Every day, one of my friends sends me a quote from a little book called Live and Learn and Pass It On, edited by H. Jackson Brown. Here is one I particularly enjoy: “I’ve learned that everything I truly value has been gained by vulnerability on my part. It is the secret to life.” (Anonymous, […]
You Don’t Need a Fancy Title To Be a Servant Leader
One of my favorite stories in our recent book, Servant Leadership in Action, comes from James Ferrell of the Arbinger Institute. The leader James writes about doesn’t have a fancy title, but he’s a living example of Robert Greenleaf’s definition of a servant leader as someone who “focuses primarily on the growth and well-being of […]
Greetings from a Servant Leader
“Good morning everyone, this is Ken. It’s a little bit after eight o’clock in San Diego, California….” That’s an example of the way I begin my morning message that goes out to most of the people in our company every weekday morning. I’ve been doing it for the better part of 20 years now! When folks outside […]
Surround Yourself with Great People
One of my favorite quotes is “None of us is as smart as all of us.” Two of our company’s cofounders, Don Carew and Eunice Parisi Carew, came up with that simple truth when they coauthored our team leadership program. It’s one of the basic tenets for building and maintaining high performing teams. In a […]
Managing the Ups and Downs of Performance
Every year we have a Final Four basketball week at our company. Teams of three from departments around the company compete with each other for the championship. We also have a free throw contest from the foul line. The prize goes to the person who hits the most out of 20. In the past, I’ve […]
Escape the Tyranny of Your To-Do List
I don’t know about you, but sometimes I get overwhelmed by my to-do list. I can end up grinding my teeth thinking about all the meetings, projects, and deadlines piling up on my calendar. That’s when I know it’s time to take a deep breath, calm myself, and affirm, as the Daily Word recently reminded […]
Leaders Talking About Serving Others
We’re going to do something a little different this week. Below is a guest blog from my friend and colleague, David Witt, marketing program director at The Ken Blanchard Companies. David was the catalyst behind our Servant Leadership in Action Livecast, which was broadcast online last week to more than 3,200 viewers. Read on for […]
3 Actions Every Leader Can Take to Serve Their People
Over the years, I’ve written a lot about servant leadership. I was recently reviewing Ken Jennings and John Stahl-Wert’s book, The Serving Leader (Berrett-Koehler, 2003 and 2016) when I realized how much I like the term serving leader—it makes the point that leadership is about doing something, it’s not just a philosophy. When you are […]
Let’s Clear Up Some Misunderstandings about Servant Leadership
When people hear the phrase servant leadership, they are often confused. Their assumption is that it means managers should be working for their employees, who in turn would decide what to do, when to do it, where to do it, and how to do it. If that’s what servant leadership is all about, it doesn’t […]
Moving from Success to Significance
Several years ago, my friend Bob Buford wrote a great book called Halftime (Zondervan, 1997). One of the key points he makes is, later in life, most people like the idea of moving from success to significance—from getting to giving. But you don’t have to wait until your life is half over. If you want […]