Teams365 Blog - Potentials Realized

#TEAMS365 #2038 – Focus in the Hot Days of Summer

7/30/2019

Some readers will find themselves mid-way through summer, with another month until the fall routine kicks in with Labor Day.

As I have written this month, simplification, renewal and digital detox are all topics which rise to the surface at this time of year when we move to a summertime routine.

Whether it’s due to the weather, summer time travel, or different working routines, changing our schedules and ways of working can lead to new lengths.

It may be useful to pause and take stock of the last month and notice:

Where has your focus been? How has this helped? Hindered?
What’s worked for you with your routine?
What do you want to make sure you continue doing, even as things speed up?
What have you “let go of….” (this may be part of your work routine, tasks or regular schedule”?
What space has this created?
What do you further want to simplify as you move into a fall routine?
What focus do you want to have going forward into August? Into the rest of the year?

Revisit your annual vision and make adjustments as you would like.

Warm regards,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #2028 – Weekly Journaling Prompt 59

7/20/2019

This week’s Weekly Journaling Prompt gets you to write around the prompt of “I appreciate….”

Appreciations can range from:

Taking stock about the things that are working can be important
Saying thank you to others in your work of life on a regular basis
Making a practice of taking stock at the end of the day three things you are grateful for. This exercise which comes from positive psychology has been shown to have positive impact.

Here’s an article you might want to explore from Forbes entitled: 10 Reasons You Need To Show Appreciation Daily By David Sturt and Todd Nordstrom

What are you going to do to focus on appreciation this week?

Best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #2021 Weekly Journaling Prompt 58

7/13/2019

It’s Saturday which means that it’s time for another Weekly Journaling Prompt. This week’s post gets you to consider the question “One thing I want to let go of is…”.

This is part of a weekly series. Take a look at past posts here.

Enjoy the reflection!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #2010 - Renewal

7/2/2019

Welcome to the month of July! This month is about simplification, and reconnecting to renewal and well being. As we know from high performance research, great teams and leaders need renewal in order to go hard.

With this in mind, this month’s posts are going to focus on items such as:

Digital Detox
Work-life
Focus
Simplification
Habits
Creativity

This month I work from my northern office. I crave these six or seven weeks a year where I get to work really remote. I practice many of the topics we are going to touch on today – from simplification, to digital detox. While I work most days, I’m off the line by 1 or 2 in the afternoon, creating space and a pause to reconnect with my creative passions, and renewing after a busy year. The digital detox is the part I enjoy the most - checking email strategically throughout the week. The most challenging part of it is managing other's expectations. I've found that clearly communicating to clients my "offline" summer availability has made it a realistic way of working - and many of them opt to pick up the phone rather than shoot off multiple emails.

What do you do at this time of year to renew?

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1998: Team Building Tip 241

6/20/2019

In recent years, more and more organizations have become more aware of the importance of growth mindset. Coined by Carol Dweck, growth mindset invites all of us into an ongoing learning insight. To learn more about Caro Dweck’s Work – visit her TED Talk - If you haven't heard Dweck talk about her work on mindset, here is a video.

Part of growth mindset, and at the heart of continuous learning is the notion that we may not yet have mastered things YET. As I assert in my writing, growth is about ongoing action, reflection, feedback and iteration. In fact, the tagline for my two recent planners, PlanDoTrack and the Coaching Business Builder, is Consistent Action + Daily Steps = Momentum.

It is through these daily steps and ongoing action that we see what works, and what doesn’t. It means that we are always learning and adjusting as we go.
As a team this week, I hope that you will engage in the discussion of “What haven’t WE mastered yet?”.

What are we still learning from, and learning about?

Enjoy the conversation!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1980 – Weekly Journaling Prompt #52: AT your Best....

6/2/2019

It’s time for another weekly journaling prompt. These are geared to get you to build in a pause point every week and think about what is important to you.

This week the question is “at my best I am….”

In past posts I've shared the benefits of journaling. You can read that post here.

One of the activities I take a lot of teams through is this reflectin of who they are when they are at their best. Reconnecting with what's worked, and who we are when we are leveraging our skills and strengths can create a strong pivot.

Today I hope you will find some time to create a few minutes to capture reflections of times when you were at your best.

Enjoy your writing!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1977 – Team Building Tip #238 – Perspectives

5/30/2019

Welcome back to another Thursday Teams365 blog post. This week’s question to explore is “What’s another way of looking at that?”

In today’s world of doing more with less, and ongoing change, it can be invaluable to reframe and adjust perspectives around our biggest challenges, and opportunities.

As you and your team consider what your biggest challenge is right now, ask the question – "What’s another way of looking at that?”. To get your ideas flowing around reframing consider these areas which might shift things:

Resourcing
Supports
Collaboration
What would you do if you knew you would not fail?
What is the flip side of this issue?
What would saying NO to ____ look like?
If we added ____ what would happen?

Exploring multiple perspectives around a challenge, or opportunity, often generates new ideas and insights.

Enjoy the conversation!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1972 – Weekly Journaling Prompt 51

5/25/2019

This week’s Weekly Journaling Prompt gets you thinking about the question “Something I won’t forget….”

Our memories can easily fade and transmute with time. Writing things out provides us with a clearer indication of what did happen.

As you consider the events from the last few months, what are the things you want to remember? What are the things you don’t want to forget next time….?

A quick reminder that I have pulled the Weekly Journaling Prompts together in a quarterly format. You can pick up and download the first 12 weeks of the series in a new downloadable booklet format at the Potentials Realized store. Here are a few shots of Volume 1 – the first 12 weeks in action.

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1970 – Team Building Tip 237

5/23/2019

This week’s Team Building Tip gets you thinking “outside of the box”. Challenges and opportunities exist all the time. What are the solutions which could be activated around your most pressing business challenge?

One of the frameworks I like to share with teams I work with is the Six Thinking Hats from DeBono. Read more about this topic here.

With the Six Thinking Hats we are encouraged to look at issues from a variety of perspectives –

what’s possible,
what new ideas can we generate,
what are the benefits of the approaches,
what caution do we need to heed,
what are the facts and
what might get in the way.

If you are not familiar with De Bono’s Six Thinking Hats model, take a look at his work and writing.

Wishing you all the best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1968 – Teamwork in Uncertainty – Pivot

5/21/2019

As a writer, one of my favorite past times is heading to the library for some focused writing. I often try to fit it in on Tuesdays. When I am there, I usually check out the business book selection. Two titles, both named Pivot, recently caught my attention. Jenny Blake’s Pivot explores the shifts and turns we can make in our career. The 2nd Pivot book is by Adam Markel. Pivot: The Art and Science of Reinventing Your Career and Life.

Both are great reads for those looking at ongoing performance and change. Whether we work for others or ourselves, we can all benefit from the tools and tips in both books.

The Cambridge Dictionary defines pivot as:

a fixed point supporting something that turns or balances;
the central or most important person or thing in a situation.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/pivot

As you consider your biggest opportunity or challenge right now, consider:

What is creating balance in the situation right now?
What is the fulcrum around what things are turning?
What is the important person/issue in this situation?
What is the most central item?
With this information in mind, what’ s possible? What are the options for next steps?

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development).
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in an digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.