The Weber Consulting Group

If you know an educator, please share this with them. They perform one of the most pivotal roles in society, and they do so in one of the most demanding of contexts. The vital work these dedicated professionals perform is both difficult and rewarding. Our goal is to help them reduce the difficulty and increase the reward. This is important, because helping educational professionals build stronger, more resilient institutions is not just good for educators – it’s good for society.

Conversational Capacity and Educational Professionals By Randy Weber and Craig Weber The foundation of every state is the education of its youth. — Diogenes The Synopsis Educators perform one of the most pivotal roles in society, and they do so in one of the most demanding of contexts.

"Why does a walk in the woods seem so relaxing? Why do Americans spend $45 billion a year on bird watching? And why will nearly 10 percent of the world’s population visit a zoo or an aquarium this year? The great Harvard University evolutionary biologist Edward O. Wilson had an answer—an inborn human instinct he called 'biophilia.'"

Is Love of Nature in Our Genes? Is biophilia a universal human instinct or a trait on which people differ?

I had a great time with Chris and Bill on the People and Performance Podcast! Check it out!

‎People and Performance Podcast: Inspiring Constructive Change on Apple Podcasts ‎Show People and Performance Podcast, Ep Inspiring Constructive Change - Nov 30, 2023

"With a deceptively convincing hypothesis embedded in your skull, it’s only one short stop for your brain to start seeing evidence for that hypothesis. Your poor, deluded gray matter sees what it expects to see not what is actually there. The moral? Treat with the greatest suspicion the proof of your own eyes." -- Cordelia Fine.

“Nurses use it to lessen anxiety and enhance their coping skills. Patients use it to reduce the impact of chronic pain and to maintain a positive state of mind during treatment. Pilots use it to improve their communication and decision making in a crisis. Soldiers use it to boost their energy and reaction time in combat, and to guard against post-traumatic stress disorder. Police officers use it to remain clear-headed in high-pressure situations. Teachers use it to more effectively deal with difficult students, parents, administrators, and faculty. Firefighters use it to build their resilience and reduce stress and anxiety. Athletes use it to reach peak performance. You can use it make your brain more connected and resilient, to reduce pain and stress, and to build your conversational capacity.What wields such impressive power? Mindfulness awareness.” – Excerpt from Chapter 2 of Influence in Action.

Harvard researchers study how mindfulness may change the brain in depressed patients Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School are examining how mindfulness meditation may change the brain in depressed patients.

In my first book, I describe the ability to stay in the sweet spot as a “conversational martial art.” But in this martial art, our opponent isn’t other people, the issue, or the context. It’s our ego. And to remain in the sweet spot, focused on learning, we need the ability to take our ego to the mat. Put differently, for a person or team with high conversational capacity, learning is more important than an ego massage.

“A lack of self-awareness combined with overactive egos can trip up even the best executive team.”

Don’t Let Overactive Egos Ruin Your Senior Leadership Team’s Effectiveness So much is riding on the performance of senior leadership teams. Consider a quick review of how ego-influenced behaviors might be holding back their effectiveness.

"When analyzing the data, Cohen’s team made an intriguing discovery: They observed a spike in brain activity, mimicking the neural pattern seen during the practice session, but compressed by twentyfold. Rather than being idle, the brain was replaying the practice session over and over at an astonishingly high rate of speed—flipping the material from the neocortex, where sensory and motor skills are processed, to the hippocampus, the brain’s memory center, over two dozen times in the span of 10 seconds. Stepping away from the activity, it turns out, is not stepping away from the activity at all."

We Drastically Underestimate the Importance of Brain Breaks When it comes to optimizing learning, we don’t value breaks enough, neuroscientists suggest in a new study.

You can’t control every variable in a conversation or meeting. But you can choose to be a constructive variable:

Be a Constructive Variable You can’t control every variable in a conversation or meeting. But you can choose to be a constructive variable.

Diversity is even more important than many people realize. Research shows that more diverse teams outperform less diverse teams, especially in complex, unpredictable, adaptive situations. Diversity, therefore, should be viewed as an asset, as another form of intelligence. But there’s a catch.

Conversational Capacity® and the “Diversity Bonus” To think is to differ. — Clarence Darrow Synopsis: Diversity is even more important than many people realize.

Don’t Let Power Dynamics Derail Work Communications Leaders can learn to carry their authority in a way that lifts, rather than lowers, the conversational capacity of their team says communication expert Craig Weber.

"Being an adept communicator is the keystone of all social skills." — Daniel Goleman

"Being an adept communicator is the keystone of all social skills." — Daniel Goleman

Well, I see it differently! UCLA psychologist Matthew Lieberman explains why people don’t perceive the world the same way others do.

Adaptive Engagement and Conversational Capacity® The majority of full-time workers in the world are either watching the clock or actively opposing their employer. — Gallup Engagement is widely recognized as an important indicator of organizational health.

"The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence; it is to act with yesterday's logic." ― Peter Drucker

Conversational Capacity® and Psychological Safety Psychological safety is an enabling condition for effective teamwork Conversational capacity is an enabling competence for creating it. The only Zen you can find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there.

"It's a crazy world out there. Be curious." -- Stephen Hawking

"Most of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to get their work done." — Peter Drucker

How to Be Self-Aware Manage your feelings so they don’t manage you.

"Self-awareness is the meta-skill of the 21st century" -- Tasha Eurich

Wow. I had no idea I was even being considered!

Top 100 HR Influencers List of 2021 | Engagedly Engagedly’s research team came up with a list of HR influencers of 2021 who made a major impact in their organizations as well as the industry.