The end of the year always makes me think about goals. Every December, I take stock of the previous year and ask myself: How well did I achieve what I set out to do? What was my biggest success? What would I like to do differently?

I admit it. I am a goal-aholic. And in my 15 years as a business owner, I have come to learn that goals should guide, but never dictate. Click inside to find details about how you might want to go about this process of setting goals, sticking to the good ones, and letting go of the lemons.

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How can you become a better delegator?

That’s a topic that I have been giving a lot of thought to lately because, increasingly, I am being hired to provide delegation-skills classes for managers in my clients’ organizations.

One of the reasons, as you well know, is that managers are being asked to do more with less—and it doesn’t look like this trend is going to change any time soon.

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There’s a lot of excitement these days about the four-day work week.

The trend made headlines in The Washington Post last year when the Virginia legislature allowed state employees to take Fridays off. The leaders of the Commonwealth of Virginia estimated that they’d save millions of dollars on energy by shutting down government buildings across the state one day a week.

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Career coaching is a big part of a manager’s job. Yet, many managers avoid it like the plague. As one manager told me, “When one of my employees wants to talk about their next career step, I want to run and hide. I usually put off the meeting as long as I can.” That’s the topic we tackle in this month’s issue of Workforce Learning.

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In this month’s newsletter, I tackle the topic of conflict. I know, I know. Mere mention of the word makes you tense up a bit. That’s why I tread softly when I teach my management skills workshop. I begin by getting a quick pulse on the health of an organization to determine if there are bad management practices lurking that will diminish the effectiveness of my teaching. I can tell immediately if this organization has a culture that won’t support a good manager.

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With the scent of Valentine’s Day roses still in the air, this month I tackle a topic that not many discuss in the workplace: Love. I realize, of course, that merely uttering this word in an office setting has the tendency to set off fireworks with HR folks worried about that bugaboo — sexual harassment. That doesn’t mean we should toss out the critical ideas of loving our work, colleagues, and companies. I scouring the business books in my library regarding “love” at work, and here’s what I found.

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I admit it. I have been leading a double life. My professional life is well documented on my website, but my other life is something that may come as a surprise to many. While my professional life is well documented on my website, my other life, however, is something that may come as a surprise to many. It is my passion for the visual arts. The only evidence of my artistic life is the mention in my bio that I have a doctoral degree in art education. How did I make the transition from art teacher to business owner?

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A good friend of mine recently about a very bad day she had at work. She had to fire a staff member who was not performing the job he was hired to do. In fact, his performance wasn’t up to the most minimal of standards. We talked a bit about the endless days of training and guidance that ended in the termination, and finally my friend asked me: “How can I learn how to do a better job of firing someone? They always end in tears, with me feeling guilty, as if it was my fault that the person was not the right fit for the job. What am I doing wrong?”

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Are you good at managing managers? Can you explain how to write meaningful and measurable performance goals? Can you show us how to tell someone their work is not up to expectations? I am asked these questions frequently as I interact with business leaders. Immediately, my brain opens the big mental file folder labeled “Managing Performance.” Whether I am coaching individual leaders, working with a management team, or teaching a class on management skills, nearly everything I communicate falls into this huge knowledge area called performance management.

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For nearly a decade, I was one of the beleaguered souls known as a middle manager. Sandwiched between front-line supervision and senior leadership, each day was a struggle to balance the needs of the workforce with the aspirations of the top dogs. Right before I left to start my own business (and the reason why I did), I remember excitedly telling my boss that I was going to take over the creation of a new leadership development seminar. He said, “I don’t pay you to do the work yourself. You have staff to actually produce the work. I pay you to direct them.”

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Hello, Powerhouse! Women business leaders bring a powerful difference to the world of work because they tend to view life as an ongoing matrix of interconnected relationships — one that can be leveraged to achieve results. In my experience, this constant outward focus is unique to women and their approach results in a rich environment that focuses on much more than the financial side of the business. Yet this constant outward focus can be overplayed and become a liability.

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Are you feeling productive? If not, you aren’t alone. As we begin 2010, more and more of my clients are reporting that they are overworked, stressed, and they fear that soon their productivity will suffer. But consider this: Statistically speaking, the US workforce is actually more productive than it has been in years — despite the rash of layoffs and workforce reductions we saw in 2009. So here’s my question: Can fewer workers produce more output, and sustain it? If so, what toll will it take on their health, their lives, and ultimately their companies – not just today, but in the future?

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You aren’t alone In the last issue of Workforce Learning, I focused on how organizations can prepare for the growth cycle ahead in our recovering economy and offered three scenarios for how the recovery may play out. In the weeks since, I’ve done a more analytic survey and asked nearly 150 professionals from more than a dozen different DC-based organizations: “What will you do differently once the economic recovery seems to stabilize?” Believe it or not, the most frequent response from these professionals was that they want to go out on their own and start their own business. Before taking the plunge, here are five competencies you need to succeed.

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Economists and media pundits are suggesting that the recession is nearing its end, and I am finally seeing signs in the metro DC area that indeed they may be right. My buddies at search firms and recruiting agencies are getting requests every day to fill more jobs, and prospective clients are looking to me to help them in their management challenges. I’m thrilled to no longer be hearing the words: “yes, we want you — but not now,” but rather, “yes, can you conduct a training session next week?”

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Just as the London Symphony Orchestra works in harmony to play a beautiful concerto, any successful collaboration can be one of the most satisfying experiences we have as professionals. That’s because when collaborative efforts click, everyone understands and values each other’s role on the project and the unique contribution each person is making. In fact, successful collaborative efforts can often be the height of a person’s professional career. So, why is it often so hard to collaborate?

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