What are you cultivating?

In the words of Plato, "what you honor in a country, you will cultivate there." I attended an Athena Awards program that honors women who have demonstrated extraordinary leadership skills. I had the honor of speaking at the event and I spoke about what we honor will be cultivated. Yesterday's experience was a perfect example of what Plato said hundreds of years ago, that is still relevant today.

I am a big believer in what you focus on you get more of. Just imagine if we spent more time honoring those who demonstrate positive behaviors, extraordinary skills, acts of human kindness, strong leadership in tough times, a can do attitude, respect towards fellow workers and customers-what ever you honor you will cultivate.

What do you want to cultivate in your business, home, community? Think about whether or not you are acknowledging/recognizing (honoring) what it is you want to cultivate.

Red Zone

How effective are you in your "Red Zone"? I'm not big on using sports analogies, but this one works. I was watching a Jet game last week and it occurred to me, we have a "red zone" in business. I asked my self a question-how effective is my performance when there is 20 yards to go to score a touch down?

What's your "Red Zone"? How effective are you? What's your proverbial "touch down play"?
Is it closing a sale? Is it how you use the the last two hours of the work day? Is it exceeding a clients expectations? Is it completing a project ahead of schedule? Is it bringing a product to market under budget?

"Simple Certainties"

Do you ever think we make what we do too complicated? Whether it's life or work related. Well I was meeting with a gentleman about two weeks ago discussing some work I am doing for a client and he said it all boils down to "simple certainties". What does that mean? He proceeded to compare what I was talking about (mission, vision, values, changing human behavior, etc.) to what and who. All of what we want to accomplish in terms of changing human behavior which is at the heart of what I do with my clients is about what and who. We simply need to ask one powerful question. What's most important? Followed by who do I need to ask that question to and then we will have the ability to overcome any value conflict-which is what holds people back from changing the desired behavior. We all view life through our very own filters which consist of values, beliefs, and experiences. If our behavior or the desired behavior isn't in alignment with our values and beliefs we resist the change. So simplfy what you are doing and consider "Simple Certainties".

It's the customer stupid!

I typically don't use negative remarks but today I had another less than good customer service experience and it is time to remind everyone about the importance of customer service at every size organization. Customer service makes or breaks a sale-I've been shopping for two big ticket items, central air conditioning and a water holding tank. The service experiences have been disappointing. Either the person answering the call doesn't display quality service skills or the person making the sales call doesn't. Individuals must realize that service impacts sales and you cannot have a successful business without both quality service and sales. It is the single most important aspect of the customer's experience and if it's the first experience it potentially can be the last. The beauty of correcting this is that it's not rocket science. It really doesn't have to be hard-be polite and respectful, don't interrupt, be knowledgeable in what you or your company sells, talk less and listen more, and remember it's about the customer-not you. Do these simple things and you will experience more success in selling and retaining customers.

Managing the Great Divides

We have four generations in one workforce. How do you manage the different communication and behavioral styles and the different approaches to learning and work? These appear to be deep divides between the different generations. Or are there more commonalities than differences? I've been studying this for the last few years as it became a challenge in the "corporate classroom". Try engaging an 18 year old and a 50 year old in customer service training and the divide is very clear. But I also discovered from a customer service perspective their wants are similar. They both want respect, friendly and courteous service. From a learning perspective it is a different story. It is important to recognize what each brings to the learning experience and how each learn differently and accommodate those differences. Quite often I'll engage both to share their experiences and little is about right and wrong perspectives, just different. The same is true for managing this multi-generational workforce-demonstrate respect, leverage the differences in talent and encourage collaboration-it works!

Language is everything!

I've been working with a group of "Middle managers" for the past six months on leadership and management development. One of the areas we have been focusing on is performance management, specifically setting performance expectations, reviewing performance, and conducting performance appraisals. It has become apparent how important language continues to be a critical component of being an effective manager/leaders, and particularly when setting expectations or assigning tasks. One of the mangers gave an example of how he asked an employee to complete a particular task. He asked the employee, "In your spare time would you type this letter?" How might the employee interpret this request? How clear are the expectations? Whether you are setting specific performance expectations or assigning a task, language is critical to achieve desired outcomes/results.

Summer is a great time to evaluate

As we approach the summer months, this is a great time to focus on your development. Typically most businesses do slow down and this is the perfect time to evaluate your professional development goals. Summer is a more relaxed time of year which is why it's such a great opportunity to focus on yourself. Is there a course you've been wanting to take, or have you been trying to improve a particular skill and haven't had the time, is there a goal you haven't worked on during the first six months of the year? These are just a few questions to ask yourself and take advantage of the summer to evaluate your successes and identify what you want to focus on for the remainder of the year.

Not getting enough feedback? Ask for it!

I've been working with a group of middle managers in small government and I'm hearing that a lot of them haven't received feedback from their manager (boss) in years. In most of their municipalities there are no formal procedures for performance management. So, you have to wonder how people know what is expected of them. Here are some thoughts that I have been sharing with these folks. All of us need and want feedback. Feedback is one of the most valuable tools to create a motivating, engaging work environment. So, if you are not getting enough feedback, ask for it. The other thought I'd like to share, is don't not provide feedback to employees because your boss is not providing it to you. Don't use that as a reason not to be an effective manager.

Are you growing or dying?

Are you stretching yourself to expand your talents, achieve better results, be a better manager or leader, or develop a new skill? I’ve been doing quite a bit of reading on success principles, and what successful people do differently, and how to become more successful as a person. These principles can be applied to our work life as well as our personal life. I have begun to see some patterns or common practices as I learn more about successful people and one of common practices is that successful people constantly stretch or challenge themselves to grow and learn something new. If we are not stretching ourselves to grow and learn we are doing the opposite-dying. With growing comes some discomfort, but with that discomfort come some of your best learning experiences. I help people become more effective in selling products and services and one of the learning activities is video tapping them in a client interaction. Boy does it generate a lot of anxious and nervous learners, but consistently the feedback is positive and that it wasn't as bad as they thought and it’s the most valuable part of the program. They grow more from that 10 minute learning activity than from the entire 2 day program. What are you doing to grow?

People before Policy

We all know what it’s like to be a client or customer. There are businesses that still put their policies before people. When was the last time you heard the proverbial “I’m sorry we can’t do that” or” it’s not our policy”? It happens too frequently and it’s poor customer service in my book. I’ve been working with a client for the past year on improving their customer service levels to external and internal clients and they conducted a survey recently to see how they are doing. Happily I can report that the survey results were better than last year across all categories, but there’s still room to improve in select areas, one being a question concerning whether they put people before policy. Although there has been improvement the EVP of this organization wants to see continued improvement, so they implemented “COP”, Challenge Our Policies”. The employees have been asked to challenge the policies that they think are not in alignment with “people before policy” and must provide suggestions for improvement. It’s working; there have been several suggestions that are being considered for implementation.

Take 10

Have you ever been frustrated about not making progress towards achieving a goal? I know I have and it can feel defeating. I was listening to Rory Cohen, Co-Founder of Entelekey Inc. last night speak about Take 10 Now!, a system to help people take action towards their goals. It's actually quite simple, by taking 10 minutes of focused energy/time towards a particular goal each day, you will successfully achieve it. In fact, the cover story for Entrepreneur magazine features this concept, "Start a Business 10 Minutes a Day". So I decided to put the concept to the test with a very small goal. I've been wanting to organize and set up a file system for a pile of articles/resource material for months, and as the pile grew larger the less I wanted to tackle the goal. Well in just 10 minutes I was on my way to organizing the pile. I tossed half of it-and made smaller piles by topic. I then took 10 minutes the next day and created folders for each small pile. In two days, goal accomplished. And this was a small goal relatively speaking. My final thought is to "chunk" the time you spend on taking action towards achieving your goal into minutes rather than hours. Action is "King" when it comes to ahieving any goal. I challenge you to try this on.