Independent business blogs are blogs that aren’t supported by an organization like a magazine, newspaper, company, or business school. Those people provide lots of great content, but they don’t need any additional exposure. In this post, every week, I bring you posts of quality from excellent bloggers that don’t get as much publicity.

This week, I’m pointing you to posts by Ken Downer, Skip Prichard, Art Petty, Lolly Daskal, and Karin Hurt and David Dye.

From Ken Downer: 9 Secrets to Leading Sheep – No Matter How Many Legs They Have

“As a rule, we tend to look down on sheep, but we have a lot more in common with them than we might want to admit.  In this post we’ll look at one would-be shepherd who learned the hard way that sheep are not the passive conformists we think they are, and we’ll build a list of nine ways to successfully lead sheep, no matter how many legs they happen to have.”

From Skip Prichard: What Will Change in 2021?

“A year like no other has just passed. 2020 brought Covid, death, destruction, fires, hurricanes, storms, racial inequity, earthquakes, job losses, blizzards, killer bees, unrest, climate change, political fighting, mental health crisis…a never-ending list of awful. For me personally, the unexpected and sudden loss of my mom made 2020 the worst year I have ever experienced.”

From Art Petty: 4 Ideas to Help Improve First Time Manager Selection and Success

“If you are either considering the move from contributor to a manager or you are responsible for developing new managers on your team, here are four actions you can take to improve the odds of success.”

From Lolly Daskal: How to Look Forward with Confidence in Uncertainty

“One of my favorite books of all time is Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. It’s a book I turn to and reread every year on my birthday, and I learn something new every time. I find that it’s especially helpful in times of struggle, difficulty and uncertainty—which makes it perfect for the world today. Here are some of Frankl’s words that can help us all find the confidence to move forward:”

From Karin Hurt and David Dye: How to Be an Even Better Leader

“Once you get to ‘expert’ level, it’s easy to put all your leadership development energy into your team. After all, it’s your job to grow leaders. You want to invest in your team as others have invested in you. Perfect. There’s no better way to get your team focused on being better leaders than to show that you too are working to be a better leader. Experts are continual students.”

That’s it for this week’s selections from independent business blogs. If you liked this piece you may enjoy my curation posts on this blog. On Fridays you can wrap up your week with “Weekend Leadership Reading” consisting of choice articles on hot leadership topics culled from the business schools, the business press and major consulting firms.

How I Select Posts for this Midweek Review

The five posts I select to share in my Midweek Review of the Independent Business Blogs are picked from a regular review of about sixty blogs I check daily and an additional twenty-five or so that I check occasionally. Here’s how I select the posts you see in this review.

They must be published within the previous week.

They must support the purpose of the blog: to help leaders at all levels do a better job and lead a better life.

They must be from an independent business blog.

As a general rule, I only select posts that stand on their own, no selections from a series.

Also as a general rule, I do not select posts that are either a book review or a book report.

I reserve the right to make exceptions to the above.

Here, on Three Star Leadership, I post things that will help a boss at any level do a better job and live a better life. And, at my blog for part-time business book authors, I share tools and insights to help you write and publish a book you’ll be proud of.

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