Blog | Bluegem Learning

Apr 2, 2019
3 min

The Manager's Bermuda Triangle

Hi there!! Russell Stratton, president and leadership champion with Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours to help managers improve individual and team performance so they get even better results for your business. In the last couple of VLOGS I've been discussing the topic of Leading from the Middle and there's been a lot of emphasis on how we can lead within the organization when you are in the middle of the organization and you have people working for

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Mar 25, 2019
4 min

Influencing Strategies for Managers & Employees

I'm Russell Stratton, President and Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours to help managers improve individual and team performance so that they get even better results for your business. In my previous article in our Leading from The Middle Series, I discussed the unique position that a lot of middle managers find themselves in. Specifically I was providing some analysis as to our positional power in different types of organiz

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Mar 19, 2019
3 min

Eat or Be Eaten: Know the Political Landscape in your Organization?

Hi there. Russell Stratton, President and Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours to help managers improve individual and team performance to get even better results for your business. The topic I'd like to come back to today is this concept of Leading from the Middle, which I've spoken about briefly before. Middle managers in an organization are in a unique position... They are stuck bang slat in the middle of the organization. Th

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Mar 15, 2019
11 min

Effective Leadership When You're Stuck In The Middle

“Why can’t I just tell the bastards what to do?” asked the Commander squinting at the diagram in front of him. He adjusted his cap to block out the light, which caused the sun to glint off his cap-badge. I could tell the veteran Borough Commander was half-joking, but it was the half that wasn’t joking that worried him. Fergus, however, was unfazed. “Because, you old sod,” retorted Fergus in the same tone. “the world has changed under your feet in case you hadn’t noticed.” F

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Mar 5, 2019
3 min

Three Contenders for The WORST Boss EVER

Hi there. Russell Stratton, president of Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. Over the last 25 years I've worked with a range of organizations to improve bottom line productivity. In the last couple of blogs I've been talking about Managing Your Boss. As I've said before, this is one of the key topics that people come to talk to me about after my workshops. How do I deal with my boss? And often they've brought an anecdote or a story to tell me about the person they're w

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Feb 26, 2019
3 min

How To Manage Your Boss in Four Simple Steps

Hi there, Russell Stratton, President and Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. For the last 25 years I've worked with organizations to develop leaders to maximize team performance and improve bottom line productivity. In our last vlog we were talking about the seven types of bad boss and as I was saying, this is one of the most common topics that people come up to me after my workshops and say, "Hey Russ, how do I deal with managing my boss?" So we identified the seven

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Feb 22, 2019
3 min

The 7 Warning Signs of a BAD Boss

Hi there. Russell Stratton, President and Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. For the last 25 years I've worked with organizations to develop leaders so that they can maximize team performance and improve bottom line productivity. One of the questions I get asked at a lot of my workshops is... "How do I deal with a bad boss?" This seems to be the number one topic that participants have in their mind. How do I deal with a bad boss? So it got me thinking about people Id

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Feb 15, 2019
6 min

The Survivors Guide To Managing Your Boss

People don’t leave their job - they leave their boss. The business relationship you have with your immediate manager, your boss, is one of, if not the most important relationships you have at work. A good boss can help you progress your career to new heights... ...a bad boss can be like a dead weight around your neck and leave you frustrated and searching the job adverts. In the course of my work I regularly get people come and tell me about their “problem” boss and ask what

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Jan 23, 2019
2 min

Tips for Communicating Change Pt 2

Transcript: Hi there, Russell Stratton, President and Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours to help managers and leaders improve individual and team performance in your business to increase results. In a recent vlog, I was talking about the four step process to put together a change message when you've got some significant change happening in your business. And this got me thinking how this links back to Kurt Lewin's force field

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Aug 24, 2018
3 min

If Money Won't Motivate My Employees, What Will?

Transcript: Hi there, I'm Russell Stratton, President and Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours to help leader and managers be even more effective and to help them improve individual and team performance. What I wanted to speak to you about today is one of my favorite motivational theories. And this was the work of Daniel Pink and his theory called "Drive". Why I like Pink's theory is I think it really resonated with the modern d

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Jul 27, 2018
2 min

Tips For Transitioning Into A New Management Role

Transcript: Hi there, Russell Stratton, President and Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours, to help leaders and managers improve their effectiveness and increase individual and team performance. I was talking to one of my clients only last week, who's just moved to a brand new leadership role, and he had a slight amount of trepidation along with excitement of the role. I'm not sure whether you've faced this as well. First week o

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Jul 13, 2018
4 min

Lessons in Leadership from Colin Powell

One of my favourite set of leadership lessons from Colin Powell, in this vlog I choose three that resonate with me. Transcript: Hi, Russell Stratton, Leadership Champion at Bluegem Learning, working with companies like yours to transform average bosses into great leaders. With the theme of leadership in mind, I wanted to focus on some work that was done by Colin Powell on his 18 lessons in leadership. Now for those of you who don’t remember, Colin Powell was former chief of s

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Jun 14, 2018
4 min

Behind The Bench, Not On It

You don't want the coach on the field. One of the greatest challenges facing a new Leader is the shift in thinking from star to coach. You’re no longer thinking of yourself as the star player who takes centre-field. You’re thinking of yourself as the coach who stands behind a bench filled with high-performance athletes. The coach doesn’t get onto the ice and play the puck for them, or get onto the field and block the tackles for them, or run onto the court and move players ab

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May 23, 2018
4 min

How are you engaging your virtual team?

Are you a team leader who manages a virtual and/or remote based team? How can you engage your team members? Transcript: Hi, Russell Stratton, Leadership Champion of Bluegem Learning. I work with companies just like yours to help transform average bosses into great leaders. What I wanted to talk to you about today was, how do we build engagement with a virtual team? So what do I mean by a virtual team? Well, often we’re co-located with our team members, either on a job site or

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May 18, 2018
4 min

Lessons From Scotland Yard: Influencing Within Your Organization Part 2

Transcript: Hi, Russell Stratton, Leadership Champion of Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours, to help transform average bosses into great leaders. To help them facilitate, improve performance for both individuals, and teams. In the last blog, we were talking about influencing at work, and look to this particular model, about influencing in four directions. At the end of that blog, I talked about the secret, being understanding where our power sources w

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May 8, 2018
3 min

Lessons From Scotland Yard: Influencing Within Your Organization Part 1

Hi! Russell Stratton, Leadership Champion of Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours to transform average bosses into great leaders, and help them facilitate improved individual and team performance. One of the areas that I focus on in Bluegem is helping managers influence within the organization. So what do I mean by that? Well, if we have a look at the diagram just behind me, we think about you as the manager here, often there are several different dimen

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Apr 17, 2018
4 min

How To Give Effective Feedback At Work – Use The Four Box Reflective Model

Transcript: Hi, I’m Russell Stratton, Leadership Champion with Bluegem Learning. I work with companies just like yours to help transform managers from average bosses into great leaders and help to facilitate improvement in individual and team performance. A number of the vlogs that I’ve done recently I’ve talked about managing performance. One area I want to focus on today is the concept of giving feedback. Now many of you will have come across a feedback model named the feed

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Dec 14, 2017
4 min

A Millennial Leader’s Experience of Managing a Multi Generational Team

Transcript: Hi there. Russell Stratton, Leadership Champion of Bluegem Learning. I work with organizations just like yours to help transform average bosses into exceptional leaders. This helps drive individual and team performance within your organization. One of the conversations I was having recently was with a group of young managers. These were all new graduates, fresh out of University, very keen, very able, and they were moving into their new organization in their first

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