Tremendous Tracey
Prioritizing Humanity or Inhumanity?
As I was celebrating the return of Mike's wallet, Messenger hit me with an unexpected blow—my Facebook account was suspended. A notification popped up on my phone stating that I had violated their policies. I knew this wasn't true. Someone had hacked my account, and just like that, I was blocked and erased. There was no warning, no explanation, and no way to reach a human for support. It was as if I never existed.
The Heat of Preparation: Resilience in the Face of Adversity
Watching the events unfold in Butler, PA, this past week, I was struck by the crowd's reaction to the assassin's shots. Rather than panic, the crowd remained noticeably still, allowing those nearest to the injured to call for help and clear the way for the President's safe exit. It wasn't a scene of chaos; it was a testament to calmness under pressure.
The Three Lanes of Life
Every day we decide which lane we are going to traverse on the highway of our lives. Get by, get ahead, or get eternal? I'll be the first to admit that I have spent time in each lane. As I have matured in resources and knowledge, I have spent less and less time getting by and more time getting ahead. It was only in the past few years that I understood the highest form of existing is to ‘get eternal’. The events of the past few weeks have brought that timeless truth back to the forefront in a spectacular fashion... Read More
Social Distancing, NOT Mental Distancing
When an emergency disrupts our daily routine, we must keep our heads in the game. A crisis is chaotic, confusing, and complicated. In today's global and interconnected world, it is not a question of if an emergency will occur, but when. I recently published research on the effects of an organizational crisis. An event came from out of the left field and threw the two merging organizations into distress. Although the coronavirus pandemic we are experiencing is different in context, there are many similarities of what we can do as leaders and followers to turn confusion into confidence... Read More
Without Ambition, We Are All Butt Dust
Hello tremendous tribe! Although school is out for summer, yours truly has been up to her eyeballs in writing and rewriting my dissertation research on the Theory of Motivation. I interviewed 28 individuals who went through a merger, which turned into a crisis. Part of this study is about resiliency. If you are an innately resilient person, external events don't matter much. You can do a merger a day, no matter how chaotic, and remain grounded. If you're not resilient, it’s all bad, no matter the reality. Anytime we are faced with something outside our comfort zone, we have two options: to become excited or to become entrenched.
It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Research
This past week I moved one step closer to achieving one of my life goals; I completed my Prospectus hearing for my doctorate in leadership. This milestone includes the written front end of your dissertation and a briefing on your research problem and the methodology whereby you intend to go forth and gather data. My hearing was this past Wednesday and my readers and several faculty members who were with me since the beginning were in attendance.
Seeking an Organization that Turned Chaos into Opportunity
Tremendous tribe, I need your help! I am searching for an organization that has successfully navigated its way through a challenge as part of my doctoral research on the perceptions of leader effectiveness in an organizational crisis. My goal is to conduct a case study on follower motivation and engagement as the crisis unfolded, and the team emerged on the other side. At the core of the proposed research is the study of leader perceptions in the follower's mind.
Falling Apart or Falling Into Place?
Unless you are broken, you cannot be transformed. You need to melt the ice before it can be remolded. If you want to be a vessel that is poured out in service to others, you must be put in the kiln repeatedly in temperatures over 1,000 degrees.
When Worlds Collide
Much of what living a tremendous life involves is deconstructing what is and reconstructing it to what can be. Life is like a jigsaw puzzle where you get to create the picture on the box as you go. There’s a timeless tension between where we are right now and where we want to be in the future. If there's one thing I've learned it's that intentionality trumps capability. There is no use in saying, "I can," unless you follow it up with an, “I will.”
