At BrilliantRead Media, we always strive to bring some of the meaningful and powerful stories from India and around the world to empower and motivate our growing community of entrepreneurs, investors, management students and aspiring entrepreneurs. This weekend we invited Manbir Kaur for an interview with us. She is an Author, Speaker, Executive And Leadership Coach, Team Coach. Let’s learn more about her astonishing journey so far!
Excerpts from our exclusive interview with Manbir:
Talk us through your background and your journey so far and please share with our audience a little bit about your book;
Manbir is an Executive and Leadership Coach (Professional Certificated Coach, PCC-ICF). She is also a Conversational Intelligence (C-IQ) Enhanced Skills Practitioner, Positive Intelligence (PQ) Pioneer Coach and a key-note speaker.
She specializes in coaching leaders from technology organizations. Manbir helps leaders and entrepreneurs to align themselves and their teams to the strategic goals, unleash their own and their team’s potential. Over the years, she has developed specific frameworks to help organizations and leaders achieve success in the most effective way. Her frameworks make coaching progress measurable and she believes in creating value for her clients in every engagement. Her clients include executives from various technology companies from India, UK, USA, Middle East and so on.
She is also the author of the books Are You The Leader You Want To Be? And Get Your Next Promotion. The first book introduces a path-breaking, five-part leadership framework called HUMAN. This book was nominated as top 5 Business Books in India for BBLF CK Prahalad Best Business Book Award 2019.
Manbir has more than two decades of work experience. Prior to being a coach, Manbir has worked in the corporate world for various Indian and multinational IT companies in roles such as development, operations, presales, people management and consulting. This work experience enables her to relate to her clients in a more immersive way.
Her professional goals are aimed at helping millions of leaders and teams across the world to develop the abilities to break the shackles that may hold them back and help them achieve their potential. As new changes in the business and personal worlds affect the individuals, she takes a step back to study, research, reflect and come up with simple methods that can help professionals from all spheres to continue to excel despite these changes. She writes articles, blogs and books to share the hard-earned wisdom, lessons learned and simple-yet-effective frameworks with all.
On a personal front, she is quite dedicated to her family. She believes in fostering deeper connections. She works hard but always makes space for the people who make the sun, shine in her world. She believes in work-life integration and has achieved that elusive balance that we all seek. In her spare time, she pursues hobbies such as theatre, dance, and poetry.
Seeking your next promotion but not quite there yet? Rising up in your career shouldn’t be left to chance. Manbir’s latest book Get Your Next Promotion makes you understand why some people get promoted while some get stuck.
There are a few things that stop professionals from growing beyond mid-level management. The book offers you a chance to understand the problems and the challenges that you may have been facing and why your current efforts may no longer lead you to your next promotion.
Each person must find their own path up to the mountain peak, yet to complete the feat successfully, they still need the same universal strengths, skills and tools. One may favour certain strengths or tools over the others but missing on some may lead to failure. Similarly, while there cannot be a single formula for progressing up the career path, this book reveals the universal abilities that all must possess to become great leaders through ten intriguing stories. Each story focuses on a specific facet of your next promotion while tracing the career of a leader who used it effectively.
The book helps you understand what you need to do, why you need to do it and how you can do it. And well, if you have not started already, you may want to get started as soon as possible.
Why did you choose to be an author over taking up a regular job?
Well, I am an Executive Coach first. That is my full-time profession. I have been a practising Executive Coach for about 10 years now. A few years back, I contributed one of my coaching experiences for the book called, “The Power of Professional Coaching.” The feedback I got on the share encouraged me a lot. I learned that insights shared in a book have a much wider reach and can impact many professionals. That was the time that I realized that if I wanted more professionals to benefit from my frameworks for executive success then books are the right medium.
I co-authored along with Kathy Mitchel, fellow coach and dear friend, our first book “Are You The Leader You Want To Be?” in Jan 2018 after about four years of hard work. It was a proud moment for me when it was nominated as top 5 Business Books in India for BBLF CK Prahalad Best Business Book Award 2019. That book shares a framework for leadership success called HUMAN. Very apt for times such as today when we all work remotely and maybe even more disconnected from each other. People who use this framework invariably reap huge benefits.
I have recently released my second book, “Get Your Next Promotion” which helps professionals get unstuck and advance to leadership levels to achieve their potential.
What gets you out of bed in the morning i.e. what’s your source of motivation?
My vision is to help leaders, across the world, become better at what they do.
Our ability to make a difference in the life of other people is the most fascinating part of life. I am lucky in that being a coach I get this opportunity many times each day. I want to be able to reach even more people through my books.
What challenges/obstacles did you face in your journey so far?
I like many others, I too struggled through the early days of my professional career when I left the corporate role and became an entrepreneur. I had to pivot a couple of times before I found my niche and started focusing on executive growth.
How do you handle the pressure and manage stress?
I like to connect with friends and spend time with my family. The deeper connections I have with these close group of people helps me de-stress. In my spare time, I pursue hobbies such as theatre, dance, and poetry. I have performed in a few professional theatre shows. I cherish those moments. Once covid19 settles down I may resume theatre again.
What advice would you give to someone starting out as an aspiring author?
Be clear about why you are writing. If you cannot re-read your own creation, multiple times, without losing any enthusiasm, to find ways to make it even better and yet be proud of what you have written already, the topic may not be close to your heart and may not add value to the reader.
BrilliantRead is committed to bringing stories from the startup ecosystem, stories that reshape our perspective, add value to our community and be a constant source of motivation not just for our community but also for the whole ecosystem of entrepreneurs and aspiring individuals.
Note: If you have a similar story to share with our audience and would like to be featured on our online magazine, then please write to us at [email protected], we will review your story and extend an invitation to feature if it is worth publishing.
