Visionary Talk - Seth Kahan’s Visionary Leadership

Five Years in 18 Months

I have been interviewing association CEOs since the pandemic began. Two recently told me that with all the pressure in ...
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Six Tactics Proactive Evolutionary Leaders are Doing Today

Proactive Evolutionary Leadership builds on the past, adapts to the present, and prepares to thrive in the future. The associations ...
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Proactive Evolutionary Leadership

We are living in a disruptive world with tremendous pressure. Many association leaders hunkered down, figuring out how to make ...
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Renewal and Reflection

It’s almost mid-October 2020, and the global pandemic is still not under control. Many organizations are trying to figure out ...
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Adaptive Leadership

100 CEOs – I am talking to 100+ CEOs to learn about how the pandemic, the economy, and fight for ...
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Strategic Foresight: Seeking Counsel

The times are changing, and they are not going to stop. Could you have dreamed that this is where we ...
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Strategic Foresight: New Game New Rules

Disruption is causing things to change often, and organizational leadership is constantly juggling. Associations must be able to react quickly ...
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Being a Backbone Organization + A Special Offer

Last week I covered ‘collective impact’ and ‘common agenda’, an excellent way to achieve your association’s goals by joining forces ...
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Crafting a Common Agenda for Partnerships & A Special Offer

The country and world are facing many challenges right now. Now is the time for organizations to focus on making ...
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Special Offer

I am offering a significant discount to all Zoom strategy sessions between now and Sept 15. Here are the ...
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Increasing Your Organization’s Nimbleness

I continue to an initiative to talk 100 CEOs in 100 Days. One thing is clear; the short term has ...
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Working Together for Everyone’s Benefit

Like the thunder rumbling in the background of this video, there is a storm brewing in our country. The pandemic, ...
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Strategic Foresight in Uncertain Times

I am in the midst of a quest to speak with 100 CEOs in 100 days. More than halfway through, ...
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Today’s Stress Creates Tomorrow’s Association

To better serve association executives, I’ve been on a mission to talk to 100 CEOs in 100 days. After three ...
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Invite: How to Take on Structural Racism in Associations

Today our country is facing systemic racism like never before. Associations have a long history of being inclusive, so how ...
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Extraordinary Video on Black Leadership Response to Black Lives Matter

Our nation is living in considerable uncertainty, and associations are being impacted on multiple fronts simultaneously. We are dealing with ...
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Racial Justice Leadership for Associations

There is a national conversation about racial justice going on. Many organizations are making public statements but then asking,” How ...
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North Star, Next Stage

We are experiencing disruption on multiple levels. The pandemic has caused disruption to the economy, supply chain, and how we ...
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Pivoting to Action on Structural Racism

It’s June 2020, and systemic racism has moved front and center on the national stage. Companies across the US, and ...
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Association Business Model Template

Where there is turbulence, there is energy. The challenge is channeling that energy to create value for your stakeholders while ...
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Removing Blind Spots

When I led a leadership development retreat for America’s National Parks’ superintendents, we convened in New Mexico. At one point, ...
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Coronavirus Playbook

In 2008 the American housing bubble burst, setting off a global financial crisis and recession. At the time, I was ...
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Strategy during the Pandemic

Imagine that you’re the captain of a ship – your association – and it is your job to keep the ...
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Insights for Leaders

I’ve had many discussions, including interviews, zoom calls, and one-on-one conversations with CEOs and executives this week. I’m eager to ...
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Pandemic Week 7 – So much to learn!

If ever there was a time to serve your members, it is now! I am gathering and sharing information and ...
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INVITATION to Hackathon on Virtualizing Meetings

Through my work with association executives, I’ve identified a theme. Associations must be preparing to not just get through the ...
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Leading through the Pandemic

A visionary leader is someone who aligns the well-being of society with that of their organization and their customers. When ...
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3 Lessons for Virtualizing Meetings

I’ve been designing and leading virtual meetings much longer than ZOOM has been around. My largest virtual meeting took place ...
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Pandemic Shelter-in-Place Week 3

I extend my heartfelt prayers and best wishes for you and your loved ones, for your health and your safety ...
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CovidLeadership.com

Unprecedented times call for unprecedented collaboration. I am committing, for the next 60 days, to help association leaders get through ...
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INVITE: Responding to the Coronavirus – March 24

As the world works to deal with COVID-19, associations have special responsibilities and challenges. Despite the disruption to our personal ...
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Meeting Triage – Factors to Consider when Delaying or Canceling a Meeting

While working at the World Bank, designing and facilitating hundreds of meetings, I developed a framework for what to consider ...
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COVID-19 Response Checklist for Associations

March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization announced the novel coronavirus is a pandemic. Disrupting the global supply chain and ...
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Leading Change

Leading change is a core competency for today’s successful leader. There was a time when change was episodic; it would ...
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3 Core Competencies of Visionary Leaders

There are three qualities that every visionary leader I work with has in common: Operational Excellence Strategic Foresight Calculated Bold ...
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Creating Enterprise Wide Results

What is the number one thing association CEOs wish their direct reports would do? Through my work with 100+ ...
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Developing Your Senior Team

The senior team is the most critical in any organization. They can be the CEO’s most significant asset or greatest ...
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IMPACT How Association Leaders Change the World

I’m an advocate for associations and the impact they have on society. I believe every association, by virtue of experience ...
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The Sweet Spot: Where to Aim Your Biggest Initiatives

Association leaders have the unique opportunity to enrich America and sometimes even the world by harnessing the expertise and experience ...
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Lessons Learned from Susan Neely’s leadership at ABA

I recently led an event featuring Susan Neely, CEO of the American Council of Life Insurers, and Jay Timmons, CEO ...
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The Power of Shared Value

My wife is an extraordinary performer, singer, and songwriter. You can check out her music here: LauraBaronMusic.com. Living around music, having her ...
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Visionary Leadership Academy – March 10, 2020 – Early bird discount 20% until Dec. 31

I love working with emerging professionals; that’s why I founded the Visionary Leadership Academy (VLA). On March 10, 2020, I’ll ...
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Happy Thanksgiving!

I wish you a very special Thanksgiving, one that’s overflowing with appreciation and gratitude. I’ve learned firsthand how appreciation and ...
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Thank you, Dawn Sweeney!

Today I want to express gratitude for a remarkable leader, Dawn Sweeney who has contributed to my Grand Challenge work ...
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Dealing with Difficult People when Leading Change: 3 of 3

When I published Getting Change Right, my business bestseller, I was surprised to see that the section about dealing with difficult ...
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Dealing with Difficult People when Leading Change: 2 of 3

When I published my business bestseller, Getting Change Right, I didn’t realize that dealing with difficult people was going to be the ...
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Dealing with Difficult People when Leading Change: 1 of 3

When I wrote my business bestseller, Getting Change Right, I did not anticipate that the section on dealing with difficult ...
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CEO event with Jay Timmons & Susan Neely

I’m hosting a great event for CEOs on October 23rd from 3-5 pm at the National Association of Manufacturers. I’ll ...
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Creating a Shared Stake in Success and Accelerating Buy-in

Every leader wants their vision to spread. Visionary leaders want to go beyond the transactional sharing of information and look ...
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Storytelling to Accelerate Collaboration

I worked with the World Bank, Center for Narrative Studies, and the Center for Association Leadership on the problem of ...
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Invite: CEO event with Jay Timmons and Susan Neely, Oct 23, 3-5pm

I’m hosting a great event for CEOs on October 23rd from 3-5 pm at the National Association of Manufacturers. I’ll ...
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3 Flavors of Value Innovation

There are three flavors of value innovation, more value, better value, and new value. New value is often borne from ...
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The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

I’ve been re-reading a classic, “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” by Thomas Kuhn. It explains how paradigms change. It’s easy ...
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3 Steps to Increasing Your Capability as a Leader

The best leaders are constantly transforming themselves and building new capabilities; trying things that have never been done before. In ...
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Identifying Disruptions You Can Introduce into the Market

I often work with leaders to design their own disruptions to introduce into the marketplace. This video explains two criteria ...
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Obstacle Judo

This video is about Obstacle Judo. We all know people who focus on the obstacle when presented with a challenge ...
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Interview Techniques

In my work, helping to drive change initiatives I interview many leaders, sometimes up to 30 per week. Many are ...
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Building Beehives: Creating Communities that Drive Your Organization Forward

Today, I’d like to talk about one of my books: Building Beehives: Creating Communities that Generate Returns. I wrote this ...
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Getting Innovation Right: Understanding Inflection Points

You may be familiar with my books, the most famous of which is, “Getting Change Right” because it was a ...
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Getting Change Right: Changing the Mindset of Staff

The crucial element to leading change in any organization is making it possible for your staff and volunteer leaders to ...
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Using Storytelling to Influence Stakeholders

From my work with visionary leaders, I know that one of the biggest challenges they have is bringing their stakeholders ...
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Culture Change and the Importance of Engagement

I was prepping for a full-day session about culture change when I was reminded of my work with the World ...
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60th Birthday Special!

I’m super excited! Today, July 9th is my 60th birthday! I’ve circumnavigated the sun 60 times on planet Earth, and I’ve ...
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My Facilitator’s Handbook

The best CEOs are excellent facilitators. They understand facilitation and take time to investigate liberating exercises that highlight and leverage ...
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Getting a Feel for Exponential Growth

We live in an environment where technology is growing exponentially and has been for a long time. And the exponential ...
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6 Questions for Strategy

Today, I want to share with you six questions that I have found extremely helpful when developing strategy. They’re specific ...
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Association Leadership and Visionary Leadership

In my latest book, Visionary Leadership, How Association Leaders Embrace Disruption in the 21st Century, I identify a group of ...
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Market Acumen and Visionary Leadership

In my latest book, Visionary Leadership, How Association Leaders Embrace Disruption in the 21st Century, I identify the competencies that ...
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Personal Power and Visionary Leadership

My latest book, Visionary Leadership: How Association Leaders Embrace Disruption in the 21st Century, lays out, among other things, ...
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Visionary Leadership book offer – Free pdf!

My next book, Visionary Leadership: How Association Leaders Embrace Disruption in the 21st Century, is available June 7th. I’d like ...
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Honoring Mark French, and invite to upcoming event

The focus of my work is visionary leadership – leadership that leaves the world better than we find it. An ...
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Encouraging Volunteer Leaders to Step Up

I’ve been thinking a lot about what it takes to step up and how Boards of Directors can make a ...
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Visionary Leadership, the book

In just 3 weeks, my fourth book, Visionary Leadership, will be available. In it I detail case studies of CEOs, ...
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Patrick Spear, GMDC, and his Skunk Works

I love to tell stories of exceptional CEOs, and I’ve got one for you today — Patrick Spear, of GMDC, the Global ...
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Educating the Board

Last week, I shared my most recent report, Getting the Most from Your Board. One of the first topics that ...
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Getting the Most from Your Board

I’ve worked with many boards leading strategic planning retreats, professional development seminars, and grand challenge discussions. Some boards are high-functioning ...
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Market Awareness and Visionary Leadership

I’ve distilled the Visionary Leadership skillsets down to three super categories: Market awareness Association leadership Self-development Each of the three ...
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Visionary Leadership Self-assessment

The 20 years I’ve worked with visionary leaders has led to the identification of a core set of competencies found ...
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Portfolio Evaluation

A special thank you and shout out to Henry Chamberlain, CEO of the Building Owners and Managers Association International ...
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Optimizing Your Social Systems

An association’s social systems include all the constellations of people who work together to achieve the organization’s objectives. There are ...
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Paul Bellantone and Trust at PPAI

I had the good fortune to work with Paul Bellantone. CEO of Promotional Products Association International (PPAI), to help with ...
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Growth, Mission Impact and Stakeholders

There are three core areas of association growth: Mission impact, Members Profitable Revenue. Which is the organizing principle for the ...
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Paul Bellantone and the Strategic Foresight Playbook

I love working with CEOs who have great foresight, are fun to work with, innovative and show enthusiasm for creating ...
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Grand Challenges and Growth

We’ve spent the last few four weeks exploring three things the most successful CEOs are doing to drive growth within ...
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Financial Growth and Mission Impact

The most successful associations are focusing growth on mission impact, membership, and profitability. I’ve identified three things CEOs of these ...
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Investing in Your Social Systems

For the last few weeks we have been discussing growth. Many of the most successful associations focus their energy growing ...
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Growth: Mission, Members and Profits

Last week we discussed the imperative to grow and evolve. The most successful associations focus their energies growing three areas: ...
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Breaking Through – Grow or Die!

Grow or die. Blunt, but true. Many associations have grown content with a flat situation as it relates to mission ...
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Science-based Research – 10 Key Elements of a Social Movement

Last week we talked about Framing the Crisis, the most critical of the 10 Key Elements to a Social Movement ...
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Framing the Crisis – 10 Key Elements of a Social Movement

Not long ago I shared a video about the 10 Key Elements to a Social Movement. Remember, a social movement ...
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What Winning Association Leaders Do

If I had to define challenge in one word it would be growth. Recently, I’ve been working to identify the ...
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Carpe Annum 2019!

RSVP NOW December 18, 2018 — 4 – 6 pm — Dupont Circle, Washington, DC Stefano Bertuzzi, CEO of the American Society for ...
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10 Key Elements of a Social Movement

Associations work best when everyone from the CEO to members and volunteers is aligned around a common objective. The clearer ...
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Gratitude

Gratitude has profound value and considerably impacts the quality of your experience of life. Science has proven that people who ...
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Disrupting Yourself

It’s hard to innovate when you have a good thing going. Today’s fast-moving market requires that you create new value ...
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Salons for Association Leadership

I had the pleasure of co-hosting a salon and dinner with Stefano Bertuzzi, CEO of the American Society for Microbiology ...
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Continuous Communication - Condition 4 for a Successful Collective Impact Initiative

Backbone Support – Condition 5 for a Successful Collective Impact Initiative

In the past weeks, I’ve shared videos discussing the conditions of a Collective Impact model. The first four include common ...
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Continuous Communication – Condition 4 for a Successful Collective Impact Initiative

Today I want to talk to you about continuous communication as it relates to the collective impact model. Last week ...
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Mutually Reinforcing Activity – Condition 3 for a Successful Collective Impact initiative

Today I want to talk to you about the need for mutually reinforcing activities where you’re using the collective impact ...
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Shared Measurement: Condition 2 for a Successful Collective Impact initiative

Today I want to talk to you about the second condition required for the success of a collective impact model: ...
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The Common Agenda – Condition 1 for a Successful Collective Impact Initiative

Today I will explore the lynchpin that holds everything together: The Common Agenda. Last week, I shared a video summarizing ...
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Collective Impact

Collective impact is a powerful approach arisen out of the social action arena where it is widely believed that a ...
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10 Elements of a Social Movement

Mandating change is no longer sufficient. Today, much change is generated from social movements that create real impact. Based on ...
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Susan Neely, Visionary CEO

One of my greatest joys is the opportunity to meet face-to-face with great luminaries, ordinary people who have succeeded at ...
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Operationalizing Your Game Plan

Operationalizing your game plan is the culminating step of my 7-step framework for getting to the core of association strategy ...
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Documenting Your Strategic Plan

Documenting the strategic plan is the sixth step in my 7-step framework for association strategy. How you record and deliver ...
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Strategic Planning: The Board Meeting

Regular communication with the board throughout the strategic planning process is important, particularly when ambiguous or contentious issues arise. There ...
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Assessing Your Organization’s Capabilities

You’ve gathered member and market intelligence. The obstacles and opportunities facing your association have been identified? What’s next? Assessing your ...
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Identifying Opportunities and Challenges

Gathering member and market intelligence – steps one and two in my 7-step framework for association strategy will yield candidates ...
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Gathering Member Intelligence

While gathering member intelligence is the second step in my 7-step Framework for Association Strategy, it should be a continuous ...
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Gathering Market Intelligence

Understanding your market is critical to success in a world of constant disruption. Gathering market intelligence, the first step ...
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Seth Kahan’s 7-step Framework for Association Strategy

A strategy is the game plan that will get you from where you are today to where you want to ...
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The Foundation of Association Strategy

What is strategy and who drives the process at an organization? The CEO is the only leader at the intersection ...
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New Leadership Competency: Radical Self Care

Leaders today are being stressed and stretched by overlapping change and exponential breakthroughs in almost every sector. How is your ...
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New Leadership Competency: Systems Thinking

A better understanding of systems thinking – the idea that there are massive numbers of interconnected relationships that create living ...
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New Leadership Competency: Intentional Self-Transformation

Visionary leaders continuously seek to raise the caliber of their work, to create greater influence, and to understand leveraging for ...
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New Leadership Competency: Reframing Obstacles as Opportunities

How does your leadership team respond to obstacles? If they aren’t using Judo to leverage the force of disruption to ...
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New Leadership Competency: Leading for Collective Impact

Are your leaders leveraging partners, members, and customers to create influence in the marketplace? Collective impact – working to support ...
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New Leadership Competency: Identifying Disruptions

Today’s market is probably the most chaotic that it’s ever been. According to Deloitte, the topple rate – the rate ...
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New Leadership Competency: Detecting Larger Patterns

The ability to detect larger patterns is one of the leadership competencies required be successful in today’s tumultuous marketplace. Can ...
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New Leadership Competency: Detecting Larger Patterns

The ability to detect larger patterns is one of the leadership competencies required be successful in today’s tumultuous marketplace. Can ...
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7 New Leadership Competencies

The World is changing exponentially, however, the average human mind has difficulty processing exponential growth. Do your senior executives have ...
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Real-time Strategy

You can no longer wait 3 years to take a look at your strategy! Here I explain what Real-time strategy ...
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Driving Your Digital Business

You must get your digital business in order this year! Your members depend upon it. You need your data, ...
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Building New Kinds of Partnerships

Associations have long had partners, but new kinds of partnerships are emerging with world-class organizations united on a common aim ...
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Scale for Impact

2018 is the year to leverage your members’ experience and expertise to drive value to much larger segments of ...
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Dealing with Disruption

Associations MUST master disruption this year. This means both (a) learning how to spot it before it causes you harm, ...
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Driving Results 2018

This is the year to innovate or lose ground. In this video, I go over the five areas that associations ...
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Keeping Ahead of Disruption

Many business leaders still treat innovation as an ambitious side project—something to attempt when the risk is low and defeat ...
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Disruptive Innovation

Apply for Visionary Leadership Academy Next cohort starting February 2018 Begin your visionary leadership journey today. Up to 33 ...
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SuperFriends

The value of colleagues who are engaged in the same intensity of work as you ...
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Time for Reflecting on Career Growth

The time between Christmas and New Year’s is the perfect time to reflect on your accomplishments and lessons learned, so ...
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Contribution

Contribution – the importance of bringing people and organizations together for collective impact ...
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Business Model Innovation

Every member of your senior leadership team should understand how to design and develop a business model, a way to ...
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Last chance to seize the year! – Carpe Annum 2018

Carpe Annum 2018 A CEOnly celebration Friday, December 8, 2017 3:00-6:00 p.m. We have a few seats left for the ...
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How Agile can help organizations create more value in today’s changing world

If you look around, there is an illusion that everything is stable. You might not know it, but there is ...
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Thanksgiving Appreciation for Leaders

As leaders we are constantly driving for results, addressing obstacles, challenges, bottlenecks, and log jams. And our minds are skewed ...
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Self Transformation and Professional Development

It’s important to choose personal and professional development opportunities so you can acquire new skills and improve your performance. It’s ...
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Innovation Tools: Jumping the S-curve

The S-curve is well known in innovation circles. “Jumping the curve” is what you do to keep your place and ...
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Innovation Tools: The 3 Horizon Table

The 3 Horizon Table makes use of the three horizons discussed in The Alchemy of Growth by Baghai, Cole and ...
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Attending UCLA’s Grand Challenge Workshop

Attending UCLA’s University-led Grand Challenge workshop Oct 5, 2017. See attached paper, What is a Grand Challenge? ...
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The Underexplored Core of Association Strategy

Here I lay out my 7-step approach to the core of association strategy and talk about how to use the ...
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How to Build Tomorrow’s Business Model Today

The “how” of building new business models includes these activities and more: regular meetings with your senior team to discuss ...
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Why You Must Build Tomorrow’s Business Models Today

You can pretty much guarantee the business models you are using today will be defunct tomorrow. The extinction of your ...
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Visionary Leadership at Oneness Family High School

In the year ahead I will be teaching my curriculum at a Montessori high school. If you would like a ...
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3 Horizons of Strategy

First introduced in The Alchemy of Growth by Baghai, Coley and White, the 3 Horizons have persisted as a valuable ...
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Strategic Foresight & Operational Excellence

5 Steps to Strategic Foresight

5 Steps to Strategic Foresight: Building your brain trust, gathering emerging trends, identifying key attributes of those trends, analysis with ...
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Business processes for Strategic Foresight and Operational Excellence

The Magic 3 for Peak Performance

Are you at peak performance? Achieving excellence in these three areas results in raising your performance to its highest levels: ...
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Radical Self-Care

How might your self-care transform your ability to lead? ...
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2 Grand Tools for Peak Performance

Reporting from the Grand Canyon, here are two tools I use in the Visionary Leadership Academy (VLA): (1) the 3 ...
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Plus Delta

This is an extremely simple and elegant framework for identifying what needs to be done to get better results ...
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The Power of Transitions

Anyone who juggles a large number of important activities often experiences transitions. Effectively managing this makes a great difference in ...
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2 Grand Tools for Peak Performance

Reporting from the Grand Canyon, here are two tools I use in the Visionary Leadership Academy (VLA): (1) the 3 ...
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Team of Teams for Leadership Development

General Stanley McChrystal’s book, Team of Teams, remains one of the best books on how to transform your organization so ...
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Marquee Customers with Bill Lee

Discussing “marquee customers” with Bill Lee, who runs the Center for Customer Engagement, and puts on the annual Summit on ...
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3 Elements of Visionary Leadership

The 3 elements of visionary leadership: self-transformation, strategic foresight, and leading change ...
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The Importance of Peak Physique to Leaders

Your body is your primary tool for receiving information from your environment and for communicating. Take the time to build ...
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Highly recommend for Leadership Development: Team of Teams

General Stanley McChrystal’s book, Team of Teams, remains one of the best books on how to transform your organization so ...
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4 Timelines for Leading Change

When I work with CEOs I use these deceptively simple 4 timelines to map what success looks like ...
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Facilitation: Your Key to Greater Impact

I am always impressed when one of my CEO clients is a facilitation buff. The results they create are consistently ...
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Scott Wintrip: The Competitive Advantage of Hiring Top Talent

A short interview with Scott Wintrip, author of recently released HighVelocity Hiring: How to Hire Top Talent in an Instant, ...
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Introducing New Ideas and Getting Them to Stick using Frames

Have you ever had difficulty getting new ideas to stick? Try using frames. In this short video I give an ...
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Scott Wintrip: The Competitive Advantage of Hiring Top Talent

A short interview with Scott Wintrip, author of recently released HighVelocity Hiring: How to Hire Top Talent in an Instant, ...
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Kiki L’Italien on How Leaders can Build an Online Presence

Kiki explains the benefits leaders can secure from social media, influencer marketing, tips on finding your niche, what it takes ...
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Creating Drive in Others

Sparking action in others is a talent every leader must master. Here are 3 tried and true techniques ...
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Leading Change: Helios HR – Human Capital Impact Forum

The 2nd installment of the 2017 Helios Human Capital Impact Forum. Seth Kahan recounts how he got started in change leadership ...
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Upgrading Senior Leadership Teams

The first installment of several in the months ahead – here Seth Kahan speaks about how to transform senior leadership ...
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Logjams are Opportunities

Logjams, obstacles, bottlenecks… here’s what they all have in common and the best way to handle them ...
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More than 2 Sides to Every Story

There can be multiple perspectives to every dilemma, and you better learn how to take them all into account or ...
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Strategic Foresight

Strategic Foresight is the ability to spot emerging trends before they crest and exploiting them for competitive advantage. I invite ...
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Strategic Framework format

In this short video I lay out the basics of my framework for standing up Strategic Foresight in an association ...
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Preparing for the Future

It’s important to meet face to face with the people who are doing today what you want to do tomorrow ...
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Preparing for the Future

Preparing Ourselves and Our Organizations for the future. This is a summary of my keynote for CEOs of Professional Societies, ...
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Your Super Powers!

What are the special talents you have to create results in the world, and where do they come from? Check ...
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Do You Need Everyone to be Involved?

Large scale transformation relies on participation and engagement, but not as widespread as some believe ...
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Chris McEntee interviewed by Seth Kahan on Innovation and Leadership

Seth Kahan interviews Chris McEntee, Professional Society CEO of the Year for 2016, to discuss innovation and leadership ...
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Your most important asset – Your State!

Learn why your mental state, the quality of consciousness you bring to bear on your work, is your most important ...
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Interviews with Members and Customers Successfully

Which is more important when you interview a VIP, trust or information? Find out in this video and what to ...
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Strategic Foresight – Standing it Up in Your Organization

Here are tips on building Strategic Foresight capability in your organization, so you can spot the emerging trends that are ...
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Your Next Breakthrough

How can you find the way to your next stage of growth, the next new level of personal and professional ...
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The CEO Mindset – 2 Traits

What really makes for a leadership mindset? Here are two views into the elusive chief executive’s mental game ...
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Seth Kahan on Association Strategy

Watch this video to learn about my new online training course, Getting Association Strategy Right. The Beta test for the ...
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Affiliation and engagement for Associations

I have served the last 18 mo or so on the American Geophysical Union ‘s task force on Affiliation and ...
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Innovation that Systematically Produces Increases in Performance

Here I explain the kind of innovation that helps you systematically jump the curve to a new level of performance ...
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Strategy – Creating the Escape Velocity that will Reach a New Level of Performance 3 months ago

In this short talk on strategy I cover the three benefits of an effective strategy: Growth, Relevance and Leadership. I ...
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The Importance of Support, Buy-In and Engagement

Almost all successful change depends on support, buy-in and engagement. Here I explain what they are and why they are ...
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Strategy is a Social Phenomenon

It’s not enough to have a great strategy. You have to have great execution, too. And the secret to dynamite ...
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5 Gems from Detractors

I have found that by listening to detractors I can learn a great deal about how to succeed in a ...
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Energizing, Activating and Equipping Your Most Valuable Players

Your Most Valuable Players are the people who will help you most with your change initiative. Here I talk about ...
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Diffusing Resistance to Change

In my experience over 90% of the resistance to change can be diffused by listening to the resisters and framing ...
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Million Cat Challenge

Earlier this year I attended the Skid Row School for Large Scale Change where I had the opportunity to work ...
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Kate Hurley and the Million Cat Challenge

I attended the Skid Row School for Large Scale Change, to learn how to catalyze large social movements. There I ...
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The Value of Strategic Relationships

Strategic relationships are a powerful way to increase and expand your organization’s impact in the market while generating new sources ...
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Using Market Intelligence to inform Strategic Planning

Seth Kahan shares how he researches market intelligence and draws on experts to aid Boards of Directors in strategic planning, ...
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Sapna Budev on the Visionary Leadership Academy

Sapna Budev, Executive Director at The Signage Foundation, Inc., speaks about her experience at the Visionary Leadership Academy. To learn ...
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Executive Team Performance

The senior leadership team is an extraordinary group, unique in their position to contribute to the organization’s goals. However, they ...
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David Gammel, Executive Director, ESA, talks strategy with Seth Kahan

David Gammel of the Entomological Society of America shares his strategy for growth including securing the prestigious International Conference in ...
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Mary Power, CEO, CBBB, talks strategy with Seth Kahan

Mary Power is the president and CEO of the Council of Better Business Bureaus. In this 11 min video she ...
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Paul Bellantone, CEO, PPAI, and Dale Denham, Incoming Chair-Elect, talk strategy with Seth Kahan

Paul Bellantone is the CEO and president of Promotional Products Association International. Dale Denham, CIO, Geiger, is the Incoming Chair ...
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Working with a Traveling Team

Here I lay out how to start and sustain momentum with a senior team that is on the road continuously ...
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Seth Kahan interviews Jill Sweitzer Reddell, Co-director, UCLA Grand Challenges

Jill Sweitzer Redell co-founded UCLA Grand Challenges with Michelle Popowitz. I interviewed her July 13, 2016, in Los Angeles. She ...
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Seth Kahan interviews Marcus Shingles, CEO, XPRIZE Foundation

Inside XPRIZE’s Collaboration Station Marcus Shingles talks about the rapidly approaching future, building the bridge to a world of abundance ...
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Executive Team Synergies

Trust among the executive team is often an issue CEOS come to me to address. Here is some insight into ...
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Creating Suction in the Market

Don Cole interviews Seth on innovation uptake, excerpted from a larger interview on Seth’s book, Getting Innovation Right ...
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Self-Transformation

Self-transformation is the most important activity for a visionary leader. How is it done? Here are several techniques ...
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Promotional Products Association International – Strategy Session in DC

Conversation with Paul Bellantone, CEO of the Promotional Products Association International, and Tom Goos, Chair of the Board of Directors, ...
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Seth Kahan interviews Steve Denning

Steve Denning and I have remained close since he was my boss at the World Bank 1996-99. He continues to ...
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SuperFriends: Seth Kahan, Lisa McLeod & Robbie Baxter

Lisa and Robbie share insights on transformational leadership including Robbie’s models based on cocktail glasses. Lisa McLeod, McLeodAndMore.com Robbie Baxter, ...
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LeadingLearning 2015, Part 1 of 3

Here is Part 1 of 3 of my plenary presentation to the Leading Learning Symposium of 2015 ...
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Healthy Nurse Healthy Nation™

The American Nurses Assocation’s CEO, Marla Weston, and president, Pam Cipriano, explain their Grand Challenge. They discuss how Healthy Nurse ...
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Hacking Association Strategy

What’s overhead and what’s essential? Find out! ...
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The Power of Peer Exchange

I helped build 120 Communities of Practice at the World Bank around the globe. A Community of Practice is a ...
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10 Elements for Successful Grand Challenges

Chris Economos did groundbreaking research in 2001 to learn what it took for a successful national movement. I am applying ...
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The Power of Esprit de Corps

One of the most valuable assets any team can have is the esprit de corps. It is the fundamental fabric ...
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Seth Kahan on Jim Wolfensohn and Performance Communities

My work is about helping visionaries achieve success. In this short video I share a story from my days working ...
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Seth Kahan shares Dr. Robert Cialdini’s method

I spent the morning today with the author of the book, Influence: the Psychology of Persuasion. In this short video ...
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Creating Dramatic Surges in Progress

Whether you are in the midst of an internal change initiative or a mass communications effort, watch this 2 minute ...
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Grand Challenges – A Valuable Contribution by Today’s Associations

Bring your mission to life with a Grand Challenge. Learn why they are so meaningful in today’s world ...
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Visiting Silicon Valley with Robbie Kellman Baxter

Thanks to Robbie, I have spent the last 3 days meeting folks at Apple, Google, Pinterest, Yahoo!, Badgeville as well ...
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Seth Kahan interviews Jeff Cobb, Lifelong Learning expert

Jeff Cobb has distinguished himself as the premier thought-leader on lifelong learning with a specialty helping organizations create and market ...
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5 Kinds of Growth: #5 Lowering Costs

Lowering costs will provide you with greater profits on existing revenues. Three ways to do this are (1) replicate processes, ...
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5 Kinds of Growth: #4 Increasing Market Penetration

Increasing market penetration is the most popular form of growth. It is about expanding your customer pool, reaching out and ...
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5 Kinds of Growth: #3 Improving Loyalty

How can this be a growth strategy? Because improving loyalty ensures future profitability. This video highlights the two keys to ...
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5 Kinds of Growth: #2 Growing Your Base

Growing Your Base is a core competency for every leader. This 2 minute video lays out the five factors that ...
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5 Kinds of Growth: #1 Getting a Bigger Buy

Getting a bigger buy is one of the most lucrative and low labor intensity ways to increase profitability. On this ...
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5 Kinds of Growth

No matter what kind of organization you are, growth is a goal. It could be profitable, sustainable growth that occupies ...
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Intentionally Engaging with Problems

Obstacles, logjams and roadblocks point the way to what needs to be done next. Yes, it’s true: your biggest problems ...
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What does an Executive Adviser Do?

In this 2 minute video I explain my work as an executive adviser. Since 1996 I have been relied upon ...
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3 Kinds of Associations

Associations that focus primarily on creating transactional member value are actually practicing the old mindset, trying to save their organizations ...
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Commanding Attention

Sometimes you have to violate your own norms to get people’s attention. Here’s a story of a time I did ...
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Seth Kahan interviews John Sydnor on Venture Acceleration

John Sydnor is an expert in venture acceleration with a broad and deep background in technology, financial services, and venture ...
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Association Strategy

There are three important ways that associations are different from private sector organizations. These need to be taken into consideration ...
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Communities, #1 Tool for Change

Communities are a unique resource in organizations when you are leading change. Learn why ...
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Seth Kahan on innovation from the customer’s pov

Here is what good innovation feels like to the customer ...
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‘The Membership Economy’ by Robbie Baxter (Book Summary)

I love Robbie Baxter, Silicon Valley guru and author of the Amazon bestseller, The Membership Economy. In this 3 1/2 ...
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Seth Kahan interviews Veronica Meadows on Measuring Member Engagement

Veronica Meadows is Director, Member Engagement, at the Council of Landscape Architectural Regulatory Boards (CLARB). They have a reputation for ...
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The 4 Forces of Business Disruption

The 4 types of business disruption are laid out as are strategies for using any one of them to your ...
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Speed of Execution

Speed of execution is the single most important differentiator for leaders who consistently succeed in the market place when it ...
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Creating a Breakthrough Mindset

Four ways for leaders to create a breakthrough mindset, the most important asset for achieving a new level of success ...
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How to Engineer a Breakthrough

Using my experience at the world’s largest energy company as an example, I lay out the six steps for engineering ...
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Value Pulses, Value Surges and Value Webs

Each of these vehicles build and tighten the bond with your customers, making it possible to convey extraordinary and compelling ...
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Seth Kahan keynote: Next Gen Government Summit

What can the adoption of a young Indian girl teach us about innovation? It has to do with identity, communication ...
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Seth Kahan’s Opening Remarks – 2015 Grand Challenge Summit

This excerpt from the inaugural Grand Challenge Summit held for association executives, volunteer leaders, and staff rising stars was held ...
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Future Trends and HR

The global mindset, Internet of Things, pay equity for women, cultural diversity as a core asset, emerging nations coming online, ...
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Seth Kahan interviews Robert Nelson

Robert Nelson was CEO of the National Coffee Association for 18 years. He has unique experience designing and running Grand ...
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Seth Kahan interviews Chris McEntee

Chris McEntee, the American Geophysical Union’s CEO and executive director, talks with me about the Thriving Earth Exchange, which is ...
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Seth Kahan interviews David Gammel

David Gammel, the Entomological Society of America’s executive director, talks about his leadership style, organizational culture, the International Congress of ...
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Storytelling

Fresh from a storytelling workshop for the Leadership Congress of the International Sign Association, I tell you how to create ...
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Leading Change at Shell & the National Apartment Association

Don Cole interviews Seth, taking a look at the essence of his work with leaders ...
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Seth Kahan and Lisa McLeod

Lisa McLeod, bestselling author of Selling with Noble Purpose, discusses organizational performance, grand challenges, her next book and leadership ...
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Grand Challenges

What is a Grand Challenge and why is it such a powerful tool for associations? This video explores the basic ...
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Knowledge Business Engine

This video covers the basics of the Knowledge Business Engine, the core revenue and value generator of successful associations that ...
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Seth Kahan on Association Evolution

I lay out the three stages of evolution of an association and share a little on why Grand Challenges grow ...
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Kodak and the World Bank stand as examples.

Excerpted from my Feb 10 presentation for business leaders in Washington DC ...
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