“The most important thing about leadership is your character and the values that guide your life.” ~ Brenda Barnes

The above quote really sums up what leadership is to me because a title alone does not make you a leader. A person can have a title and people can report into them (more…)

I started off my working life as a fitness instructor and breaking into IT was quite a challenge. As you can imagine I took every opportunity that presented itself. I started off working in a credit card software company (a start up/stay up) that had a great buzz about it. It wasn’t long before I was moved to a software development team and then that great buzz turned into an annoying din! My new boss had a unique management style… (more…)

It has been interesting chatting with people over the last few weeks about how they really didn’t like the idea of working from home when we went into lockdown and now they don’t want to go back into the office – they prefer to work from home! The human psyche is very interesting, isn’t it? Initially when things change we push back against it, it causes stress, worry and concern. This is perfectly natural because, believe it or not, we’re designed (more…)

We’re well and truly over the lock down period now and I know a lot of organisations are in discussions with their teams about how they’d like to move forward in terms of creating a balance between working from home and working from the office. It’s not as straight forward as you might think because before the lock down the majority of people were working from the office and working from home, for most people, was only an exception. (more…)

Now that we’re over the worst of the pandemic (well, in New Zealand anyway) it’s important to start to look to the future. Whether you’re in business for yourself, part of a team, or leading a team, creating a compelling future is vital for getting up and running after a significant change. Whenever I need to create a new direction I always return to a tried and tested formula; I call it the R.I.D.E. formula and, even though (more…)

I hope you and those close to you are safe and well. These are challenging times and they are certainly invoking a lot of different emotions for people. As a leader, all we can do is provide support to our teams and encourage them to make themselves the priority. If your experience is anything like my own, you probably jumped into the response to the pandemic with a sense of gusto and challenge; however, as the weeks (more…)

I’m sitting on Tauranga beach writing this and with St Patrick’s Day looming I can’t help but think about the impact that one man has had, not only on the lives of every Irish person, but also on generations of Irish people all over the world. The story of St Patrick is an interesting one and one I recommend having a quick look at. When St Patrick was converting Irish people to follow God he was called upon by the king of Ireland (more…)

It’s the beginning of another year and of course I’m going to talk about goal setting. It’s such an important part of our personal and professional development, and is an absolute must in your leadership toolkit. How many of us set goals for the new year, start off with a hiss and roar but have nothing to show for our efforts a couple of months later. We’ve all been guilty of it because goal setting alone isn’t enough. (more…)

I was giving a workshop on communication a few months ago and I shared that the only real way to build relationships was through face to face interactions. One of the participants absolutely stumped me when he vehemently disagreed and proclaimed that in his last role he worked from home and through email and social media formed some the best relationships of his life. I had to agree that the world is changing and that it is possible to form a relationship over the internet but (more…)

A very close friend of mine, Pádraig, was celebrating the christening of his daughter. Louise, my then-girlfriend and now long-suffering wife, and I were invited back to his place to continue the celebrations. Pádraig and I first became friends when we met as fitness instructors at a gym in Dublin. I left the industry, but Pádraig went on to become one of the foremost fitness experts in Ireland, lecturing in Trinity College and having a starring role in a long-running and successful television programme (more…)