One of the exercises my leadership students like most is the Authentic Voice exercise. I’ve written about it at least four times here, including examples from great masters of speaking in their authentic voice, like Muhammad Ali and Robin Williams. Communications skills exercises, part 10: Your Authentic Voice Your authentic voice The great masters of speaking with authentic voices Communications skills exercises, part 10b: another example of voicing your self-talk[…] Keep reading →

I’m not going to claim my time was fast, but I’m happy enough with coming in second in my age / sex group in a small five-kilometer run NYU hosted yesterday and tenth overall that I can’t help posting about it. I’m not bragging. The race didn’t have meaningful competition: I finished several minutes behind the winner and there were only 127 runners, many of whom walked most of it,[…] Keep reading →

Want to learn and practice one of the most effective leadership techniques? Then join me for a workshop, Tuesday, December 1st at 6:30pm in midtown, and get a copy of the #1 bestselling leadership book included! This is an encore workshop from attendee enthusiasm at the last one. From the announcement from the Columbia Business School Alumni Club (everyone is welcome): The Workshop Committee of the Columbia Business School Alumni[…] Keep reading →

Longtime readers know a big inspiration for how I teach leadership and entrepreneurship is how we teach acting, based on the self-awareness, emotional expression, mutual support, and ability to perform I see in great actors. Leaders and entrepreneurs can use many of the same skills, and much of my teaching practice involves using what works in teaching acting for teaching leadership and entrepreneurship, with appropriate changes. To learn the training[…] Keep reading →

The people who run Connectorcon love connecting people and they’re good at it. Every person they’ve connected me to has been valuable to me. I’m not just talking: I drove back all night after my cousin’s wedding near Pittsburgh to attend their all-day event this past summer. December 12, from 10am to 6pm they’re hosting a conference to help people connect and learn to connect better. You apply through a[…] Keep reading →

Leading others begins with leading yourself. Part of my daily workouts is to stretch my hamstrings by sitting with my legs straight in front of me, like this: How do you feel about your abdomen when you crunch forward like this? Does it show fat that you prefer people not see? Do you look flabby? Do you avoid such positions for that reason? I noticed that my entire life I’ve[…] Keep reading →

I hope long time readers are asking, “What?!” Five years ago, in my fifth post on this blog, I wrote “Less, please,” which founded one of my most fundamental practices, one I recommend to everyone. That post described reducing my wall of books to about ten, learning about my values and discovering freedom where I used to feel weighed down. I’ve since gotten rid of more books and more other[…] Keep reading →

A reader wrote to ask about my August 2012 post, “Three things I learned from yoga” “With yoga you can use your body alone to create many emotions and learn how to handle them.” Have you written more about this? I can only see me creating fear, determination, calmness, anger and patience. These don’t count to many, so I wonder what other emotions could one create? I haven’t done yoga[…] Keep reading →

If you’ve talked to me in the past few years, you’ve heard how watching Inside The Actors Studio inspired me to learn how actors came to excel so much at skills leaders in other areas of life work hard to achieve but rarely do. On top of that, many great actors on the show dropped out, were kicked out, or otherwise didn’t finish much school. Meanwhile, graduates of Ivy League[…] Keep reading →