2012 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 25,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 6 Film Festivals

Click here to see the complete report.

Friday’s Wrap Up

Here are 4 articles I came across this week I thought could be helpful. Hopefully you’ll find at least one nugget to help you grow as a leader.

7 Dumb Manager Mistakes – Darryl Rosen

According to a recent CareerBuilder poll, 58% of managers received NO training before starting the job.  Of course, even smart, well-trained managers make dumb mistakes. However, the difference between dumb managers and smart ones is that smart managers notice when their salespeople are unmotivated and their workers are uninspired. Smart managers work at making small behavioral changes, one step at a time, to correct common management mistakes that are having a negative impact on their and their team members’ performance. (Read full article)

30 Ways Your Business Should Leverage Social Media This Year – Daniel Mbure

Social media is big in business circles and every business is scrambling to implement social media strategies to take advantage of this new opportunity. If your business is not already on the social media bandwagon, you still have time to create a social media strategy and start getting social. (Read full article)

Inspire People To Change – Paul Thornton

Leaders not only challenge us but also inspire us to take action. Some leaders post quotes in their office as reminders to inspire themselves and others. Here are a few examples. (Read full article)

Yes…You Can Be Creative! – Mark Miller

I’m amazed how many leaders I encounter who say, “I’m not creative.” When I hear this, it actually energizes me, because EVERY human being on the planet has the seeds of creativity within them. After studying and practicing the disciplines of creativity for over 30 years, I’ve concluded that the realization of this untapped potential is only three steps away. (Read full article)

Friday’s Wrap Up

Top 10 Excuses for Being a Lousy Manager – Dan McCarthy

Throughout the course of my career in leadership development, I’ve had the opportunity to confront, counsel, and console a lot of bad managers. The majority of these bad managers were not really bad people. In fact, once you got to know them, they could be sincere, caring, and down to earth. Many of them, when confronted with evidence that their management skills were less than ideal, were shocked. Don’t let that happen to you! Like they say, perception is reality. Or, if you’ve been called a jerk by more than three people recently, maybe you’re acting like a jerk. (Read full story)

3 Tips For The Overworked Leader – Mark Miller

I’ve come to realize a totally counterintuitive truth: the less you do, the more you accomplish. So, for almost a decade, I’ve been trying to be more effective by doing less. Let me quickly add that on any given day or during any given season, I fail miserably. When this happens, my impact decreases. While I continue to work on the issue, here are 3 ideas that are helping me today. (Read full article)

Getting the Most From Live Events: A Guide for Attendees, Hosts & Participants – HubSpot Blog

There are thousands of conferences every year, and thousands of opportunities for attendees, exhibitors, speakers and conference planners to benefit from these events. However, most of these chances are lost in the chaos of an event and the post-conference wrap-up. (Read full article)

Negative Brainstorming Offers an Alternative Problem-solving Method – Kevin Dwyer

Leaders can come up with better solutions to problems through a technique known as “negative brainstorming,” in which a problem-solving team brainstorms for ways to make the stated problem worse. The output from this brainstorm is then taken and explored to see if any new ideas for a solution are suggested by thinking about how to eliminate the things which make the problem worse. … Negative brainstorming is usually more focused than regular brainstorming and the solutions become self-obvious. (Read full article)