Michael D. Comer, D.M.

President

Mike is President of The Hayes Group International, Inc. He has over 30 years consulting experience with Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, non-profits as well as smaller organizations in organizational and team development, leadership assessment and development (executive coaching), and training development and delivery. In his role as President he oversees the work of 28 senior-level consultants.

Mike started his career at Andersen Consulting (Accenture) in Washington, D. C. where he was senior manager of Change Management Services for the southeast. He then spent 10 years as an independent consultant working with Ameritech (AT&T), Pharmacia, CSC, Digital Equipment Corp., and KPMG Peat Marwick. Mike joined the Hayes Group in 2000.

Mike serves as a coach to leaders – providing individualized feedback and development plans to enhance leadership skills for senior executive-level managers. He has helped large and small organizations manage change, including developing and implementing customized processes and training programs, assisting with corporate-wide leadership training, and implementing organizational changes in multiple locations with multiple employees.

Mike has personally worked with over 115 major organizations. Some of Mike’s clients include AIG, Citrix, Federal Express, International Paper, Department of Defense, Social Security Administration, Burger King Corporation, US Army Corps of Engineers, Westinghouse, General Dynamics, Trane, Volvo, Gulfstream Aerospace, UnitedHealthcare, Promus Companies (Embassy Suites, Hampton Inns), Electric Boat, Kaiser-Permanente, Milliken, Curtiss-Wright, Syneos Health, and ABB.

Mike’s global experience includes conducting team development and leadership coaching in China, Brazil, Spain, England, Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, Italy, Switzerland, Mexico, Japan and Eastern Europe. In 1993, he co-founded the Eastern European Leadership Forum – an organization that connected Western business leaders with Eastern European entrepreneurs.

Mike holds an MBA in Management/Finance and a Doctor of Management (DM) degree in Organizational Leadership. His doctoral studies examined how a leader’s passion and sense of calling resulted in specific leadership behaviors. Mike co-authored the book Start with Humility: Lessons from America’s Quiet CEOs on How to Build Trust and Inspire Followers, which shares the lessons learned of six senior leaders and provides practical tips on real-world leadership.

Workshops Facilitated by Michael D. Comer, D.M.

Leadership Edge

Today’s business leaders need to be especially skilled in having good judgment, or to put it another way, to be skilled at making the best decisions. This workshop enables you to accelerate the pace at which you gain leadership maturity skills. By applying these Key Elements of the Leadership Edge, you will develop more maturity and be more skilled at having better judgment and making… Read more »

Influencing Skills

The Influencing Skills workshop is a dynamic and participative experience where participants learn and practice specific influencing techniques and skills. The participants learn how to better formulate a clear and accurate plan for influencing others, develop specific influencing strategies, and organize interactions to create desired results. The Hayes Group uses their special video-recorded skill development method to truly help people make positive changes in influencing… Read more »

Coaching for Peak Performance

Nothing is more important to becoming a more effective manager than the ability to be a successful COACH. The training/development process in “Coaching for Peak Performance” has proven over and over again to be valuable in helping one become more skilled at coaching. Each participant leaves the workshop with three Workshop Outcomes: A specific, accurate assessment of their Coaching Skills. In addition to assessing their coaching skills, the Job Relations Inventory (distributed… Read more »

Building Trust and Inspiring Followers

This half-day workshop helps managers identify behaviors that are hindering them from inspiring others and building trust with employees — leading to slowed innovation, change resistance, lower morale, and lack of real effort. Based on Hayes research and the book, “Start with Humility: Lessons from America’s Quiet CEOs on How to Build Trust and Inspire Others,” this interactive workshop will target specific non-productive team behaviors, introduce you… Read more »

Articles by Michael D. Comer, D.M.

Quit while you’re Ahead!? (said no one ever)

Posted on Sunday, March 8th, 2020

My mother informed me this week that she was no longer teaching a class at her church that she has taught for 50 years. 50 years! She was not giving up but moving on to new things. She was excited. Her replacement, the 35-year father of two, was excited and the class was excited. Most of us are not told to quit and leaders aren’t… Read more »

A Crises in Leadership (the lack of depth)

Posted on Tuesday, January 29th, 2019

Many people believe character, competence and connection are things on a “to do” list and immediately say “I don’t have time to hear from everyone on the team”, “I don’t have time to read everything that comes across my computer screen” or “dig into every issue”. Read more »

Starting your New Year with some Leadership Introspection

Posted on Wednesday, January 3rd, 2018

Great leaders practice self-awareness and self-reflection! This week pause for 15 minutes and think about these questions (from Michael Watson author of “The First 90 Days”). Write down your answers (goals written often look different than those that are only verbal). Challenges and Opportunities: • In what areas is your business (or team or department) most likely to face stiff challenges in the coming year?… Read more »

Leadership Competencies You Will Need in 2017

Posted on Monday, February 6th, 2017

A Hayes Group International Perspective on your Personal Growth and Development The most effective organizations are planning now for tomorrow’s leaders – specifically by interviewing for future leader skill sets and coaching/training those who are in the leadership pipeline on the key leadership competencies. Our coaching with leadership from multiple organizations in 2016 showed a great lack of leaders being “present in the moment” – leaders… Read more »

Confession and Venting as a Leader

Posted on Thursday, January 12th, 2017

“An honest confession is good for the soul, but bad for the reputation.” – Thomas Dewar “As a leader, be careful who you ‘vent’ to…” Like many of us, early in my career I learned a very important lesson. Recently out of graduate school and 24 years old, my first job was with Andersen Consulting on K Street in Washington, DC (at the time the… Read more »

Let’s make 2017 the year of starting with humility!

Posted on Monday, December 12th, 2016

Here is what we found humility to really be (and NOT be) when writing our Start with Humility: Lessons from America’s Quiet CEO’s on How to Build Trust and Inspire Followers. Great leaders lead with humility. In Start with Humility we discuss six “humble” competencies. All pictured below. How are you doing with each of these competencies? Is there something you could do differently? For… Read more »

Humility is what’s missing in our Presidential race

Posted on Monday, August 29th, 2016

I must admit – I’m not a fan of any of this year’s presidential candidates! As someone who has devoted most of my career to studying and observing leaders, I see deficits across the board. However, I am convinced that many leaders (including our presidential ones) miss a key attribute that differentiates good leaders from great ones – humility. Jim Collins in his best seller… Read more »

Restoring Productivity after Layoffs

Posted on Thursday, March 10th, 2016

How today’s managers and leaders make the best of bad news… Restoring Productivity and Morale after Layoffs Is there a “right” way to downsize? A major company decided to shut down an entire branch without coaching its managers in delivering the news. The CEO requested a meeting of all employees, but did not show up. Instead he sent the branch manager a FedEx box with… Read more »

Beating ‘Grey Cubicle Syndrome’

Posted on Monday, January 25th, 2016

Content by Dr. Michael Comer & Interview conducted by Suzy Fielders I was recently interviewed for Winston-Salem Monthly Magazine on ‘grey cubicle syndrome’ and wanted to share this information with our followers for anyone who feels stuck in their current job or career going into 2016. Article transcript is listed below or can be found here. In our very driven and technologically savvy world, it’s… Read more »

Getting to the Next Level in Your Career

Posted on Tuesday, July 14th, 2015

By Dr. Michael Comer with Bennett Wright There is a reverse funnel as you progress through the ranks of most organizations. As one moves into increasingly senior level positions, the competition for the positions becomes greater. Your existing talents may have landed you a management position, but likely won’t boost you to the VP level. To quote the title of Marshall Goldsmith’s bestseller, “What Got… Read more »

Dealing with Organizational Change

Posted on Wednesday, August 29th, 2012

This is Part II of a two-part article dealing with managing and implementing change. Part I examined methods of leading personal change among employees. Part II examines Organizational Change. As was examined in Part 1 of this series, change affects employees on a personal level and effective leaders realize and proactively plan for these impacts. However, effective leaders also realize the impact of change at… Read more »

Dealing with Personal Change

Posted on Monday, July 23rd, 2012

This is Part I of a two-part article dealing with managing and implementing change. Part I examines methods of leading personal change among employees. Part II examines change within organizations. “People don’t mind change they do mind being changed.” As leaders it becomes our responsibility to assist people in moving beyond their comfort zone into a level of acceptance of change. Professional counselors are trained… Read more »

Evolution not Revolution: Do People Really Change?

Posted on Friday, March 11th, 2011

It was early Monday morning when we received a phone call at our office in Winston-Salem, North Carolina from a major corporate leader in Zurich. His dilemma was familiar. There was a senior engineering manager who was a top performer in terms of meeting deadlines, bringing in revenue, and completing projects under budget. However, according to this vice president, his style was such that he “leaves… Read more »

Leadership for the Third Millennium

Posted on Sunday, August 8th, 2010

Leadership for the Third Millennium: A call for visionaries and influencers The topic of leadership has become immensely popular in the past decade with multiple books, essays and research studies attempting to define the concept of leadership. Pulitzer Prize winner John Burns McGregor asked, “Is leadership simply innovation – cultural or political? Is it essentially inspiration? Mobilization of followers? Goal setting? Goal fulfillment? Is a… Read more »

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