“You Lead People. You Manage Things.”

Leadership Blog

05 Jan 2012
Sticky Post By Posted in Attitude, belief lenses, Courage, Perseverance, personal, Process, Purpose, Strategy, Uncategorized, Vision With No Comments Permalink

How do you know when dreams are just a dream?

Sticky Post By On January 5, 2012 With No Comments

I received the following message yesterday from an old friend and thought it would be great to share this conversation with you, as well.

So I’ve read your posts, looked at your website, and watched your sample videos. If you had to pick a starting point for someone who has a dream, but has spent most of their life being “against” themselves, what would you tell them? How do you know if it really IS just a dream?

L – thanks for the message – great to hear from you.  You inspired today’s post.

I use the term Dream -AND it hit me after seeing your message that I don’t like how unattainable it sounds… will it just be a figment of my imagination?

 

So – I’m changing my phrasing to: Dream big! and then set it up as a “Burled Arch Destiny”!

 

For those that have read my ‘Iditarod Leadership’ book or followed the Iditarod – you know the term ‘Burled Arch’ – as it is the finish line and the term ‘Destiny’ that comes from the same word as Destination.  Destiny is not ‘Fate’ (whatever happens to me – that’s my Destiny) – no – Destiny is a decided beforehand Destination that I am determined to reach!

With ‘Burled Arch Destiny” – all we need is the map, the skill and the will to get there!

Maps are creatable – Skill is grow-able…. only one question left – do you have the WILL?

So what I would tell people is this: “Dream Big!  AND then learn the steps that it is going to take to get you there.”

•  Where are you now along this trail?
•  Why do you want this Destiny?
•  What will you need to Learn?
•  What skills will you need to develop?
•  What role will others play in helping you reach this Burled Arch?
•  What are measurable steps along the way?
•  What is the NEXT step?

If you can understand and take the next step and continue that process (WILL) – nothing can stop you from reaching your “Burled Arch Destiny”!

It’s not going to be perfect – anything worth doing – is worth doing UGLY!   Ugly is how we start and it leads us to continuous improvement!

(Remember how bad we all were when we first started learning to play sports as little kids?  Eventually – if the WILL persists, the skill improves and you make JV and then on to Varsity! It takes talent – but as my mentor John Maxwell says, “Talent is NEVER enough!”) That’s why it’s a huge difference maker to keep on practicing each and every single day. On the other hand, as for athletes, who are having concerns like  the  projector screen backing for their sports gadgets, they can refer to the experts found online.

Finally, what do we do with all of the self-defeating voices in our head?

•  Fight them with everything you have!
•  What the roots drink – the fruits think!
•  Celebrate small victories and progress ‘Checkpoints’ like crazy!

Saturate yourself in “Can do – positivity!”  Find a voice – someone that lifts you up – and listen to their positive beliefs.  I listen (almost daily) to speakers that are highly positive and motivational – why?  because I need it too!

Read, listen, watch – anything you can to make sure your tank stays full of the belief in possibilities!

Next – Celebrate any progress – ANY progress toward your Burled Arch Destiny – you learn a new skill, take a new class, spend 30 minutes in dreaming and mapping! – whatever it is mark down and celebrate the wins!  This is the fuel needed to keep it up!  Why keep running if you think you’re not going anywhere?  Mark your progress – celebrate the smallest progress!

Lastly – find an encouraging friend, accountability partner or coach…  when you start to doubt (which we all do!), when you want to quit – you’ll need them to cheer you on!

Keep Dreaming – Keep moving – Keep growing – Keep doing!  The Burled Arch Destiny is attainable!

14 Nov 2011
Sticky Post By Posted in Culture, Organizational Effectiveness, Perpetual Learners, Strategy With No Comments Permalink

How the best develop their people for results…

Sticky Post By On November 14, 2011 With No Comments

As an Organizational Effectiveness consultant, I look to add PROVEN value to customers every day.  My value proposition – or where I add the most value –  is in developing the people in organizations with a purposeful intent to increase their performance and bottom-line results.

As for the bottom-line, here it is:

Being the best takes a concerted effort from an intentional team.  An effort that embeds and involves L&D (Learning and  Development)  deep into the organizations CULTURE.

According to ASTD (American Society for Training & Development), the BEST are bench-marked by:

• L&D has an enterprise-wide role.

L&D professionals are not just Lackeys holding NEO (New Employee Orientation) classes.  They are savvy business partners that are involved in the executive team, they understand and create solutions to business issues and are vital in setting organizational strategy.

• Learning has value in the organization’s CULTURE

Again, the Culture (Language, Beliefs, and Behaviors) embraces learning opportunities for employees and Leadership, alike.  These organizations don;t just talk the culture – they walk the culture – they back up their language with BEHAVIORS because of their belief that L&D can and will make a difference.  It exists, purposefully, for
the growth of the organization, and helps drive innovation.

The commitment extends to the heights of C-level involvement.  Learning is not something that is done at the lower levels.  As many of you have heard me say, “They are Growing Leaders, Growing Leaders!”

• L&D is directly linked to individual and organizational performance

The BEST realize that in order for the organization to achieve the desired level of sustained performance, L&D must be aligned with the business performance goals  and the measurement of the effectiveness of learning it that it must help drive personal/organizational efficiency and effectiveness.

• Investment is made in learning and performance initiatives

Again, Culture is not about language only – it’s not all talk!  You can tell the BEST because they put their money where their mouth is – they fund L&D – they make a strategic investment!

Investment, by it’s nature expects a return.  L&D professional cannot expect an endless stream of funding without some level of increase in individual/organizational performance.  On the other hand, Leaders need to understand that behavioral change doesn’t happen overnight.  As with most strategic initiatives, the return will take some time to play out.

In a study conducted by the University of Pennsylvania (1995 Richard Zemsky).  It was discovered that a 10% investment in PPE (Property, Plant, & Equipment) companies realized a 3.8% increase in productivity whereas that same 10% invested into People Development yielded an 8.6% increase in productivity.

On average, the BEST according to ASTD re-invest

• About 0.7% of Revenue, or
• Approx. 10.88% of Profit, or
• Roughly 2.15% of Payroll, or
• $1081 per employee

How about your organization?

Is it’s mantra, “Growing Leaders, Growing Leaders…”?

Is the Learning tied to performance enhancement?

How does it’s investment bench-mark against the BEST?

26 Sep 2011
Sticky Post By Posted in Culture, leadership roles, Strategy, Vision With No Comments Permalink

Creating Intentional Organizational Culture

Sticky Post By On September 26, 2011 With No Comments

In the last Blog, I talked more about discovering your present culture and although there are a number of formal ways (Organizational Surveys, Discovery Initiatives, hiring great consultants like me) we talked about the informal (survey of eyes and ears). Click To Know More about consultants and their contribution to businesses.

Today, I would like to take a few minutes and discuss next steps..  How do you tweak, shift, shape, remake, or even re-engineer the present culture into a desired culture.

Vision

As with most things in business (or life) we need to define our Burled Arch.  Without consideration to our present location – our first step is to dream – to envision where we want to go and what we want the team to feel like – again, broken into the three components of – Language, Beliefs, and Behaviors.

From a blank canvas, start to get a picture of desired daily life in your organization…

What mindset do you want your organization approaching their day with?  What about HOW they approach their interactions with each other?  Or our clients?  Their mindset toward problems or adversity?

What if you think (or feel) that you are not fully ready to carve a brand new, fresh trail of desired Culture?

 – Get others in the organization involved

 – Search for companies with great cultures and find one that feels right for you

 – Use others as a template

I am a firm believer that there is very little ‘new under the sun.’  Modeling your desired culture after another is a great way to start, while adding your unique perspective to it. In times of financial distress, seeking guidance from experts in insolvency resolution can provide valuable insights and strategies to navigate challenges and rebuild a sustainable business culture.

Finally, on the creation of vision, make sure that the new vision is a good fit for the organization or that it is a vision that can be (somewhat) easily adopted and implemented.  If the vision is too much of a radical shift – there may need to be some smaller vision shifts created to work the organization up to it. Consider seeking assistance from HR outsourcing companies UK such as Avensure as they can help assess the compatibility of the new vision and assist in transitioning to the shifts.

Implementation

R.A.C.E. is my powerful and effective model  for Change Management.  The implementation phase of Culture shift must be broken into the components of making sure everyone is:

R – Ready to change (Line out with great clarity what the shift means in people and process, in Language, Beliefs and Behaviors)

A – Action is developing the internal marketing campaign FIRST!  We must take the action steps necessary to get our team on board! Use a phased-in approach while leveraging the Lead  and Swing Dogs for Team adoption.

C – Use Checkpoints to monitor progress and make mid-course corrections.

E – Evolve the Vision AND the process.

Cultural awareness is critical to having an Organization that operates with intentionality.  Cultural change, like most change, is not an easy undertaking.  However, with some strategy and a great process, you CAN shift your culture to something fantastic!

06 Jun 2011
Sticky Post By Posted in belief lenses, Culture, employee engagement With No Comments Permalink

Organizational Culture – Part 1

Sticky Post By On June 6, 2011 With No Comments

Every Organization has a ‘Culture’ and as I’ve discussed in previous blogs – that culture is either by design or it is by default. In any case, the Culture exists.

What is the present ‘Culture’ of your organization?

I define ‘Culture’ as a being made up of three components:

Beliefs
Behaviors
Common Language

It is a rarity, nowadays, that I would get to help create a company culture from scratch – before any employees are hired – before any defacto culture exists. Most of the time, our starting point is two fold from the outset. 1.) Present Culture 2.) Desired Culture.

There are many reasons for Present Cultures: adaptability of the people to work problems, differing perspectives between team performers and team leaders, communication competencies (or lack thereof), aligned (or mal-aligned) incentive/compensation programs, layoffs, cutbacks, growth – and, probably, a hundred more… The Reason(s) are an important piece – as the Root Cause – of any issue is DEEPLY important to change.

So if you took a few minutes today – and simply walked the halls of your office or sat in the break room of the manufacturing plant – What would you hear? What would you see?

Like it or not – this is your present Organizational Culture.

Are your people tired? Does their behavior align to the Company values? What are their individual and collective beliefs? And what does their communication look like?

It is a great exercise to sit, watch, listen, and record the beliefs, behaviors, and conversational language that occurs in your company. It can be VERY eye opening.

You say, “How do I know what my people believe?”

Easy… Watch their actions, listen to their communication.

Belief Drives Behavior.

I could say that phrase a thousand times over – People will reveal what they believe by their actions and by their speech. Their actions are, usually, a truer representation of their beliefs.

Over the next few days (with as much objectivity as possible) just listen, just watch, just record.

Is the Culture Proactive? Or Reactive? Owners? Passengers? Victims? Engaged? Disengaged? Empowered?
The work comes into play once the present ‘Culture’ is discovered – and we’ll discuss that in the next blog!

In the meantime – checkout one of the previous blogs on Culture – Have a great day!

23 May 2011
Sticky Post By Posted in Attitude, Perseverance With No Comments Permalink

The power of “Plant it and Plan it!”

Sticky Post By On May 23, 2011 With No Comments

Waking up this morning refreshed, powered up and ready for the week!  Eyes opened at 4:45 am and as I lay there trying to go back to sleep – this powerful thought was getting bigger – and growing both my excitement and energy levels..

The Power of “I Can!”

There are so many battles that we fight – but none more fierce than the battle of self belief.

Before the world hits us, before the traffic jams and road rage, before the shop opens, the computer is turned on, and WAY before the first Sales call – our own mind turns on – and sometimes turns on us.  But what if we could turn it toward working for us and not against us – what if the power of our minds was unleashed towards helping us succeed instead of flooding us with reasons why not, barriers of never happen, and shards of broken, unrealized dreams.

What are the conversations that you have with yourself while you’re getting ready?

Sometimes – we are just running – the day has started without us – we are already behind and facing the tidal wave of a day, a week, a month, and another year – just like the previous… however long….

Today – let me Plant a SEED!  A seed of thought in your mind that, “You CAN!”

You have everything in you that you need to succeed.

Let me stop and make you say that again in your mind.

You have everything in you that you need to succeed.

I know it sounds cheesy – but you have the ‘power of potential ‘and the ‘dynamite of determination’!

You have what you need and you can get wherever you want to go – from where you are now – with two steps:

Plant it and Plan it.

  1. Plant it

    2. Plant it refers to setting the mark of achievement.  What is your desire? Goal? Hope? Or Dream? What are you aiming at?   Without something specific – you won’t have a tangible item to chase – if you have a sales goal – make it specific – to sell $100,000 of product this month, this week, this year… to make 20 calls this week – or today..  Whatever the goal is – make it a specific number.  If it’s weight loss – what do you want to weigh?

    We’ve taught about making your goals ‘smart’ for years:

    S – Specific

    M – Measureable

    A – Action oriented

    R – Reasonable

    T – Time Bound

    (I’ve been teaching it for so long – I’m not sure where it came from – or I would give specific credit to them!  So if you know it’s origin – please comment and we’ll give them their credit together! )

  2. Plan it

For each goal – map the process of achievement – what are the steps to get there? Dreams fail and hopes are shattered – right out of the gate – when there is no plan!  There has to be steps to achievement – we RARELY take leaps – more than likely – you will take steps toward your dream – and as you can mark your progress (Daily or weekly) you can keep up your momentum!

Not near enough time to talk about all the steps of success for planning – but I’ll give you some thoughts:

Break your planning into:  Major Milestones, Main steps, and Mini steps.

Every day – you can do something to get you – even a ‘Mini step’ closer to your goal.  Look for incremental success – take one step at a time – ‘I CAN’ take the next step – or ‘I CAN’ find out what that next step is and start to line out a plan to that next step…

Give yourself permission to succeed today!

  • Tell yourself,  “you can!”
  • Plant the flag  – plant the stake in the ground of your goal or dream
  • Plan it!

Dream, Plan, ACT!

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