There was deafening silence on the floor. Andy had just finished chastising Sarah. Andy was fastidious, hard to please with such assignments, but Sarah was green. She was giving it her best. Everybody around could see how upset she was. Averting her eyes, she walked to the pantry at the end of the floor. Her manager Rhea watched it all unfold. Sarah walked up to her to seek her advice on the next steps and Rhea had nothing for her. She just said “you screwed up.”

Sometimes I watch an episode or two of Madam Secretary (1)- and it gets me thinking about crucial conversations and starting with your heart like nothing else. While it’s great to have your team skilled in crucial conversations, it is even better if those who teach it to the team also practice it themselves within that very organization. Elizabeth McCord is the Secretary of State for the US (in the fictional world of Madam Secretary). She’s hastily brought in after her predecessor suddenly gets killed/ dies.

A mentor helps you reach your potential and a sponsor flies political cover while you are at it. It’s as simple as that and as complicated. Your sponsor champions you, has your back and makes sure that you have space to grow. Your mentor on the other hand is the one that gets to see you in all your vulnerable glory, your moments of self doubt, your struggle with achieving mastery and your silent commitment to becoming great at what you already do well.

All culture change is rooted in influencing human behaviour. Any successful change strategy is centred around “high leverage” behaviours, which means the behaviours that have a disproportionate effect on change, on people, on teams and in organisations. There’s been a lot of study on why culture change fails. Let’s spin it and take a look at why culture change works. “He has allowed ideas to bloom”.

Over the last 2.5 years, LinkedIn has become the social media platform that I use the most. I rely on LinkedIn for almost all my business connects, but it wasn’t so before. Earlier I relied on referrals, networking events, the works. Still do, but LinkedIn is where I check out the competition and the stakeholders. I remember thinking couple of years ago about why would people come to my profile? What about my profile will give them an idea about who or what I am or my offerings? I started with doing daily posts, sometimes sharing a personal story.