In this solo presentation, Walter V. Murray introduces the concept of creative resilience—the ability to generate new, innovative solutions when facing leadership challenges—and positions it as his core strategy for effective leadership. He argues that self‑leadership, which he terms "intentional mindset management," is essential for any leader, regardless of sector, because managing one’s emotions and thoughts determines the impact of one’s leadership. Murray discusses common emotional triggers such as staff underperformance and missed organizational goals, emphasizing that leaders can choose not to be derailed by these triggers by applying intentional mindset management. He differentiates ordinary resilience (the capacity to bounce back) from creative resilience, warning that resilience without creativity leads to repetitive, ineffective actions—a notion he links to the famous Einstein quote about insanity. Murray shares personal habits that support his mindset, notably daily beet, carrot, and celery juicing, and uses these routines as an analogy for deliberate physical and mental upkeep. Throughout, he promotes a suite of his educational resources—including the book Rebound, the masterclass "You Can’t Lead," the course "The Three Demands of Leadership," and a strategic planning program—inviting listeners to engage via his social‑media platforms for further training.
Chapters
Creative resilience is the ability to keep coming up with new creative solutions for challenges that face you as a leader-manager. I am creatively resilient. I lead and manage with creative resiliency. Leading with creative resilience is my master strategy for handling leadership challenges. I'm creatively resilient and resiliently creative. I lead and manage with creative resiliency. Ah, yeah, that's my, uh, juice. I've been juicing, you know, beets and carrots and celery juice drink. Every morning because, you know, that helps to manage my physical state, even my mental emotional state. You know, you get some good energy in your system. You know, it reminds me of a conversation I was having with some leaders and managers and CEOs, etc. We were just kind of networking, shooting the breeze, but the topic of leadership obviously came up. And seems that there was a real consensus that self-leadership and what I call intentional mindset management was one of the keys to being an impactful, successful leader in whatever sphere you lead. And there were leaders there from, you know, clergy leaders, C-level executives, of small to mid-sized organizations. We had departmental managers, regional managers, principals of academies, a college president. So there were leaders from just a wide array of experiences, and it seemed to come down to self-leadership. And I have a term that I have coined for self-leadership. I call it intentional mindset management. Intentional mindset management. How well you manage your mind, your emotions, dictates or determines how impactful your leadership is within your organization, how well you lead your team. Self-leadership requires a certain level of emotional intelligence, and what I call intentional mindset management. Interesting conversation, interesting conversation. Keep checking my virtual platforms. We're going to do another conversation. I'd like to invite you, if you are a leader or manager, you know, in business, nonprofit, etc., just keep checking all virtual platforms. Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and, um, see when our next conversation is coming up. We do an entire training on self-leadership. It's called You Can't Lead. It's a master class that looks at self-leadership, the two key paradigms of self-leadership. It looks at, um, self-alignment. How do you emotionally align yourself with yourself so that you can be better aligned with your team. You know, it really isn't that complicated, but it's essential, uh, self-leadership. So yeah, this conversation kind of focused a lot on self-leadership and intentional mindset management. So one of the, one of the triggers that leaders and managers encounter almost on a daily basis is the trigger of staff underperformance, right? It's an emotional trigger when organizational goals are not met, when there are situations and roadblocks and barriers that seem to threaten the, uh, the accomplishment of organizational goals. Those could be emotional triggers. For leaders and managers. These triggers are a true test of self-leadership, a true test of self-leadership. How are you going to intentionally manage your mindset so that you don't let these emotional triggers derail you? And so I know it could be frustrating, it could be really frustrating, downright annoying When staff underperform, when organizational goals are not met, when performance targets are not met, those emotional triggers could be really frustrating. They could get you sick and tired of leadership and management if, if you let it. If you let it. And see, and here's the key of intentional mindset management. A trigger doesn't have to trigger you. That's where you have that intentionality of mindset management. Yes, there is a trigger. Staff is messing up, staff is not performing. You know, you seem like it's just kind of things are going haywire, there's chaos everywhere. Yet you don't have to let those triggers trigger you if you know how to intentionally manage your mindset as a leader-manager. So one of the things that has worked for me in terms of intentionally managing my mindset is creative resiliency. Creative resiliency, the ability to push back against those emotional leadership triggers. What is creative resiliency? So creative resiliency is much more than simply being resilient, right? You know, resiliency, resiliency is the ability to bounce back, to rebound, In fact, one of my best-selling books is called Rebound: How to Rebound in Business and in Life. And I have a masterclass I teach on rebounding strategies in life and in business. You know, from my personal experience and from studying other leaders who have had to rebound, it's an important skill. Resiliency is critical, but creative resiliency is much more than It's more than just being able to persistently, time and time again, come back, push back, fight back, and move forward. It's a good characteristic. It's a good trait every leader must have, you know, the ability to rebound and be persistent and be resilient. But resiliency, that persistent push back and fight back and Rebounding, resiliency without creativity can be disastrous for a leader-manager, right? So you've probably heard the cliché, insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. You see, that's resiliency without creativity. Resiliency says I'm gonna keep fighting, I'm gonna keep persisting, I'm gonna come back and back and back, I'm going to push forward. But if you keep coming back and doing the same thing and expecting different results, you might be an insane leader. All right, okay, well, I'm not going to go that far. I'm not going to make any clinical diagnoses here, right? Not qualified, beyond my pay grade. But you get my point. Resiliency without creativity, especially for leaders who are trying to strategically allocate relationships and resources to achieve a specific goal. Resiliency without creativity is insanity. That phrase insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, that was attributed to Albert Einstein. He's a pretty smart man, pretty smart man, so I figured he knew what he's talking about. In fact, physicists say that that phrase actually has validity in the field of quantum mechanics and quantum physics. I don't know, I'm beyond my pay grade. Yeah, but the point is, resiliency is important, but creative resiliency is by far more important, by far more effective in helping you as a leader push through those challenges that come up on a daily basis in life. I mean, if you're a leader and you're not having daily challenges, share the secret with me. All right, share that secret with me. Um, but yeah, don't let challenges get you down. See, don't let challenges dictate your mindset. You have to intentionally manage your mindset as a leader. And this is something you have to do every day. Like I do my juicing every morning and drink my freshly squeezed juices so I can intentionally manage my physical well-being, you have to every day manage, intentionally manage your mindset as a leader-manager if you want to be the most impactful leader manager that you can be. By the way, there is a ton of other resources that I have made available for leaders and managers on my website, my YouTube, my Facebook, and my LinkedIn. There's going to be some contact information, some additional information that you could click on to browse through some of those resources, maybe sign up for one of our masterclasses, or maybe enroll in one of our online courses. We have an online course right now called The Three Demands of Leadership, and also a training program on strategic planning. And as I mentioned earlier, there is the masterclass that you can also access called You Can't Lead. You Can't Lead is a deep dive into self-leadership, emotional awareness, emotional alignment for leaders and managers. Strategic planning is also a great course to take. One of the greatest tools that a leader has in his or her toolbox is the ability to effectively strategically plan. And execute that plan to achieve strategic outcomes. All right, again, so, uh, thanks for joining me today. Um, look forward to chatting with me and me chatting with you on leadership and management.
