defensiveness tagged posts

2. Top down initiatives are viewed as personal attacks December 15, 2021 Affective Leadership, Emotional Intelligence One comment

Top down initiatives viewed as personal attacks

When confronted with a need for change either personally or professionally most people don’t differentiate “what they did” from “who they are”. Instead of focusing their creative resources to battle an outside enemy people view a “demand” for change as a judgment against them personally. Lasting transformation within complex social systems cannot and should not be dictated from the top down or outside in...

Fearless Conversations or Fearful Conciliation’s? December 15, 2021 Affective Leadership, Association Insights, Emotional Intelligence, Keynote Keys, Peer Powered Performance, Training

Using Unrelated Stories to Overcome
Unreasonable Defensiveness

I was recently asked to come up with an approach to safety concerns at one of the largest concrete structures in our country.

The request, as usual, was to be funny, fix the problem, and get out. You have 45 minutes. An impossible objective, but it is entirely my own fault. I am a victim of my own creation. For two decades I have been most widely known as a keynote humorist...