Leadership Biz Cafe with Tanveer Naseer

Over the past few years, there’s been a growing discussion around artificial intelligence (A.I.) and the potential risks that come with it. Just reading comments from Stephen Hawking, Bill Gates, and other high profile technology leaders about the potential dangers of AI would certainly seem to be reason to give pause on the continued development of this new technology. And yet, early developments in this realm would seem to demonstrate some genuine game-changers that can actually improve both the way we work and live our lives. So given both the public unease and the positive gains from these early advancements, how should leaders be viewing this technological field and what might its impact be on the way they lead? That’s part of the focus of my conversation with A.I. expert Neil Sahota in this episode of my podcast "Leadership Biz Cafe". Neil serves as the United Nations Artificial Intelligence subject matter expert. He's an IBM Master Inventor, and the Chief Innovation Officer at the Irvine School of Law at the University of California. Neil is also the author of the book “Own The AI Revolution, Unlock Your Artificial Intelligence Strategy To Disrupt Your Competition”. Although a big sci-fi fan, I’m not too familiar with A.I., so I really appreciated this conversation with Neil over which we touched on the following topics: What’s behind our ambivalence and fear about A.I. and the role it might play in our workplaces and society at large.How do you program computers to learn so we can ensure we’re getting the outcomes we need, as opposed to some of the high-profile PR disasters we’ve seen with some A.I. initiatives.How A.I. can disrupt the way we work for the better and how can leaders prepare for this transformation.The early steps leaders can take to bring A.I. into their workplace to benefit both their employees and their organization. Whether A.I. is on your radar or not, what we learned in 2020 is that disruption is going to come whether you’re ready for it or not. And after talking with Neil, it’s become clear that A.I. will indeed be that next big wave of disruption that will soon hit your organization’s shores. Noteworthy links: Buy Neil’s book “Own The A.I. Revolution” on AmazonLearn more about Neil’s work in the A.I. field - neilsahota.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The success in any change initiative is tied to how well employees are able to learn and adapt. But how can leaders encourage a learning mindset out of these pursuits? In this edition of my Leadership Espresso Shot series, I share three simple measures leaders can employ to promote a continuous learning mindset within their workforce.As I mentioned in this episode of my leadership podcast, the idea behind this episode was inspired by conversations I had with attendees after some of the virtual leadership keynotes I’ve given over the past few months to audiences across Europe and North America. Although these leaders had managed to help their employees adapt and pivot to various external challenges of the past 12 months, the concern was how to not only sustain this agile mindset, but build on their hard-won successes.In one of my talks I do share insights on how leaders can promote a continuous learning environment in their organization. And so, I wanted to explore one of the ideas I share in this keynote, specifically 3 simple measures any leader can take that will help to encourage a continuous learning mindset within their team and organization.As a reminder, these Leadership Espresso Shot episodes are designed to be these short, ‘bite-sized’ episodes which offer an insightful dose of leadership insight or inspiration to improve the way you lead.We’re now heading into our third year of producing these episodes and it’s been gratifying to see how in the last two years, some of these episodes not only end up making it into the top most listened episodes of my podcast in 2019 and 2020, but how it’s also been a favourite for many people who’ve attended some of my leadership keynotes over the past 12 months.So I hope you’ll check this out and as I point out at the end of the episode, if you’d like to contact me about speaking about this topic, fill out the contact form on my website and let’s talk.https://open.spotify.com/episode/72yyR8AILBcCmRKpFqqpb4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There’s no question that our mindset plays a critical role in how we relate to our world and those around us. But how can leaders make sure their mindset is helps bring out the best in others and not impede organizational growth and success? That’s the topic I’ll be exploring with my guest, Dr. Ryan Gottfredson, in this episode of the “Leadership Biz Cafe” podcast.Ryan is a mental success coach, leadership development consultant and researcher. Ryan is also a leadership professor at the Mihaylo College of Business and Economics at California State University, Fullerton. He’s also the author of “Success Mindsets: The Key to Unlocking Greater Success in Your Life, Work, & Leadership”*.Over the course of this episode, Ryan and I cover a number of areas around mindset and leadership, including:How a simple shift in our mindset can lead to positive, tangible change.The four specific mindsets you need to develop to improve your ability to lead and succeed.How leaders can develop and strengthen a growth mindset that’s so critical to fostering innovation and agility.What causes some leaders to inadvertently develop a closed mindset and what they can do to become more open-minded in the way they lead.Now if you enjoyed this or any other episode of my leadership podcast, I’d appreciate it if you could rate and review it on your favourite platform to listen to podcasts. And if you’d like to share this or other episodes of my podcast with your colleagues or employees, just share a link to our podcast page where they can listen to episodes, find links to subscribe to our show on some of the top podcast platforms, as well as show notes like this one for past episodes.https://open.spotify.com/episode/1lEF5M86IvW5EwJLypVjm6Noteworthy links:Buy Ryan’s book “Success Mindsets” on Amazon*.Take Ryan’s personal mindset assessment here.*Affiliate link that’s used to support this podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Have you ever thought about how how you’re communicating progress in your organization? In this latest edition of my Leadership Espresso Shot series for my leadership podcast, I share findings from a fascinating study that show this can have a powerful impact on sustaining motivation over the long term.With the start of a new year, there’s naturally a lot of focus on setting goals, developing plans, and executing strategies that will help your organization to succeed over the next 12 months.Now most of us are familiar with that reality of how when we take on learning something new, or making a change to our lifestyle like eating better or exercising more, at the start we tend to do very well at keeping up with this new effort.Unfortunately, there comes a moment where that early motivation we had to commit to this change or to learning this new skill starts to wane and we find ourselves reverting back to the old and familiar.Of course, this behavioural pendulum is not limited to changes we make in our personal lives as the same thing happens when the senior leadership proposes changes that we might at first be excited about and want to dedicate our best efforts to, but then over time, our interest deflates and progress slowly comes to a standstill. And if you encounter this pattern enough times in your workplace, it’s not surprising to find a lot of resistance to any change initiative surface as people have learned not to buy into it as it’ll inevitably end up in that pile of good intentions that amounted to little change.So how do we stop or even avoid this cycle? Well, there’s a fascinating study that looks at what the relationship between progress and motivation and to find out what it says and what we can learn from it in terms of how we lead, just hit the play button below and listen to this latest episode of my podcast, “Leadership Biz Cafe”, and I’ll share all the details.https://open.spotify.com/episode/4a2Q5aRUsCSftJkDNCDPMU Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

One of the perks of hosting my leadership podcast is I get to speak with some fascinating and thought-provoking people whose insights help us to learn and grow. So for my last episode for 2020, I wanted to share some of my favourite moments from this past year where my guests shared insights that are both timely to what we’re dealing with right now, and timeless for how it will help us in 2021 and beyond.Now to be clear, this isn’t some kind of Top 10 list of mine, given that I’ll be publishing in mid-January 2021 a list of the most popular episodes from 2020 based on listening/download metrics.Instead, these are moments from conversations I’ve had with some of my guests that in some cases were prescient in addressing the challenges we’re now dealing with, even though at the time of our recording we weren't in the midst of a global pandemic.In other cases, my guests offered insights that can help us to not only get through what we’re facing today and for the next few months in 2021, but even beyond the pandemic when we finally beat this virus once and for all.What I especially like is how despite their focus being on different aspects of leadership, organizational culture, and business strategy, there is a common thread running through each of them that helps to paint a bigger picture of what leaders need to do to not simply get through the challenges of this pandemic, but what they’ll need to prepare for after this pandemic is over if they are to bring out the best in those they lead.It’s my first time putting such an episode together and I do hope to make it an annual tradition for my leadership podcast. So I hope you’ll enjoy this retrospective look at some of my favourite guest moments in 2020, and I look forward to sharing with you the fantastic line up of guests we have in place for 2021.https://open.spotify.com/episode/2kv69PD431Lif9L7oPU0WMNoteworthy links:How Will You Remember 2020?3 Lessons On How Promoting Sense Of Belonging Can Drive Change Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Few words inspire optimism and hope for the future like "opportunity". But as I reveal in this latest installment of my Leadership Espresso Shot series, the truth is our relationship with opportunity is much more complicated and worthy of more reflection and review.Granted, in light of the pandemic, pondering our relationship with opportunity might seem like something that should be examined at a later date, when the situation is calmer or at least more certain. But that’s why in this episode I share quotes from such innovative thinkers and doers as Thomas Edison and Sir Richard Branson to remind us that conditions are always ripe for finding opportunities and that the real challenge is how we understand and evaluate them.Now I don’t want to write anything more as I don’t want to give too much away. But given how my Leadership Espresso Shot series on my leadership podcast is designed to offer these condensed, but thought-provoking insights into how to improve your leadership craft, I can tell you it’s worth taking 10 minutes out of your day and give this episode a listen.https://open.spotify.com/episode/73Rqb4R8ekhoggVAAUZcWW Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For most of us, the best leader we ever worked for not only led our team to succeed, but also helped us fulfill our career aspirations. So what is that ‘secret sauce’ that allowed these leaders to not only achieve their organization’s goals, but attract and grow employees under their care? That’s a question I’ll be putting to my guest, Professor Sydney Finkelstein, in this episode of the Leadership Biz Cafe podcast.Sydney is the Steven Roth Professor of Management at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. He is also a Fellow of the Academy of Management and is on the global Thinkers 50 list of top management gurus. Sydney has published 25 books and 90 articles, including the bestsellers “Why Smart Executives Fail” and his latest, “Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent”, which Sydney and I discuss in this episode.Over the course of our conversation, Sydney shares:What traits leaders who are able to attract and build talent within employees share in common.Why superbosses love hiring people more talented and smarter than them, and what prevents other leaders from doing the same.The two things superbosses do to empower their employees to be “super engaged” in the work they do.How superbosses approach delegation differently from other leaders, where they’re a combination of both effective delegator and micromanager, and how this balance actually leads people to deliver their best efforts.If you enjoy the episode, I’d appreciate it if you could share it with your social media networks. The easiest way to do this is to share a link to our podcast page, where people can find links to subscribe to our show on iHeartRadio, Spotify, Apply Podcasts, Deezer, Pandora, Google Podcasts, and Listen Notes, listen via our media player to every episode of our show, and find links to the show notes for all our episodes.https://open.spotify.com/episode/1IyTCezE5XgJDWgaNjgjGlNoteworthy Links:Buy “Superbosses” on Amazon*.Learn more about Sydney’s work on his website.The Sydcast - Sydney’s podcast where he interviews people from all walks of life.*Affiliate link used to support this podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

One of the key responsibilities of leadership is to provide a workplace environment that encourages people to do their best work. In this edition of the Leadership Espresso Shot series for my leadership podcast, I share 4 steps that can help leaders cure a toxic workplace.In my previous piece, I asked the question as to whether your leadership inspires collaboration or conflict amongst your employees and shared strategies for how leaders can not only avoid organizational silos, but the more damaging mindset of seeing people as us vs. them.This piece certainly proved to be popular, with many people reaching out to share with me various measures their organization has had to put into place to ‘keep the peace’. But I also had a few leaders reach out to say how they’re struggling with how to overcome a toxic workplace environment that is not only impacting employee productivity and morale, but understandably leading to higher than normal turnover rates.So to follow up on that piece I mentioned above, I decided to use this Leadership Espresso Shot series in my “Leadership Biz Cafe” podcast to share a science-based strategy for how leaders can cure a toxic workplace, bearing in mind that no two workplaces are the same.Even if you don’t suffer from this problem, I’d like to encourage you to take the few minutes to listen to this episode as I do believe the strategies I share here can also help prevent the slow creep of workplace toxicity in your organization.https://open.spotify.com/episode/2eUggLin6QJygb9GJT5RcfNoteworthy links:3 Steps To Create An Organizational Vision That Energizes EmployeesDoes Your Leadership Inspire Collaboration Or Conflict Inside Your Organization? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If ever there was a singular event that brought to the forefront the influence - if not importance - of good governance, there’s little question the pandemic fits that bill. Indeed, throughout the world, we’re seeing a critical examination of not only how effective governments at all levels are at not only protecting its citizenry from this global pandemic, but doing so in a way that doesn’t create long-term damage to their economies and societies at large.While in some countries this discussion has become highly politicized, the fact is leaders in both the private and public sectors have a vested interest in how well - or how badly - their governments manage this crisis.That’s why I wanted to sit down with Adrian Wooldridge, the political correspondent for The Economist who along with John Mickelthwait, editor in chief of Bloomberg News, have written their 7th book called “The Wake Up Call - Why The Pandemic Has Exposed The Weakness of the West, And How To Fix It”, to talk about what governments in Europe and North America need to be doing to not just beat this health crisis, but ensure we do so in a way that doesn’t permanently damage our economic and social infrastructure at the same time.Admittedly, this is a different conversation from what you usually hear on this podcast. But through my speaking work with leaders and their organizations, it’s become clear how critical this is for leaders in multinational, national, and regional organizations.In fact, I’ve created new keynotes around leading beyond the pandemic, as well as adapting previous leadership keynotes I’ve given to take into account the new realities leaders and their employees are grappling with and will continue to grapple with in the months and years ahead because of the fallout from this pandemic.As such, I invite you to check out this episode because whether your leadership is based in the private or public sectors, we all should be invested in learning what our governments should be focusing on to help overcome this current health crisis, and what role our organizations should play to assist in this fight.https://open.spotify.com/episode/6fA8Tgy4MGxde1qmOccoFL?si=xjcMdxkwRHym7DC8So2uzQNoteworthy links:Buy Adrian Wooldridge’s book “The Wake Up Call” on Amazon*Is Your Leadership Lacking This Critical Element During The COVID-19 Crisis?3 Steps To Boost Your Critical Thinking Skills During The COVID-19 Pandemic3 Important Lessons On Crisis Management From The COVID-19 Pandemic*Sponsored link Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During challenging times, it’s critical that leaders boost their communication time to provide clarity and assurance to their employees. In this edition of my Leadership Espresso Shot series, I make the case that it’s equally important for leaders to express more gratitude through their leadership when faced with uncertainty about the future.Now this past Monday was Thanksgiving Day here in Canada which commemorates the end of the harvest season. For my family, this long weekend holiday is our favourite time to visit with our extended family and share laughs, good times, and warm memories. Unfortunately, thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, Canadians have been advised to stay home to slow the spread of this virus. But while we weren’t able to visit with family, I still found myself thinking about all the things I’m grateful for, despite all the challenges and problems this global pandemic has given rise to.And this got me thinking about how important it is for leaders to express gratitude through their leadership, especially during challenging times. In fact, there are several studies that demonstrate the numerous benefits leaders can tap into by bringing more gratitude into the way they lead. So what are those benefits and how can leaders express gratitude through their leadership? Well, to learn the answers to those questions, you need to listen to this episode.In the meantime, if you’ve been enjoying my leadership podcast, I’d appreciate it if you could share my show with your colleagues and network. The easiest way to do this is to share a link to our podcast page, where you can listen to ever episode of my show, as well as find links to subscribe on iHeartRadio, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Listen Notes.Speaking of different platforms where you can listen to my leadership podcast, you may recall how I shared recently my “Leadership Biz Cafe” podcast is now on Deezer. Well, I’m happy to share the news that just last week, my podcast was added onto Pandora as well.Now given the topic of this episode, I do have a personal message I share with listeners of my leadership podcast. So I do hope you’ll check this episode out and hopefully gain both insight and inspiration for not only why you should express more gratitude through your leadership, but how to get started right now.https://open.spotify.com/episode/0WO0h345XeFwkdsvfo9Tje?si=f5gs-p2bSjqvZB5Vq1V8zw Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.