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Stuck in the mud?

August 1, 2010 in Business with 0 Comments

It’s easy to get stuck in the mud.

In this case, I’m talking about the inability to make a decision. You’re stuck and you just can’t seem to decide.

I know you’re probably in this position as often as I am.

Most successful people know that decisions need to be made. Those same successful people will often make decisions even though there’s a good chance they’ll be wrong. It’s not very often that all the stars align and decisions come easily. Even the smallest decisions can put us at task.

What kind of sandwich should I order from Subway?

What should the headline on our advertisement say?

Can we really afford to give away free appetizers?

But when we find ourselves stuck, the first and most appropriate course of action is to seek new knowledge and information which may help us decide, or sway us, one way or another. If no new information can be found to help make the best decision, you must to be prepared to make a wrong decision. In fact, you can almost guarantee that, most of the time, you won’t be able to find all the information required to make the 100% best decision.

And then there’s the time thing. Sometimes decisions need to be made quickly, and sometimes we don’t have the time to consult with others or look for evidence to support our gut instincts.

Then again, it was Harvey Cox who said, “Not to decide is to decide.”

I think he’s right, but I can’t decide.

What Leaders Can Learn From Inception

July 30, 2010 in Business, Linchpin with 4 Comments

Last week I saw Inception. What a fantastic film! I highly recommend seeing it.

Without spoiling anything, here’s a general look at the plot:

inception.jpg

Dom Cobb, played by DiCaprio, is a professional extractor. He has the ability to go inside people’s dreams and extract (or steal) information.

Of course, since Cobb is basically a thief, he’s on the run from the law.

Cobb is offered a chance to have his record cleared so he can return to the USA and see his children. He’s offered this provided he’ll take on one last job. The job, however, is a bit different than the types of jobs he’s used to doing. Instead of stealing information by using extraction, he’s asked to plant an idea/story/information inside someone’s mind using inception.

It’s a tail of corporate espionage.

Get it?

OK. Here’s what I believe leaders and those in a leadership role can learn from Inception.

A big part of a leadership role is preparing those around you for the future. Of course, the future is unknown.

So how does a leader/boss/manager prepare those around him for an unknown and unpredictable future?

If you guessed, “Inception,” you’re right. You get a gum ball.

Leaders use stories to paint pictures of the future. It’s the same as setting goals. It’s the same as positive thinking.  Leaders paint pictures of what’s to come.

The idea is to create a story for those you lead and plant it inside their heads.

A word of caution. Stories need to be told in much the same way as they are in the film Inception. They have to be believable. Therefore, the leader knows he must paint a positive picture. Our minds will fill in the rest of the details. The leaders goal is to prepare us for the unknown future by using a positive story.

Steve Jobs might tell the story about the life-changing possibilities the iPhone 4 will bring to Apple’s customers. It’s THAT story that inspires those working at Apple to go beyond the edge and create a remarkable product.

If Steve’s story fails to convince the employees that the iPhone 4 will change lives, and instead his story is, “we’ll increase revenue by 20% in this quarter,” or in other words, his words and story do not inspire them.  He fails.

And here’s the worst part of it. If there’s no Inception – everyone of your employees is left in limbo. And limbo is forever.

Wake up!

Hitting Paydirt

July 29, 2010 in Business with 0 Comments

If your business is hoping, waiting or wishing for a big payoff and banking on hitting paydirt at the very same time your business is in a downward spiral, you might be making a grave mistake.

Great business minds have often said, If a business isn’t growing, it’s dying.

The thing is, the opportunity or payoff you’re waiting for might come just a tad late. Or, it might not come at all. Waiting for the perfect moment, when all the stars align, could take a while.

Instead of waiting, you need to get busy initiating. Don’t wait until it’s too late.

Even sadder

July 23, 2010 in Business, Career & Work, Life, Success with 3 Comments

tho_only_people_1006a.1.jpg

From Hugh MacLeod of GapingVoid.com and his book Ignore Everybody

Merit can be bought. Passion can’t.

The only people who can change the world are people who want to. And not everybody does.

Human beings have this thing I call the “Pissed Off Gene”. It’s that bit of our psyche that makes us utterly dissatisfied with our lot, no matter how kindly fortune smiles upon us.

It’s there for a reason. Back in our early caveman days, being pissed off made us more likely to get off our butt, get out of the cave and into the tundra hunting wooly mammoth, so we’d have something to eat for supper. It’s a survival mechanism. Damn useful then, damn useful now.

It’s this same Pissed Off Gene that makes us want to create anything in the first place- drawings, violin sonatas, meat packing companies, websites. This same gene drove us to discover how to make a fire, the wheel, the bow and arrow, indoor plumbing, the personal computer, the list is endless.

Part of understanding the creative urge is understanding that it’s primal. Wanting to change the world is not a noble calling, it’s a primal calling.

We think we’re “providing a superior integrated logistic system” or “helping America to really taste freshness”. In fact we’re just pissed off and want to get the hell out of the cave and kill the woolly mammoth.

Your business either lets you go hunt the woolly mammoth or it doesn’t. Of course, like so many white-collar jobs these days, you might very well be offered a ton of money to sit in the corner-office cave and pretend that you’re hunting, even if you’re not, even if you’re just pushing pencils. That is sad. What’s even sadder is that you agreed to take the money.

From Hugh MacLeod of GapingVoid.com and his book Ignore Everybody

P.S. Enjoy the Weekend!



Discipline hurts less

July 22, 2010 in Business, Life, Success with 1 Comment

Than what?

That thing you’ve been putting off for months now. That new business venture you’ve been talking about. That great idea for an iPhone app you thought about. That exercise program you’ve been thinking about starting. The nutrition plan you were going to stick with. The marketing course you were going to take.

The discipline of starting something now, and sticking with it, can be painful. It’s painful because it requires some sacrifice. No success comes without some sort of sacrifice.

Sacrifice might mean having a salad while everyone else has pizza, or you might have to work Friday and Saturday nights go get that restaurant going. You may even need to sacrifice money and buy less, or live a little more frugally.

All this sacrifice can hurt, but that’s just the beginning. You need to build up self discipline and stick with it to get through the dip.

I know, I know… The pain can be unbearable at times.

I’ve got a feeling though, it will hurt a hell of a lot less than regret.

Survival

July 19, 2010 in Business, Success with 0 Comments

When we find ourselves in an emergency situation, the first instinct will almost always be self-preservation.

My wife likes to tell the story while we were walking on a trail in Newfoundland, and literally bumped into a massive moose, it was I who turned around and bolted in the opposite direction, leaving her to snap a few photos (including this one).

But when an emergency arises, a few things happen. First, the adrenalin goes up and the heart starts beating faster and faster until you can actually feel it pounding against your chest. Secondly, time seems to either stand still or fly by. And finally, fear kicks in and instincts, like self-preservation, will drive us to make fast, quick, reactive decisions.

Of course, fast, quick and reactive decisions usually aren’t the best decisions. Granted, in a bad enough situation (where time is of the essence) you’ll usually want to go with these decisions…Fast!

But let’s say for example that today, around 4:00 pm, you get called into your manager’s office. He lets you know that they’ve decided to let you go. You’re free to pack up your desk and not come back tomorrow.

I have no doubt that your heart will be beating and thumping against your chest as you drive home to tell your spouse the news.

But once you’re out of immediate danger, now’s not the time to make a bad situation worse. Now is the time to use your brain and assess the situation. This is where logic needs to kick in. This is the moment where you begin to carefully assess all options. This is true survivor mode. This is the moment you use the one tool you’ve had in your arsenal all along – your brain. Use it wisely.

Don’t jump at the first opportunity. Don’t start spamming your resume to hundreds of employers. Don’t panic and use up all your resources. Don’t eat anything you’re not sure about. Use this time to carefully analyze the situation and plan for your survival. You might be in it for the long haul. The good news is, this might be a blessing in disguise.

Oh, but if you see a bear, run like hell.

Find the Cracks – Fill The Gaps

July 13, 2010 in Business with 4 Comments

A friend of mine asked me the other day where he might find an idea to start a business.

I asked him, “What kind of business do you want to start?”

He responded and said that since he was so knowledgeable in his current career, and loved what he was doing, he could see himself starting a competing business.

And then the lizard showed up.

The excuses rolled in. His current employer had been around forever. It would be hard to persuade people to switch to a new startup. There is no way he could compete… Yada Yada Yada.

I suggested that before we allow the lizard to lay a smack down, we spend a little time looking for the cracks.

Is customer service slipping?

Are they ignoring customers?

What could be done better in sales and marketing?

Are they simply surviving in the middle-of-the-road? Can you go to the edge and pass?

Has their guard been dropped?

Maybe the business idea you’ve been looking for is right in front of you.

If you can find the cracks, and fill the gaps, you might just have a winner.

Power up the DeLorean – Charge the Flux Capicitor

July 1, 2010 in Business, Career & Work, Life with 0 Comments

Younger Dr. Emmett Brown: [running out of the room] 1.21 gigawatts? 1.21 gigawatts? Great Scott!
Marty McFly: [following] What-what the hell is a gigawatt?

~ Back to the Future – 1985 (quotes from IMDB)

I’m not exactly sure why Doc Brown and Marty McFly popped into my head this morning. I don’t get it. Sometimes, I wake up with these ideas and it’s easy to put my fingers to the keyboard. I was thinking about the DeLorean, time travel, and the future. Here’s what got me to thinking.

A few years back, I worked in an organization that thrived on lunchtime board meetings. We routinely spent our lunch hours discussing the problems, failures, and breakdowns of past board members and employees of the organization.

We discussed the things the organization had attempted or tried to do in the past, and usually failed. We’d use those failures to discuss the future, and how to move forward, making sure we wouldn’t make the same mistakes again.

“The last board tried implementing a similar strategy three years ago, and it failed miserably” or “Back in 2004, they tried giving away free pancakes as a promotion, and it was a total nightmare“.

We became fearful about the future. We froze up. Nothing new or groundbreaking ever was accomplished. We didn’t want to make the same mistakes again. Everything about the future became scary and unpredictable.

Of course, Doc Brown and Marty rarely dwelled on the past. What happened, happened. They were more interested in the future. But they knew that everything that happened in the past had a direct effect on the present or future. They knew the devastating effects of changing the past. After all, the past is what created the future. Doc always stressed the importance of never making changes to the past.

Did you get all that? In a nutshell, when applied to the above scenario at the organization I worked for, the past is what brought the organization to its current state. The act of dwelling on the past was really a waste of both precious time and resources. We had no DeLorean. We didn’t have 1.2 gigawatts of power to go back and change things or alter the “present.” So why even discuss it?

The better option would have been this:

“OK – The free pancake promotion in 2004 was a flop. What can we learn from that campaign? How can we make it better this time around?”

In the short time I was in the organization, I realized what a debilitating effect dwelling on the past could have. Instead of learning from past mistakes, and making adjustments moving forward, we allowed those mistakes to scare us away from trying something new, something risky, or something unpredictable. We rarely looked into the future, and when we did, we did it with scared and timid eyes.

It’s the exact same thing in your personal life. No amount of dwelling on the past is going to change things. You simply won’t be able to muster up enough power (1.2 gigawatts) to go back and change things. And yet, we constantly allow the past to shape us moving forward. We allow the past and our personal failures to scare us away from trying something new, something risky, or something unpredictable.

After all was said and done, Marty finally began to understand that the choices he made now, and in the present, would have such an effect on his future.

I can’t stress enough the importance of putting your one month, one year, three year, five year plans down on paper.

Where do you want your business to go?

What’s your vision for your business?

How about your personal life.

How much money are you making?

What kind of car (DeLorean) are you driving?

What do your friends and family look like?

Where are you working?

When you create a detailed plan for the future, you’ll be more inclined to make choices and decisions now that will take you where you want to go.

Of course, there’s always one other option.

You could make no plans at all, set no future projections, and make no future goals. You could fly by the seat of your pants and allow the failures of the past to scare you into doing nothing.

The problem with taking this route is if you make one wrong mistake, you’re pooched. Next thing you know, you’re sitting in your car at the local mall waiting for lighting to strike the clock tower at exactly 10:04…. Good luck with that.

Emulate the Amish

June 30, 2010 in Books, Business, Life with 10 Comments

I read an interesting post on BrandAutopsy this morning. John Moore reviewed the new business book Success Made Simple – An Inside Look At Why Amish Businesses Thrive.

As John says,”According to a recent study, less than 5% of Amish businesses fail within their first five years. That’s astounding considering 50% of (non-Amish) small businesses fail within their first five years.”

One of my favorite parts of John’s short review is the following statement about what makes the Amish so successful, because it’s something I’ve been harping on you about for months now….

The Amish Maintain a Learner’s Attitude

The Amish businessman is always seeking knowledge. Their learner’s attitude begins early in their business life. The Amish gain hands-on experience in their chosen trade before they start their own business. From there, the Amish will seek out mentor relationships with respected community business leaders to continue their business education. The successful Amish entrepreneur views every learning opportunity, including learning from competitors and customers, as vital sources of business knowledge.

It reminds me a lot of a great quote I read in a book the other day.

“The reason why most people are so pathetic is that they will not take the time to develop and refine their skills.” ~ Stuart Wilde

I’ve heard it said in so many other ways…

Someone once remarked,

“How can you call yourself a _____ salesman, if you’ve never read any Zig Ziglar?” (insert any of the following before the word salesman: car, boat, carpet, furniture, ice cream, hot dog, life insurance, etc…)

I’d like to take that a step further.

How can we take your marketing skills seriously, if you’ve never read any Seth Godin?

How could we possibly hire you as our copywriter, to write and create our ads, if you’ve never studied Claude Hopkins, or Gary Halbert, or Dan Kennedy?

How could I possibly hire you as my “life coach” when you’ve never studied the works of Napoleon Hill?

How can you call yourself an investor when you’ve never read anything by Warren Buffet?

What would you add to the list?

I read another book recently where the author said,

“During my first business I read 7 business books and the business failed miserably. During my second business, I read over 700 books and the business was a huge success. It’s not hard to figure out what made the difference.

Be like the Amish and never stop learning. It’s clearly working for them.

This call may be recorded for quality service…

June 25, 2010 in Business with 6 Comments

It must be Friday.

I just spent the past twenty-five minutes on-hold listening to elevator music.

The funny thing is that when the call was first answered, I was told this call might be recorded for quality service purposes.

When I finally managed to get through, the service was pretty lousy.

Aside from the 25 minute wait, the person on the other end was unwilling to help, or budge, or break protocol, or reason with my requests. The answers were canned and rehearsed. I felt like I was talking to a robot.

After I realized I would get nowhere, I decided to cut my losses and move on. Yet she still had the nerve to try to sell me on an “exclusive offer.”

I wish at least the initial message had been honest.

These calls are intended to waste your time, but make you feel like you’ve accomplished something. Later tonight you can tell all your friends how firm and demanding you were with us. You can tell them how we bowed down to your requests and gave you some extra credit, or took a few bucks off your bill. (which wasn’t really credit by the way, it’s junk we give away to anyone like you. And we’ll tack a few extra bucks on your bill for this type of thing anyways…”system access fees” (It’s part of our contingency plan). We honestly don’t give a crap about you until you stop paying your bills. Screw off and have a pleasant day.

So are they really recording or monitoring the calls? Are they busting them out at staff parties? Who’s the joke on here?

The whole experience got me to thinking about Zappos. Zappos is known to be the leader of exemplary customer service. I wrote about Zappos a few weeks ago.

Just for fun, I called Zappos shortly after my first call. I wanted to see how their phone process works.

Press 1 for help with clothing.

Press 2 for help with shoes.

Press 5 for the joke of the day.

Or, just stay on the line. This call may be monitored or recorded for quality assurance.

I decided to stay on the line. In less than 10 seconds, I was greeted with a happy and cheerful voice.

“It’s a great day at Zappos, you’ve reached Kalina. How can I help you?”

I told Kalina that I didn’t want to buy anything; I just wanted to hear how they answer their phones.

We had a laugh, a quick chat about what I was doing. She proceeded to ask me if there was ANYTHING else she could help me with, and then with another giggle, she told me to go have myself a great weekend. I wished her the same, and we parted ways.

It was a genuine human connection. I felt connected to the person on the other end.

Ten seconds or 25 minutes?
No Script or Script?
Humans or Robots?

The business lesson is huge, and the time invested is minimal. Sure, you could read a hundred books on “how to improve customer service”, or you could make two phone calls and compare them for yourself. Once you’ve done that, the solution is simple – strive to be like the second one.

Or even simpler, just show you friggin care.

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