As Executive Leadership Coaches to CEOs & Executive Leaders across the globe, we are present to the transformative insights and collective intelligence from our client interactions. This quarter, these are the three themes showing up consistently in our conversations with the Executive Leaders we support:

Quality of Attention

As the speed of change continues to accelerate many of our Executive clients are realizing the importance of developing daily and weekly practices to design and manage what, where and why they focus their attention.

Insight

Attention consists of two qualities:

1. Focus – Clarity of Attention
   • What are your top 3 priorities for the quarter?
2. Concentration – Depth of Attention
   • Are you scheduling time for deep thinking to your top 3 priorities that can generate new value to move the needle in your business?

Example

One CEO scheduled time every Friday for strategic thinking to elevate how he supported the organizations strategic plan. He also found that working from home to do this improved his strategic thinking, creativity and focus.  For example, this practiced had him initiate a full day with the sales team where sales professionals brought an account to brainstorm with the C-Suite and VP of Sales, resulting in new opportunities generated that will move the needle for their organization!

Question

Do you have the courage to let go of 80% of activities that take up your valuable time but don’t move the needle? Do you have the courage to go all-in on the 20%, those activities that are the clear path to you being the most effective in your role and making the most impact to move the needle in your organization in 2025?

Managing Change

Currently many of the Executive Leaders we coach are experiencing a common theme; that their staff are “overwhelmed” by the amount of change that they are managing!

• Technology evolution
• Economic uncertainty
• Political influences
• Market changes
• Client demands
• Staff changes
• Supply chain issues
• Environmental issues

Insight

When people become stressed and overwhelmed, they tend to revert to some type of “coping” behaviours i.e., shutting down, going it alone, moving on, checking out to name a few. Why? Because self-doubt kicks in and we start telling ourselves that there might be something wrong with me, maybe I’m not enough, so I need to figure this issue out on my own so I can prove my worth. This is not only for staff, perhaps you can relate too.

Solution

Now is the time to leverage the practice of pausing and ask yourself two simple, impactful questions:

1. Is this a Threat or Opportunity?
2. Who can support me right now?

Practice noticing when you are in your head (your Negative Self-Talk Stories) and get into a conversation with a Trusted Accountability Partner who can support you in getting perspective and to get you into action with others.

Question

How effective are you at calling on your Accountability Partners when you are overwhelmed to move you from stuck to action? Remember being in a conversation is an excellent way to shift your perspective of a challenging situation!

Leadership vs Performance

Many Executive Leaders come to us for support because they feel that they have a performance issue they need to address in order to improve sales, results, margins and EBITDA.

Insight

1. Leadership comes from a commitment
2. Performance comes from coordinating action

So, when your organization is struggling to meet strategic goals or clients or shareholders are frustrated, pause and ask yourself,

• Do we have a performance issue, or do we have a Leadership issue?”
• Are leaders in the organization allowed to step over or around issues allowing or endorsing non-accountable behaviours to go unaddressed?

When you are committed to a culture of performance, acceptable and unacceptable behaviours like accountability and execution are clear, leading to excellent performance in the organization.

Example

One CEO clients spent the last 18 months rigorously implementing EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System) by Gino Wickman & Tom Bouwer. It supported building a Leadership Culture that values holding everyone accountable to their promises allowing execution to improve substantially, allowing 2024 to be the organization’s best year for revenue, EBITDA and employee engagement. 

Question

Where in your organization do you have poor performance, and have you reflected on the leadership behaviours present or not present for the person leading that department or division?

If you would like to learn more about Awesome Journey’s Executive Leadership Coaching expertise to support you and your team being successful in 2025, check out our website at www.awesomejourney.ca