CG.com Podcast #013: Identify the Personal Constaints Holding you Back; Interview with Flip Flippen

Wow. All that I can say about educator, psychotherapist, and author Flip Flippen, is that he is truly cultivating greatness. I had the honor of interviewing this brilliant man yesterday. This podcast is full of wisdom!

CG.com Leadership Podcast #013 - Interview with Flip Flippen


Flip Flippen is the head of The Flippen Group He has worked with businesses and individuals all over the world, including baseball legend Nolan Ryan, Terry Bradshaw’s NASCAR racing team, and some of the largest school districts in the country. In thirty years of coaching couples, families, corporations, and individuals, Flip has learned invaluable skills that can help people in all aspects of their lives. Their company philosophy is “We Grow People”.

This man has an amazing amount of great advice and sage principles to help you overcome some of your shortcomings and personal constraints.

Not only top-level executives, but anyone in your audience can benefit from Flippen’s advice. He explains that the first thing people need to understand are The Five Laws Of Personal Constraints™, which include:
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Peter Drucker On Leadership

by Rich Karlgaard

Peter F. Drucker was born 95 years ago today [Nov. 19, 2004]-can it be possible?-in Vienna. The universally known writer, thinker and lecturer now is nearly deaf and doesn’t get around like he used to. He stopped giving media interviews about a year ago. But in late October, Drucker granted an exception to Forbes.com at the urging of Dr. Rick Warren, the founder and head of the Christian evangelical Saddleback Community Church in Lake Forest, Calif.

The Drucker-Warren relationship may surprise many readers, but it goes back two decades, to when the young minister came to Drucker for advice. Under Drucker’s tutelage, Warren’s own success as a spiritual entrepreneur has been considerable. Saddleback has grown to 15,000 members and has helped start another 60 churches throughout the world. Warren’s 2001 book, The Purpose-Driven Life, is this decade’s best seller with 19.5 million copies sold so far and compiling at the rate of 500,000 per month.

Warren and I met at Drucker’s surprisingly spartan home in Claremont, Calif., on a cloudy Tuesday morning. We were greeted by Drucker’s wife, Doris, and ushered into the den for what developed into a two-hour conversation. During the first 30 minutes, Drucker-a religious man himself, albeit of a more muted Episcopalian type as compared to Warren’s exuberant brand of Southern Baptist-advised Warren on the challenges of ministry and church building. This consultation is one Drucker and Warren have engaged in twice yearly for two decades. For the last 90 minutes we moved to broader topics. Below are Drucker’s thoughts on leadership. (Click here for Drucker’s official biography.)

What Needs to Be Done
Successful leaders don’t start out asking, “What do I want to do?” They ask, “What needs to be done?” Then they ask, “Of those things that would make a difference, which are right for me?” They don’t tackle things they aren’t good at. They make sure other necessities get done, but not by them. Successful leaders make sure that they succeed! They are not afraid of strength in others. Andrew Carnegie wanted to put on his gravestone, “Here lies a man who knew how to put into his service more able men than he was himself.”

Check Your Performance
Effective leaders check their performance. They write down, “What do I hope to achieve if I take on this assignment?” They put away their goals for six months and then come back and check their performance against goals. This way, they find out what they do well and what they do poorly. They also find out whether they picked the truly important things to do. I’ve seen a great many people who are exceedingly good at execution, but exceedingly poor at picking the important things. They are magnificent at getting the unimportant things done. They have an impressive record of achievement on trivial matters.

Mission Driven
Leaders communicate in the sense that people around them know what they are trying to do. They are purpose driven-yes, mission driven. They know how to establish a mission. And another thing, they know how to say no. The pressure on leaders to do 984 different things is unbearable, so the effective ones learn how to say no and stick with it. They don’t suffocate themselves as a result. Too many leaders try to do a little bit of 25 things and get nothing done. They are very popular because they always say yes. But they get nothing done.
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How To Project Leadership

by Wil Schroter

There you are, sitting at the head of the conference table staring into the faces of your new subordinates. They know you’ve never led this group before. They know you’re new to this leadership position. Heck, they may even be aware that you’ve never held a leadership position since you were the captain of your foosball team.



As a result, you might be asking yourself, “How do I project the leadership skills of Napoleon Bonaparte when my team is looking at me like Napoleon Dynamite?”

The short answer is: You fake it. But faking leadership is an art form in and of itself, and one that has been practiced by newly minted leaders that range from ancient royal princes to President George W. Bush.

There are a few ways to legitimately project leadership, and they all come down to knowing how to manage your power position without revealing how little you actually know. Most new leaders are capable of leading, but they must first face the challenge and understand the role and process of being a leader.

Lead the charge
The hallmark of a good leader is his ability to set the tone of the organization. That means showing up first and leaving last. It means that if you want your salespeople to make 50 phone calls per day, show them you’re willing to make 100.

No one can discredit a leader who is willing to work harder than everyone else. That’s why certain generals are famous; they led the charge into battle, demonstrating a willingness to lead and to assume more risk than anyone else.
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CG.com Podcast #012: Author Interview: Paco Ahlgren - Discipline

As the publisher of CultivateGreatness.com, we get books sent to us from literary publicists. There have been some great ones filter my way recently, so I decided to start interviewing them and sharing the wisdom with the listeners.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to do the first interview with an extremely intelligent, first time author Paco Ahlgren. His book Discipline is highly recommended for those who enjoy quick-paced page turning thrill-rides.

Here is the Podcast interview with Paco Ahlgren, August 20th, 2007

Building on the vision of Kurt Vonnegut, the suspense of Michael Crichton, the rich characters of Stephen King, and the passion of George Orwell, Paco Ahlgren’s first novel Discipline paints a chilling picture of a world that defies human perception.

Science, politics, economics and spirituality fuse explosively in this visionary thriller. In some far future-or is it past?-Philip K. Dick nods with satisfaction.

-Jeffrey Satinover, physicist and psychiatrist, author of “The Quantum Brain”

I sat and read this book in two settings. This book is hard to put down. There are many clichés used in book reviews such as ‘page turner’, ‘gripping’, and many more … but they ALL certainly apply to DISCIPLINE by Paco Ahlgren.

Ahlgren deftly melds the intimacy of one man’s personal journey of self-knowledge with cosmic, mind-expanding concepts of quantum physics, time travel, and multiple universes. The stunning and skillfully constructed story combines elements of metaphysics, romance, fantasy and even sci-fi, with an intricate plot and fully realized characters. The end result is a page-turner that haunts you long after you’ve closed the book. “Discipline” is a masterful first novel that rivals the works of many more “mature” authors with dozens of books to their credit.

And what a story it is, for it surely stretches the mind even as it entertains. I look forward with delicious anticipation to everything Ahlgren writes in the future.”

Dr. Marie D. Jones, author of “PSIence: How New Discoveries in Quantum Physics and New Science May Explain the Existence of Paranormal Phenomena.”

Paco, I thank you for the opportunity to talk with you and interview you. I hope that many of my readers pick up your wonderful book!

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