• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Alissa Finerman

Los Angeles Executive Coach and Gallup Certified StrengthsFinder Coach, Speaker and Author

  • Home
  • About
    • Testimonials
  • Seminars
    • Employee Engagement
  • Strengths Coaching
    • About Coaching
    • Speaking
  • Living in Your Top 1%
    • Book
    • Top 1% Tips
    • Resources
  • Blog
  • Contact
    • Media

Living in YOUR Top 1% – It’s Possible

January 1, 2017 By Alissa Finerman Leave a Comment

Living in Your Top 1% is about potential and possibility. It’s about taking the words can’t, should and impossible out of your vocabulary and shifting your mindset to say “I can.” Yes, sounds easy enough.

I live in Santa Monica, CA and was in NYC giving a seminar to an investment management company on Living in Your Top 1%. After the program, I spent a few days in NYC with my family and friends. One night after dinner I met some friends and the conversation steered toward our goals, dreams, and challenges in the new year. A fascinating discussion emerged. There were five of us sitting at the table, four women and one man all in our 40′s. One of the women was a talented artist who described herself as self-taught. I share this because she was allowing the seemingly innocuous term “self-taught” to define her story and limit her ability as an artist to create and do what she loves. I asked what if Madonna bought a piece of her work? Would she still be insecure that she was self-taught? Would that validate her work? She smiled and understood the wake-up call.
Words are powerful. A client of mine likes to use the word disaster when describing parts of her life. Well, a disaster is some event that causes great damage – not something that any of us truly want to experience. The word disaster does not shine positive energy (do you agree?). The question we need to ask is how does the word disaster, or any other word that drains our energy, move you forward on your path?

Bottom Line: Use words that empower you.

When you go on a road trip, you either use your GPS or look up directions on Google or Yahoo. Typically, you search for the most direct route with the least amount of traffic. Well, shouldn’t you use the same approach with your own life? When you use words like disaster and self-taught you are simply adding in traffic and detours to your path. It’s a common pitfall so don’t feel bad. The good news is you can alter how you connect the dots with three easy steps:

1. Bring greater awareness to the words you use on a daily basis.

2. Keep a two-day journal and write down a few key phrases that you use frequently. Do they help you move forward?

3. Make a conscious decision and write down the words you like and want to use such as inspiration, motivation, gratitude, kindness, laughter etc.

Listen to the words you use to see if they propel you forward or hold you back. Often we are not even aware of our core word choices. We are all closer than we think to achieving top 1% moments but we need a little help up the hill. Use words and surround yourself with supportive people who help you be a shining star.

What dreams and goals would you love to achieve this year? Would you love to start your own profitable business, run your first 5k, or actually have time to focus on yourself? This is the time to take a step forward.

As you move forward this month, consider three questions:

1. What do you love to do?
2. What would you love to do more of?
3. What would you love to stop doing?

Please share your thoughts and dreams and empower people to take a small step forward and live in their top 1%.

Believe in yourself,
Alissa

About Alissa

Alissa Finerman is an Executive Coach and Gallup Certified Strengths Coach, speaker and author of Living in YOUR Top 1%. She works with managers, C-suite executives and teams to leverage strengths, shift beliefs and achieve meaningful goals. Alissa has an MBA from the Wharton School and a BA from the University of California, Berkeley. She has worked with Ross Stores, Petco, BNP Paribas, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, Brookfield Property Partners, Neutrogena, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Dress for Success. To learn more about coaching with Alissa, please visit her website and follow her on Facebook

Filed Under: Living in Your Top 1% Tagged With: living in your top 1%, mindset, success

Alissa Finerman’s Living in YOUR Top 1% Action Plan Podcast

December 29, 2016 By Alissa Finerman Leave a Comment

I created this special Living in YOUR Top 1% action plan podcast because I know how difficult it can be to get started. I  have also learned that we all need some support regardless of our previous achievements. The perfect place to start is right where you are regardless of how imperfect it may seem at the time. Please give yourself 25 minutes of uninterrupted time to focus on yourself and listen to the podcast. Feel free to write down some ideas in your journal or computer to start the process. The ideas in this podcast are from my book Living in YOUR Top 1% which provides a more detailed roadmap to help people live their best life.

Listen to Alissa’s Living in YOUR Top 1% Action Plan

https://secureservercdn.net/198.71.233.39/35d.521.myftpupload.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/01-Alissa-Pod-Cast-1-Seven-Step-Action-Plan.mp3

Living in YOUR Top 1% is about expanding your mindset and broadening your idea of what’s possible to live YOUR best life. It’s about taking the words can’t, should and impossible out of your vocabulary and focusing on what you CAN do today — however big or small the step may be. It’s often only a small mindset shift between good and great. Think about what goals you would be excited to achieve this year and then let’s make it happen.

Wishing you all the best for a top 1% year!

“If everything seems under control, you are not going fast enough.” – Mario Andretti

About Alissa

Alissa Finerman is an Executive Coach and Gallup Certified Strengths Coach, speaker and author of Living in YOUR Top 1%. She works with managers, C-suite executives and teams to leverage strengths, shift beliefs and achieve meaningful goals. Alissa has an MBA from the Wharton School and a BA from the University of California, Berkeley. She has worked with Ross Stores, Petco, BNP Paribas, Neutrogena, Bristol-Myers Squibb, the Milken Institute, LA Business Journal, Prostate Cancer Foundation, and NBC Universal. To learn more about coaching with Alissa, please visit her website and follow her on Facebook

Filed Under: Living in Your Top 1%, Podcast Tagged With: action plan, leadership, living in your top 1%, Setting Goals, strengths

Using Feedforward to Have Your Best Year

December 21, 2016 By Alissa Finerman Leave a Comment

As we start the new year I like to first take a moment and have my clients focus on their wins for the previous year. What are you most proud about and why? Your wins can be big or small. It’s important to focus on what went well and what accomplishments you achieved. They could include starting a new business, getting a major client, writing your first blog, surpassing a certain revenue figure, becoming a yoga instructor, successfully changing roles or careers or making time for your family and friends. What did you learn and how will that shape your decisions for 2017?

The next thing I like to have my clients focus on is selecting two or three specific things they want to improve or change. People don’t change until they are ready and decide to make something a priority and commit to it. People will make the change when they realize it actually benefits and improves their own life. The other important element to realize is it’s not enough to think that you’ve successfully changed. We need the people in our life or at work to let us know they see a change. So if you are working on sharing your voice or listening, we can only know that we have successfully made the change when our circle of friends or co-workers sees a difference.

Here is where a new twist on feedback called feedforward comes in. This is a concept that Marshall Goldsmith, an executive coach, developed and it’s very impactful. Feedback focuses on what happened in the past. It focuses on what we are not doing well. Does anyone like to hear what we are not doing well? Most people I know do not like hearing feedback unless it’s positive and even then we are nervous until we know what the feedback is about. Feedforward is a very empowering process where the person making the change selects the behavior they want to work on. They pick 4-5 supportive and non-judgmental people to share the behavior with and ask for two suggestions to help. You are only allowed to say thank you and nothing else to each person who makes a suggestion.

You can do this with your team at work and it goes like this:

* Select a behavior that you want to change

* Partner up with a co-worker and share the behavior you plan to change (ie, I will share my voice in team meetings).

* Your partner shares two suggestions of FeedForward that can have a positive impact.

* Each person in the exercise takes notes on the suggestions made.

* Thank your partner for their suggestions. You can only say thank you and nothing else. This allows each person to fully listen.

* The other partner shares what he or she is working on and receives two suggestions. They thank the person for their suggestions.

* You repeat the process with another partner.

This is an exercise in giving and receiving feedback without making a judgment. You simply thank your partner for listening and sharing a suggestion. You may not like every suggestion but you may also be surprised and receive a few good ideas that you would not have previously considered. Most people enjoy this exercise because it’s forward thinking and involves something that you have control over and can change.

3 Rules to honor for FeedForward:

  1. People can only say thank you and nothing else when you hear the suggestions.
  2. Keep this as a judgment free zone. You don’t need to tell your partner whether you like their ideas but rather simply say thank you.
  3. Each partner sharing exercise should be under three minutes in total with both people sharing.

Once you have shared what you want to work on, you circle back to this same group of people each month to ask them how you’re doing. If they see a change you know you are making progress if they don’t you need to keep working. This is a process so give yourself at least a few months to see progress or more.

Including the process of feedforward into your routine is essential to getting better and improving. We have to involve other people in this process to get their input and learn how we are doing. Even if you think you have become a better listener but your inside circle thinks you still interrupt others, you may lose their respect and have unnecessary conflicts.
This is an easy and fun way to make a huge impact in your life and improve your relationships in all areas of your life. I’ll share three specific things I am focusing on for the new year: fully listening and pausing before I speak rather than reacting, being patient and staying present with each conversation (ie put your phone away)!!

Feel free to share what you are working on for the new year!

About Alissa

Alissa Finerman is an Executive Coach and Gallup Certified Strengths Coach, speaker and author of Living in YOUR Top 1%. She works with managers, C-suite executives and teams to leverage strengths, shift beliefs and achieve meaningful goals. Alissa has an MBA from the Wharton School and a BA from the University of California, Berkeley. She has worked with Ross Stores, Petco, BNP Paribas, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, Brookfield Property Partners, Neutrogena, Bristol-Myers Squibb, the Milken Institute, LA Business Journal, Prostate Cancer Foundation, and NBC Universal. To learn more about coaching with Alissa, please visit her website and follow her on Facebook

Filed Under: Leadership Tagged With: feedback, feedforward, leadership, strengths coaching, success

Best Articles on Leading with Strengths

December 20, 2016 By Alissa Finerman Leave a Comment

As a Gallup Certified Strengths Coach I have seen how a strengths approach can make a difference for employees, customers and companies. It’s a win-win. The Gallup Organization does amazing research on the strengths based approach and how it can help your employees, managers and organization. Here are a few excellent articles to learn more. Feel free to contact me with any questions or to learn more about doing a strengths seminar for your team.

* How a strengths based development approach can improve profit, sales, engagement for your company, customers and employees

ROI for Strengths Based Development

* Managers can make a huge impact in the success of your company and employee engagement. This article shares why managers matter, how they can make a positive or negative impact and a few strategies to help them development.

Manager Development Matters

* The strengths based development approach is impactful. This article shares some powerful stats that companies are seeing from using this approach. It also shares some best practices for managers to consider.

Strengths Based Development: The Manager’s Role

Why Aren’t All Organizations Strengths Based

Why Coaches are Essential to Creating Strengths Based Organizations

Building A Strengths Based Organization

Do Strengths Differ for Men and Women

Strengths Based Development for Leaders

Do Employees Know What’s Expected of Them

 

About Alissa

Alissa Finerman is an Executive Coach and Gallup Certified Strengths Coach, speaker and author of Living in YOUR Top 1%. She works with managers, C-suite executives and teams to leverage strengths, shift beliefs and achieve meaningful goals. Alissa has an MBA from the Wharton School and a BA from the University of California, Berkeley. She has worked with Ross Stores, Petco, BNP Paribas, Neutrogena, Bristol-Myers Squibb, the Milken Institute, LA Business Journal, Prostate Cancer Foundation, and NBC Universal. To learn more about coaching with Alissa, please visit her website and follow her on Facebook

Filed Under: Strengths Tagged With: engagement, Gallup Strengths Coach, leadership, managers

Success Magazine Interview with Alissa Finerman

December 19, 2016 By Alissa Finerman Leave a Comment

Success Magazine interviews Alissa Finerman about her book, Living in YOUR Top 1%, and aligning goals with your values for greater success. Enjoy and feel free to share!

Success Magazine interview

http://www.success.com/podcast/alissa-finerman-on-how-to-align-your-choices-with-your-goals

About Alissa

Alissa Finerman is an Executive Coach and Gallup Certified Strengths Coach, speaker and author of Living in YOUR Top 1%. She works with managers, C-suite executives and teams to leverage strengths, shift beliefs and achieve meaningful goals. Alissa has an MBA from the Wharton School and a BA from the University of California, Berkeley. She has worked with Ross Stores, Petco, BNP Paribas, Neutrogena, Bristol-Myers Squibb, the Milken Institute, LA Business Journal, Prostate Cancer Foundation, and NBC Universal. To learn more about coaching with Alissa, please visit her website and follow her on Facebook

Filed Under: Living in Your Top 1%, Mindset, Podcast, Success Tagged With: living in your top 1%, mindset, stretch goals, success

  • « Go to Previous Page
  • Go to page 1
  • Go to page 2
  • Go to page 3
  • Go to page 4
  • Go to page 5
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Go to page 24
  • Go to Next Page »
  • Email
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Categories

  • Feedback
  • Goal Setting
  • Interview Series: Living in YOUR Top 1%
  • Leadership
  • Living in Your Top 1%
  • Managing
  • Mindset
  • Motivation
  • Overcome Obstacles
  • Podcast
  • Strengths
  • Success
  • Uncategorized
  • Email
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Contact

To contact Alissa about executive coaching, presenting a seminar for your team, leadership consulting or inviting her to speak at an upcoming event/conference, please email: Alissa@FinermanLiving.com

Copyright © 2021 Alissa Finerman · Design by Pixel Dust, LLC