With March being Women’s History Month, and the Southwest Institute for Emotional Intelligence recently becoming a certified women-owned business, I want to celebrate a special woman in history: Barbe-Nicole Clicquot. A Spotlight on the Grande Dame of Champagne Let’s take a closer look at 19th century female entrepreneur, Barbe-Nicole Clicquot, who created the modern champagne industry and led Veuve (which means “widow” in French) Clicquot out of the brink of destruction. At the age of 21 years old, Barbe-Nicole married Francois Clicquot, Philippe Clicquot’s only son — the marriage w ..read more

We judge ourselves based on our good intentions, and we judge others based on their actions. The holiday season is full of good intentions but also many emotional pitfalls and opportunities to feel let down, put down, or shut down. We feel more pressure to be positive and present with family and friends, on top of accomplishing everything else on our normal end-of-year to-do list. So what gets in the way of us fulfilling our good intentions? Most of the time, it’s our emotions. According to research by Dr. Rachel Jack with Glasgow University there are four driving emotions that impact our abil ..read more

Thanksgiving is a great time to celebrate gratitude.  I am thankful for my family, friends, clients (many are good friends too), vendors, and all of you who take the time to read my blogs. I discovered the power of gratitude when I learned about the neuroscience of emotional intelligence. Practicing a daily acknowledgment of who and what we are grateful for can be life-changing. Studies have shown how gratitude can shield you from the blues, promote optimism, and make you feel happier. In a nutshell, appreciation can be your antidote to fear and anxiety. Practicing gratitude is a key ..read more

I’ve been enjoying podcasts for the last few years, and I’m not surprised about their rise in popularity. Personally, I think podcasts act as windows into authentic conversations. Whether you enjoy self-help, mystery, humor, news, or personal stories, every podcast offers a fascinating view into another person’s mind. I recently listened to a great podcast covering confidence and charisma — it provided practical tips and insightful research. I’ve always believed in the importance of charisma, especially given my professional experience owning a speakers agency and working in the training/coach ..read more

I’m a big fan of Michael Scott in the hit show The Office. The original version of the show was created by Ricky Gervais in England and it was his idea to have Michael’s character be a great salesman to appeal to an American audience. Michael was an award-winning sales manager before he became the Dunder Mifflin branch manager. There’s something very likable about Michael and his character even when he shows the most inappropriate behavior. His ability to form strong relationships and friendships with his team and customers were key to every episode. Top-performing salespeople develop strong r ..read more

The pandemic has sped up the rate of change in our world, which was already moving at an extraordinary speed due to advances in technology and changing ideas. Today, leaders and their organizations are forced to address increasingly complex challenges and grow with uncertainty.  The key to sustaining and thriving during unpredictable times is emotional mastery and building your immunity against learned helplessness.   Failure is a familiar trauma in life, but its effects on people differ widely. Some reel, recover, and move on with their lives, while others get bogged down by an ..read more

I’ve spent decades coaching and noticed the most successful executives and leaders take time for self-care while balancing stress. Their key to success is more about attitude than time. Your ability to change your mindset and attitude has a lot to do with self-care. I believe whether you’re up or down in life or rich or poor, you can change your situation for the better. Just remember that you can’t change much if you’re depleted of energy, self-worth, or rest. Feeling unhealthy, unhappy, or lacking mental focus won’t help either. It’s crucial to constantly work on yourself—by doing so, you’ll ..read more

What Are Some of the EI Core Competencies? In the training programs that we deliver, there are some core competencies that make up emotional intelligence. And so those core competencies fall under, basically your self-awareness, then your emotional management, and then your emotional connections to other people. And we have a tool set called Emotional Intelligence or “EI competency cards”. So they list the competency on the front, and they have a tool and a way for you to approach that more effectively. So the emotional or self-awareness, competencies are your self-awareness, your level of se ..read more

What Does It Mean To Be a Leader- And Why Are Leaders Important? Well, first of all, I think a leader and all leaders in an organization are so important. And I think if you have a leadership title or you’re an individual contributor, you still have a leadership influence. So people can influence people, whether they have a title or not. And that’s so important. But I think leaders really drive the organization, they set the culture, they set the tone. People, especially in leadership roles, the one thing that we know and research and I see this in my coaching is that people model what you do ..read more

We judge ourselves based on our good intentions, and we judge others based on their actions. The holiday season is full of good intentions but also many emotional pitfalls and opportunities to feel let down, put down, or shut down. We feel more pressure to be positive and present with family and friends, on top of accomplishing everything else on our normal end-of-year to-do list. So what gets in the way of us fulfilling our good intentions? Most of the time, it’s our emotions. According to research by Dr. Rachel Jack with Glasgow University there are four driving emotions that impact our abil ..read more