Inventorying your grit, taking a passion check, unwinding identify  from one’s job role, and finding joy in what we do were topics resonating with the BIG team this past week and show up in our curation of our weekly favorite posts…enjoy!

Grit: Perseverance and Passion for Long-Term Goals (Angela Duckworth, Christopher Peterson, Michael D. Matthews, Dennis R. Kelly)

There are those who dream dreams and those whose dreams become reality. Into which group might you fit? Could how much grit — defined by the authors as “perseverance and passion for long-term goals. Grit entails working strenuously toward challenges, maintaining effort and interest over years despite failure, adversity, and plateaus in progress” — you have play a role?

Leading Again for the First Time (Chris Souba, The Ohio State University Journal of Surgical Research 157, 139–153, 2009)

It’s all here: confusing your identity with your role, telling yourself empowering and/or disempowering stories, being mindful of your mental hard drives (what a great turn of phrase!), using interpretative versus evidence-based decision-making, and even two views of reality. All great stuff as a either a primer or review, depending upon where you are in your leadership journey.

The Joyful Heartbeat Checklist (Janet Goldstein on Janet Goldstein)

At BIG we’re fond of asking clients if there’s a heartbeat in their spreadsheets. If you’re caught in the quicksand of meetings, deadlines, and lists of gotta do’s and are looking for escape, you’ll find Janet’s exercise of creating a “Joyful Heartbeat Checklist” a welcome respite.

The Red Hot Heart of Leadership (August Turak on Forbes)

August tells the compelling story of Claire and the value of commitment. “Continual hedging damns us to a life of one foot on the gas and the other on the brake, and when our marriage, business or project fails we never know whether we were wise to hedge or whether we failed because we hedged.”

Cleaning Baby Poop Helps Make Great Leaders (Ben Lichtenwalner, Modern Servant Leader)

What a title — not often is baby poo offered up as a leadership development tool. We’re on a bit of a leadership humility kick here at GYBO, so it’s fascinating how Ben uses cleaning up kid’s nasty diapers as a storytelling vehicle, prompting leaders to consider whether or not they’re humble enough to get their hands dirty. Good stuff!

Which one are you? “The hero is one who kindles a great light in the world, who sets up blazing torches in the dark streets of life for men to see by. The saint is the man who walks through the dark paths of the world, himself a light.”~Felix Adler

May your week be filled with inspiration and positive power at the intersection of the art of leadership and the science of business!

Photo credit: The People Credit