Leadership Management International Inc. (LMI)

“Fulfill your leadership potential”

Business View interviews Lucien Naarden, Master Licensee Greater Caribbean of Leadership Management International, for our focus on Professional Services

Leadership Management® International (LMI) is a world pioneer in professional development, organizational development, and strategic planning. Based in Waco, Texas, LMI’s facilitated process insures client results and success for their partners worldwide. With over 60 years of successful experience, tools offered in 28 languages, and marketed in more than 80 countries, LMI is continuing to expand its presence to meet a critical need in business and industry for its unique process and materials.

The LMI team are specialized in action and result oriented training programs to gain and create knowledge, skills, attitudes and behavior and smoothly transition these into action, performance, and results.

As part of its growth strategy, LMI is looking for individuals who have: A strong desire to succeed; A desire to own a profitable business; Building future equity; A deep interest in working with people and businesses to help them succeed and achieve measurable results; A desire to be a leader in the professional and organizational development industry; A track record of success; Are willing to participate in a comprehensive professional certification program; And have a Degree and/or experience in Organizational and/or personal Development.

LMI offers these benefits:

–  A world-class training and support system

– Associating with professionals worldwide with a rich background of experience and success

– The advantage of time-proven systems, tools and assessments

– A process that delivers measurable results to clients

– Personal satisfaction from the realization of your true potential.

Lucien Noaarden (LMI Master Licensee Greater Caribbean)

Lucien Naarden (LMI Master Licensee Greater Caribbean) is a psychologist, a trainer, organizational developer, personal developer. In the past, he worked for other companies doing supervision and management training. But he found that, after completing the courses, people would inevitably return to their old ways. So, even after developing a lucrative career, he wasn’t satisfied with the results. Eventually, he became involved as a licensed franchisee with LMI in Suriname (the country of his birth) and never looked back. Why?

Naarden explains, “Because at LMI we change attitudes, we change behavior, we use a psychological concept of conditioning, repetition, making people’s thought habits change – and in the end it automatically changes their behavior, so there is a very high rate of return on investment. It was what I had been looking for my whole life, a leadership and management program that would really change people, and based on that, make them successful. So I left my jet set job and trained at LMI in Waco, Texas, then I started a business in Suriname. This happened in 1996. It went so well, that bit by bit, Texas offered me the greater Caribbean region as a Master Licensee. At LMI, the Caribbean is considered one country because of the small populations.”

Today, LMI is doing so well that they have won a number of global awards. They work with large companies, such as Shell and British Petroleum, but also small, one-man businesses. “The major successes we see is with small and medium-sized businesses,” says Naarden. “Our programs are designed to increase efficiency and their goal setting is better; their focus and vision is sharper, and they move faster than larger organizations.”

According to Naarden, the big turnover of employees right now is because of the leadership gap. What employees expect from their leaders is not necessarily what leaders think they should do to motivate their people. Employees leave because the salary is the only motivation, they don’t find satisfaction in their job. Whereas if they have genuine leadership, people feel so good working with a company that money is not the only incentive.

When leaders are trained by LMI, they learn to overcome this. Naarden elaborates, “Say you are a manager with a team of 20 people. You come in and we ask you: What are your challenges? What are the areas where you want improvement? We make a short assessment and then we ask but why do you say you need improvement? What is not the way you like it? And based on that we set goals.”

During the program, LMI trains people on how to set goals, how to take action steps, what attitudes are needed, and how to develop those attitudes and the behavior and the actions needed to get where they want. In the end, the trainer measures again, and extends the goals until they’re accomplished. “That’s what we call the return on investment,” says Naarden. “What you describe in a tangible way for us – that’s your goal. The moment you can describe your goal in a tangible way, you are already 20 percent  there. Most of the time, they are able to accomplish five goals in the period of the training program.”

Throughout the pandemic, a lot of the programs were virtual but LMI prefers personal contact. Then it doesn’t matter if you sit in a group (max. of 12), you will walk your own development path. Because you have a unique starting point. The group is all about empowering each other – they share lessons learned, and best practices, and traps, too – what to watch out for. By helping each other and explaining why you had a good week or a not so good week, you leave motivated. Naarden emphasizes, “If you have a series of four or five day sessions, you learn and then forget. That’s only knowledge and a diploma but you don’t change your ways. We have weekly sessions, instead, because we don’t want you to know, we want you to do it.”

ILM offers a portfolio of over 40 programs based on different objectives. Most of them are leadership programs: strategic leadership, motivational leadership, personal leadership, productivity and performance improvement, communication, even sales strategies in management, development, etc. The length of the programs vary from six to 16 weekly sessions.

Naarden acknowledges, “Most people have a tendency to develop one aspect of leadership, and usually that’s the trap. That’s why we have a Total Leader session, so we can show them how to be very productive and have a high performance themselves. To work on their personal leadership and help them discover their life vision and mission, so they can in turn motivate, lead, inspire, and coach their team in a way that productivity increases drastically. We use the same concept for both personal productivity and team productivity and when that’s in place, the person can use that same focus on goal setting for their employees and their company. That’s being a Total Leader. At LMI, we always say, If you are not successful yourself, you will not allow others to be successful. So work on yourself first.”

To become an LMI licensee, you must go through a selection process. Naarden notes, “Yes, you are going to make a very nice income, but one of the main criteria I have when selecting people is don’t join my business for the money. Join it because you enjoy seeing other people grow and you enjoy changing people’s lives in a positive way. You enjoy helping people accomplish goals and become successful. We are avidly looking for new licensees in all the Caribbean countries and the northern part of South America. Large companies can even purchase a Site License, where they purchase the LMI program and we train people in their company to be facilitators for their employees.”

If you are interested in the LMI program, please contact Lucien Naarden at naamcons@yahoo.com

AT A GLANCE

Leadership Management International Inc. (LMI)

What: Worldwide pioneer in professional development, organizational development, and strategic planning

Where: Head office in Waco, Texas

Websites: www.lmi-world.com     https://naamenterprise.com/