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 Alli Polin, Lolly Daskal, Steve Keating, Ken Byler, and Ken Downer.

From Alli Polin: Pronouns and Leadership: What’s Your Default Leadership Language?

“When we talk about ourselves and our colleagues, without giving it much thought, we use pronouns to identify the relevant parties. The pronouns we choose also recognize a contribution and define relationships. It’s our default leadership language that gives the biggest ahas.”

From Lolly Daskal: Daily Habits of the Most Successful Leaders

“If you want to emulate the most successful leaders, the best way is to adopt their habits and apply them consistently. Here are seven of the most important:”

From Steve Keating: Leadership Execution

“Holding a leadership position doesn’t automatically make someone more disciplined. Leaders may be superior vision casters but if they don’t have a solid plan to make that vision happen then their vision soon becomes clouded. If they do have a plan then they must also have the discipline to follow it. Many leaders don’t have the required discipline needed to execute their plan.”

From Ken Byler: Leadership Spontaneity

“What if our success as a leader doesn’t actually result from working harder or thinking smarter? Could our lack of spontaneity actually prevent us from attaining what we are striving so hard to achieve? Chinese thought has a phrase that is paradoxical when translated into English. Wu-wei (pronounced oooo-way) literally translates as ‘no trying’ or ‘no doing’ but it isn’t about not trying or not doing. Instead, the concept of wu-wei refers to the actual state of mind of someone who is being very active and optimally effective.”

From Ken Downer: Achieving Goals: Five Ways to Make Your Dreams a Reality

“My big dream was the Ironman triathlon. Not just to do one – I had already completed six. My hope was to finish an Ironman high enough in the standings to qualify for the world championships in Kona, Hawaii. To do that, I would have to finish either first or second in my age group. It was a tall order; the best I had done before was 12th.”

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. Every Tuesday, “Leaders and Strategies in Real Life” helps you learn about leadership by studying what real leaders do. 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. At the The 360 Degree Feedback blog, I join other bloggers with posts on leadership development. And, at Wally Bock’s Writing Edge, I share tools and insights to help you write better.

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