communication Archives – Self Determined Life

The importance of perspective taking: a lesson from life

perspective taking: ballet shoes

Leadership emerges from the interactions between people and good leadership is exemplified by exchanges that leave all parties feeling that they have been understood and their interests accounted for. Good leadership is therefore relational not transactional. And at the heart of this kind of leadership is perspective taking capacity – the ability to understand the … Read more

The Kotter change model: 8 steps to accelerating change

The video below (from Flixabout.com), details John Kotter’s change model. This is perhaps one of the best known models for organisational change. Kotter’s model aims to give organisations a road map to follow when they seek to bring about major change. The difficulty I have with the model is that, if applied rigidly, it is … Read more

Performance appraisals: How to position the feedback

Conducting performance appraisals can be one of the most challenging tasks for people managers. They are sometimes fraught with tension, largely because of the need to deliver mixed feedback – what went well and what could have gone better. In my experience, some people are fine with recognising that there are improvements they could make. … Read more

20 Effective leadership questions: the power to motivate and inspire

Effective leadership questions are at the heart of great leadership. This is because great leadership is relational, not transactional. As leadership expert Michael Cavanagh contends, “the quality of the conversation determines the quality of the relationships and the quality of the relationships determines the quality of the organisational system”. And, in my view, it is … Read more