it to a point that will captivate the audience … and in doing so they move further away from the truth and further away from reality. Whether it is by omission or the careful selection of one’s words … being untruthful is the same as lying!
When we say that someone is frugal … what do we mean? Are we implying they are cheap, a tight wad, a penny-pincher … or are we implying that they spend money wisely? You can interpret frugality in a number of ways. For example, a single Mom raising 3 kids on her own because her loser ex-husband has an entitlement attitude and refuses to get a job that supports his kids NEEDS to be frugal.
“You are your greatest asset. Put your time, effort and money into training, grooming, and encouraging your greatest asset.” – Tom Hopkins. Sometimes it may be a mental leap to think of ourselves as our greatest asset. That said … here are a few questions to get us grooming our minds to think differently …
The power of words can have an unforeseen negative or positive impact on your life. At some point someone has directed one or more of these words towards us … dumb, stupid, idiot, ignorant, asinine, inane, despicable, egregious, ugly, fat, failure, repulsive, substandard, jackass, moron, reject, etc!