Countdown: A 50-Day Personal Leadership Challenge
DAY 50: Today’s challenge is to stay mindful, stay sane, and stay healthy. What steps will you take to achieve this goal? Start by setting a goal to think GOOD thoughts. Did you know that up to 70% of the thoughts that most people think are negative. And, of all the thoughts we think each day, research suggests that up to 95% are the same thoughts we thought yesterday. How is this possible? It may be built-in to your job description. For example, when I recently mentioned this 95% figure to a bright young sales clerk at an office equipment store he looked at me in disbelief. Then I explained that the sales pitch he had just given me was probably the same one that he had delivered to a 100 people before me. Knowing this was true, he smiled at me and nodded his head in agreement. To boost the number of good thoughts you think each day, try this simple exercise: say to yourself “Be Mindful” each time you take an action. The more mindful you are, the more present you become. While staying fully present in every moment may not be possible, it’s a worthy goal. It means that you are taking full responsibility for what happens in your life. Learning how to lead from the INSIDE out is a leadership practice. You recognize that every thought, words or action is the result of a choice you have made. Chose well. Others may be watching, and following your lead. Alexia Parks is president of 10TRAITS Leadership Institute: Offering 1-Minute conflict resolution tools, research, and trait-based training...G.E.T. Smarter Faster: Express Your Full Potential
G.E.T. Smarter Faster is based on the synergy of 10 powerful feminine traits that are the complementary opposite of 10 equally powerful masculine traits. When these traits are placed in a dynamic synergy, they unlock untapped potential that has been suppressed and polarized in both men and women. Alexia Parks GET Smarter Faster talk and workshop includes an experiential session with the 1-Minute Evaluation Tool. Everyone in the room experiences it at the same time. Everyone gains benefits. Use it to strengthen relationships, reduce conflict, shed hidden bias and improve decision-making. Good relationships, of course, give us more freedom to focus on our goals and opportunities because we are spending less time and energy overcoming the problems associated with negative relationships. 10TRAITS structural framework for decision-makers leverages-natural trait-based differences in order to strengthen relationships and reduce conflict, sustainably. Facilitators are trained at the 10TRAITS Leadership Institute to help use this framework to create trait-balanced organizations TAKE ACTION: Bring this event to your K-14, college, organization or corporation in 2019. BIO: Alexia Parks is founder of 10TRAITS Leadership Institute, inventor of the Gender Equality Tool,-and a UN Mentor. Alexia was called “One of 50 people who matter most on the NET,” by Newsweek magazine for her launch of Votelink, one of the first electronic democracy systems on the Internet “ She formerly wrote for the national desk of The Washington Post. Alexia’s science-based work lies at the interface of technology, biochemistry, and human...Three TECH Savvy Solutions That Could Reunite Migrant Families
If you, like me, wake up every day wondering what single action you can take to help solve the problem of the 2,400 migrant children separated from their parent(s), here are three ideas I came up with that are starting to attract attention: IDEA #1: The 3-Meter Tech Solution: Lawyers in collaborate with tech smart what3words and Google Earth, could identify the specific location of each child within 3 meters and give them a wrist band with their own unique three words embossed on it. Take a photo of each child showing their three-word wrist band, then do the same with their parent(s). IDEA #2: The StartUp Village Project: If a safe return to their home country is possible – where poverty, not violence, was the reason for leaving – migrant families could be provided with a 5-year-guaranteed income to live in a new *startup village.* This would require an agreement by the government of the country and skills training. For example, THIS location in Guatemala. The cost would be in the millions, not billions, and recognize America’s role in creating an unnecessary humanitarian crisis and PTSD and separation anxiety that could last a lifetime for these migrant families. IDEA #3: CANADA’S new immigration program. This easy to implement program could also work in America. In the U.S. a reunited family would be released from custody await legal determination in the U.S. if they are able to secure five sponsors, using Matchmaking technology. Alexia Parks, inventor of the Gender Equality Tool and G.E.T. Smarter Together 1-Minute Learning Tool, is Founder and CEO of 10TRAITS Leadership...$4,000-per-Minute-Facebook-Fundraiser Has Everyone Talking
It’s time to restore TRUST in our common humanity. It took the collective horror of images of toddlers ripped from the arms of their parents, of caged children sobbing, some even drugged into compliance…, for one tech savvy couple from the San Francisco Bay Area to say BASTA! Enough! The one simple action they took to raise $1,500 to help one family post bond and be reunited with their children has now gone viral. In less than five days, the $4,000-per-minute-Facebook-fundraiser set up by former Facebook employees Charlotte and Dave Willner (who now work at Pininterest and Airbnb, respectively) is about to reach their new goal of $20 million. They money will be given to RAICESTEXAS.org a Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services in Texas. Felix Salmon a regular Slate contributor and host of the Slate Money podcast, can vouch for the organization’s capabilities. Salmon says that he donated money to RAICES before the campaign even started and “it’s been amazing to watch as this formerly obscure nonprofit has achieved a level of visibility that thousands of much older and more established organizations can only dream of.” America is good at throwing massive amounts of money away: This year, the federal government gave the Austin-based non-profit Southwest Key Programs almost $500 million to operate its shelters, according to The Dallas Morning News. Could Congress tell the Appropriations Committee to un-fund it? Yes. Should the almost $500 million now directed to Southwest Key Programs be redirected instead toward RAICES? RAICES staff say the money will “provide legal representation to every child” and “ensure every parent has representation and legal counsel.”...
Startup Leadership: What Question Would You Like People to Ask You?
I just signed up to attend my favorite event of the year: BoulderStartUpWeek. This week-long event is about to start and all available hotel and airbnb space in town is filling up. Hosted in dozens of venues downtown including many co-working spaces and supported by hundreds of volunteers, it feels more like a community potluck for the mind than an event. People who show up at this annual feast of free events includes everybody who has an interest in all things startup. Their curiosity drives them to take time off to take a look at the future of (almost) every field of endeavor that the human mind can imagine. If you, like me, are lucky enough to learn about the event before the more than 50 “high octane” talks a day by seasoned entrepreneurs fill up, you can get first pick of the panels that interest you most. And even if they’re marked “filled” chances are, you can still get in. Once inside an event, you’ll be certain to be asked The Question at least once. But first you have to fill out your profile. Most of the details requested in the profile are easy to fill out and none push the privacy alarm. But this one: “What question would you like people to ask you?” has a catch. It slows me down a bit because it makes me think of who is asking the question. Is it a millennial? A boomer? A venture capitalist? A potential customer? Or is it someone who simply asked the question and doesn’t really have time to listen to the answer? We live...
Purchase Alexia Parks latest book