Lee Ellis's Blog, page 66
February 2, 2023
Coaching Clip – How Companionship Can Excel Your Leadership
In this new coaching clip, Lee reflects on the importance of healthy companionship and ways to make it a more effective tool in your leadership toolbox. Those honorable leaders who have employed this idea will agree that their professional work has been enriched and increased in value –
Also, read the companion blog on this topic – “The Leader���s Lifeline: Healthy Companionship”
Increase Companionship Levels on Your Team
Thousands of leaders and teams are already using Courageous Accountability Model to manage team communication and decisions:
Begin using it immediately in your day-to-day decision-making and witness the results of better team performance and results. We offer three options–choose the one that best fits your objectives and goals:
Personal Study
Read the award-winning book, Engage with Honor: Building a Culture of Courageous Accountability, to learn and apply this model.
Purchase in the Online Store
Purchase on Amazon
Group Self-Study Program
The Engage with Honor Training Guide provides 10 self-guided lessons that you and your team can study together.
Purchase in the Online Store
Purchase the book and training together and save 30%
Group Online Study Course
Many leaders don���t feel qualified to conduct training, and it���s expensive. The Courageous Accountability Development Course, is an online platform using the latest, real-time collaborative learning technology to ensure the best learning environment possible.
Learn More and watch a sample interview
Request a complimentary course demo
The post Coaching Clip – How Companionship Can Excel Your Leadership appeared first on Leading With Honor��.
January 31, 2023
Pre-Order Release Announcement!
We wanted you to be the first to know that the upcoming new book, Captured by Love: Inspiring True Romance Stories from Vietnam POWs, was just released to pre-order in advance of its May 2023 release!
One of the Foreword authors, Actor, Musician, and Author Gary Sinise, says this –
���Most readers will experience a few tears here, but also lots of laughter as they engage with these stories. The stunning level of pain and sacrifice that our POWs endured is mind-boggling, but the love and romance that they have experienced is even more extraordinary!���
Order your copy, and please share with others.
The post Pre-Order Release Announcement! appeared first on Leading With Honor��.
January 30, 2023
The First Deployment as a Fighter Pilot – Jocko Willink & Lee Ellis
Watch this special excerpt from his interview with Jocko Willink as he describes his first deployment as a fighter pilot. As an honorable leader, how can you apply Lee’s experience in your own day-to-day work?
You can watch the full interview with Jocko here – Jocko Podcast 358: Out of Airspeed, And Ideas. With Fighter Pilot and Hanoi POW, Col. Lee Ellis
The post The First Deployment as a Fighter Pilot – Jocko Willink & Lee Ellis appeared first on Leading With Honor��.
January 29, 2023
Coaching Blog – The Leader���s Lifeline: Healthy Companionship
(A Special 2023 Note: This year is going to be very special as we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the return of the US POWs, most of whom had spent more than five years incarcerated in the ���Hanoi Hilton��� and related POW camps in North Vietnam. This was possible because the Paris Peace Accords were signed resulting in the United States ending of its role in the Vietnam war.
As you can imagine, resilience was critical to our survival through that long and difficult experience, and the same can be said for the wives and families back home. Each month this year, I���m going to share some resilience stories and lessons learned through that experience that you can apply in your day-to-day life and work.)
*****
While the Cupid���s arrow of love and romance are reminiscent of Valentine���s Day this month, it���s the perfect time to emphasize a deeper level of intimacy called companionship. ��
This important idea of companionship���specifically from a professional standpoint���hovers at the front of my mind, because we just finished a new book on the true romance stories of POWs called Captured by Love which will be out in May 2023.
Then recently, I also came across and read two separate pieces of research from the Gallup organization and the US Surgeon General���s ���2022 Report on Mental Health and Wellbeing��� where they both highlight the importance of being connected with others to be happy, successful, and resilient.
Results Overshadowing Companionship
In the last couple of centuries, there has been an ongoing drive in our western, industrial society to get results���and get them faster and faster. It���s a good leadership strategy when you���re in combat or facing a crucial deadline that must be met. We must get results and accomplish the mission, but over the long haul, there is a decline in performance and results if you keep ���whipping the horse��� to get things done.
“The obvious reality is that people are not machines���we are all humans and have a need to be accepted, valued, and believed in.” [Tweet This]
These relational attributes are a big part of companionship which I���ve coined as ���connecting with the heart��� in my writing, coaching, and training (they could also be called beams of love, but that sounds a bit soft for some folks in my generation).
In this month���s 6-minute Leading with Honor Coaching clip, I describe the idea more in-depth. Please watch and then continue reading the blog below ���
Companionship in the Workplace
My first thought about companionship in the workplace goes back to my younger days when I was an Air Force fighter pilot. We always flew in groups with at least one wingman, because your wingman is your companion who sees what you don���t see and protects your rear (so you don���t get shot down) while you are looking forward. After every flight, we debriefed with our companions; and if it was at the end of the day, we might sit back and have a beer to just chat and socialize.
Companionship as a Key to Survival
In the Vietnam POW camps, companionship was key to our resistance to the enemy and survival. Knowing the power of companionship, our enemy tried to isolate us as much as possible and even punish us for connecting with others. Staying connected was so critical in those years that we would risk painful torture and isolation in order to stay connected with each other. Upon our return home, we realized that companionship was the protective remedy that allowed us to return with a very low rate of mental illness and PTSD.
The Battle in the Workplace
As a workplace leader (or teammate), are you being intentional about connecting with the hearts of your people? The research mentioned earlier shares the importance of connection and community to give others social support and a feeling of belonging.
If you���re truly serious about getting results and keeping the most talented people on your team, let me encourage you to be intentional about the idea of companionship. Here are four ways to practice it ���
Spend some intentional social time with your people to get to know them and discover what���s on their mind. Engage them and ask them some simple questions about their work and life. Just listen and don���t try to tell them how to ���fix it.���Identify some of their talents and encourage their use of them.Pause to reflect on how you can make this person feel special and then do it. Remember even the small things noticed and mentioned can mean a lot.Remember to smile when you see them. Smiles are simple yet powerful rays of love and acceptance that lift the emotions of others.
“The reality is that companionship is a powerful tool to build positive energy and emotional health in leadership and teamwork.” [Tweet This]
You know, these principles of companionship also work at home. What I realized in writing the Captured by Love book is how the 20 couples in the book became resilient companions to not only survive our difficult POW experience but remain together for 40-60 years of marriage.
Don���t be a lone ranger. Embrace the idea of companionship for yourself and others to raise the bar of excellence on your life and leadership.
LE [Tweet this Article]
Increase Companionship Levels on Your Team
Thousands of leaders and teams are already using Courageous Accountability Model to manage team communication and decisions:
Begin using it immediately in your day-to-day decision-making and witness the results of better team performance and results. We offer three options–choose the one that best fits your objectives and goals:
Personal StudyRead the award-winning book, Engage with Honor: Building a Culture of Courageous Accountability, to learn and apply this model.
Purchase in the Online Store
Purchase on Amazon
Group Self-Study Program
The Engage with Honor Training Guide provides 10 self-guided lessons that you and your team can study together.
Purchase in the Online Store
Purchase the book and training together and save 30%
Group Online Study Course
Many leaders don���t feel qualified to conduct training, and it���s expensive. The Courageous Accountability Development Course, is an online platform using the latest, real-time collaborative learning technology to ensure the best learning environment possible.
Learn More and watch a sample interview
Request a complimentary course demo
The post Coaching Blog – The Leader���s Lifeline: Healthy Companionship appeared first on Leading With Honor��.
Leadership History Lesson for January 29th
On this day in leadership history in 1856, Britain’s highest military decoration, the Victoria Cross, was founded by Queen Victoria.
What���s the leadership lesson? Honorable leaders have developed a habit of recognizing others��� achievements every day. Make it your intentional habit.
Victoria Cross – Wikipedia
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January 27, 2023
Leading with Honor Wisdom for Today, January 27, 2023
���Success if not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.��� ��� Winston S. Churchill
The post Leading with Honor Wisdom for Today, January 27, 2023 appeared first on Leading With Honor��.
January 26, 2023
Latest Leadership Recommendation from Lee���s Bookshelf ��� ���Executive Courage���
The Latest Leadership Recommendation from Lee���s Bookshelf ��� ���Executive Courage: Sometimes You Have to Walk Point��� by James Benson.
Walking point is taking charge of the organization. It involves trusting one���s instincts, possessing a propensity to will or determine an outcome through words and action, and having a diminished sense of fear and risk and an insatiable appetite to be the best.
Check out this insightful book on Good Reads, and post your review below if you���ve read it.
The post Latest Leadership Recommendation from Lee���s Bookshelf ��� ���Executive Courage��� appeared first on Leading With Honor��.
January 25, 2023
Leading with Honor FAQ on Stamina
Leading with Honor FAQ ���
���When you look at some of the stamina that developed in the camp from you and others who had to endure a lot of hardship, what was your mental outlook that kept you focused and hopeful?���
Lee���s Answer ���
���I think some of that is my personality and a lot of if was the leadership around��me. I tend to be a positive person and have never been a worrier, which has been a blessing. I did worry some in those early months in not knowing what was going to happen. My initial thought was, if I can make it six months, President Johnson will have to win this war to get re-elected. And he is a politician so he will end the war and we will be home by the summer of 1968 and I will make the Mexico Olympics. Well he tricked me and decided not to run. So we sat there and after six months, I said I could make it one more year. After that I said I could make it two more years and I did, but it was more like three and a half.
You have to keep setting goals where you can mentally and emotionally handle it. Then you set another goal and meet that goal and pretty soon you are walking yourself one day at a time into the future and toward a goal. We also had personal development goals. For instance, I learned differential calculus with a piece of broken red roof tile writing on a concrete floor in the corner of the room. A fellow who majored in math from the Naval Academy taught me differential calculus. Then I memorized Spanish words sitting and walking around the cell and started speaking Spanish every day and when I came home I was pretty fluent in Spanish.
We did those kinds of things to keep us busy. I learned to stay occupied and move toward some goals. We also had these great leaders who really made a difference and they were positive also. Leaders give people hope in difficult situations and they gave us hope and built a culture around the belief that we would someday go back home. We had to do our duty and we were going to have to suffer, but in the end we were going to be victorious and walk out of there and go home. They built the culture and set the example. We had no reason not to believe that we weren���t going to go home at some point.���
Read more Leading with Honor FAQs
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January 24, 2023
New Podcast from The Biz Communication Guy
We���re excited for our friend and colleague, Dr. Bill Lampton PhD ���The Biz Communication Guy��� and the launch of his new podcast. Every week, he interviews renowned communication experts about their areas of expertise.
Listeners learn tips, strategies, and guidelines for sales, management, customer service, presentation skills, technology, and persuasion.
Search for it on your favorite podcast platform, or learn more on his website.
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January 22, 2023
Leadership History Lesson for January 22nd
On this day in leadership history in 1901, Queen Victoria of England died after reigning for nearly 64 years. Edward VII, her son, succeeded her.
What���s the leadership lesson? Honorable leadership is mostly a marathon, and rarely a sprint. Adjust your pace and expectations accordingly.
Queen Victoria – Wikipedia
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