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Unveiling the Secrets of Successful Keynote Speaker Booking: Insights from a Meeting Planner To learn more about booking a keynote speaker tailored to your event’s specific needs, please don’t hesitate to contact us. Our experienced team is ready to provide expert guidance and help make your next event an unforgettable success. A Meeting Planner’s Perspective […]

Odds are good that you’re doing 10 SMALL THINGS YOU SHOULDN’T SWEAT AT WORK things to proactively manage how you present yourself at work: writing concise emails, speaking up in meetings, and trying not to make your sentences sound like questions. But when you’re in the first phases of your career, sometimes understanding office etiquette […]

Some say great leaders are born. We say great leaders are made, HOW TO BE A GREAT LEADER. There are many different types of leaders and leadership styles. While it’s important to find your own style, there are many qualities of leaders throughout history that have stood the test of time. While we will view […]

A lot has happened in the past few years since my book, We’re Really All In This Together: Creating a Team Culture of High Performance, Trust, and Belonging, was first published in the spring of 2020. I completed the manuscript for this book (which was just released this week in paperback) at the end of 2019. I […]

The global market economy is facing a tough time, with billions of dollars lost this week alone — and the local market is following suit with wisdom all around us The outlook is negative and some economies are preparing for another crisis. This does not provide an inspiring environment for someone looking to start or […]

Easter is obviously when Christians celebrate a miracle that is central to our faith and The Importance of Belief. We are also in the seasons of Ramadan and Passover.   Although my work here is never intended to be about any particular set of spiritual beliefs, it struck me when thinking about these observances that […]

Building brands takes time. Be patient. Branding is an overused, misused and even abused management term. People think brand is a quick design fix for many management ills. It’s not. Building a brand takes time to root and enact change. The reason being, brands can influence our emotion and behaviour and that doesn’t happen overnight. […]

Eddie Botes, Leadership and Culture Speaker wrote this article, Critical Thinking for the Adaptive Leader. VUCA is an acronym that is now well established as a description of the business world that we currently operate in. In a Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous world, there is no going back to the familiar and predictable world before the global financial […]

Thinking of Self Care When Burned Out as i was Heading to Dallas from Kansas City recently, I heard the familiar tone of the voice over the intercom start up: “Ladies and Gentlemen, we’ve got a full flight to Dallas today…” Travel is BACK and flights are almost always full again, so I couldn’t be […]

Getting absolutely clear about HOW TO UNCOVER YOUR PASSION is critical to your success as an entrepreneur. You want a passion that you are willing to shout from the rooftops—that you’ll share with everyone, even strangers at a cocktail party. Why is identifying your unique passion so important? Because passion is fundamental to your forward progress. […]

Do you remember what life was like right before you received the message of biggest trap in business that confirmed your appointment as executive? Or before you started your own business? Or before you took over the family business? Opportunities lay ahead like an orchard of fruit trees ripe for the picking and everything that […]

Ways to Use Authenticity is so much more than “being yourself”, and how you can use it as your new career playbook. It was a teeny bit embarrassing. I had just kicked off one of the most important negotiations of my career. I was brand new in the COO role for my company, and one […]

Life has a such a unique way of giving us what we need (soul food) rather than what we want. Stop another dark night of the soul.   I have just come out of what can only be described as another dark soul of the night. Unable to see further than my fear and feeling […]

Start Training to Live the Real You and The Ability to Feel Confident in the Midst of Life’s Challenges Takes Practice Why is practicing for life’s challenges so important? We are biologically designed to access great stores of energy when things matter. It’s how we’ve survived as a species. Life and death circumstances require great […]

Don’t you just love when prospects ask you that question? – What Makes You Different? If you recognize the question as the true trap that it is, and you know how to deal with it, then you love it. If you don’t treat that question as the trap that it is, you’re toast.   For […]

One of the attractions of Work-At-Home schedule is the vision of freedom it invokes — no time clock, no time sheets, and no one to account for how you spend your time. Yes, it is an attractive proposition, but like so many attractive propositions there is a heavy downside — you are likely wasting a […]

Toward the end of 2020, I made a resolution to cut down on my intake of fast food. I was almost resolute never to bring another juicy slice of pizza to my lips ever again and Making Organizational Changes Stick I had always known the truth – it was counterproductive to my gym routine and one slice […]

In this age of constant digital innovations and disruption with the future of events, the value of digital elements across the board has become evident. With continuous learning and development, digital activities have become ingrained in the fabric of humanity. However, it is vital, especially, in the age of information that brands and organisations lead […]

Without exaggerating, there are literally hundreds of ways of becoming more self- aware, and hence be more Adaptable to embrace and think through opportunities and / or adversity. As a Preferred Partner in South Africa for the Six Seconds EQ Worldwide Network (in 174 countries), we talk about ‘emotions driving people, and people driving performance’. […]

Can you imagine Say No To Revenue? It doesn’t sound right, does it? Ironically enough, that’s exactly what might be necessary to set you and your business up to achieve success. Anyone that knows chicken, has at least heard of Chick-fil-A and their famous chicken sandwiches served across locations in 48 states in the US. […]

On this day that has been set aside to honor the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., it’s important to note that Dr. King’s words still ring true today, It Really Boils Down to This. The power of truth does not decay with the passing of time. Dr. King’s message is proof that you […]

To succeed, you have to Training Others to establish boundaries.   But boundaries are only as good as your ability to communicate them.   If people don’t know your boundaries, they become ineffective and are more likely to be discarded.   Training other people on your boundaries requires learning how to say no. That doesn’t […]

Are we on the brink of the Un-Recession? The latest jobs report–published August 5–showed that the United States added over half a million new jobs in the month of July.   Unemployment is at or a near a 50-year low. Both points add credence to a growing number of economists who are pushing back against […]

Culture and Talent Retention is a real challenge and employees are looking for organizations that inspire them, uplift them and create opportunities for growth and progression. Of significant importance to retaining people is the ability of an organization to create alignment between what they say and what they actually do. Misalignment of value systems is […]

Chris Bertish | Captains Log 13th June 13th -17th June 29 05’474 N 128 01’447W Pacific Ocean Milestones-The waterline/ Hatches & rouge waves/MOB take 2 -Injuries /Slow is pro / It’s all shifting / Maslow’s hierarchy of Needs / Story of the clever turd! / Shifting spaces / Into the light.. Breakthrough/ Flicker on! / […]

“Have a great day!” We say this statement to friends and loved ones so often in Inspiring Others that it may become perfunctory. Just because it may seem cliché, does not mean it is not a sincere remark. I truly want the people in my life to have an awesome day all the time and […]

Some people get up every day and make excuses to justify the reasons why they “can’t” get what they want so here are my The 3 Keys to Peak Performance.  They allow their EXCUSES to take a VIP seat in their life. “I can’t” apply for a promotion because I don’t have the skills necessary […]

For many of us, robots used to conjure up images of humanoids in sci-fi movies, and we thought them to be Robots are creepy? Not at all. We need them. But now that they have become so ubiquitous, this is no longer the case.   More and more companies are embracing the robotics revolution, introducing […]

Lizette Volkwyn is also one of only two certified PEI human lie detector in South Africa! Meet Lizette Volkwyn, an energetic, dynamic and focused South African who believes that all you have to do today is to be 1% better than yesterday. Lizette encourages individuals to strive for self-acceptance and to appreciate their self-worth. She […]

I’m not going to pretend that this is easy stuff for Second Best, especially given all the uncertainty in the world. Over the course of the last three weeks, as corporate America has made the transition from meetings in conference rooms and common spaces to Zoom calls and other online sessions, I’m struck by the […]

Veteran business writer Theodore Kinney interviews Dane Jensen and shares his takeaways from The Power of leading under Pressure for strategy+business. Pressure is a goad. Whether it arrives in the guise of a burning platform or a project deadline, a strategic goal or a performance target, a high-stakes deal or an aggressive competitor, pressure can […]

Drink more water! About 60-70% of the body is made of water, so drinking enough of it helps maintain the body’s fluid balance. This assists in transporting the relevant nutrients throughout the body, helps to regulate body temperature, and is a vital ingredient in good digestion. Besides flushing out toxins and maintaining regular bowel habits, […]

A common problem new pilots struggle with is avoiding a PIO or pilot-induced oscillation. So how do we Stop the Cycle as We’re all familiar with the concept of overcorrecting in a car. A deer runs out, you’re driving tired, you’re near the edge of the road, and you yank the wheel the other direction […]

I have worked with corporate teams that measure what seems like everything. My concern with these teams isn’t what they are measuring, but rather what they are not measuring — leadership effectiveness. Teams measure on-time delivery, sales call per day, employee engagement, and so many more useful metrics. I’ve even seen a team measure coffee […]

How to make change work for you, As human beings, we don’t look at change and think, “Hmmm I want more of that.” Given my own relationship to and with change, I challenged myself to figure out why this is true. Why do we avoid change? Why does change create stress, fear and uncertainty? The […]

Having left a secure executive position with IBM for the insecurity of starting my own business, I sometimes struggled Working From Home before expanding into ‘real’ commercial office space to accommodate staff and here are my Tips for Working From Home-or in your Own Business. Now, like many others, I find myself back working from […]

Ten years ago, I was retrenched from a marketing and sales position. My story is the same as many other people. Sometimes losing a job can point towards a better life and opportunities you never thought possible and now Ten Years as an Entrepreneur. After my retrenchment, I didn’t have an epiphany about starting a […]

How to bounce back after retrenchment or a job loss. Got retrenched? Here’s how to recover and step up One of the most devastating feelings is the realization of the loss of your income. It puts you in an immediate spiral of fear, anxiety, and uncertainty. Retrenchment affects you emotionally and the whole process can […]

On Culture and Leadership, WHAT COULD POSSIBLY BE SAFER THAN A RIGID RULE…? Can debate produce greater safety than rules? Isn’t the iron-clad rule a surer safeguard against disaster? We tend to think of organisations like NASA as having more or less the same basic character despite the passage of years. But it’s not necessarily […]

When Lance Armstrong was bust for using performance enhancing drugs through most of his career one of his defences was that it was part of the racing culture of the time and many other riders were doing it too. So, Would you use performance enhancing drugs at work? In order to be competitive, he believed […]

For Africas growth path it is important to recognize that lessons learnt in a particular place and time in history are not automatically transferrable to another part of the world. However, the growth of Africa mirrors to some degree that of Asia over the past 40 years. The development of the four main Asian Tigers – […]

When I am working from home, one of my favorite places to go when I need a break is my daughter’s apiary (bee yard). I am absolutely fascinated by these amazing creatures and WHAT YOU CAN LEARN. Between their work ethic and how they function together as a colony, I think I could sit and […]

Companies are constantly adapting to provide Habits of Collaborative Leaders as the most efficient and productive work environments for the employees. The team – not the individual contributor – is the new secret for business success. U.S companies spent $12 billion on leadership development. 56% of company leaders say they will soon face a shortage […]

Change Your Sleep, Change Your Life: Do you suffer from the inability to go to sleep? I have my entire life. Until lately things have finally begun to change, but it is a choice, as I’ve begun to make and keep simple promises that are making a huge difference. Change Your Sleep, Change Your Life […]

When I started in sales and Social Selling, I had to visit 8 clients physically, every single day. No jokes! In our wildest dreams we could not have imagined a tool like email, never mind social media and Building Relationships Online. Social media has created so many incredible opportunities for us, and it is about […]

A little while ago, I wrote an article titled “Critical thinking for the Adaptive Leader – nine key characteristics to What are your sacred cows”, which featured on the Conference Speakers International website. I briefly highlighted nine characteristics that Adaptive Leaders adopt to navigate a changing world. For this article, I am going to be […]

We’re 60 days out from a new year and a new year and 10 things to do in the next 30 days ensure 2023 is your most EPIC year yet. I don’t know about you but I plan on making 2023 a year of EPIC achievement, EPIC health and EPIC experiences.   Having an EPIC […]

THE RISE OF THE MINI TYRANTS, we all know the type. Dress a man in a hi-vis vest, armed with a clipboard and a biro, and you’ve just built yourself a mini tyrant. You’ve licensed a tiny authoritarian to impose the rules verbatim, as he sees fit, no matter the context or circumstances. It’s worrying […]

The risks of Algorithmic Inequality Trap and discrimination and bias have received much attention and scrutiny, and rightly so. Yet there is another more insidious side-effect of our increasingly AI-powered society — the systematic inequality created by the changing nature of work itself. We fear a future where robots take our jobs, but what happens […]

Imagine this scenario: You are considered THE BEST in the world at your chosen profession – according to critics, peers, well known in the public – and suddenly you MUST change your career. Does this thought excite you, or terrify you? If it is YOUR choice, then it’s a great thing! If it’s doctor’s orders […]

Social media abounds with the hype and extraordinary news of Shackleton’s ship Endurance is patience concentrated being found in 3008 meters of water in the Weddell Sea, 107 years after it was smashed by ice in 1915. This discovery has deservedly grabbed global attention. “Men wanted for hazardous journey, small wages, bitter cold, long months […]

Empowering Innovators Mindset in today’s fast-paced technological landscape, organizations struggle to stay relevant and innovative. With technology rapidly evolving, traditional business models and strategies become obsolete. This inability to adapt and innovate leaves companies stagnant, eventually causing them to fall behind their competition. The key to survival in this highly competitive environment lies in fostering […]

Know What You Want and Success is actually fairly simple. Firstly, set a goal.  Then break it down into actionable activities.  Do the activities.  Add in some patience, resilience, hard work and discipline, and voila…..Success! Easy, right? Well, if it were that simple, we wouldn’t need an entire industry dedicated to motivation, training and coaching. […]

Regular Mindfulness Practice, Meditation and Benefits Forget about the incense making you feel all balmy… I want to share with you some of the scientific evidence of the benefits of Regular Mindfulness Practice (*) Results from fMRI scans after 8 weeks of Regular Mindfulness Practices training… Intervention studies have been carried out that specifically look […]