I don’t like hype. So, I will try to avoid it.
Here is my story.
Growing up I realized that some people were effective at what they did.
I saw this across different living, learning, working and playing situations.
Each situation had different requirements, and called for people to have different skills, knowledge and abilities.
These effective people exceeded the requirements, and then did more.
They also tried to help/teach/coach others to improve.
I saw this at home, in my neighborhood, among my friend’s families, at school (from elementary thru MBA and PhD graduate programs), at work (from my cousin’s farm thru consulting to large companies), in sports (from little league baseball, thru college football and baseball, up to minor league baseball), and in life as I meet people and try to help those trying to grow.
I earned my PhD from Dr. Robert Carkhuff. His work focused on understanding what makes people effective.
He had a profound vision:
The only meaning to life is growth.
Therefore, growth is worth any price. Even work.
His research focused on the skills and tools effective people use to make a difference.
We applied these skills and tools to a wide range of situations, and got good results.
We taught the skills and tools to people in different living, learning, working and playing situations. They improved their results. And, reached out to help others.
There are scholarly research papers, and books, that cover this work. See the Background lesson.
But there isn’t one place you can go to learn the sub-set of these skills and tools to manage your growth, help others manage theirs, and build growing relationships.
So, I created these lessons for people who want to add to their existing skills and tools.
We all face living, learning, working and playing situations where our success depends on our ability to:
- Decide on our Personal Brand - the type of person we want to be in a situation.
- Explore the situation and decide if/how we want to be involved.
- Determine the role we are expected to play, and decide if/how we want to proceed..
- Identify growth opportunities that clarify the short- and long-term value of the situation.
- Specify the things we need to improve to meet our requirements.
- Make personal decisions at key steps in our life.
- Monitor our progress, and revise our efforts to succeed.
- Communicate with people to gain their support of your efforts.
- Help others personalize their use of the skills and tools to manage their growth.
- Coach others to improve their performance.
- Use the skills and tools to build and improve growing relationships.
Think about your skills and tools.
We all face situations every day where our ability to perform the right mix of these skills and tools determines our results.
But where can you go to learn these skills and tools, put the right ones together to fit your situations, and manage your growth?
This is why I created this site and these lessons.
If you would like to add to your skills and tools, and don’t mind some work, these lessons are for you.
Regarding Feedback. I put the material out on a website so I could make changes in response to constructive questions and feedback. So, I welcome your constructive questions and feedback.
You can use the comments at the ends of each lesson, the Questions & Feedback buttons in the headers, or email us at support@tools4mygrowth.com.