The Modern Manager

Building psychological safety may be the most important thing you do as a manager. Creating an environment in which people feel comfortable acknowledging mistakes, asking questions, offering ideas and feedback, and experimenting and failing, enables a team to think big, be nimble, and accomplish great feats.  In this episode, I’ll touch on what psychological safety looks like in the workplace and...

You may have heard the idea of manager as coach before. It’s one of the core ideas I subscribe to as a manager - that we should coach our team members to unleash their potential. But what about coaching yourself? Is that even possible? This week’s guest, Jennifer DiMotta, is the Owner and President of DiMotta Consulting LLC where she takes her 20+ years of triple-digit growth success and transform...

There is an old joke that a manager’s work is to go to meetings. As a meeting expert, that sounds lovely to me, but as an experienced manager, I know that’s not the case. This week’s guest, Mike Tannenbaum, is Founder, Principal, and Lead Strategist of Humanity. Mike helps people create better experiences by deepening their understanding of humans. He focuses on helping people and teams become the...

Is your organization more like a stoplight or a round-a-bout? That may seem like an odd question but while they do the same thing (manage traffic intersections), they operate in fundamentally different ways. This week’s guest, Aaron Dignan , has spent the past 10 years studying organizations and teams with a new way of working that prioritizes adaptivity and autonomy over efficiency and control. A...

It’s been 1 year since I launched The Modern Manager podcast. To celebrate, I take a look back at some of my favorite episodes and lessons learned, and share plans for the future, including some exciting changes.   Get all the free mini-guides (episodes 1-52) in a single download.   There is a new community! Join the Modern Manager community to get the full guides, guest bonuses, access to the for...

How many languages do you speak or understand? Learning a new language helps you appreciate the importance and nuance of language and how it impacts your ability to communicate and connect with others. Leadership and management have their own language which you can learn. This week’s guest, Krister Ungerboeck , is a CEO Coach, and expert in The Language of Leadership.  Prior to retiring at age 42,...

Unfortunately, bullying is not limited to kids and playgrounds.   This week’s guest, Matt Paknis , is a senior management consultant who focuses on lessening bullying in the workplace. He was a former assistant coach at Penn State under Joe Paterno and has spoken publicly about being abused as a child. He is the author of Successful Leaders Aren’t Bullies and has over twenty-five years of experien...

Virtual meetings are laden with problems. Incorrect or missing call-in numbers, strange echoes, and the occasional choppy connection delay and interrupt what is already a difficult situation. But even without technological issues, virtual meetings have all the typical challenges of in-person meetings and more. So how do we make virtual meetings engaging and productive?   Get the free mini-guide wi...

What sets apart great leaders and high performers from everyone else? Why is it that some people seem to create magic over and over again for themselves in their personal life, with their team, or their organization? This week’s guest,  Rob Shallenberger , is one of the world's leading authorities on leadership, planning, and execution. Rob is the CEO of Becoming Your Best Global Leadership and ha...

We all experience stress at work. Ideally, it’s short lived and easily manageable. When a heightened state of stress becomes the new normal, you may be on the way to burnout. While burnout is the extreme and typically rare case, it’s critical to notice when stress, frustration, overload and overwhelm are taking over. They’re the signs burnout may be coming.   Get the free mini-guide with questions...

Team building can develop relationships in ways that profoundly impact the team. When people get to know each other, they are able to work together more effectively and efficiently.  This week’s guest, Amani Roberts , is a DJ, music producer, podcaster professor and creative who loves to help people unlock their creativity by teaching them how to DJ. After a successful career as a corporate execut...

Your team members are your greatest resource. When they succeed, you succeed. Taking time to focus on each of them rather than the work can have exponential impact on employee engagement, quality of work, productivity, trust, and more. That is the power of One-on-Ones.   Get the free mini-guide with the One-on-One agenda template I use.   When you join the Modern Manager community , get the full g...

This is the fifth bonus episode in the Parenting Your Business series. In these episodes, I talk about my experiences as a parent and manager / entrepreneur, comparing situations and learnings. In this episode, I reflect on moments when we are asked questions that make us uncomfortable and how we might be underestimating both our kids and our colleagues. Get in touch and join the conversation! mam...

Managers play many roles throughout their day: leader, task-master, visionary, advisor, facilitator, cheerleader, etc. One of the most important roles any manager plays is that of coach. When a manager puts on their metaphorical coaching hat, they’re shifting out of the role of telling people what to do and into one of encouraging team members to discover their own answers . This week’s guest, Amy...

Managers are often expected to be natural interviewers with a discerning ear, able to determine if a candidate is both capable of doing the job and a good fit with the team. I had to learn how to interview and assess a candidate because it's way more complicated than a gut check. This week, I explain learning from experience interviewing and the process I use to understand a candidates capability,...

Are you a good listener? Like breathing, listening is something we do every day yet most of us struggle to do it well simply because we were never taught how. A lack of listening skills in combination with the many distractions vying for attention can have a profound impact on our ability to work effectively, make good decisions, and connect with other people. This week, I speak with Oscar Trimbol...

How many times have you thought, “I’m too busy to figure out a better way to do X” or “I’ll improve this process as soon as things settle down.” The reality is that things never really settle down and yet, if we don’t periodically pause to reflect and improve our processes, we’ll soon discover they’ve eroded into overly complicated, burdensome ways of working. This week, I walk through a real-life...

Asking questions, and knowing when not to, can be a kind of ‘secret sauce’ that enables you and your team to be more efficient and effective. Questions can help you prioritize, clarify, and even make decisions, when you know how to use them. This week, I speak with Pete Mockaitis, award-winning speaker and coach who helps professionals perform optimally at work, and host of How to be Awesome at yo...

As a manager, you are responsible for your team members accomplishing their individual and collective goals, but you also need to motivate them to work in ways that will foster a culture that will ultimately serve the team best. This may include what seem like obvious behaviors such as owning your mistakes, or more complex ones such as giving real-time feedback to one another or asking for help. I...

"It's OK to fail." Really? Does anyone actually believe that? No matter how genuine your intent, innovation will never flourish while your team remains constrained by systems designed to enforce and reward traditional metrics of success. So how can you truly invest in new ideas and recognize "failure" as a vital part of the idea development cycle? This week, I speak with Jesse Fowl, managing direc...

I’ve found that most teams don’t often enough pause to reflect on or evaluate the success of the work itself. There is so much to do, that we just keep pushing forward without pausing to ask how we’re doing and if we should keep going. In this episode, I outline four approaches to evaluating your teams’ work.   Get the free mini-guide to help you get started with evaluating your team’s work.   Joi...

This is the fourth bonus episode in the Parenting Your Business series. In these episodes, I talk about my experiences as a parent and manager / entrepreneur, comparing situations and learnings. In this episode, I reflect on moments when we communicate unclearly or don't say what we actually mean and how we make assumptions about what other's say or do.   Get in touch and join the conversation! ma...

We all have moments when we wish we were better communicators: less nervous, more confident, better able to connect with and inspire members of our team, and more likely to really be heard by those listening. According to this week’s guest, “Owning your voice means feeling confident in the moment of communication because you know how to move through nerves and anxiety to say what you need to say s...

I’ve found that most teams don’t often enough pause to reflect on or evaluate the success of the work itself. There is so much to do, that we just keep pushing forward without pausing to ask how we’re doing and if we should keep going. In this episode, I outline four approaches to evaluating your teams’ work.   Get the free mini-guide to help you get started with evaluating your team’s work.    Jo...

When was the last time your team had a conversation about a non-work topic? That might seem like an unusual question when in fact, it’s an important component to building a high performing team. When people connect on a human level, they develop and deepen trust and respect, enabling them to constructively engage in conflict, openly share ideas and much more. This week, I speak with Ann Smith, Exe...