Mark Donovan & Associates – Videos
The road to what we want out of life is not smooth.
The road to genuine personal attainment is not straight, wide and downhill.
Are you ready for the setbacks along the way, and are you resilient enough to keep going?
We all need to feel useful and appreciated.
Are you making yourself accessible to your clients and showing them you care?
We all need to feel appreciated.
Who am I?
I’m your constant companion, I’m your greatest helper, or your heaviest burden.
I will push you onward, or drag you down to failure.
I am completely at your command, who am I?
Do you really want to change?
Humans are unique in our ability to willingly change.
We can change our attitude, our appearance, our skills, but only when we want to!!
Build your life by climbing one step a day!
Many of us dealing with the current crisis, are worried about, what will happen next?
What will have changed?
What will be different?
Their problem is not your problem!
When we jump in and try to solve someone else’s problem we are enabling them.
Once we take the problem from them, we are also taking away their ability to solve it.
What are the most in demand skills in the world today?
Do you have what it takes to influence, communicate and deal effectively with other people?
Why people are like elastic bands!
In my experience people are like elastic bands.
When we are stretched, we never go back to our original ways of doing things.
Be thankful for what you DON’T have!
In the current climate, it’s easy for us all to look at what we don’t have.
Working with my clients, one of the first things I get them to focus on is, what they are thankful for in their lives.
Bad things happen to good people!
Things happen to us over which we have little or no control.
We cannot move forward if we just sit around feeling powerless and blaming others for our circumstances.
Beware of the victim cycle…….
We will never accomplish anything unless we start taking control of our own future.
The key is self responsibility, we can’t do this until we first develop an understanding of the victim cycle.
Optimism is the fuel!
There is so much doom and gloom at the moment.
We hear on a daily basis, ”Will this ever end!”.
Life will never be the same again.
Are you a hustler?
I love sayings!
My favourite one is ‘every thing in life comes to those who wait…..well, what’s left by those who hustle’.
I’m not the finished product yet, are you?
In times of dramatic change, it is the learners who will inherit the future.
The learner usually finds themselves equipped to live in the changing world of today.
Who is the only person we can change?
We always have the power to create significant positive change.
When we are faced with any situation we always have two choices ……..Accept the situation as it is or Take self-responsibility for changing the part that we can influence
Do you want to fly to the moon?
When we take self-responsibility for taking action, stuff happens.
The more we ‘move’, the more things we will learn and this eventually leads to results.
When we get results, it leads to motivation and inspiration, which leads back to more movement.
Are you just getting through the day?
To what end is tomorrow just another day to get through?
After you get through all the days, then what happens?
What if we saw opportunities instead of tasks?
Start your day with a key initiative
Routines inevitably lead to efficiency, since they remove the decision-making step, saving us time and energy.
Are you setting the tone for your day, how are you spending the first 30 minutes of your day?
Who am I?
I am your constant companion.
I am your greatest helper or your heaviest burden.
I will push you onward or drag you down to failure.
Live life successfully one day at a time!
None of us know what is going to happen in the future!
No one foresaw the situation we would be in today!
Are you taking self-responsibility for living life successfully one day at a time?
Get more done while you are working from home
The challenge for many of us who, are now working from home is to the deal with the inevitable distractions that we don’t normally have to deal with.
What are your top three priorities, that if you do them everything else will be easier or unnecessary?
Life is not what we want it to be, life is what we make it!
Many people today are worried about the long term effects of what will happen to the economy, to world travel, will things ever get back to normal?
What do you need to do over the next 12 months to start moving forward towards your goals?
Beware of boredom
Boredom can occur when we feel energetic but have nowhere to direct our energy.
It can be marked by an empty feeling, as well as a sense of frustration with that emptiness.
But, we can look at it as a “call to action” to get focused on what’s really important to us
Resilience
Resilience is the ability not only to bounce back from adversity but to also to grow from it.
Don’t lose this once in a lifetime opportunity to become a better leader, partner, parent.
In the Winter the fisherman repairs his sails!
Worry is like a rocking chair, It keeps us moving but it gets us nowhere.
We always have choices in how we react to adverse situations in our lives.
What way are you going to use this time to do the things you have been putting off?
It’s not a Knowledge Problem it’s an Execution Problem
Would you be surprised if I told you that cigarettes are not a good source of vitamin C!
Or that watching hours of reality TV does not dramatically raise your IQ!
Probably not!
None of us are indispensable
Do the best you can and be proud of yourself, but remember, there is no indispensable person.
Are you working at the level you are being paid to work at?
When working with a senior leadership team last week, one of the senior team said they had no time to work on our agreed strategy and cultural outputs from the session.
She went on to say, that because she was so busy, she didn’t know when she would actually have the time to work on these key areas with her team.
Does anyone really change after doing a Leadership Development Programme?
I’ve conducted hundreds of Leadership Development Programmes over the last 10 years, and my conclusion is that very few people achieve positive and lasting behavioural change without real structured follow-up.
Turn down your sensitivity barometers
People today go out of their way to be offended, is this really necessary? and how much energy and focus is this taking us away from what we really need to achieve in our businesses and our lives.
Beware of the ‘Jam Doughnut Effect’
When I work with leaders, I’m a huge believer in the power of feedback, particularly positive feedback for driving high performance, engagement and staff retention.
Are you giving feedback to your key stakeholders that is specific and to the point?
The Importance of having a Compelling Vision for 2020
Without a compelling reason to choose otherwise most of us with take comfortable actions over uncomfortable actions.
Our most value added actions are usually the ones that are most difficult to do.
Is there ever enough time?
The biggest challenge that my clients tell me today is, they don’t have enough time.
But there is never enough time!
If we look at time as the resource, then we will be continually stuck for getting the things we really need to get done, done.
What is a personal brand?
One of the value added areas that I work with my clients on today, is developing their personal brand.
What is a personal brand?
The best term I like is, a personal brand is…. ‘What do you get, when you get me?
The Importance of Eating the Dessert First!
This is being grateful for what we have while we are striving for more and to be better.
What are you grateful for that maybe you have been taking for granted in your life?.
Catch your key people doing the RIGHT things!
A recent Forbes study concluded that, the number one reason that people leave organisations is through lack of appreciation.
What we need to do as leaders is get in the habit of catching our key people doing the RIGHT things and give them the positive feedback they deserve!
The biggest barrier to success is ourselves!!
When the voice in our head says, ‘why me?’
The next time the voice in your head says, ‘why me?’, change it for, ‘why not me?’.
Do you want to be liked, or respected?
The question I want to ask today is, do you want to be liked or respected?
When I ask this questions to leaders that I work with, they all say they want to be respected.
Stop looking for job security!
Stop looking for job security…….it is not out there!!
Are you doing the work you are best at, for those who appreciate and value it?
Take a look in the mirror
One area I look at a lot of clients doing is getting them to look in the mirror.
This way they can see the blindspots that may be limiting in their career.
By recognising these blindspots and holding up the mirror you can propel your career or business forward.
Accepting self-responsibility and taking action.
One of the key concepts that I put across with my clients is accepting self responsibility and taking action.
My philosophy is very much around ‘accepting self-responsibility for something we want to change and most importantly, taking some action to do it.’
How do I engage my people to work more effectively in the organisation?
The one key tool that costs absolutely nothing to implement and give the biggest results in getting your people to engage at the highest level possible is…. recognition!!
Is lack of confidence holding you back?
One of the biggest things that hold people back is lack of confidence.
If you develop your assertiveness skills, confidence follows.
Confidence follows being assertive, if you are assertive , your confidence will develop.
Are you a rower or are you a steerer?
The reason most people get promoted is because they are good rowers, which means they are good at doing the job!
When you become a leader what you need to do is…….become more of a steerer, and that is guiding people to do the jobs they need to do.