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You are here: Home / Archives for Self-Management
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Good Listening, a Virtue of Character

March 10, 2019 By Tom Watkins

As of last week, The Book of Life at The School of Life website had been viewed over 26 million times but its How to be a Good Listener chapter had just 51,655 views.  No surprise there. The soft stuff is always harder than the hard stuff. Despite the ever-present need, "improving my listening practices" rarely appears among people’s common interests or priorities. It is impossible to overemphasize the immense need humans have to be really listened to, to be taken seriously, to be … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Leadership, Resource Library, Self-Management

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Aim to heal, not hurt

May 3, 2018 By Tom Watkins

We can heal or hurt people simply by the judgements we make about them. When we extend healing to others, we also heal ourselves. The ability to choose between the discomfort of becoming aware of our judgemental habits of mind and the discomfort of being ruled by them, is a vitally important self-management practice. The small, tight-knit specialist peer group I belong to learned that one of us, (I'll call him Andrew - not his real name), appears to have committed and confessed to a repugnant … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Attitude management, Habits of mind, Mindfulness, Resource Library, Self-Management, Stress reduction

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Choose how you respond to pressure, disruption and uncertainty | Tom Watkins

April 28, 2017 By Tom Watkins

Struggling to accept what we are sometimes faced with is a normal part of being alive, like a tax on being human works-in-progress. Our battles with reality are usually won, in the end, by reality. But have you noticed that for very many people, reality increasingly involves relentless pressure and frenzy? Three inescapable societal trends are behind this. Being overwhelmed by them is optional. Within the next twelve months you'll experience increasing pressure, disruption and uncertainty in … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Attitude management, Capacity Development, Comfort with uncertainty, Coping with disruption, Habits of mind, Leadership, Mindfulness, Organisation culture, Priority management, Resource Library, Self-Management, Stress reduction, Time management Tagged With: Attitude management, Capacity Development, Change Initiatives, Emotional intelligence, Habits of mind, Organisational Culture, Personal resilience, Self-Management, Stress management

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The best and simplest goal: get better

November 2, 2016 By Tom Watkins

Can most of us, with enough persistent effort, get pretty good at anything? Probably. Effort, as psychologist Angela Duckworth has shown, counts twice:  talent x effort = skill, and skill x effort = achievement.  And though both talent and our willingness to exert persistent effort may be at least partially genetic, only a minority of our personality is inherited. High performers  don’t rely on either nature or nurture, but on a combination of the two — and they are really good at … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Capacity Development, Mindfulness, Resource Library, Self-Management Tagged With: Achievement, Attitude management, Emotional intelligence, Habits of mind, Performance Development, Personal development, Personal goals, Personal resilience, Stress management, Testing Assumptions

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Sharpen-up priority management (1)

October 5, 2016 By Tom Watkins

The foundation of effective priority management is the ability to clarify purpose and hold our focus on it. Both steps can be challenging. The first, because purpose is easily confused with current activities, dealing with agenda or completing to-do lists. The second, because we get caught up in our attitudinal compulsions (to be constantly busy or needing to be liked by others, for example), and effortless distraction is almost always a nanosecond away. There's no perfect approach to getting … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Capacity Development, Leadership, Mindfulness, Resource Library, Self-Management Tagged With: energy management, estalishing purpose, Self-Management, Stress management

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First, step off the treadmill

September 9, 2016 By Tom Watkins

If we paused regularly and often enough to reflect on how we approach what we do, we'd soon improve our efforts and their results. That's a self-management no-brainer. But how and when can we get off the workplace treadmill for this?  For many people, that's a serious dilemma. Without reflection, we go blindly on our way, creating more unintended consequences, and failing to achieve anything useful. [Margaret J. Wheatley] When I first ask coaching clients to add periodic self-reflection … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Capacity Development, Organisation culture, Resource Library, Self-Management

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Like a clock during a thunderstorm

August 30, 2016 By Tom Watkins

We are shaped by what gains our attention and occupies our thoughts. To limit unhelpful fight, flight or freeze reactions to adversity, we must develop some voluntary mind-control over our attention.  We should know how to put it where we want it, whenever we need to. Quiet minds cannot be perplexed or frightened, but go on in fortune or misfortune at their own private pace, like a clock during a thunderstorm. [Robert Louis Stevenson] Acquiring this ability should never become a matter of … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Capacity Development, Mindfulness, Resource Library, Self-Management Tagged With: Attitude management, Emotional intelligence, Habits of mind, Personal resilience, Stress management

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The very common denominator

August 18, 2016 By Tom Watkins

When the Operations Manager, my mentoring client Julia, met two of her team to address a complex performance incident, I was present in an observer role. She'd estimated the meeting would take 15 to 20 minutes. Ben and Allen (no actual names used here) responded well enough to Julia's genuine curiosity, her clarifying questions and occasional paraphrasing to test and demonstrate her understanding. 10 out of 10 for that:  she'd been working with me to improve those practices and was doing … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Meetings, Resource Library, Self-Management Tagged With: Conflict resolution, Emotional intelligence, Empathy, Interpersonal communication, listening, Meetings, Self-Management

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Got a minute?

July 28, 2016 By Tom Watkins

“Yes, of course . . “, is the usually anticipated and almost automatic response when someone comes by with a query, a problem or a story introduced by that question. And why not? A refusal might be seen as inconsiderate, or result in missing some vital or titillating information. Why not? Because to do so is often a small sign of bigger problems. Reacting to this kind of everyday stimulus automatically, either from FOMO (fear of missing out ) or anxiety about how others might view us, is an … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Resource Library, Self-Management Tagged With: Attitude management, Conflict resolution, Interpersonal communication, Meetings, Self-Management, Stress management

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Emotional Agility

July 14, 2016 By Tom Watkins

To have a decent shot at developing our personal character, we must bring the mind itself under control. For this . . . We should prepare for a lifetime of challenge, as there is no more difficult task in life. [1]  One test of progress is how calm we remain under provocation. On what does our ability to do that depend and how might we enhance it? Mountaineering over a molehill I offered to support a colleague, but during the exchange he offloaded irritation in my direction. It was a simple … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Mindfulness, Resource Library, Self-Management Tagged With: Attitude management, Emotional intelligence, Habits of mind, Mindfulness, Performance Development, Personal resilience, Stress management

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Published: April 2016
Author: Tom Watkins
ISBN 978-0-473-35414-5
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Read latest Articles

  • The purpose and wisdom of teams
  • Good Listening, a Virtue of Character
  • Aim to heal, not hurt
  • Choose how you respond to pressure, disruption and uncertainty | Tom Watkins
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