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More & Less Ahead

Despite the present economic situation some people have decided to come out ahead when this downturn turns up.

The president of a business to business food service company explained her simple strategy. She called it her One More and One Less plan for 2009. She explained One More to her sales force, “In 2008 we averaged 3-4 item orders on each call to each customer. In 2009 we will most likely get only 2 orders from that same customer. So when you get your next two orders I want you to immediately ask the customer for one more introduction to one more person who might enjoy our product. Then get one small sale from that new customer.” She emphasized small so to remind the eager sales folks that the goal is one more customer for the future, not a one big sale today. She expects company profits to be flat this year, but has a vision to come out ahead by owning a larger portion when the market rebounds. But that’s not all.

Sales never turn into present profits or future business without strong operations support to make sure the product or service is delivered on time, on budget and on quality to the customer. The president requested a revamp to improve processes- a one less strategy to simplifying systems and speed up service. “One less step, one less report, one less procedure, one less hand written form, one less redundancy that will directly improve customer satisfaction.” This lady knows that a business strategy needs to be balanced to be successful. But that’s not all.

Since extra time is required at work these days, it is vital for us to be more intentional about how we spend the limited time we have with the people who matter most. A balanced life strategy might be worth considering: one less TV show, one more story shared, one less couch potato evening, one more stroll in the twilight, one less cell phone call/text message at the dinner table, one more minute really listening about your day, one less long email, one more note with a stamp, one less rush out the door, one more long goodbye hug, one less minute complaining about what we don’t have, one more hour helping someone who is worse off than we are.

Working Journal Entry: Anyone can find success in good times, but to be successful in down times takes a better strategy and intentional execution. But that’s not all. What will you do more and less to come out ahead in leadership and life in 2009 ?

Leading the People that are Left

It’s been a few weeks since the big layoff. You are hoping things will get back to normal soon. Then as you walk past a half vacant row of cubicles, you overhear another “Who will be next?” conversation cut short by the sound of your footsteps. In silence you ask, “How can I help my people get fully engaged again?” There is no a right answer to this question, but here are a few suggestions I have gathered over the years from managers who have asked themselves this question and found a few things that work.

Create a Clear Agenda – Put a simple plan in place today. Point your team toward real goals. Don’t assume people are on the same page with you, no matter how smart and experienced they are. Give them a short-term vision to strive for and fill in details as things get clearer for you.

Tell Two Sides of the Truth – First, speak candidly about the intended benefits of the decision to downsize. Remind them that it may not be over, but you hope it is. Then listen to their concerns. Second, talk about how you feel about all the changes. If things are unnerving to you, tell them. People follow confident and humble leaders.

Clarify Roles and Provide Training – During rapid change, role clarity is critical. Make sure everyone knows where they stand and who they report to. Start cross-training immediately. Set-up ways they can learn cutting edge technology and provide assessment tools to help people understand other careers that could fit them. People feel more secure when they have options and marketable skills, plus they will be prepared to perform at a higher level when the market turns up.

Fill the Communication Pipeline – You made an official announcement and you even sent a follow- up email the next week. That should be enough. Wrong. The problem is people don’t retain information well when under stress. Make it a habit to update people even about small changes. If you don’t give out small bits of information consistently, someone with no information and a big imagination will.

Take Care of You – Do you have a documented career plan? Is your business network strong? Are your family relationships what they need to be? How are you keeping physically healthy and spiritually strong? Pre-flight airline instructions are always to put on the oxygen mask first and then assist others. To lead others through uncertainty tomorrows, take a deep breath and start getting in shape today. Most of us can’t do this alone. Find someone you trust to listen and hold you on focus.

Use Humor – “Laughter doeth good like a medicine,” said King Solomon in the book of Proverbs. Studies continue to support the healing power of laughter. Getting results at work is serious business, but living life is funny business. Use self- effacing opportunities to show the lighter side of you and never make others the brunt of a joke. When people laugh together as a group, they pull together as a team.

Working Journal Entry: Do any of these ideas suit you? If so, try them for a week or so and let me know what happens. Remember to lead with your head and your heart when leading the people who are left.

Request – If you have learned a valuable lesson about leading after a layoff, I would like to hear you story and pass it along to others. Please email me or give me a call.

Effort to Align

I feel excited most mornings on my way to work. Yes or No

Work in 2009 will be different than the past few years. There will be fewer people with much more to do. Teams will likely be smaller and asked to produce faster. Everyone will be required to rethink how they work. Individually or as a team, people will need to improve performance by being fully engaged and focused on the right things together more than ever before.

In his new book, “Great Business Teams” Howard M. Guttmann states that for an organization to raise its level of performance, every team,must be aligned in five key areas:

Business strategy
Business deliverables coming from the strategy
Roles and responsibilities at individual and business unit or functional levels
Ground rules for decision making and conflict resolution
Interpersonal relationships

Your career needs to be aligned in five areas as well. Uncertain times call out to each person to be certain of being:

Attuned to how your organization and profession will change in the next few years
Aware of what skills will be needed to be highly effective in the future
Articulate in how your success is measured for your job
Absorbed in learning better ways to manage projects and lead people
A mentor in your organization and to colleagues outside

Working Journal Entry: Rate your team and your career on each of the items above on this scale: 1 Aligned 2 Not aligned 3 I don’t know. If you do this exercise you might see some areas to concentrate on this year, and that would be good. You might also become aware of some factors which influenced your yes or no answer at the top of the page, and that would be even better.
What effort will you make to align your leadership and life in 2009 ?

“O Lord, thou givest us everything at the price of an effort.” – Leonardo da Vinci

Career Examen

Do you ever wake up at night wondering, “Is what I’ve been doing in my career really what I want to do? While also asking, “Do I have enough time left to do something else I really want to do?”

Since none of us knows the answer to the “time left” question – at least not from this side of heaven. I’d like to offer an idea to help you get a clearer answer to “What do I really want to do?” by illustrating a simply process ,which seems especially appropriate, as we approach Thanksgiving Day.

The process is found in the book Sleeping with Bread- Holding What Gives you Life, by Dennis, Sheila, and Mathew Linn. The book title is based on experiences of workers in World War II refugee camps who cared for many orphaned children. The shell shocked children had problems sleeping at night fearing they would wake once again homeless and without food. Nothing seemed to reassure them. One night someone gave each child in their area a piece of bread to hold at bedtime. Holding the bread these children could finally sleep in peace.

The Linns took this concept of finding something simple that gives us a sense of assurance and created the Examen. The Examen is simply two questions you ask at the close of each day:

1. What moment today am I most thankful/grateful for? gave me energy
2. What moment today am I least thankful/grateful for? took away my energy

The authors share many examples of how these questions, if applied consistently, can help teams, couples, families and individuals become stronger and improve communication. For our purpose today, I suggest you record your answers to these two questions as they relate to your day-to-day work activities. Do this for one week. At the end of the week look over your list and add other ideas which come to mind. You have now created an inventory of what you want in your next career move and what you want to avoid.

Working Journal Entry: Using your data write a narrative, create a chart or draw a picture of the place, people, challenges and other things that make you most alive and most productive. Outsource, avoid or minimize any necessary energy drainers.

Now you see what you really want to do in your leadership and life. Time is all you have.

Choosing Hopefulness

Bill was promised an ownership position if he could turnaround the failing profit center. He had the smarts, the experience, the enthusiasm, and a plan. First he removed incompetent staff, then hired good people and improved the service. Sales increased and profits grew. Team spirit lifted. All the while, the owner acted as his top cheerleader.

Suddenly the boss started to find fault in any mistake Bill made. He went around Bill to the staff and micro-managed everything. After a while Bill succumbed. Like a caged lion stripped of his pride, he crouched silent in the shadows to avoid the whip of an inept trainer. The gleam in Bill’s eyes disappeared. Talented people left. Profits tumbled. Bill was fired. The message came via e-fax.

“When persons of power rob others of their right to make their own choices, they do it most often because they feel powerless themselves. Insecurity is a typical trait of a tyrant,” writes Dan Baker, PH.D in his book, What Happy People Know. Dr. Baker coaches high income people, who appear to have everything in life except happiness. He says when a person faces a problem and acts out as an oppressor; this can often be traced to a feeling of helplessness. Baker says helplessness is founded on one or more of these three perceptions:

Permanence- thinking a problem will last forever
Personalization- thinking a problem is entirely your fault or one single person’s fault
Pervasiveness- thinking a problem extends to every other situation

Tom Watson, the founder of IBM, made his fortune by surrounding himself with smart people and allowing them to make their own decisions. Once, a decision was made at IBM that resulted in a $10 million dollar loss. The manager responsible for the decision was devastated and offered to resign. Watson replied, “What? After I just made a $10 million dollar investment in your education!”

When an individual is faced with a problem and chooses to show up as inquiring and supportive; this is usually because he/she comes from a position of internal security and hopefulness. Hopefulness is experienced as a balanced blend of: confidence and promise, reality and vision, expectancy and encouragement. Hopefulness is often grounded on one or more of these three principles:

Temporariness – acknowledging the facts and believing “this too shall pass”
Teamliness* – acting as if building lasting relationships is what matters most
Tapering off – using mistakes as tools that shave rough edges, narrow options and sharpen focus

A mistake can be either an opportunity to eradicate or an occasion to educate. It’s our choice.

Journal Entry: In your role(s) as: manager, employee, spouse, parent, coach, team members, or big kid on the playground: How will you decide to show up when someone makes a mistake which causes a problem for you in your leadership and life?

A wise man’s heart guides his decisions and his lips promote instruction. Proverbs 16:23

*Note: I am aware that “Teamliness” is not a Webster approved word. Lighten up. Be hopeful.

Rule of Three

Over the ages great leaders have used the rule of three to change their world.

Writers, officials and revolutionaries have successfully applied the rule of three to move people toward a vision. “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” “Government of the people, by the people, and for the people,” “Friends, Romans, countrymen,” “Blood, sweat and tears,” “Father, Son and Holy Spirit,” “Faith, Hope and Charity,” “Mind, body, spirit,” “I came, I saw, I conquered.”

Jon Stewart is a comedian and the infamous TV news anchor on “The Daily Show” . Here is how Jon relies, as effective joke tellers do, on the rule of three to make us laugh and make a point. “I celebrated Thanksgiving in the old- fashioned way. I invited everyone in my neighborhood to my house, we had an enormous feast, and then I killed them and took their land.”

The U.S. Marine Corps have ingrained the rule of three into the DNA of their operations. In a nutshell, the rule is applied as the Marines guide for structure in effective management and mission execution. Each Marine has three things to worry about. They have three men to a team commanded by a Corporal (so there are actually a total of four on the team, when you count the team leader). Three teams to a rifle squad commanded by a sergeant. Three rifle squads to a platoon commanded by a Lieutenant. Three rifle platoons to a company commanded by a Captain. Three companies to a battalion commanded by a Lieutenant Colonel, etc. The Marine’s apparently experimented with a “rule of four,” and retention and effectiveness took a nosedive.

Effective business leaders and professionals today use the rule of three in their speeches , but few consider its power to impact effectiveness and retention. When a top manager is called on to make an important speech they take time to be clear on the purpose of their presentation and use the rule of three as a structure consistently. But in the day-to-day break neck speed of business, important assignments are often made in a shoot-now-structure-later fashion. When an unclear mission is combined with an uncertain structure then multiplied by the speed of the world today, how can we expect effectiveness not to take a nosedive. Frustrated achievers often leave for a better run battlefield.

In this time of experimentation with flatter organizations, multiple reporting relationships and expanding spans of control, maybe it is a good time to take a closer look at the rule of three. Consider the possibility that adding this one consistent element to your plans, projects and processes might change your world for the better.

Working Journal Entry: How might you apply the rule of three to help you sharpen your focus, strengthen your execution and simplify your life and your leadership?

Signs for Success

Back 20 years or so ago I sat in a dull green room attending my first and only traffic school. I was part of an unmotivated group comprised of fifteen people with one- too- many traffic tickets and a very upbeat traffic cop. He was our teacher.

We had just finished viewing a video of the largest traffic accident in the history of America , a 196 car chain reaction pile-up on a freeway in Lansing , Michigan . Our positive policeman asked this pointed question, “So what was the cause of this accident?” The room was silent. He answered, “A nice driver came to a stop to let another car on to the highway.” Building momentum toward a certain crescendo, he continued, “So, what one rule of the road did this guy ignore? What is the one question we have learned to ask ourselves before we make a decision on the road?” He did a dramatic 180 degree spin and pointed his finger at a big, white sign with handwritten red letters, which read:

Will what I’m about to do promote the smooth flow of traffic?

Thankfully that day is over, but the question on that sign still holds on to me. Over time I have discovered that the premise found in this one question can help us make better leadership decisions in time of stress even when we are not on a highway.

In a public meeting, a young project manager, who was representing his company, got caught red- handed in a mistake. He was embarrassed and rightly so. But instead of owning up and apologizing, he started explaining how the client had contributed to the error. The smooth flow of the meeting stopped. A relationship destroying pile up was on the brink. Then the president of project manager’s company took control of the situation. She stood and said “We are so sorry. This was completely our mistake”, and maneuvered the meeting out of an impending crash.

What one rule of relationships did the president know that this project manager ignored? What one question did he need to ask himself before he responded in a situation like this? I imagine him walking into work the next morning, just missing the president as she exited his office – a red marker in her hand. On his office wall he sees the one question. It is written in bold, letters on a big, white sign:

Will what I’m about to do promote a long term relationship with this client?

Other possible signs for success:
Will what I’m about to do promote: the smooth flow of information; the customer feeling that they are being served; the growth of this person; the seamless execution of this project; the closing of this deal; the values of this organization; a climate of love and respect to each individual in our family; the truth about me?

Working Journal Entry:
What signs for success might encourage and direct you and the people in your corner of the world as you travel the roads of your leadership and life?

Complexity Crisis

“They asked us to automate 92 reports for their company. They didn’t even have 92 employees”.

I heard this personal account from the president of a successful computer service company. We were standing in the hallway discussing our shared observation that mid-level managers are feeling run over and run down by the extensive reporting being required in today’s high tech business environment.

Managers are being told that their job is to grow the business and develop people, but they can hardly find time to do their job. In many organizations the majority of work days are spent attending meetings, writing reports or justifying the report written yesterday.

It appears to me this complexity crisis is often driven by executives who are armed with unlimited report formats and analysis at their finger tips. They act as if not utilizing every reporting possibility is akin to conserving ammunition in the heat of battle, when just the opposite is true. In an effort to respond quickly to the pressure to expand profits, create new products and implement new procedures and systems, some leaders may be unintentionally stifling the bottom line.

This challenge seems to have existed for a while. Peter Drucker wrote about complexity concerns in his classic 1963 Harvard Business Review article “Managing for Business Effectiveness.” John Mariotti, in his 2008 book The Complexity Crisis, says executives face the same complexity issues. Drucker’s answer 45 years ago was the need for “clarity of focus”. Mariotti’s solution today is to simplify. Marriotti says effective leaders need to focus on doing three key things, but I am very tired of all these 3 key formulas. So I instead decide to offer you a quote of business wisdom of Robert Townsend, author of the timeless book Up the Organization.

“If people are coming to work excited… if they’re making mistakes freely and fearlessly… if they’re having fun… if they’re concentrating on doing things, rather than preparing reports and going to meetings then somewhere you have a leader.”

Working Journal Entry: Is there any complexity you can eliminate? How would getting rid of this help simplify your world, sharpen your focus and possibly multiply your influence in your leadership and life?

PS- If you just must know Mariotti’s 3 step formula, email me your request and I will send you the points and paragraph I cut from this article – so you can sleep peacefully tonight.

Having it ALL

His hard hat and heavy tool belt was conspicuously out of place in the plush elevator that frigid winter morning. A well dressed lady with a shiny briefcase asked how he felt about working outside in the bitter cold. “I’m lucky today,” he said “I’m doing repairs inside.” The door opened. As he stepped out, he stopped and said, “I really don’t mind working in the harsh weather. We do what we need to do for the ones we love.”

Standing behind the cash register in a busy garden shop she moved methodically amid the potpourri of plants and garden pots. She had officially retired a year or so ago with a good pension. Like many retired people, she assumed all her time would be spent in volunteer work and leisurely activities. Wiping her hands on her garden apron, she beamed, “But there’s just something about getting a paycheck.”

What does having it ALL mean? These two people have something that makes life work for them, but do they have it all? I have found that there are three ingredients in the mix of having it ALL: Achievement, Legacy and Love.

A chievement – Accomplishing something that is recognized favorably against similar goals that other people you admire have achieved. Examples might include: education level, certifications, job title, professional recognition, awards, fame, fortune or a paycheck.
L egacy- Realizing that your values or accomplishments will help others find success in the future. Which could involve such things as: teaching a child, contributing to a foundation, writing a book, creating a painting, mentoring, volunteering, building a successful organization or constructing a building that lasts.
L ove – Knowing that you have made a positive impact on people you care about and that you invest in enjoying life. Think about your family, friends, colleagues and the notes written, jokes told, stories remembered, homes shared, adventures, and hobbies that hold on to your heart. As Og Mandino said, “Success without happiness, success without laughter, success without love is the worst kind of failure.”

My chance meeting with the retiree lady and the construction guy brought to mind the need to be more intentional about having it ALL. Like me, you may sometimes feel that you, not only, don’t have it all, you wonder if you have it at all. Consider the possibility you might have it ALL, but you just haven’t noticed that you do.

Journal Entry:
Today: Write down 3-4 current activities/accomplishment in your life and work. Look at each one in light of the ALL ingredients. What is your discovery? Which of the three ingredients will you need to be more intentional about as you move into the next phase of your leadership and life?

Hope & Hotdogs

A man lived by the side of the road and sold hot dogs. He was hard of hearing so he had no radio. He had trouble with his eyes so he had no newspaper. But he sold good hot dogs! He put up a sign on the highway telling how good they were. He stood by the side of the road and cried, “Hey mister, buy a hot dog.” And people bought. He increased his meat and bun orders and he bought a bigger stove to take care of his increased trade. Then his son came home from college to help him and something happened! His son said, “Father, haven’t you been listening to the radio? There’s a big recession. The international situation is terrible, and the domestic situation looks even worse.” Whereupon the father thought, “Well, my son has been to college. He listens to the radio and reads the newspapers, so he ought to know.” So, the father cut down on the bun order, took down his advertising signs, and no longer bothered to stand on the highway to sell hotdogs. His hotdog sales fell overnight. ” You were right son,” the father said. “We are certainly in the middle of a terrible recession.”

When economic times appear to be tightening, short- sighted businesses cut costs in all the wrong ways. Like our ex-hotdog seller they pay too much attention to the abundant supply of naysayer. They do mass layoffs and hole up until the tide turns, but smart businesses understand that opportunity lies amid the turmoil.

Great organizations do cut expenses, but instead of taking down all their signs of hope and dismantling their teams, they take a longer view, especially when it comes to talented people. Their leaders become very intentional about helping both themselves and others become more resilient. They turn the suddenly available non-production time into an opportunity for training and mentoring. Then, when the market upswing comes – and it always does – their strengthened staff will stand sturdy with the skills needed to hit the new upturn head on and capture the market from hopeless shortsighted organizations.

Working Journal Entry:
Have you taken down any signs of hope in reaction to the economic slump? What two decisions do you need to make today to be prepared when the upswing comes tomorrow in leadership and life?

“Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid and discouraged because of the King and the vast army with him. For there is a power greater within us than within him. 2 Chronicles 32:6-8.

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