For millions of people worldwide, the act of taking selfies has become an integral part of the social media experience. Selfies are internationally pervasive and evoke strong reactions from those that encounter them.

In a hysterical clip about selfies, comedian Sebastian Maniscalco hits hard on selfie takers. In his words, the act of taking a selfie should be called “taking a lonely.” “Do you know how alone you have to be,” he asks, “to take a picture of yourself?”

As funny as Maniscalco’s rant is, there is a deep element of scientific truth in it. For many, selfie taking is, in fact, the product of being alone. Lead researcher Dr Peerayuth Charoensukmongkol, of the National Institute of Development Administration (NIDA), Bangkok, said: ‘Not only do individuals who become obsessed with taking selfies tend to feel that their personal lives and psychological well-being are damaged, but they may feel that relationship qualities with others are also impaired.

NIDA researchers also found that a vast majority of those studied spent more than 50 per cent of their spare time on either their mobile phone or scouring the internet. Moreover, experts believe that both men and women who have lonely personalities tend to take more selfies for approval from other people.

leadership, business, coaching, relationshipsNaphtali HoffDecember 18, 2017Impactful Coaching & Consultingloneliness, sociability, leadershipComment

What’s Your One Sentence?

In his bestselling book Drive (pp. 154-155), author Dank Pink references a conversation between Congresswoman Claire Boothe Luce and President John F. Kennedy. Sensing that the president had too many competing agendas, she sought to focus him by asking him to think about his “one sentence”.

Each great person, she said, has a single sentence that describes him/her. For Abrhama Lincoln, she said, it was “He preserved the union and freed the slaves”. In the case of FDR, a fitting single sentence would be, “He lifted us up from the Great Depression and helped us win a world war”. Because of his competing agendas, Luce felt that Kennedy’s one sentence would instead become an overly muddled paragraph.

We all can have single sentences that describe us, even if our contributions are not as deep and lasting as the aforementioned presidents. Whether they say something about us as individuals, as leaders or as community contributors, having the ability to construct a single sentence that captures our essence can serve as a great guidepost and motivator.

Get to know the job well

My first leadership experience was the most unusual, most unexpected and most fleeting management role that I ever held. When I was a high school senior, I was asked if I could provide supervision in a kosher restaurant in Manhattan on Saturday nights. I didn't live too far from the place and wanted to earn some extra cash, so I agreed. The position, I was told, included oversight in the kitchen, and, because I could be in and out, manning the cash register.

The first night was going pretty smoothly. It took me a short while to learn the inner workings of the establishment's kitchen and how to operate the register. Not bad, I thought, for $10 an hour. But then, the head waiter told me that I had a phone call.

"Is this the manager?" asked the woman on the line. "Manager?" I thought. I hesitated, thinking that he had called the wrong person to the phone. I asked her to hold and went back to the head waiter. He explained to me that every kosher supervisor who works in that restaurant is also the manager, so yes; I was the right one to answer. I picked the phone back up. The woman, by now confused and a bit annoyed, asked incredulously, "are you sure that you're the manager?" With the confidence of a censored child I meekly replied to the affirmative. Let's just say that I've had better leadership moments than that one.

business, coaching, leadershipNaphtali HoffNovember 27, 2017Impactful Coaching & Consutlingleader, leadership, learningComment

Your approach to problem-solving: diet or regimen?

Until recently, I had never dieted. I simply didn’t need to. I come from a family of fast metabolisms and was always able to eat more or less what I had wanted without worrying about added girth. Even when my waistline started to expand, it wasn’t significant, certainly not enough to truly conscience the idea of dieting.

In addition, I had seen what happened to so many others who had set out to diet. Too often, they failed miserably. Some were unable to stay sufficiently disciplined. Others lost the weight that they wanted (and often even more) but quickly gained it back. If I was going to do something about my weight, it would have to be done in a way that I would achieve a different, more sustainable outcome.

So recently, when I decided that it was time for me to again fit comfortably into some old clothing, I put myself on an exercise regimen, rather than a diet. Though I had knew that weight loss comes primarily through changes in one’s eating habits, I felt that if I could first become disciplined establishing a demanding exercise regimen, I would be able to create a more sustainable approach to healthy living and, as a result, weight management.

business, coaching, leadershipNaphtali HoffNovember 13, 2017Impactful Coaching & Consultingleader, leadership, diet, workout, problem solving, regimenComment

No More Excuses

We all make excuses. Whether they cover up for why we were late (“There was no parking”), provide a reason as to why we didn’t do that errand that our spouse requested (“It didn’t get into my to-do list”), seek to justify why we broke our diet (“There we SO many sweets on the table”), or attempt to explain why we didn’t get the business deal (“My competition swept in and undercut me”), we use excuses throughout our day to justify our errors and explain away our failings.

The reason that we do this, according to psychologists, is to protect ourselves against anxiety and shame. It is simply easier to blame external factors than ourselves for our lack of achievement or for letting ourselves or others down. The problem is that the more that we make excuses, the likelier we are to build barriers that will impede our chances of attaining meaningful goals in the future.

While excuse making is common problem for everyone, it can be particularly problematic for leaders. Leaders are responsible for their own work as well as those that they lead. When leaders excuse away failures, they lower the standard at which they operate, which will inevitably reduce their productivity and impact. Worse, such behavior helps to create a culture of excuse-making that quickly trickles down the pipeline. In no time, people throughout the organization feel vindicated in justifying their miscues or lack of production. And if the boss makes his/her own excuses all the time, who is going to call them on it?

business, coaching, leadershipNaphtali HoffOctober 16, 2017leadership, ownership, excusesComment

6 tips to manage personal stress

business, leadershipNaphtali HoffSeptember 18, 2017leader, leadership, stress, management, health, wellbeing, strategiesComment

Taking the Fear out of Change

Few words scare people like “change.” While we know that change is critical for organizations who want to stay cutting edge and prepare for the future, the fact is that change and disruption are hard on individuals and teams. They mess with our routines, raise questions about proper procedure and protocol, and force us to change our behaviors. Worst of all, they create a fundamental baseline of uncertainty, which cause many to descend into fear and doubt.

So what can leaders so to manage change effectively in the organizations and with their teams? The following are strategies to help manage change effectively:

1. Set the expectation that change is inevitable – Communicate your vision of a dynamic and evolving organization, where progress and change are inevitable. When a major shift happens, your people will be more likely to accept it as a matter of course.

Appreciating What We Have

It can be easy for all of us, especially the chronic complainers amongst us, to see the glass as half empty. Particularly in a society that makes many promises and encourages us to think that we deserve every last convenience and pleasure, it can be easy to fall into the trap of complaint when things don’t go our way. But if we just take the time to look at things from another’s perspective, we can often see that we have it good even when it doesn’t always appear that way.

So how can we start to see things from another’s perspective? And how can we adjust our thinking to be more thankful for what we have and see our life’s glasses as being half full?

Adjust your paradigm – In his book, “The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People”, author Stephen Covey shared a story involving a young father and his children on a train. Covey was seated on the train, preparing for a long weekend in front of him. He expected a nice, quiet ride while he read through his favorite periodical. The children, however, had other ideas. They were loud and boisterous and the father seemed quite oblivious. Increasingly annoyed, Covey eventually made his way to the father and asked him to control his children. You can imagine his shock and dismay when he was told that the man and his kids had just come from the hospital, where their wife/mother has passed away. Covey uses the story to speak about paradigms, or the way that we see things. If we have rigid, me-first perspectives on what should happen, such thinking will impact how we act and communicate. If, however, we condition ourselves to think more in terms of what others want and need, as well as to set more realistic expectations for situations (such as taking public transportation), then we can approach them with more patience and balance.

coaching, leadership, relationshipsNaphtali HoffDecember 17, 2016happiness, appreciation, living, bus ride, perspective, paradigmComment

From barracks to boardroom: How Bill Sandbrook parlayed military experience into corporate success

When I asked Sandbrook whether it was harder to emerge from Chapter 11 or to resurrect a defeated leadership team, he quickly said the latter. You can find ways to get funding and other components that are needed for a turnaround, he told me, but it’s not so easy to change people’s mindsets and behaviors.

Success, he said, works from the inside out or from small to big. To use a military analogy, he sought to make winners out of people who weren’t used to winning. Once they developed a greater sense of control, efficacy and success on a personal level, it was just a matter of time before the company would benefit. As of this writing, the stock trades well over $50 per share.

business, coaching, leadership, relationships, teachingNaphtali HoffAugust 26, 2016leader, leaders, leadership, military, training, executive coachingComment

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