You Are Who You Are

Posted on by

You are who you are.

You are not who you say you are. You are not who you are pretending to be, nor are you yet who you want to be. You are not the sum total of all of all of your worst weaknesses nor are you the best of all of your greatest strengths. You might be a work in progress, growing and heading in a great direction, but please tell us, who are you TODAY?

You are who YOU are.

And, why will you fail in your current role? Because, as hard as it is for me to agree with pop-culture counselors, you must be you. Sure, go ahead and be your best you, but you MUST be you. If you don’t know who you are and if you can’t communicate it effectively to others, then how can you expect the people leading you to do better than what you offer them? A leader, boss or coach can’t be expected to employ someone into their best possible role if they don’t know really who they are dealing with.

Countless partnerships and business relationships have been doomed to failure for this one simple reason, “you aren’t being you”.

“But, they are who we thought they were, and we let them off the hook! - Dennis Green, Oct. 16, 2006

So, will you candidly, with a zeal for honest evaluation, tell the people who are counting on you what your best skills and attributes are? Then with the same measure of honesty (not more, not less) be sure to carefully and honestly describe the types of roles you should not lead up and outline areas where you would certainly be least effective. Don’t hide out in fear, hoping to survive. You and the people around you will enjoy life and work more when you are thriving in a leadership role that fits you best. Every job should have some margin for growth and new opportunities, but the entire role shouldn’t be one humongous fantasy bet on “best case” and your dreams at night.

Need some help figuring out who you are?
Strengths Finder
Now Discover Your Strengths

The Difficulties of Leadership

Posted on by

I’m a minimalist. I give away almost everything I don’t really need and part ways quickly with things just taking up space or collecting dust. I have very, very few collections or random trinkets I hold dear.

In my office there is a stack of books, each laid on their side, that reaches nearly seven feet tall, written on the singular subject of leadership. All of these books are biographies, spanning nearly all of history. This stack of books represents the collective knowledge and actions of the ‘who’s who’ of the greatest men and women throughout time. I have read them cover to cover, page by page, word by word… some of them more than once or twice. This stack of books is one of my very few collections.

There is another stack of books I own. This stack used to be at least as tall as the other, but I have judiciously whittled it down to only the best of the best, most impactful and practical books on business and modern leadership principals. Honestly, not many books make this cut, because the people who write them often turn out to be thinkers on these subjects, not actually accomplished doers.

Condensed here for your convenience are some truths about the difficulties of leadership that all great leaders understand and share in. The weight and practical application of these statements might hold less meaning if you haven’t studied deeply of these men & women, but it’s my hope that you will consider them carefully all the same.

  • Leaders are inspired and carried forward by visions of alternate realities, futures and possibilities, regardless of the improbabilities that might lie ahead.
  • The hope of a better future carries a leader through all of the hard work, suffering and sacrifices that will come.
  • Tough, heart wrenching decisions are unavoidable. Great leadership will certainly exact a personal toll.
  • You will lose some of your closest friends because you need to do what is best. This reality it will haunt you, as will the fact that you know it was unavoidable.
  • Take heart, you are in great company, because all leaders have (or will) hesitate in the face of profoundly difficult moments of decision.
  • When a leader doesn’t vacillate and rises to make difficult decisions, it’s because they have dug deep into their faith, their religion, their personal conviction or into the vision of what can be.
  • Some of the greatest leaders of all time have faltered in critical moments, and it is the faltering in these moments that nearly all of them look back on with regret.
  • Although most leaders are surrounded by councils, friends and loved ones, each leader inevitably experiences isolation when the hardest work and linchpin decisions need to be made.

These are just some of the undeniable factors separating our ordinary lives from the best life, the best leadership, the best outcomes, and the best tomorrows.

4 things you must do while in college

Posted on by

This isn’t an old man regretting decisions not made, but experience casting a bet on what the next generation will need to excel, regardless of whether you are pursuing leadership in business, the nonprofit sector or the military. Here are 4 things you must do while in college -

1. Learn a foreign language with intensity
A truth that we can’t ignore is the rapid globalization of economies and relationships. Language is more than the words, it’s an immersion into culture, world view and human behavior. Leadership requires a robust understanding of humanity… and my 4th grader is capably of studying both Mandarin and Spanish while still retaining excellent grades in English, so don’t tell me you aren’t smart enough.

Need more motivation?  Mandarin Chinese language stats  |  Spanish language stats

2. Study abroad for at least a year
You live in a bubble and a trip to Disney world will not give you what you need to know about the world at large. Your beliefs, paradigms and personal habits need to be challenged and sharpened. You don’t really own who you are until you are pushed out of the nest and learn to “fly” in the real world. Your twenty’s are a shaping period of life, so GO get shaped by the world ‘out there’, nut nestled down in your apartment or your dorm room in some middle America, small college town that will be exactly the same a year after you leave it.

3. Capture the opportunities of technology
Technology isn’t just a new means of doing “work”, its way more than that. Technology creates a brand new paradigm for how you work and from where you get the opportunity to work.

By the end of 2007, all 4,000 staffers at Best Buy headquarters will be on ROWE (Results-Only Work Environment), which permits them to work whenever and wherever they want. So, what happens when smart companies realize that work isn’t a place where you go, but something that you do? - 4 hour work week, Tim Ferris

“I think everybody in this country should learn how to program a computer because it teaches you how to think.”  — Steve Jobs, the lost interview from www.Code.org

4. Take adventurous forays into the workforce 
Internships, paid summer opportunities and entrepreneurial experiments. The classroom is an isolate, non-real, sequestered learning environment. I can appreciate that you don’t have a 10 year plan or know exactly “what you want to be when you grow up”. Let’s be candid, very few of us are doing today exactly what we went to get a degree for. The surest way to find your strengths and broaden your appreciation for what you ought and ought not be doing with your life is to get more real world experience. Courageous 20-somthings will push their way into new experiences and broader leadership opportunities. Don’t just kill your summers on the beach!

“If you want to master the art of business, you don’t need to go to business school.” - Josh Kaufman, The Personal MBA

Things we should teach our kids (and ourselves)

Posted on by

This is a list of things we should teach our kids (and ourselves) in life, for better citizenship, healthier living and excellent leadership.

Art
Kids, I am convinced are artists by nature, but adults often don’g inspire the process. I am guilty. I love to draw. My boys love to draw. However, we don’t draw together very often, but when we do it is magical and whole heck of a lot of fun. Creativity spawns creativity.

Money
(I am not the first person to say this and I won’t be the last.)
Why in the hell don’t we teach about money in junior high and high school as required course work? Simple and critical financial matters are being grossly overlooked. Dave Ramsey is killing it in the area and you should be too. Start now with your kids.

Confidence
Adults lack confidence because it wasn’t nurtured in them as kids. Encourage the heck out of you kids and help them to see what they are good at. Teach them to have humble confidence in their strengths and learn to be ok with skills and areas where they have limitations. There is no shame in weakness because we all have stuff that we can do awesome and stuff we can’t.

Experimentation
Failure is not a dirty word. Experimentation follows art and confidence and leads to new achievements. Experimentation enables us to pursue our dreams, create new products, fund new cures and uncover new adventures. Experimentation leads humanity to new heights, deeper love, and greater cooperation. Experimentation requires failure, support, courage and a little moxie.

Computer proficiency
I grew up with an Apple II and then my family was fortunate enough to have one of the very first Mac computers in the Pacific NW. By grace I have been able to provide similar tech opportunities for my kids. WARNING: Giving our kids digital devices for hours and hours of gaming is not the same as guiding them towards computer literacy. I am also not talking about learning to be a social media star on Facebook. Kids needs to lear real programs and acquire real tools. You must watch the video below.  And it is imperative that young people understand these stats.

* There are more and more classic disciplines like such as second language study, science, history and more. The idea is simple, there is so much to learn that will hone who we are as leaders, but far too often we fall short for lack of effort, inspiration, motivation and just pure laziness.

Lightning Action versus Unflappable Patience

Posted on by

The battle of leadership super powers: Lightning Action versus Unflappable Patience.

Does the leadership universe have room for two super powers? If not, which would win in a battle of Lightning Action versus Unflappable Patience.

Lightening Action!
“You are about to lose out on this incredible opportunity nothing short of immediate results will do”!

Unflappable Patience.
“Let’s watch this play out and see what happens because good things will come.”

Two modes of action that can enhance your leadership. At the right moments, each can be a key differentiator in the art of leadership. At the wrong moments, each can be devestating. The hard part? Obviously it’s know which one to employ in each critical moment.

When your child is about to take his first step but he’s standing on a hard surface like tile: Do you rescue him or let him go? (Think “little dude”, Nemo)

When a younger leader under your direction is about to faulter in an important decision: Is learning through failure a viable option and if so at what cost?

A new idea has hatched in a team meeting that could be a deal maker for your organization: Is this the moment for “all hands on deck”, some redbull and a late-into-the-night flurry of creative energies turned loose towards a quick launch?

You need to be both Jeckle & Hyde, patience and action oriented, and wise enough to figure out when to be who. You are capable, but you must be deliberate at deploying each skill into the right moments.

When emotion becomes the guiding force.

Posted on by

Daily life is filled with incidents, interactions, reactions, decisions and emotion becomes the guiding force. It’s easy and natural to make snap decisions, comments you’d love to take back, and time accidentally wasted on less meaningful activities.The challenge that each of face in a fast paced, highly interactive world is aligning our daily decision points with our long term goals and desired outcomes. When faced with these moment-by-moment decisions, we easily veer from our goals with each step. These decisions can come through email, phone calls, meet-ups, how we spend our time online and our idleness.

Too often emotion becomes the guiding force.

We need all need a plan. A plan that we have thought through, consulted, checked, double-checked and really worked on. The plan needs to aim at our goals and our dreams. But, working a plan is harder than running on emotions and “in the moment” results. It takes intentionality to get these end goals that we are each seeking.

The rewards of developing and tracking on a plan are great. A plan can leave contingency for opportunities, spontaneity, and “going with our gut”, but a plan well developed can act as a compass or reference during these key moments. A plan influences how we spend our time, how we treat people, what we do and what we will not do. Achieving our greatest dreams and goals are the ultimate reward.

So what is your plan?
How are you going to get from where you are to where you really want to be?

Where Is Your Hungry Man?

Posted on by

Each of us has a better, hungrier leader located deep inside. Some know how to tap readily into this hungry self and bring him or her to the table on a daily basis. This hungry man has drive and determination. He goes out and kicks tale. He works relentlessly days and sometime nights on meeting his goals. He dreams, thinks, eats, sleeps his next victory. The goal is always out in front. When he speaks, you can tell that he is serious about his missions. This hungry man leans forward in the conversations and in the meetings. He takes charge and others around him have innate confidence that he will deliver.

And you? Where is your hungry man? How deep down is he buried? And what will it take for you to let him out of his cage?

I know you. I have seen before the traits of this hungry man inside of you. He has risen to the surface when you have crossed finished lines, started and sold a company, brought forth your best on past projects, or tackled weight lost But right now… he has gone into hibernation.

NOW it is time for you to wake your hungry man up.

revised: A theory on entitlement and employees

Posted on by

revised: A theory on entitlement and employees.

Employees have their self valuation.
And of course, employers have their valuation for the position that they hiring for.
Over time, employees taper their output to give their employer the % of effort to meet the % level at which the employer is paying them as compared with their internal valuation of their subscribed actual worth.

Example:
You hire Jim for $50,000
Jim thinks he is actually worth $75,000
Jim works for you at the 66% effort level because that is what you are paying him in comparison to his own evaluation.

So who is the ‘golden employee’?
The one who works with all of their best when they sign an agreed upon contract.

* Obviously this is a generalization and I concede that there are some who still have integrity and work hard because they agreed to the job for which they are being paid.

You can always get your job back

Posted on by

Fear holds you back from doing something new, adventurous and more significant. And fear holds you back from leaving the comfort of a job you know and do well, for the pursuit of the unknown, for the possibilities that lay ahead.

Think for a moment about your current, comfortable job. It’s familiar. You have achieved a modicum of ‘expertise’. Currently, your employer is satisfied with your leadership or output. The paycheck is predicable but not amazing. The days (or nights) can be a grind of ‘the usual’. It is safe.

Hear this and think for yourself whether it’s true… You can always get your job back.

But not your dreams and not the missed adventures.

If necessary, you can re-apply and re-hire for that same exact job. Maybe not with the same employer, but if all of the things I stated above are true, you can again work in the same industry at the same level doing the exact same tasks for about the same pay that you are making now. If you are comfortable (translated, not scared but not excited ) you can always be comfortable again.

But what about your dreams? What about the possibilities of a better paycheck, new leadership opportunities, or a nonprofit initiative that you know just needs to begin? What have you to lose….?

Nothing. Because we just established that you can always get your job back.

It Can Be Changed

Posted on by

Random conversation with a friend resulted in the question, “Do you believe that most people think of themselves as better than average when it comes to their physical appearance / attractiveness?”

My answer, “Yes”.

Why? Because being attractive is no less within your control than being a better leader. It can be changed. I am certain that you can improve both your attractiveness and your leadership, however, I care way more about your leadership. Give me a chance to explain.

Attractiveness is completely subjective and a certain portion of it is genetic. One a scale of 1-5 with 5 being very, very attractive, we aren’t all born at the top-end of the scale. However, so much about beauty is within our personal control, see: hygiene, diet, internal self confidence, social skills, fitness, clothing, hair, temperament / demeanor, posture, values and smile.

Excellent leadership is far less subjective and also far less genetic. Scale 1-5, 5 being a super, duper, awesome leader, chances are great you aren’t a 5. But here’s the thing, there is absolutely no reason that you have to suck at leadership and be a 1. If you are a 1 then it’s because you don’t care and are not trying. The power, magnitude, effectiveness and temperament of your leadership can be developed and is within your control. Today you can begin to change it. Pick an area, any area, of your leadership and start to do some work… think of it as brushing your teeth. Need a leadership mirror to gauge your effectiveness, just ask the people who are trying to follow you.