I was coming out of my MBA accounting class when I saw the tornado sweeping down 7th Street in Fort Worth. I was out of danger but not the downtown. Soon I could see buildings shaking and windows shattering. The twister they said would never hit the City brought its full force and fury. Two people died and over 80 buildings sustained damage. That was 2000. It didn’t take long for the people of Fort Worth to pick up the broken shards of glass and rebuild the devastated parts of town. It was really just a matter of a few years before every building was redone and new construction strengthened the Downtown. Resilient communities are more than just responding to Read More

We continue our four part series on Building Resilience in 2015 and this week it’s all about your family. I’m committed to building our family resilience this year by focusing on improving my praise and compliment giving to my family members. By reinforcing what we do well, our strengths, we build hardiness. Hardiness creates self-assurance and the capacity to withstand difficulties. Here are some ways to build up for family’s endurance and toughness. Celebrate success: Watch how professional athletes celebrate every little thing from a first down to a touch down. These guys know how to party. Try taking on that same attitude around small wins at home. Give your spouse a hug for making vacation plans or tell your Read More

Change is in the air in the workplace and we’re all coming to terms with the idea that we have to become more efficient and effective in how we do our work. There is simply not enough time to get everything done and the result is that we wind up feeling exhausted and worn down—not a good resilience strategy. Here are some strategies that I think will be de rigeur for 2015 Forget the standard 60-minute meeting: Determine ahead of time how long your meeting needs to be and schedule it for just that amount of time. Change your communication patterns: The Coca-Cola corporation recently banned voice mails since they often lead to unproductive “telephone tag”. Face to face communication Read More

The New Year holiday represents an opportunity to consider how you want to shape 2015 for yourself. Over the next 4 Resilient Wednesday’s, I would like to discuss some small ideas to build your resilience in 2015: Week 1: Building Personal Resilience Week 2: Building Business Resilience Week 3: Building Family Resilience Week 4: Building Community Resilience Personal Resilience Don’t make any resolutions: Research shows that resolutions fail. Instead identify some new habits you want to develop and work on them for 30 days. Track yourself for accountability and then give yourself a reward. Get more sleep: Try a sleep track app like SleepBot that will help you assess the quality of your sleep. There is no better idea for Read More