• Learn New Strategies for Branding and Marketing
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Classes meet in a computer lab equipped with individual computers for every student’s hands-on use.

Topics include:

• Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook
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• Create effective e-marketing campaigns
• Writing effectively and publishing your own blog

Course Details

4 Week Schedule:
October 4th, 11th, 18th, and 25th
Tuesdays 6:00pm – 9:00pm
Tuition: $249

Location:
Graduate School of Business at Touro College
65 Broadway, 2nd Floor, NYC

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Some high achievers report employing a rational-behavioral approach in setting and achieving their goals. Others agree that adopting rational-behavioral strategies relative to goal achievement is logical; it makes sense!  However, when all achievers were asked to describe the methods they employed to achieve their goals, the achievers sense making becomes senseless!  Instead of outlining goal achievement plans that were rational, data rich, and milestones-specific they delivered checklists of irrational demands identifying conditions that must exist and resources that should be available that were necessary for them to succeed.  What a conundrum!

How can seemingly rationality formulated goals be achieved through irrationally conceived methods?

Let’s consult an expert!

Dr. Louis Primavera is the Dean of the Graduate School of Psychology andSchoolofHeath SciencesatTouroCollegeinNew York City. He is an award winning clinical psychologist and educator, influential author and educational leader, and nationally recognized expert in Rational-Emotive-Behavioral Therapy (REBT) having collaborated for decades with the late Dr. Albert Ellis, creator of REBT.

Rationality and Thought

Dr. Primavera offers that we socially construct our worlds; thoughts fuel emotions and drive behaviors.  “As cognitive beings we are active, thinking, and choosing organisms that control our lives and behavior, as a result we are able to create and achieve goals.”  Drs’ Primavera and Ellis share the view that rational and irrational thinking is inherent in human nature.  Unlike rational thinking which is generative, enabling people to make data informed decisions concerning their goals that are consistent with reality, irrational thinking is preventative.  It disables people’s ability to evaluate the viability of their goals and capabilities; in turn rending decision making suspect and inconsistent with reality.

Irrational thinking is characteristically rigid and absolute.  Dr. Primavera states “A key driver of irrational thought and belief is absolutism.  Absolutism manifests in several forms. People use these forms to develop irrational, dysfunctional, and unproductive thinking and behavior associated with achieving goals.” The absolutes include:

• Awfulizing: The result of not achieving goals is complete and abject failure. This condition is absolutely awful and worse than it should ever be.
• Low Frustration Tolerance (LFT): A cognitive state in which people insist they cannot endure a set of conditions or be satisfied.
• Excessive Criticality: Being overly critical of oneself, others, and situations.

Irrational thinking and Absolutes impede goal achievement.  Working with a coach trained in REBT methods can promote rational, non-absolutist thinking, foster effective decision making, and encourage behaviors enabling goal achievement.

Rationality and Change

In his 1992 seminal book Organizational Culture and Leadership, social psychologist and change expert Dr. Edgar Schein wrote “If you don’t manage change, it will manage you.”  Attempting to manage change is an important exercise in establishing a sense or order and stability in our lives. However, the powerful forces inherent in change often frustrate our desires and actions associated with goal achievement.  As a result, people often translate their frustrations into demands; demanding that certain conditions must exist and mandating shoulds that must occur in order for them to achieve their goals.

Dr. Primavera shares “Absolutes such as musts and shoulds are demands. They decrease our effectiveness in making rational decisions concerning our goals.”  Musts are especially demanding and particularly pernicious.  They inhibit flexibility and minimize productivity.  Dr. Primavera endorses three categories of musts identified by REBT founder Dr. Ellis. The must-demands include:

1. Demands on self: I must achieve my goals or it is awful and I can’t stand it!  These beliefs foster anxiety or guilt.
2. Demands on others: I must be helped to achieve my goals. If others don’t help me it is horrible and I will fail! These beliefs foster anger and aggression.
3. Demands on life: I must achieve my goals in order to live in the way I want. If this does not happen it is terrible and I can never be happy. These beliefs foster self-pity and inertia.

Irrational thinking and demands hinder goal achievement.  Working with a coach trained in REBT can guide the development of non-demanding approaches life and realistic behaviors associated with achieving our goals.

Rationality is the antidote of irrationality.  Rationality promotes informed decision making and disciplined action. Coaches training in REBT methods can enable access to the power and potential residing in rational-behavioral approaches to goal achievement.

Get rational; Be successful; Get coached.

How can failure enable your success? Consider implementing the 3R’s of managing failure toward success.

Reflection

Reflection is an acquired capability.  It requires intention and attention to develop and apply. For many people, the skills associated with reflection must be learned.  Often, learning to be reflective can be unfamiliar even disquieting as thoughts and actions are examined relative to new ideas and opportunities.  In his 1933 book How We Think, the American philosopher and educational reformer John Dewey offered three orientations promoting reflective practice open-mindedness, responsibility and wholeheartedness.  These orientations can serve as conceptual frameworks for determining if we possess these qualities associated with reflection.  To test our reflective capacity, apply Dewey’s orientations to review your thoughts and behavior relative to events in order to learn, grow, and innovate.  Failing to reflect undermines success.  However, successful failure yields information and inferences that can stimulate reflection. Reflection is the success. The result is the reflective journey inward; examining motivations, context, and importance associated with a failing. When reflection renders resolve; reengage the goal refreshed and reconfirmed.  However, if reflection reveals that the activity you’ve engaged is not a calling that it is misaligned with desires or skills, quit quickly, completely, and don’t look back.  Stop investing resources in ultimately unproductive endeavors.

Resolve

Resolution is a pivot point. It marks a nexus of intersecting streams of data, thought, and reflection franked with the stamp of decision and imprinted with the indicia of resolve. Reflection requires resoluteness.  We must resolve to be reflective in order to strengthen our resolve and generate the courage necessary to transform failure into success.  British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill wrote “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” Courage enables success.  Being courageous enough to critically examine our failures can prove transformational.  Consider the case of the British vessel HMS Resolute.  In 1853 on an arctic expedition, the ship was trapped in ice and abandoned by its crew. In 1854, it was found adrift in an ice flow and in 1856, returned to Queen Victoria.  In 1879, the HMS Resolute was retired and disassembled. The next year, 1880, the British government commissioned two large partner desks to be constructed from its timbers; one presented to then United States President Rutherford B. Hayes and the other for Queen Victoria. Today, the presidential resolute desk is the center piece of the Oval Office having served every president since being received as a gift.

The HMS Resolute in name and legacy is a model of resolve. During its commission, the ship served proudly and purposefully surviving numerous challenges to its survival and success. Then, in the end when the ship was dissembled, its builders resolved that it would realize a new destiny, one with a purpose they had not foreseen 30 years earlier. It would become an instrument of state, a desktop on which presidents would sign the documents of history.  The HMS Resolute fulfilled a destiny of transformation. Resolve empowers progress, fulfills destiny, and enables possible selves.

Respond

Reflection and resolve fuel response. Responding is purpose-in-action. When we determine a productive course of action in order to achieve a goal, the result may be failure.  However, the seeds of future success are present in unsuccessful action.  The American statesmen and inventor Benjamin Franklin wrote “I didn’t fail the test. I just found 100 ways to do it wrong.” Franklin’s response to failure was to reflect, resolve to reengage, and respond to each wrong way in order to achieve the desired result.  He forged ahead with courage and conviction; open-minded, responsible, and wholehearted.  Franklin’s willingness to fail enabled his success.  Reflection, resolve, and responsiveness served as beacons lighting his way toward transformation.

Harness the power and potential inherent in failure to fuel your success.

The American mythologist, writer, and teacher Joseph Campbell wrote “Opportunities to find deeper powers within ourselves come when life seems most challenging.” Often, the challenges of modern life drive us to find “deeper powers within ourselves” to conceive, believe, and achieve our personal and professional visions of future.  At times, our confidence wanes; neither enabling nor sustaining us. It recedes within us rendering our efforts to achieve goals near lifeless or lost to memory. So, how can we develop our confidence to serve us with greater reliability?  What strategies and methods can we employ to build confidence; in turn coherence and continuity in pursuit of our personal and professional visions of the future?

Let’s consider the role of coaching in enabling confidence.

Confidence and Coaching

Coaches help build confidence. They enable us to create contexts of honesty and authenticity. They promote self-reflection helping us to acknowledge truths about our talent and potential relative to realizing our visions of the future.  Coaches challenge our thinking and rationales for action. They listen intently and intensely in order to stimulate our awareness to trends and issues that may be inhibiting progress.  Professor Benjamin Weider, Co-Founder and Chairman of the Academy for Continuing Education shares “Confidence is developed and strengthened by coaching.  Working with a coach can enable professionals to acquire key cognitive and behavioral strategies necessary to achieve consistent high performance.” Performing confidently promotes consistency. For many people, in order to perform at high levels, they need to create coherence or balance in their lives. Coaches can enable confidence.

Coherence and Coaching

The great English poet and playwright William Shakespeare, in his early tragedy Titus Andronicus wrote “It is a wonderful thing to see the similarity of coherence in men’s spirits.” Coherence is a state of balance in our lives. Achieving coherence and consonance in our personal and professional lives is a continuous process of analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating the conditions in which we live and how we make informed decisions associated with achieving desired goals. Coaches can help us to structure our thinking, in turn decision making toward achieving coherence in our life endeavors.  David Schlamm, Founder and CEO of City Connections Realty, Inc.  shares “Balance is a key component of profession success. It provides a firm foundation for building a business and maintaining perspective. Balance enables coherence and stability; it unifies who we are and how we achieve our goals.”  Consider employing a coach and build a coaching relationship. Coaches can enable coherence.

Continuity and Coaching

Success requires confidence and coherent performance over time. The continuity of our performance is a key factor enabling success. Harvard Business School Professor Michael Porter writes “strategy must have continuity. It can’t be constantly reinvented.” Continuity is the result of planning. Planning our personal and professional lives is a challenging responsibility and task. Effective planning requires specific knowledge, competencies, and skills focused on envisioning, organizing, and implementing our thoughts and actions in order to achieve desired results. Continuity is coveted; it is necessary to be successful. Without it, visions fade and actions are rendered unproductive. Partnering with a coach can increase continuity of thought and action. It can enable consistent, long-term performance. Coaches can enable continuity.

Coaching as Enabler

The Roman essayist and Ambassador Plutarch wrote “A shortcut to riches is to subtract from one’s desires.” Our desires, visions, and goals associated with our personal and professional lives are the products of the confidence, coherence, and continuity we develop.  Coaches can inform and inspire us to embrace the importance of these variables, and then help us to achieve our goals.

Coaches can enable our confidence, coherence, and continuity.

Get confident; get coached.

Let’s explore these three concepts associated with our possible selves and creating the future today.

Self Concept

The concept of self-concept begins with the French philosopher and mathematician Rene’ Descartes (1596-1650) in his Principles of Philosophy (1644) wrote “Cogito Ergo Sum” (“I think, therefore I am”). Descartes proposed that doubt was a requisite tool of inquiry. He reasoned that because he was able to doubt, he was thinking, and as a result, existed.  A contemporary perspective suggests self-concept is composed of complex and dynamic schemas or beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors that we formulate about ourselves and our relationship to the world throughout our lives.  Our schemas provide context and information used for organizing our world view, in turn enabling us to decide what actions to take and behaviors to choose.

Self concept is constructed through self-assessments. Throughout our lives, we assess our skills and attributes which inform self-concept.  Self-concept is an evolving self-construction, a work in progress continually being reviewed and revised in order to maintain a positive and reinforcing environment for growth and goal achievement.  Professionally, self concept enables us conceive and project what we wish to become.

Self-Esteem

Self-esteem is the evaluative aspect of our self-concept. It is composed of belief schemas that we create concerning our personal and professional worth. The psychotherapist and author Nathaniel Brandon modeled self-esteem on three levels:

• High Self-Esteem – Feeling competent, confident, and comfortable, able to manage personal and professional challenges and worthy of happiness and success.
• Low Self Esteem – Feeling unprepared to engage personal and professional challenges, in turn lacking the confidence necessary to manage challenges and unworthy of happiness or success.
• Middle-Ground Self-Esteem – Vacillating between high and low self esteem; feeling confident and insecure, positive and negative, empowered and disempowered. In addition, evidencing behaviors associated with each state, in turn establishing and reinforcing inconsistency.

Coaching can enable individuals to develop and enhance their self-esteem.  High self-esteem is especially important in high visibility positions such as organization leadership, sales, and customer service.

Self- Efficacy

Psychologist Albert Bandera defined self-efficacy as our belief in ourselves and ability to succeed.  This orientation influences how we set goals, engage tasks, and approach challenges.

Fundamental to self-efficacy is the idea that our responses to events are influenced by the observations we made of others as they engage events.  Our memory of others actions influence our thinking and behavior. As a result, our sense of self-efficacy is constructed by the interaction external events and self-perception. This is important relative to our choices associated with how we think and behave in the future.  For example, individuals possessing high self-efficacy believe they can acquire the skills necessary to perform effectively in most situations. Typically, they view difficult tasks as challenges-to-be mastered, not conditions or obstacles inhibiting goal achievement.

Dr. Christina Murphy, Senior Director, Learning and Development, Century 21 Real Estate, LLC. states “Self-efficacy is key enabler of learning and performance. It fuels learning. Often, professionals evidencing strong self-efficacy embrace change, drive for results, and create their success. They recognize the degrees of self-efficacy necessary to achieve goals. So, in order to achieve their goals, they develop key skill areas such as interpersonal communications, critical thinking, and behavioral discipline supported by continuous learning initiatives.”

Nobel Prize Physicist Albert Einstein wrote “I know quite certainly that I myself have no special talent.  Curiosity, obsession, and dogged endurance, combined with self-criticism, have brought me to my ideas.” Partner with a coach to explore self-concept, self-esteem, and self-efficacy.

Identify your possible selves; begin creating your future today.

This can be a disturbing notion. Frequently, when faced with evidence of this probability, we react emotionally, informing ourselves that the data is baseless; therefore incorrect and meaningless. Moreover, we zealously reaffirm that nothing will stop us from achieving our goal. While belief and commitment are key drivers toward goal achievement, they cannot substitute for behaviors necessary to perform at the required level to achieve a desired goal.  Sadly, when the gap between actual and necessary performance differ, desired results are rendered unachievable. As a consequence the perform or perish equation is introduced.

Coaching can influence the perform to perish equation. A qualified coach can act as an objective, evidence-based evaluator of performance and potential.  As a neutral, external observer, coaches can collect and analyze performance data and provide unbiased feedback concerning performance quality.  Additionally, through the use of select performance assessments, coaches can help craft performance enhancement plans focused on high performance or offer alternative professional suggestions relative to the viability of achieving desired results.

This seems rationale and responsible; right? Wrong! Often, when confronted with the idea that a goal may not be attainable, we cognitively construct realities favoring our desires. We distort fact and bend logic to suit our perspectives and purposes. Unfortunately, when we skew evidence and orientation concerning our actual performance and associated potential, we create conditions that may become professionally detrimental.  Instead of examining the information and considering its viability relative to achieving goals, we reject it. This rejection undermines the possibility of our acquiring insights and information yielded from inquiry and discovery. It hinders personal and professional growth.

Let’s explore several perceptional errors people make that distort their perception concerning their performance.

Perceptual Distortion

Frequently, we distort our perceptions to accommodate our perspectives.  Instead of acknowledging evident performance issues, we make assumptions or inferences about evaluators’ motivations critiquing our performance.  In order to make sense of these external evaluations, we reduce our objectivity and increase subjectivity, selecting information we deem important to support a positive orientation to the performance feedback. We create context and to suit our desired outcomes. Perceptional distortions distort our view of reality, detract from goal achievement, and enable underperformance, in turn non-achievement. Dr. Jean Gordon, professor of human resource management atCapellaUniversityinMinneapolis,Minnesotastates “The influence of perceptual distortions on individuals’ perceptions of their performance can be significant.Superiorand poor performance are equally subject to distortion resulting in unrealistic expectations concerning performance and expected results.”

Expectancy

Expectancy anticipates others to living up to our expectations.  There are two types of expectancy; Self-Fulfilling Prophecy and Selective Perception.  In Self-Fulfilling Prophecy, we expect others to act in a certain way. When we behave towards others in ways we expect them to behave, they will often act as we’ve expected.  Our behaviors create the situations we expected resulting in predictable performance outcomes and reinforced perceptions. In Selective Perception, we selectively filter information in order to see and hear what we desire.  As a result, poor performance can be rationalized inhibiting objective analysis of performance gaps.

Projection

Projection is the tendency to blame our problems and difficulties on others. Projection disables accountability; it’s a defense mechanism focused on shifting responsibility for our behaviors, especially poor performance to others. Uncurbed, projection can undermine performance, hinder goal achievement, and ravage career potential.

Stereotyping

Stereotyping standardizes our perceptions of a group disregarding qualities of its individuals. It is an effort in consistency; assuming people are alike by virtue of their association with a group.  We construct categories of people, places, and things in order to minimize the amount of information-processing necessary to organize our worldview.  Stereotyping influences how we think and behave.  While it may be useful in organizing broad characteristics of groups, it can be detrimental if we allow it to distort our views of others, in turn influence our actions and performance.

Coaching as Competitive Advantage

Coaches can help identify and reduce perceptual error.  Their objective analysis of performance data can enable us to make more informed decisions concerning the viability of our goals and ability to achieve them.  Informed decision making can influence the result of the perform or perish equation.  Gain competitive personal and professional advantage. Get coached and perform to potential.

Chaos and Change

Is chaos meaningful? Does it add value to our personal or professional lives?  To effectively address these questions, we must first determine how we think; specifically, our orientations toward thinking.  For example, do you consider chaos random and unsystematic, devoid of structure, and impossible to influence?  Or, is chaos understandable and uniquely organized, possessing structure, and stimulating us to think and act in new ways?  In her 1998 seminal article Shifting Paradigm: From Newton to Chaos, change expert Dr. Toby Tetenbaum offers us an orientation toward thinking about chaos.  She writes “chaos describes a complex, unpredictable, and orderly disorder in which patterns of behavior unfold in irregular but similar forms.”  Everyday situations present us with forms of chaos.  We are confronted by the dichotomies between order and disorder; irregularity and similarly.  We are compelled to make sense, attribute meaning, and determine value offered in chaos.  We reveal to ourselves, our preferences and needs to create order from chaos; to move from chaos to continuity.

Chaos and Cognition

Moving from chaos to continuity is a cognitive and behavioral experience.  Deriving order from chaos depends on our ability adopt new ways of thinking and translating gained insights into informed, continuous action.  One cognitive approach used for moving from chaos to continuity is rationality.  Rationality employs pragmatism, logic, and reality-based thinking as tools for addressing the perceived structurelessness and inconsistencies associated with chaos.  Rationality enables us to engage, disassemble, and reconfigure chaos towards continuity.  It provides the cognitive models, methods, and metrics necessary to harness the power and potential inherent in chaos preparing us to dispute and dispel irrational beliefs inconsistent with empirical reality.

Dr. Louis Primavera, Dean of the Graduate School of Psychology andSchoolofHealth SciencesatTouroCollegeshares “Humans are active, thinking, and choosing organisms possessing some control over their thinking and behavior.  Our ability to analyze and evaluate chaotic situations, apply insights, and create positive and constant behaviors aligned with our goals, tends to create conditions of continuity enabling us to lead relatively orderly and productive lives.”

Chaos and Coaching

Many business professionals perceive chaos as destabilizing even debilitating.  When chaotic situations arise they default to modes of thinking and behavior they believe have helped them cope with chaos.  Unfortunately, many of the coping mechanisms employed are grounded in the fear, helplessness, and rigidity associated with loss of control.  As a result, the possibilities for personal and professional growth through engaging and experiencing chaos are lost.  Sadly, these professionals create and perpetuate cycles of unrealized potential composed of fear, avoidance, and helplessness that then manifest in chronic under performance.

The 2^nd century Greek Stoic Philosopher Epictetus wrote “Men are disturbed not by things but by the views which they take of them.”  A rationale view of things promotes a logical and data driven approach to engaging chaos and change. Rationality endorses pragmatic, reality-based thought and behavior when confronted with discontinuous events and the irrational thinking and behaving of others.  A rationale view of chaos considers enlisting it as an ally for growth and transformation; a powerful force fueling personal and professional achievement.  Or, chaos could become a font of new knowledge enabling deep shifts in thinking and behavior resulting in our creating conditions favoring continuity, success, and sustainability.

Coaching can enable our understanding of the complexities and constructs associated with chaos.  It can summon cognitive clarity and marshal personal commitment; seed future innovation and reinforce our resolve to grow and progress.  Coaching promotes reflection; leading to insight and informed action.  Prepare for chaos; get coached.