Building Self-Awareness for Effective Leadership: We can't change what we're not aware of

How self-aware are you as a leader?

Have you ever been in a situation where you were oblivious to a particular issue until someone brought it to your attention?

Like the moment you become aware of a stain on your shirt? Or food stuck in your teeth after a meal? Things that you weren’t aware of until someone brought it to your attention or you noticed it.

In these situations, you likely immediately took action to rectify the problem once you became aware.

In leadership, it can take us a little longer to develop this kind of awareness – and even if we are aware, the necessary action isn’t always clear.

As writer, tech executive, and philanthropist Sheryl Sandberg says, “We cannot change what we are not aware of, and once we are aware, we cannot help but change.”

In leadership, just as in life, we cannot change what we are unaware of.

Once we become aware,...

Boss Guilt: What it is and how to break free as a leader            

Are you a leader who feels like you can never get on top of things?

As the boss of my own business, I know firsthand what it’s like to burn the candle at both ends – and still feel guilty that you’re not getting enough done.

The other night I was exhausted.

I’ve been working long days. Not many breaks. Balancing the fine art of family alongside the demands of my business. I kept finding myself at my desk thinking, “If I just get this one thing done”, or “I’ll just do this one more thing before I take a break.”

And I caught myself.

This way of thinking signals the slippery slope of boss guilt.

What exactly is boss guilt?

The type of boss guilt I’m talking about is that feeling that you’re lacking, that you’re not doing enough, or being enough.

This kind of boss guilt...

How frustrating is it when you have someone on your team who you know has so much potential, is actually really great at their job and everyone really likes them - but it’s like they are just going through the motions? They get the job done, but only just, they certainly don’t show initiative and you just want to shake them because you know they are capable of so much more, of doing a much better job.

You know they are smart, capable, skilled and you’re frustrated that you’re not seeing their best.

Here's what you’re dealing with when it comes to these people – it’s not that they are lazy – they simply lack motivation.

Why is that your problem you ask? Well, you know how hard it is to find great staff right? So, you don’t want to exit them and have to go through the recruitment process again. Add to that the fact that by proactively working to improve motivation you are actually improving employee engagement – and...

The Non-Boss Mindset

As business owners and leaders, we often find ourselves spending our entire day dealing with people, managing their needs, and navigating the complexities of teamwork.

But what happens when we slip into the mindset of a non-boss boss?

When we started our journey into entrepreneurship or embarked on our careers, we may not have anticipated that managing people would consume so much of our time.

Yet, as business owners and leaders, we often find ourselves overwhelmed by the responsibility of dealing with our team members.

The desire to avoid conflict, lack of clear direction, and the tendency to please everyone can push us towards becoming a non-boss boss – and there are clear reasons why this is ineffective for you, your team and your business or organisation.

Understanding the Non-Boss Boss Mindset

The non-boss boss is characterised by a hands-off approach to leadership. They avoid conflict, lack clear direction, say yes to everyone, and struggle to lead...

The Curse of Micromanaging

It’s all too common in the world of HR to hear stories of micromanagement and the detrimental effects micromanagers have on their teams, and ultimately their business or organisational output and reputation.

Micromanagement is a style characterised by excessive control and interference in the work of others, usually those reporting to you.

It can look like dictating every aspect of a project without allowing their team to get involved or insisting on being cc’d into every email about a project. It can also look like refusing to delegate tasks, undermining a team members ability, and ignoring their input.

Micromanaging can also look like failing to provide clear instruction or guidance and then criticising the team member for not meeting expectations. Micromanagement is an insidious element that the micro manager themselves sometimes don’t even realise they’re doing. 

Whether you're a business owner, leader, or aspiring...

Planning for the 2023 Christmas Close Down: What Employers Need to Know

Unveiling the Changes to Christmas Close Downs: Prepare Your Business Now

You might think it’s a bit early to be talking about Christmas close-downs – but you’d be surprised how planning ahead will save you that feeling of dashing to the finish line.

If you're a business owner or leader who typically closes your business over the festive season, this blog post will cover the essentials you need to know.

As expert HR consultants for small to medium businesses across Australia, we’re identifying the changes that have been made and what you need to do differently this year.

What We Already Know about Christmas Close Downs

Christmas close downs have become increasingly common over the years and, in Australia, are now considered the norm across many industries and awards.

The Christmas close-down period is also the time that many business owners will do all their planning. In fact, at People...

How AI Can Help with Your HR To-Do List

In the rapidly evolving landscape of business, finding innovative ways to optimise productivity and efficiency is crucial. 

Enter artificial intelligence (AI), a technology that has gained significant attention recently, with the rise of software like ChatGPT, and offers immense potential across various domains.

While AI may seem unrelated to human resources (HR), it can be a powerful tool to enhance HR processes. In this blog post, we explore how AI can revolutionise your HR to-do list, focusing on three practical applications.     

1. Crafting Job Advertisements with Ease:

Writing effective job ads can be a time-consuming task that requires careful consideration of language, tone, and content.

With AI-powered tools like ChatGPT and Bard, you can streamline this process and save yourself some valuable time.

By providing prompts and specific details about the role, AI can generate well-written job...

The term employee engagement sounds like one of those HR buzz words which fade in and out of popularity over time.

However, the concept behind it is not a new one, and the impact it can have on an organisations bottom line results in terms of profitably, efficiency and revenue generation should not be underestimated.

So, how do we define it? Employee Engagement ultimately is a level of an employee's commitment and connection to the organisation. Two keys words commitment and connection, both are critical to engagement. Commitment in not only showing up, but giving their absolute all, and connection not just to their job, but to a cause or calling bigger than them, their roles or perhaps even this organisation. Connection to the leaders, to their colleagues and to the important part their role plays in achieving something bigger.

To put it simply, engagement refers to the extent to which an employee is willing to go above and beyond, commit that extra bit and throw all of their...

We all know the feeling, we’re losing sleep, we’re avoiding the person at work, we’re angry, frustrated and tearing our hair out. We have an employee who is not performing, not showing up how we want them to at work or behaving in a negative way, a way that isn’t sitting right with you.

We can’t always quite put our finger on the exact issue, it’s just not quite right, but it’s wrong enough to be consuming our time and attention. Or maybe it is more obvious, but we feel like we’re going over the top if we bring it up – we don’t want them to feel like we are micromanaging them or pulling them up for something that feels petty and insignificant (yet the fact that it’s consuming our time and attention does in fact mean that at some level it is significant to us).

So, we tolerate it, whether it’s behaviour, attendance, performance or something else, we tolerate it. We think maybe it’s not that...

As a business owner, leader or manager, the ability to successfully delegate tasks, responsibilities and authority is critical to your ability to grow and develop your business.

However, it’s a skill that often we struggle with.

Even those who can delegate, often don’t do it as effectively as they could, and for those who own their own businesses this can be a really tough art to master, because it involves letting go, and releasing control.

Put simply, delegation is the action of assigning responsibility for the completion of a task to another person.

Typically, you as the delegator maintain the responsibility for the task being completed, although you may, depending on the circumstances, delegate the authority up to a certain level as well. So, you delegate the ‘doing’ but still need to ensure the doing gets done.

As your business grows, delegation becomes critical, you will ultimately become a bottle neck in your own...