Friday, October 28, 2011

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

KJ Innovations Launches A New Website To Keep Clients Up To Speed During Growth

KJ Innovations Launches A New Website To Keep Clients Up To Speed During Growth

KJ Innovations has launched the new website to keep the public informed as it grows. KJ Innovations, Inc. is focusing on aggressively growing its operations in 2011.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Informative Article On Leadership - The Best Advice on Being a Business Leader Part 1: Top Business Leaders Share Their Best Advice

Fortune magazine once published an article entitled "The Best Advice I Ever Got". It was a great article that offered wit and wisdom about achieving business success. I liked it so much, that it motivated me to produce my book, Leadership: Best Advice I Ever Got, which describes the best advice 136 successful CEOs, coaches, consultants, professors, managers, executives, presidents, politicians, and religious leaders received that most helped them become effective and successful business leaders.

Here is their best advice.

1. A leader makes things happen.

If you want to make something happen with your life - in school, in your profession or in your community, do it. Perceived obstacles crumble against persistent desire.

John Baldoni, Author, Leadership Communication Consultant and Founder of Baldoni Consulting LLC, shared this advice that had come from his father, a physician. He taught him the value of persistence. At the same time, his mother taught him compassion for others. Therefore, persistence for your cause should not be gained at the expense of others. Another bit of leadership wisdom!

2. Listen and understand the issue, then lead.

Time and time again we have all been told, "God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason"... or as Stephen Covey said, "Seek to understand, rather than be understood." As a business leader, listening first to the issue, then trying to coach, has been the most valuable advice that Cordia Harrington, President and CEO of Tennessee Bun Company has been given.

3. A successful business leader can answer the three questions everyone within his or her organization wants answers to.

What the people of an organization want from their leader are answers to the following: "Where are we going?" "How are we going to get there?" "What is my role?" Kevin Nolan, President & Chief Executive Officer of Affinity Health Systems, Inc. believes the more clarity that can be added to the answers to each of the three questions, the better the result.

4. Successful business leaders need to master the skills that will allow them to work anywhere in today's dynamic business world.

Debbe Kennedy, President, CEO and Founder of Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies, and author of Action Dialogues and Breakthrough once shared this piece of advice that was instrumental in shaping her direction, future and achievements.

She was a young manager at IBM just promoted to her first staff assignment in a regional marketing office. For reasons she can't explain, one of her colleagues named Bookie called her into his office while she was visiting his location. He then began to offer unsolicited advice, advice that now stays fresh in her mind. He mentioned that jobs, missions, titles and organizations would come and go as business is dynamic - meaning it is always changing. He advised her not to focus your goals toward any of these, but instead learn to master the skills that will allow you to work anywhere.

He was talking about four skills:

    The ability to develop an idea;
    Effectively plan for its implementation;
    Execute second-to-none;
    Achieve superior results time after time.

With this in mind, Kennedy's best advice is to seek jobs and opportunities with this in mind. Forget what others do. Work to be known for delivering excellence. It speaks for itself and it opens doors.

Paul B. Thornton presents more of the best advice for being a successful business leader that seven top leaders ever received on the next page. Click to continue reading about effective leadership.Here's more of the best advice on how to be an effective leader from seven top business leaders.

5. An effective business leader has to be curious.

Curiosity is a prerequisite to continuous improvement and even excellence. The person who gave Mary Jean Thornton, Former Executive Vice President & CIO, The Travelers, this advice urged her to study people, processes, and structures. He inspired her to be intellectually curious. He often reminded Thornton that making progress, in part, was based upon thinking.

She has learned to apply this notion of intellectual curiosity by thinking about her organization's future, understanding the present, and knowing and challenging herself to creatively move the people and the organization closer to its vision.

6. An effective business leader has to listen to both sides of the argument.

The best advice Brian P. Lees, Massachusetts State Senator and Senate Minority Leader, ever received came from his mentor, United States Senator Edward W. Brooke III. He told him to listen to all different kinds of people and ideas.

Listening only to those who share your background and opinions can be imprudent. It is important to respect your neighbors' rights to their own views. Listening to and talking with a variety of people, from professors to police officers, from senior citizens to school children, is essential not only to be a good business leader, but to also be a valuable member within your community.

7. Prepare, prepare, prepare.

If you fail to prepare, you are preparing to fail. If one has truly prepared and something goes wrong the strength of the rest of what you've prepared for usually makes this something easier to handle without crisis and panic. One of the best pieces of advice Dave Hixson, Men’s Varsity Basketball Coach at Amherst College has ever received and continues to use and pass on is this anonymous quote - "Preparation is the science of winning."

Along with this are two expressions from Rick Pitino's book Success is a Choice, which speaks to preparation. Hixson asks his teams every year: "Do you deserve to win?" and "Have you done the work?" This speaks to the importance of preparation toward achieving your final goal. If you haven't done the work (the preparation) the answer to the second question is an easy "no!"

One Last Piece of Best Advice

Great advice on being an effective business leader comes from many sources - parents, other relatives, consultants, bosses, co-workers, mentors, teachers, coaches, and friends. The important point to remember is to stay open, listen to everyone, but also develop your own leadership style.

Check Out The Latest About KJ Innovations On The Web

Monday, September 26, 2011

Top Team Members At KJ Innovations Travel

KJ Innovations sends two top performing team members to attend a national leadership convention in Nashville, TN. The conference, held June 24th-26th, took place at the Nashville Convention Center.

KJ Innovations, Inc. is a marketing firm that specializes in outsourced sales, client retention, and acquisition for service based companies. KJ's approach enhances client brand loyalty, which translates into increased revenues and long-term success.

The national conference brought together executives from companies across the country. Attendees were given the opportunity to sit in on coaching sessions on leadership, managment, human resources and general business skills. Each session was taught by a specialist in their topic.

“I could not be more proud for how the whole team here has stepped up and taken charge in driving the business to the next level,” explains Nick Laffery, President of KJ Innovations. "I hope to offer more opportunities such as this in the near future.”

The reward was given to the top two account executives who had contributed to the company by taking on the most responsibilities, displaying consistent results in job performance, as well as showing superior leadership ability.

KJ Innovations is a leader in the direct sales and marketing industry that prides itself and providing for its clients and employees through integrity, hard work and determination. Currently KJ Innovations is creating a pathway in the energy consulting field, and plans on expansion into new markets in the upcoming year.

Great Article On Secrets Of Leadership Success

Secrets of Leadership Success
Leadership Success Series Introduced

By Susan M. Heathfield, About.com Guide
See More About:

Key leadership success secrets set the great leaders apart from the so-so leaders in today's organizations. Leadership style is learned from mentors, learned in seminars and exists as part of a person's innate personal leadership skill set developed over years, and existing possibly, from birth. Nature or nurture is a question often asked about leadership. I answer, "yes," because I believe the combination of natural leadership skills and nurture through leadership development defines your leadership style.

Working from personal experience and research, I will define the characteristics of leadership that make great leaders. I envision a series of interlinked articles, each of which focuses on one aspect of leadership.

Leadership differs from management and supervision although some people and organizations use the terms interchangeably. While the definitions of the terms differ, an individual may have the ability to provide all three.

Supervision means that an individual is charged with providing direction and oversight for other employees. The successful supervisor provides recognition, appreciation, training and feedback to reporting employees.


Management means to conduct the affairs of business, to have work under control and to provide direction, to guide other employees, to administer and organize work processes and systems, and to handle problems. Managers monitor and control work while helping a group of employees more successfully conduct their work than they would have without her. A manager’s job is often described as providing everything his reporting employees need to successfully accomplish their jobs. One famous quote from Warren Bennis, Ph.D. in On Becoming a Leader distinguishes management from leadership: “Managers are people who do things right, while leaders are people who do the right thing.”

While a supervisor and a manager may also exhibit leadership skill or potential, true leaders are rare. This is because the combination of skills, personality and ambition essential to leadership are difficult to develop and exhibit. According to Don Clark, on his excellent leadership resource, Big Dog's Leadership Page, Bernard "Bass' theory of leadership states that there are three basic ways to explain how people become leaders. The first two explain the leadership development for a small number of people. These theories are:
       
Some personality traits may lead people naturally into leadership roles. This is the Trait Theory.    

A crisis or important event may cause a person to rise to the occasion, which brings out extraordinary leadership qualities in an ordinary person. This is the Great Events Theory.
       
People can choose to become leaders. People can learn leadership skills. This is the Transformational Leadership Theory.”

The Transformational Leadership Theory is the one I believe is correct for most leaders today. This belief forms the basis for my thinking about leadership.

The Key Leadership Trait

The first, and most important characteristic, of a leader is the decision to become a leader. At some point in time, leaders decide that they want to provide others with vision, direct the course of future events and inspire others to success. Leadership requires the individual to practice dominance and take charge. If you choose to become a leader, whether in your workplace, community or during an emergency, the discussion of these characteristics will help you formulate the appropriate mix of traits, skills and ambition. Successful leaders choose to lead. Unlike Keanu Reeves as Neo in 1999’s smash hit, The Matrix, you get to decide whether you are “the one.” The first characteristic of a leader is Choice - leaders choose to lead.

Characteristics of a Successful Leadership Style

Much is written about what makes successful leaders. I will focus on the characteristics, traits and actions that, I believe, are key.
  •     Choose to lead.
  •     Be the person others choose to follow.
  •     Provide vision for the future.
  •     Provide inspiration.
  •     Make other people feel important and appreciated.
  •     Live your values. Behave ethically.
  •     Set the pace through your expectations and example.
  •     Establish an environment of continuous improvement.
  •     Provide opportunities for people to grow, both personally and professionally.
  •     Care and act with compassion.