Author: Jim Murray

Posted on June 1, 2020July 19, 2020

How to Avoid Unproductive Arguments

A good debate liberates our thinking. A robust but respectful exchange of views is an act of kindness – one that opens and sharpens our minds and gets us closer to the truth. It ought not be a winner-take-all contest where the primary objective is to prove one is wrong and the other right. Civilized discourse isn’t a measurement of who’s smarter; it’s an opportunity to test and exchange theories about life’s inordinate mysteries and complexities.

Posted on May 18, 2020July 11, 2020

How to Do What’s Important

One reason we get overwhelmed by our to-do lists is because we’re unable to differentiate between what we think should be done and what must be done. A lot of “shoulds” need more time to marinate; these are matters of judgment that require greater contemplation about execution. A student once asked for my help with […]

Posted on May 10, 2020July 11, 2020

Why Smart People Do Dumb Things

What makes even the brightest sometimes squander their brilliance in breathtaking acts of stupidity? Although it’s looking in the rear-view mirror, the 2008 market meltdown is instructive. Some of the most revered business gurus illustrate the case in point. Jamie Dimon, then CEO of J.P. Morgan Chase, one of America’s largest and most respected banks, […]

Posted on May 4, 2020September 3, 2020

Musings – Part 9

A few of the things I’m thinking about during this period of isolation: Forgiveness. We all do things we wish we could take back, and likely would, if only we had the chance. So why should we hold others accountable for being imperfect and fallible? When we no longer see their behaviour towards us as […]

Posted on April 20, 2020September 3, 2020

Musings – Part 8

Uncertainty. These are uncertain times. Regardless of the dire circumstances we face with this pandemic, rarely does a day in our lives pass without some degree of uncertainty. Our current predicament simply affirms that we can expect more of it, not less. Most people respond to extreme uncertainties with confusion, frustration, anxiety or even panic. Uncertainty […]

Posted on April 8, 2020

Networking

This may be a good time to reach out to your network (or build one). All the better, it can continue or start on-line. Many think of networking as a bit like flossing – necessary but not necessarily a lot of fun. A few leaders have told me they abhor networking despite its value. They […]

Posted on March 30, 2020

Living Through a Pandemic

It has been said by many that great companies, leadership and character are forged through crises. But how do we put COVID-19 in this context? What do those who’ve lived through some of the greatest catastrophes and turning points in the history of humankind know that many have yet to discover? Cornell University gerontologist Karl […]

Posted on March 23, 2020

The Affliction of Corporate Speak

I end my CEO Program with the six things a CEO must do to lead with purpose. One of them is this: your words must have meaning. Although neologisms have always been a integral part of business communications, their occurrence in the workplace is viral. If everyone agreed to use language in the way it […]

Posted on March 16, 2020August 6, 2020

A Time for Genius

Fifty years ago, I designed my first learning experience for executives who aspired to advance in their professional careers. It was called The Creative Genius Within. Its premise, simply stated, was that each of us was born a genius and that potential is still there – constrained to be sure but ready to be re-awakened. […]

Posted on March 9, 2020September 3, 2020

Musings – Part 7

Self-worth. As we age, we shed the innocence of childhood naivete and acquire maturity (or what I prefer to call perspective). We learn that what we think of ourselves is more important than what others think of us. Self-worth has little to do with, therefore does not require, the approval of others. Their expectations should […]

Posted on February 21, 2020

Asking for Help

The simplest way to solve a problem is to ask someone who has the expertise needed to suggest a good solution. We rarely help others unless they prompt us by specifically asking for assistance. It’s amazing how generous people can be when they’re asked in the right way. So why don’t we ask more often? […]

Posted on February 10, 2020

Listening

We were taught how to speak correctly and persuasively but not how to listen attentively or empathically. This is one reason why, more than ever, we interrupt and talk over others, engage in dialogues of the deaf, and try to shape the narratives we want others to believe. You can get a doctorate in speech […]

Posted on January 30, 2020September 3, 2020

Musings – Part 6

Self-knowledge. Socrates distilled the entire realm of philosophy to a single edict: “Know thyself.” Yet can we? Our brain has two minds – the conscious one that reasons and a subconscious one fueled by emotions. This is why we constantly struggle to figure out who we really are. Since there is no easy route to […]

Posted on December 20, 2019

Giving Advice: 10 Rules

Smart leaders don’t know everything they need to know – no one does. But they do need to know enough. They require independent, objective and sometimes contrarian counsel that is highly unlikely to come from within the organization. Why is this so? Because most executives don’t know how to ask for it. And the higher […]

Posted on December 11, 2019

The Lost Art of Diplomacy

The Trump presidency may have changed the art of diplomacy forever. Negotiating real estate deals and conducting international diplomacy are entirely different. Bargaining in business is not the same as communicating through back channels with defiant coalition partners in the shadow of severe mistrust or hostility. As the self-proclaimed “leader of the free world,” America’s […]

Posted on December 2, 2019

The Art of Asking Questions

The answers we get are a consequence of the questions we ask. Asking means we want to learn. Answers deepen our understanding, provide solutions to problems, improve relationships, signal competence and overcome the many fictions we tend to believe are true. Naguib Mahfouz, a Nobel laureate for literature, said you can tell a clever man […]

Posted on November 11, 2019

Avoiding a Flawed Strategy

For over 40 years, I’ve been advising clients on the changing nature and role of strategic planning (or, perhaps more appropriately, thinking) in organically growing their enterprises and achieving high performance. As the world becomes more predictably unpredictable and planning paradigms evolve to keep up, the evolution continues. Most executives either suspect or assume their […]

Posted on October 28, 2019

Mastering Tough Conversations

Tough conversations involve issues you consider important but difficult to discuss with people you care about. The topics are matters you would prefer to avoid but know you can’t. Otherwise, things will go from bad to worse. These conversations are a normal part of living in a world where we can’t agree on everything, especially […]

Posted on October 13, 2019September 3, 2020

Musings – Part 5

Bias. We are hard-wired with biases at birth; it’s one way the brain sustains itself. Yet we generally believe we are less biased than others. Psychologists call this a blind spot because we cannot see what we don’t already know. Just as Goethe said we cannot hear what we don’t understand. I call it the […]

Posted on September 30, 2019

Building a Safe Workplace

Psychological safety is defined as the feeling one will not be punished or humiliated for candidly speaking up with their ideas, asking awkward questions, expressing genuine concerns, contradicting their boss, or making mistakes. When this environment exists in a workplace, high performance is the result – people become more committed to the organizational mission and […]

Posted on September 23, 2019

How to Win an Argument

Most people have an extreme dislike of dealing with interpersonal conflicts. They simply don’t know how to utilize its enormous potential for learning, growth, progress and, ultimately, for enhancing cooperation. There’s a lot of disagreement about most things these days. Our differences, however petty, drive the news cycle. For some, it’s bred in the bone. […]

Posted on September 3, 2019

The Skill of Awareness

There are two different albeit sometimes symbiotic aspects of self-awareness – one is who we think we are and the other is what those around us believe we are. Reconciling internal assessment with external evaluation is a required meta-skill for living a life of purpose and becoming what we really want to be. It leads […]

Posted on June 28, 2019September 3, 2020

Musings – Part 4

Expertise vs. Ignorance. The overwhelming complexity of modernity, the unpredictability of events and the onslaught of misinformation make it increasingly harder to navigate our lives. This is why we need the expertise of others. But how do we know whose answers we can trust? In The Death of Expertise, Tom Nichols notes that “the public space […]

Posted on June 3, 2019

What is Memory?

I’ve been studying neurology (how the brain works) as an avocation for almost fifty years. The most remarkable thing I can say about this curious passion is how little we still know about how the brain works and how much we’ve discovered in the last two decades, especially with the advent of functional magnetic resonance […]

Posted on May 20, 2019

When Bad Stuff Happens

Many start off with a vision of how they hope their lives will unfold, then create a plan to achieve it. We presume that effort, skill and discipline (along with a bit of good luck) will be rewarded. But unexpected events invariably intrude on our best laid plans. The path we chose for the realization […]

Posted on May 6, 2019

Measuring Life

How are you doing as a player in the game of life? Is it measuring up to your expectations? Henry Miller once said “If you can fall in love again and again, if you can forgive as well as forget, if you can keep from growing sour, surly, bitter and cynical … you’ve got it […]

Posted on April 21, 2019

From Chauvinism to Empathy

Racism is antithetical to the inherent worth and dignity of every human being. Yet overt and unbridled expressions of tribalism, nativism and populism are on the rise. Fear, intolerance and resentment of other ethnic and cultural groups are increasingly weaponized to stir inbred fears, influence voters and undermine the progress we thought had been made […]

Posted on April 11, 2019

What is Enough?

I’ve known many high achievers (some of whom were clients) who’ve been plagued with incessant self-doubt that they would never accomplish the expectations or lofty standards they’d set for themselves, that there was always more they should or could be doing. In order to determine coherence and find balance between our values and our aspirations, […]

Posted on April 4, 2019

Peeling the Onion

Although I’ve used the above phrase for a very long time, it is perhaps more famously known as the title of an autobiographical memoir (published in 2006) by the Nobel Prize-winning author Gunter Grass – an account of his boyhood in a cramped two-room apartment in Danzig through the late 1950s, when his first great […]

Posted on March 28, 2019September 3, 2020

Musings – Part 3

Believing we’re right vs. being right. Sensing we’re right is an addiction of confidence that correlates with our inborn need for certainty. It helps us give meaning to our lives. But this self-induced assurance is no guarantee of being right. According to Daniel Kahneman, who studied when we should trust our gut and when we […]

Posted on March 17, 2019

The Commitment to Listen

Face it: we are lousy listeners. It’s part of what makes us human. Some are more skilled than others but we can surely all get better. Over the course of decades of teaching this critical skill, whenever I’ve asked my students “How can we improve?”, invariably the answer is “Listen harder.” To which I respond, […]