Strengths Coaching…What Is It?

When most people think of strength, their mind goes to the physical domain of strength.  The kind of Strengths Coaching delivered at Jeff Snyder Coaching has to do with the mind and behavior.

I didn’t do the initial research on strengths psychology.  However, when the results of this research were presented to me and applied directly to me, what I learned quickly made sense and changed my life.

All of a sudden, I began to understand why I saw the world in certain ways, why I did what I did and why my actions and behaviors came across to others the way they did.  It wasn’t just a light bulb moment for me.  It was more like someone had turned on all the lights in a stadium and I was standing at the center on the 50 yard line.

Don Clifton (who is now deceased) and his team determined after studying millions of successful people that each one of us is built with a group of themes.  To be specific, in the Clifton StrengthsFinder, available through the Gallup Strengths Center, you can take an assessment and purchase a report that shows you all 34 of your themes in your unique order.

By unique I mean that your list of 34 themes will show up in a different order than my list of 34 themes.  Your list of 34 themes will show up in a different order than the list that describes your boss and your co-workers. 

The themes near the top of your list are the ones that are generally considered to be your Strengths.  When you first read about your Strengths, you may or may not know that you have the Strengths you have.  This is what the coaching process is all about.

They’re not Strengths just because they show up at the top of your list. A Strength as defined by the StrengthsFinder as a consistent, near perfect performance in an activity you love doing. If you're not consistently delivering a near perfect performance, it is because you didn't know you had a particular theme near the top of your list.

Research shows that successful people in all walks of life understand their Strengths. I’ll go one step further to suggest that successful people not only know their Strengths, they take action to understand their Strengths so they know how to leverage the unique Strengths they have.  It's now just about knowing, it's about leveraging. 

This is the journey I walk my coaching clients through when I refer to Strengths Coaching.  I don’t stop there.  As I was learning about Strengths and the domain of Strengths Psychology, it seemed to me that I couldn’t simply ignore my weaknesses and pretend that they didn’t exist. 

We all have weaknesses.  My weaknesses have almost always been the root cause for the relational trouble I’ve gotten myself into throughout life.  To address the issue of weaknesses, I went on a journey to find a solution that would allow me to help my coaching clients to clearly identify their weaknesses and then to build a strategy around their weaknesses so they don’t get in the way of their Strengths. 

The topic I discovered that identifies weaknesses is Emotional Intelligence.  A few years ago, I went through training and certification to become a Certified Emotional Intelligence Coach. 

Now my clients don’t just find out what they have potential to be great at when they learn to leverage their Strengths.  They also discover what characteristics, traits and behaviors exist within them that might be holding them back. 

Here are a couple of the reported results of my combined Strengths Coaching and Emotional Intelligence Coaching.

When you get tired of settling for what you "Can" do and you want to find out what you really "Should" do based on how you are uniquely built, call me.  Jeff Snyder, 719.686.8810

Jeff Snyder Coaching

Jeff Snyder Coaching has Provided value and Results to Clients Globally

When to Speak

Jeff Snyder Coaching

You Have To Start To Be Great

The Comfort Zone

Sometimes starting something new requires an uncomfortable journey outside of one's comfort zone.  I went on such a journey and it has changed my life.

6 Years Ago

It was 6 years ago this month that I started something new.  A friend talked me into playing ice hockey for the first time in my life.  The game had always intrigued me but I had never had an opportunity to give it a try earlier in life.

Most adults who play hockey started playing about the time they learned how to walk.  May of the guys I've met at rinks in Colorado grew up in Minnesota, Michigan, North Dakota, etc. 

Let's Play Hockey

The idea to start playing hockey didn't fully cross my mind until I was in my 40s.  On September 17, 2010, nine months after starting to play hockey for the first time and 75 games into my new armature hockey career, I ended up in an ambulance where it took the skills of a paramedic to get my my lifeless heart restarted. 

They Brought Me Back!

After the skills of the paramedic and the skills of a cardiologist in the emergency room saved my life, the cardiologist suggested that the heart attack I had should have killed me.  When he found out that I was in the shape I was in as a result of deciding to start playing hockey 9 months earlier, he quickly became a hockey fan. He suggested that my fitness likely saved my life. The fitness mostly came from hockey.

I Left My Comfort Zone

When I stepped outside of my comfort zone, I took on an activity that started out with humiliation because I didn't know what I was doing and pain because I had to get in shape to play hockey.  The first three months were challenging, difficult, discouraging and downright painful.  

The decision I once made to leave my comfort zone has resulted in a second chance at life, fitness, confidence, relationships with teammates and a weekly anticipation for more time on the ice that never comes soon enough!

 What's Sitting Outside Your Comfort Zone?

How do you need to stretch?  How do you need to step outside your comfort zone?

Jeff Snyder Coaching

Look Outside Your Current Comfort Zone For a Different Point Of View

Many years ago I stopped consuming training from recruiter trainers.  Not because I know everything or because they were bad trainers but because they were presenting the same material I was trained on in the prior decade.  All they did was to package old material in a new 2.0 fancy package.

Alternatively, to stretch and grow myself, I sought and still seek training and coaching from some of the world’s top executive coaches.  Some of my training has come from brilliant Internet Marketers.  Other training has come from some of the world’s top PHD holding psychologists.  Finally, since I’m a sales professional more than anything else, I’ve taken training from some of the world’s top sales trainers.

My point here is that people outside of the recruiting profession have brought me perspectives and ideas that people in the paradigm of recruiting likely would not have offered.

“I Can Get That from My HR Department”

After hearing me speak to a CISO group, a CISO approached me to talk about coaching.  I explained my services and the results my current and previous clients were achieving.  The CISO responded by telling me that he could get the same coaching from his HR group.

I immediately wondered why he hadn’t already pursued this coaching if it was available to him. I also wondered if anyone in his company’s HR department had my experience, gifting, training and insights into the CISO profession. I wondered who in his HR department had gone to the business as I had to find out what the business wants needs and expects in a CISO.

“I have already taken a lot of the tests you refer to (Myers Briggs) with TSA coaching services”

This comment came to me from someone who is trying to elevate his career above and beyond his current TSA role.  In order to move above and beyond where you are, you very likely won’t find your upwardly mobile advice and guidance to facilitate your change by getting advice from people who see the world the same way you do.

In this particular case, I don’t use the Myers Briggs assessment and even if I did, there is a 100% chance that my interpretation of the data and the guidance I would give my coaching client would be different than the advice he has received or will receive from anyone connected to TSA Coaching Services.  Nobody in the TSA Coaching Services group has my experience, training, certifications and results to offer this individual who wants to elevate his career beyond TSA. 

Conclusion

If you want to get from where you are to where you want to go, odds are very high that you’ll get to where you want to go much faster if you don’t take all of your advice from people who operate in your current paradigm.

Jeff Snyder Coaching

John Calipari, University of Kentucky Basketball Coach, Understands Leadership

Photo Credit: 247 Sports

"My job as a coach is to transform and move a team toward its best version. That includes the players, from where they are to where they have to go. I have to convince them what their best version looks like.

Players have to trust, and the coach has to create a culture of what’s acceptable and what isn’t, and then the team moves forward. This is normal. At Kentucky, we do this every year. If things don’t move the way they should, that’s on me."

Jeff Snyder Coaching

 

Stop Settling For What You “Can” Do…Find Out What You “Should” Do

I’ve always been fascinated by greatness.  In a business management class at the University of Kentucky, one of our assignments was to choose a business book to read.  At the end of the semester, everyone in the class would write a two page paper to summarize the book they chose and they’d use that two page paper as the basis of a presentation to the class.

For this assignment, I chose “In Search of Excellence” by Thomas J. Peters and Robert H Waterman, Jr.  The next impactful book I remember reading was Zig Ziglar’s “See You at the Top”.  Later on I heard about Jim Collins’ “Good to Great” and bought the book as quickly as I could find a copy.

My point here is that I’ve always been attracted to excellence and greatness.  Several years ago, someone came along and introduced me to my strengths, the natural hard wiring that makes me who I am.  All of a sudden, many things I’d wondered about for many years became crystal clear.

The reason I’ve always been so interested in excellence and greatness is that one of my top 5 strengths is called Maximzer.  People who have this strength are driven to excellence.  At the moment when this concept was explained to me, light bulbs lit up and I finally understood why I was always driven the way I was driven.

Before learning about my own strengths, I came to a conclusion that most people I’d met along the way through 20 years of recruiting (at that time) were going through life settling for what they “Can” do and they were producing an average performance.  Gallup research for 15 years now suggests that year-after-year, 70% of the American workforce is disengaged in their work.  That leaves only 30% of people who go to work every day who are engaged and pushing for some level of excellence or greatness.

I've always been attracted to these kinds of motivated people.  Now I knew why!

When several people all at once encouraged me to offer coaching services, I immediately started wondering how I could help people move from the “Can” category to the “Should” category.  Why would I want to do that?

If smart people like Steve Jobs, Stephen Covey and Jim Collins had already figured out that getting passionate, gifted, smart and engaged people into the right jobs would take care of producing great output, my job was simple!

My job was and is to help as many people as possible to figure out what they are built to be great at.  The reason for the cool looking multi-colored frog picture at the top of this article is to illustrate that you and I and everyone else is as unique as that cool looking frog.  Every single person on this plant has been created to be great at something.  When people figure out what they can be great at, they can stop saying yes to what they “Can” do and they can confidently say yes to what they “Should” do, great things happen.

If you want to discover how to become the optimal you and produce the best output you have potential to produce, I want to meet you and I want to become your personal coach.

Jeff Snyder’s, Jeff Snyder Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810

What It Takes To Be an Effective Leader

 

In an article entitled: ”Do You Have the Fortitude to Be Strategic?”, it is suggested that 99% of executives are actually tactical executives.

“Yet according to Chet Holmes, arguably one of, if not the, best sales and marketing strategists, 99% of executives are actually tactical executives. He suggests that it’s the very rare person that both comes up with the big ideas and implements with piercing effectiveness. Yet the ability to do both is precisely the skill set required to be the best at what you do. To be clear, it takes fortitude to be strategic.”

By the way, I don’t personally know Chet Holmes and while I don’t know where the 99% comment comes from, I can tell you that it is entirely possible to find out just how strategic you are or are not.

In my surveys where I asked people what traits or qualities they expect to see in the people they are willing to follow, they told me they want the leaders they follow to be strategic and they also brought up the idea that leaders should be visionary as well.

It is entirely possible to find out if you are visionary while you’re also finding out just how strategic you are if you want to know if you have these particular traits required in leadership.

You’ll find the coaching that reveals the answer to how strategic or visionary you are at Jeff Snyder Coaching.

Jeff Snyder’s, Jeff Snyder Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810

A Coaching Combination That Works and Here’s Proof

The other day, I read one of the worst articles I’ve ever seen delivered through HBR.org.

“Strengths Based Coaching Can Weaken You”

If you want to read the article, clicking the article title above will take you to the article.

When others encouraged me to offer coaching services, I did what I had to do in order to train to deliver coaching and to become certified in several ways as a coach.

What I also did was to think for myself.  When I found the Clifton StrengthsFinder assessment and learned about it, there was no doubt in my mind whatsoever that this tool belonged in my coaching practice.  Rather than telling you all about my opinion, here are results from some of my coaching clients. If there aren't results to be achieved, I'm not interested.

All of the results mentioned above were achieved either through Strengths Coaching or a combination of Strengths Coaching and Emotional Intelligence Coaching.  

After going through Strengths Coaching myself and after significant study in the realm of Strengths Coaching (and I'm not finished yet!), it seemed to me that while focusing on one’s natural strengths makes a lot of sense, it would be a mistake to ignore weaknesses thinking that they might just go away.  

Weaknesses are those behaviors that are generally responsible for getting people in trouble personally and/or professionally.

For this reason, I kept searching for solutions.  The solution that made complete sense to me when I found it was the study of Emotional Intelligence.  I trained and became certified in Emotional Intelligence with Multi-Health Systems and I now use their extremely powerful EQi-2.0 assessment as part of my coaching practice.  Again, if there aren't results, I'm not interested.  

I believe that focusing on one’s strengths makes a lot of sense.  Find out what you were built to be great at and do what it takes to reach greatness.  At the same time, we all have weak spots.  By learning about one’s Emotional Intelligence, a person can learn to build a strategy to manage their weaknesses so their weaknesses don’t get in the way of their strengths.  Beyond just managing weaknesses, the skills that make up Emotional Intelligence can be adjusted through coaching. 

This is what is measured by the EQi-2.0 Emotional Intelligence assessment I leverage with my coaching clients.

Now you know my point of view.  What are most important are the results my clients are achieving through Emotional Intelligence Coaching.

Good luck in convincing my career coaching clients that the results they have reported are not real.  I love the work I'm privileged to do with my coaching clients and my mission for 2016 is to do this work with more people around the globe.

Jeff Snyder Coaching

IT Professionals Find Success With Jeff Snyder's 1 Hour Resume Coaching

                                                                        JeffSnyderCoaching.com

Resume Coaching Success

A Jeff Snyder Coaching client has a new CISO role:

“Jeff, Your excellent guidance on my resume surely played a part”

Jeff Snyder Coaching

What’s In It for Me?

As a job candidate, when you read a job posting, what do you ask yourself?

• Do you ask yourself how many of the prospective employer’s boxes you can check off? 
• Do you wonder what your percentage match you will be to the prospective employer’s hiring needs?

I have a feeling you want to know what’s in it for you to leave the comfort and security of your current role to step into the realm of risk in a new employer’s environment.

Here’s a posting I found on a social media site today.

What does this block of text really say?

"I have a client looking for a General Manager for a one-of-a-kind concept in Houston, TX. For more details, email me at xx@xxxxxxxxx.com attach your resume if you are interested."

• The person who put up the post has a need.
• He has some sort of a one-of-a-kind concept to fill in Houston, TX. 
• He / She wants you to make the first move by sending your resume to him / her if you want to find out what’s in it for you.

If you hire people, understand that people what to know what’s in it for them to extend effort.  If they can’t figure out what you’re offering in 10-15 seconds; game over.

Jeff Snyder’s Jeff Snyder Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810

There Is Frequently A Better Way

https://image-store.slidesharecdn.com/25fc4079-78bf-4def-ba39-75418f414f8c-medium.jpeg

Jeff Snyder Coaching

LinkedIn Invitations Register First Impressions

These three people sent LinkedIn invitations to me.  The first invitation is outstanding.  I asked the person who sent this invitation for permission to use his information.

1. His picture is an excellent business photo.
2. Had I not blocked out his name, you would see a full name and a CPP certification showing me that this is a corporate security professional.
3. This person has a full and descriptive title.
4. I was compelled to accept this LinkedIn invitation quickly.

1. Since I have over 29,400 LinkedIn connections, I've learned to quickly spot what appear to be fraudulent invitations.  The photo on this invitation looks more like a Google+ or Facebook photo. It is not a LinkedIn business photo. This one doesn't look right.
2. No thanks

1. I like to connect to people, not blank images and not company logos.  I like to see who I'm connecting to.  There is obviously no photo.  
2. There was a name until I blocked it out but it is just a name.
3. I didn't erase this person's title. There was no title showing on his invitation.
4. No thanks

You're Making First Impressions

When you send LinkedIn invitations, even before someone clicks on your LinkedIn profile and looks at your profile, what I've just shown is truly the first impression you're making on LinkedIn.  

If you want help to polish up your LinkedIn first impression, I can help you.  This is representative of the kinds of results my LinkedIn Coaching Clients are achieving.

When my clients align their Resume message with their LinkedIn message and the message they take to an Interview, this is how their results turn out.

"They made the offer now we're to the money round. Starting in mid January. Thanks for everything." 

"Working on final interviews...Currently I am the preferred candidate for both companies...our coaching sessions definitely helped me get here." 

"I have accepted an offer...they are matching my compensation and adding a pretty good amount of signing bonus to make up for the bonus I used to receive. Your assistance and thoughtful guidance at the onset is much appreciated. I will be in touch to do the leadership coaching."

  
Call me when you're ready for the kinds of results my clients are achieving.

Jeff Snyder Coaching, 719.686.8810

Take A Financial Accounting Class For Free...Leaders Should Understand The Business They Serve

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Introduction to Financial Accounting — University of Pennsylvania

Wharton professor Brian J. Bushee teaches the basics of accounting in this course. By the end, you'll know how to confidently read an income statement, balance sheet, and statement of cash flows.

It's one of four courses in Wharton's business foundation Coursera package, which costs you $595 for the classes and a capstone project, all graded. If you don't care about a certificate or being part of a cohort that can interact with each other and the professors, you can work through each course for free.

Next session: December 28 — February 1

http://www.businessinsider.com/most-popular-coursera-courses-of-2015-2015-12

Find it here >>

Shared with you by JeffSnyderCoaching.com

Leaders Should Master The Art Of Negotiation...Take A Negotiation Class For Free

Miguel Villagran/Getty

Successful Negotiation: Essential Strategies and Skills — University of Michigan

Ross School of Business professor George Siedel has taught negotiation classes around the world and says his research-based class is useful whether you're trying to secure a million-dollar investment in your business or to lower the cost of your cable bill.

Next session: Always available

Find it here >>

http://www.businessinsider.com/most-popular-coursera-courses-of-2015-2015-12

Shared with you by JeffSnyderCoaching.com

What Emotional Intelligence Looks Like In Action

This image is a screen shot from my visit to LinkedIn. Dwight Drinkard is one of my LinkedIn connections. Last week he posted this picture.  I liked the words so I shared the picture with my entire LinkedIn network. As you can see, 105 people have appreciated this photo and 6 people have commented.  

I covered up one of the names because I don't want to discourage people from sharing constructive comments.  Even thought the person who commented does not agree with the Sandra Bullock quote, he shared his thoughts without being ugly.

The bottom comment is over the top.  I don't know Sandra Bullock personally.  Perhaps the person who wrote the ugly comment does.  I don't know anything about her marriage choices.  Even if I did, I am in no position to judge Ms. Bullocks choices.  Apparently the person who made the rude comment sees things a different way.  This is an Emotional Intelligence issue.

“Emotional intelligence is the “something” in each of us that is a bit intangible. It affects how we manage behavior, navigate social complexities, and make personal decisions that achieve positive results. Emotional intelligence is made up of four core skills that pair up under two primary competencies: personal competence and social competence.” Travis Bradberry

This is an example of poor emotional intelligence on the part of the person who wrote the last comment.  He has a right to have an opinion but it is an Emotional Intelligence skill called Impulse Control that he appears to not have under control.

So, apparently I have no wisdom because I agree with something that Sandra Bullock might have said.  Even if she didn't say what is in the picture and someone else did, I still appreciate what is written.  

I hope this example enables you to see what poor Emotional Intelligence looks like in action and how the last comment was deeply insulting to me.  The person who commented by the way is a 3rd level connection to me and he does not know me.  

The good news is that for someone who is humble, teachable, coachable and in search of positive change, Emotional Intelligence can be coached and changed for the better. I am certified and trained by Multi-Health Systems to leverage their EQi-2.0 Emotional Intelligence assessment.  It is a powerful tool that gives me an instant snapshot of where my client's Emotional Intelligence lies based on 15 skill measurements.

Jeff Snyder Coaching

Stop The Insanity

"I have a two page resume and just had it professionally written.  It has been 11 months and only two interviews with no luck.  I have submitted literally hundreds of on-line applications with not one hit."

Stop What You Might Ask?

Stop hiring "Professional Resume Writers" just because they label themselves that way.  

Look for this:

• Results: Not how much money the resume writer has made selling their services but how much success the resume writer's clients have had in the marketplace. This is the way to measure a resume writing service's value.

• Methodology: Is the resume writer delivering 1980s or 1990s resumes because that's all they know?  Stop hiring these people if they haven't gone to the business recently to find out what the business wants in a resume. Times have changed.  Therefore, the methodology behind creating a resume should have changed too.

• Proof: Demand Resume Writing Testimonials to back up a Professional Resume Writer's claim of results.

• The Clock Is On:  If your resume can't be reviewed successfully in 10-15 seconds by a decision maker, your participation in the game could very well be over.

• Visual Scan: If your resume can't be visually scanned from top-to-bottom in a matter of seconds; game over.  Resume reviewers are extremely busy and data-overwhelmed people.  They are much more likely to visually scan your resume upon first glance than to read your resume.  If your resume does not scan well, it likely not be read at all.

• Applicant Tracking Systems:  If a resume writer does not have or has never seen the inner-workings of an Applicant Tracking System, run away.  Your resume will be stopped at the gate if it does not play nicely with an Applicant Tracking System.

• Pretty Resumes: Pretty resumes are not necessarily effective resumes.  As a resume reviewer, I'd rather see a text resume that clearly demonstrates Accomplishments, Contributions and Value than to see a pretty PDF formatted resume that is loaded with fancy fonts, boxes and symbols that don't play nicely with my Applicant Tracking System.  Don't be fooled by pretty.

• Audience: If the resume writer does not intimately understand your professional audience, run away.  Your resume is about you but it is for someone else 100% of the time.  Your resume must be written for it's audience to understand with ease.

• Interpretation: The more technical your skill set is, the more likely it is that you have built a resume that requires the audience to interpret.  Stop it!  The burden of interpretation should rest on your shoulders.  Your audience should be positioned to enjoy the journey of getting to know you without having a dictionary handy.

• Mobile Friendly: Hiring authorities often travel.  If your resume does not display clearly on a mobile device; game over.  Your resume might be reviewed by a hiring authority while they are sitting at the airport when they review your resume.

• Clean, Clear and Logical: Your resume should be built to match up with the order in which a hiring decision maker is looking for information. In order to understand this, a resume writer either had to be a hiring decision maker or they have to have worked with decision makers over an extended period of time to understand their thought process when they review resumes.

• Resume and LinkedIn: Is the resume writer telling you about the importance of aligning your resume's message with the message you're sharing on your LinkedIn profile. If they're not, they should be. You are being visited on LinkedIn whether you know it or not. Make your visitor's first impression count.

• Results (2): Opinions are great.  Everyone has an opinion.  Look for a resume writer who delivers results that matter to you. Be sure your resume writer's approach to writing resumes is built on prior results and not just an opinion.  Make sure the resume writer you hire tells you what you need to know and not just what you want to hear.

Happy Competing!

Jeff Snyder Coaching

Ineffective Resumes Stall Job Searches

The bottom resume format is one that I recently suggested was not good for the 21st century. For that matter, it wasn't good in the last century either.

I was asked if the bottom example was the only format that is ineffective.  The person who asked this question paid for "professional" resume assistance before they came to me and he/she has not been getting desired results in their job search.

The top example is not the resume of the person who asked this question.  This resume sample is one that I found on a professional resume writing website posted as a sample of the writer's work.  

This format was good in the 1980s and 1990s.  Times have changed. We're in a different century now and the rules of the game have changed.  

While this format is nice looking, it is very ineffective for many reasons.  I chose this example because I see resumes like this come to my own Inbox every day.

This is a tidbit of my resume writing advice.

You have 10-15 seconds to communicate:

• Who you are
• Where you are
• How someone can communicate with you
• What you’re great at
• How you’re educated
• How you’re credentialed
• What you do today

Ideally this is accomplished on the first ½ to 2/3 of page 1 of your resume.  This is the first 2/3 of a resume that came to me yesterday. If you don’t know how to do this yourself, get help.

Resume writing is a complex topic.  This is especially true if you are a technology professional. Your resume needs to be a blend of Technical Writing, Business Writing and Creative Writing.  

Too much of any particular ingredient and your resume will likely be ineffective.  If you choose to work with a resume writer or a resume coach, determine if this person's clients have achieved desired results lately.  

Jeff Snyder Coaching

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