What Are You And What Do You Do?

Do you know what this is? Is it the moon? A view of earth from the space station? Actually, it’s a picture of the top of a wild mushroom I took while on a hike a few weeks ago. It can be fun to look at an unusual picture and try to guess what the object is. While that may be fun, it is not a laughing matter when potential clients and maybe even current customers don’t really know and understand what it is you do; and if that’s the case, there is a good possibility that they will not understand how it will benefit them to work with you.

As a professional leadership coach, I often have to explain to potential clients the nature of the service I provide. For one thing, the idea of a coach may seem foreign to their thinking and experience. For another, there are a variety of types of coaching out in the market place. I have to be clear in communicating my role as a leadership coach, my coaching process, and how my clients benefit from my services.

Do your potential and current clients know what you are and what you do? Have you communicated to them clearly what you do, who you do it with, and how they benefit by working with you? If you haven’t, they may end up thinking that you’re a mushroom.

Trail Blazer or Trail Blocker?

I was hiking along a trail some time ago and encountered a tree trunk that had fallen across the trail I was following. The picture of the fallen tree caused me to ask myself, “Am I a trail blazer or a trail blocker?” It’s a significant question, and one that a leader should ask himself from time to time. It is especially a good question to ask of yourself and those who form your leadership team when a project or strategy gets stymied.

A leader can become a trail blocker when…

1. All decisions and next steps have to pass across his desk for final approval. Granted as the leader you do have to make significant decisions, but the purpose of developing a team of competent people is to be able to trust them with significant decisions once the vision and strategy is fully developed. Perhaps the buck does stop with you, but that doesn’t mean that the vision and strategy should get bogged down while you make a decision.
2. He is more concerned with getting the credit rather than enabling his team to enjoy the accolades of a job well done. The leader who starts making decisions based on how it will make him look rather than on how it will enable his team to successfully complete the tasks assigned them, will be perceived as a trail blocker concerned only with his personal success.
3. He hesitates to pull the trigger on a new strategy, product, or service. Timing is essential to initiating a new project. Don’t over analyze your situation. Form your team, do the research, develop challenging goals, create viable strategies, and begin the journey.  As a basketball coach warns his team when drawing up a plan for a buzzer beater play, “Don’t get caught watching the paint dry.”

  Decide today to be a trail blazer, not a trail blocker.

Effectively Using a "To Do" List

The use of a “to do” list remains an effective tool for consistent productivity. In fact, most successful people I know utilize tools that enable them to consistently accomplish significant tasks each day. Here are a few observations about the effective utilization of a to do list:

1.   A “to do” list is an effective tool for managing your time and maximizing your resources. It helps to keep you focused on the main things and gives direction to your daily activities.
2. The value of a “to do” list is found in the value of the items on the list. Put on your list significant activity. The goal is to be productive, not just busy. If you keep this simple but profound reality in mind and apply it vigorously, you will probably cut the number of items on your to do list by 50% or better.
3. A “to do” list is worthless without a done list. Evaluate your day on what you actually did, not on what you intended to do.
4. At the end of the day, utilize the “to do” list to reflect on the day’s activities, evaluate the significance of what was accomplished, and to prepare for the next day’s activities.

 I still like the admonition, “Plan your work and work your plan.” Use a “to do” list to keep your plans on track.

Are You Being Brutally Honest, or Just Brutal?

Sometimes, people who claim that they are just being brutally honest with others, are actually just being brutal. It’s as if they are attempting to justify their assessment of the situation by demeaning other team members and employees.

Truth, or reality is rarely brutal in and of itself, but some people tend to share unpleasant truth in a brutal way. Now the truth may be hard to face, and it may require taking some unpleasant actions; but a leader should be able to handle communicating unpleasant realities with confidence and some degree of compassion.

Keep these suggestions in mind when having to face and share hard realities:

1.      Recheck your facts and assessment of the situation. Make sure that the hard truth you are sharing is actually true.

2.      Focus on the truth being shared, not the character of the individuals being affected. Focus on the realities being faced and the decisions that must be made and actions taken.

3.      If appropriate, offer alternatives or assistance to those being negatively affected by the decisions being made.

4.      Prepare yourself for negative, even angry reactions.

When you are being brutally honest, focus more on being honest and less on being brutal.

 

 

Giving Constructive Criticism

Not only does a leader have to appropriately receive criticism, he also must be effective in giving criticism. A leader will have opportunity to evaluate team members’ performance and their contributions to accomplishing goals and developing strategies.

Here are some guidelines to consider as you provide constructive criticism:

1. Make sure you have earned the privilege to speak criticism into their lives. If the only interaction you have with a team member is when you are communicating a word of criticism, the results will not be satisfying to anyone. By pouring value into a person’s life over time, you will enhance the productive processing of constructive criticism.

2.      Communicate specifically the improvement you want to see and how it will benefit the team generally and the team member personally. Let the team member know when the needed improvement will be re-evaluated.

3.      Communicate the criticism sincerely and honestly. The person receiving the criticism needs to sense your desire that they grow personally and succeed professionally.

 A word of helpful criticism, given at the opportune time and in the right spirit can contribute significantly to the eventual success of your team. Ken Blanchard writes, “Some leaders are like seagulls. When something goes wrong, they fly in, make a lot of noise, and crap all over everything.”  When it comes to giving criticism, don’t be a seagull.

Handling Criticism

In his book Leadership Gold, John Maxwell titles one chapter, “When You Get Kicked in the Rear, You Know You’re Out in Front.” Aristotle wrote, “Criticism is something you can avoid easily—by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.”

 Receiving criticism is a reality of leadership. Handling negative criticism is a skill that an effective leader must develop.

 Handle criticism by asking three key questions:

1.      Who was it from? If it’s from someone you admire and trust and who has added value to your life before, then you might learn significantly from their input.

2.      How was it given? Angry criticism is rarely constructive criticism. Try to discern if the person giving the criticism truly desires to help you.

3.      Why was it given? There may be something valuable to learn if the criticism is from a trusted source and given with sincere and positive intentions.

 I like this anonymous quote, “Don’t mind criticism. If it is untrue, disregard it; if unfair, keep from irritation; if it is ignorant, smile; if it is justified it is not criticism, learn from it.”

I put it this way, "Always ignore your critics, unless they're right."

Who Will You Take to the Next Level?

            I’ve discovered this statement to be true as I have worked with paid and volunteer staffs across the past 40 years, “Whenever you go to the next level, some of your people will go with you, and some won’t.”

            The daunting reality of this truth is that you, as the leader, quite often have the most influence is determining those who will go with you to the next level. The challenge is to build a team of capable, effective, and enthusiastic eagles who can take your vision for the next level and fly with it. However, that presents another challenge. Once you have that team, you have to challenge them with a dynamic vision, significant goals, and opportunities for significant professional and personal growth.

            To do this requires you to possess a lot of confidence in three areas:

1.      In yourself—your abilities, your experience, your leadership skills.

2.      In your strategy—that the goals you have set and the plans for pursuing them will accomplish what you desire to achieve.

3.      In your team—the people you take with you to the next level are the very people who will help you get to the level beyond that. Recruit team members with an idea of the kind of leaders who can take you to the next level and beyond. As John Maxwell says, “One is too small a number for significance.”

Focus Determines Direction

Focus Determines Direction

            General George McClellan commanded Union forces in the early years of the Civil War. He was highly qualified and a capable strategist. He won several battles against the Confederate forces of General Robert E. Lee. His failing was that he would take the field of battle but then refuse to pursue Lee’s army once he had them in retreat. As a result, Lee was able to regroup time and again for future battles. Some scholars believe this fault in McClellan’s strategy extended the war by two years.

            Finally, President Abraham Lincoln replaced McClellan and eventually appointed General U. S. Grant as commanding general of the Union army. With Grant’s movements in the north and General William Sherman’s strategy in the south, the tide of the war turned significantly in favor of Union forces.

            The difference between these generals is that McClellan focused on winning battles, while Grant and Sherman focused on winning the war.

            What you focus on determines the direction you travel in your career and your life. Are you focused on just today’s challenge, or are you advancing every day toward achieving your most significant goals and objectives?

Significant Activity for Significant Results

Significant Activity for Significant Results

 “Your success will be largely determined by your ability to concentrate single-mindedly on one thing at a time.”   --Brian Tracey

            This quote generates two thoughts. First, I think most of us have that time during a day that we attempt to check off as many items on our to do list as we possibly can in as brief a time as we can. These are generally items of minor significance that require a minimum of thought, action, and time. They are important, but they aren’t overwhelming significant. If they are not overwhelmingly significant, they should not be allowed to consume a significant amount of our daily agenda. In fact, I encourage you to evaluate these items to see if they can be assigned to someone else in the organization. If you are doing what someone else can do, then you are probably taking away valuable time from focusing on those things that only you can do.

             On the other hand, there should be challenges and opportunities in your work day that are so significant and essential to your success that they absolutely require your undivided attention and the full arsenal of your thinking, experience, skill, and enthusiasm; and the sooner you can discern what those items are and commit a majority of your daily agenda to accomplishing them, the sooner you will experience success.

             The 80/20 principle kicks in here. 20% of your activity items usually produces 80% of your results. Are you focusing the bulk of your time and effort on the activities that produce the most significant results?

             David Allen sums it up well when he writes, “You can do anything, but not everything.”

Speeding Down the Approach Lane

You may have to navigate through some slow moving traffic with your new idea.

Sometimes while driving, I find myself observing how some other people are driving. I am always fascinated when I am in slow moving traffic on a usually high speed freeway and see people coming down an approach lane and speeding up to 60 and 70 miles per hour in an effort to merge with the cars already on the freeway. The problem is that the cars on the freeway are doing 30 mph because of the traffic back up.

Some highly motivated entrepreneurial types with a new, exciting idea are, at times, like a driver speeding up to 70 mph to merge with a lane of traffic doing 30 mph. They are going at break neck speed with an idea or challenge, and they are extremely frustrated with the slow pace of the people around them.

The driver merging into the slow lane of traffic discovers that he is going to have to slow down a bit, navigate the slow traffic until it thins out some, and then he can put on the gas. That may be what you will have to do with your new, exciting, and dynamic idea. Merge into the slower moving people, navigate through their challenges and reservations, and then be ready to speed down the road toward achievement and success. I guarantee you that the traffic will not be as congested as you get closer to your success destination.

When You Really Want to Make a Positive Impact

When You Really Want to Make a Positive Impact

 I want to give a word of affirmation today for the consistent use of handwritten notes. We live in a culture that values staying connected. We use text messages to remain constantly connected to other people. Technology enables us to connect with people in any part of the world. I sometimes fear that we are over connected. We have an abundance of connections, but I’m not sure we are significantly connected to anyone.

 One means of significantly connecting with people is with handwritten notes. Here are some reasons that handwritten notes are such a powerful connecting tool:

• A handwritten note requires a high degree of intentionality. It’s like you are giving the person to whom you are writing your undivided attention for a period of time.
• A handwritten note requires a commitment of your time and effort. It communicates the high value you place on your connection with that person.
• A handwritten note is personal. Its content is intended for the recipient, not for the consumption of all your social media contacts. It makes your connection seem special, and who doesn’t appreciate feeling special to someone else?
•   A handwritten note is unique in a day of endless social media interaction. It’s like finding a single beautiful rose in the massive thorn thicket of overwhelming electronic communication.

 So, when you are tempted to shoot a text or email of appreciation to a friend or colleague, try writing them a note instead. When they receive and read it, they will know just how significant they are to you.

Are You Making Progress, or Just Playing in the Dirt?

John Maxwell writes, "The secret of your success is determined by your daily agenda. If you make a few key decisions and then manage them well in your daily agenda, you will succeed...You will never change your life until you change something you do daily."

My father was a master gardener. When we moved to a new house when I was in high school, he committed a small corner of the backyard for a vegetable garden. Each year he added a little bit more space to the garden until it finally covered about half of the backyard.

His goal each year was to reap a good harvest of corn, tomatoes, squash, onions, peppers and a host of other vegetables. He was quite productive in his gardening. Beginning in late February and early March of each year, he began paying daily attention to his garden. He broke ground, tilled soil, fertilized, and mapped out where he would locate the various vegetables he wanted to produce. Finally, he would plant seeds and set out seedlings, then everyday he would hoe weeds, thin out plants, and water his garden. Finally, he would harvest his crop of vegetables, and it was usually an abundant harvest.

Dad's successful garden was not a one day event. Every day for months, he would do some work toward getting a bountiful harvest. Every day he significantly managed his firm decision to have a productive garden. Without that daily commitment toward a significant objective, he would've just been playing in the dirt.

What does your daily agenda reveal about your commitment to your personal success? Are you making progress every day toward your significant goals, or are you just playing in the dirt?

First, Find Leaders!

As many of you know, I am by professional experience a pastor. I have led small to medium sized churches across 40 years of pastoral ministry. I've built and led built both paid and volunteer staffs. I've developed and administered financial plans. I've led churches in the accomplishment of vision plans and goals. Every action I've led as a church pastor has been a growth experience in my journey, and they have equipped me well in my role now as a certified speaker, teacher, and coach.

This post is directed to pastors, and especially pastors of small to medium sized churches. If I could give you one word of advice out of my years of pastoral experience, it would be this, "First, find leaders!"  If God has given you a vision for your church, you will not be able to fulfill that vision by yourself. It will be too big for you to accomplish alone. You will need help to get it done.

I have watched many pastors across the years scramble every year to find workers for the varied aspects of the churh's ministry, but what they sorely needed were qualified and enthusiastic leaders  in these ministry areas. Pastor, first find capable people who will give enthusiastic leadership to the ministries of your church.

Everything rises and falls in your church with your leadership and that of your leadership team. Pastor, first find leaders. Now that I think about it, that's also pretty good advice for business professionals and business owners.

The Positive Power of Daily Affirmations

The Positive Power of Daily Affirmations

            As I listened to a mentoring call the other night, I was made aware again of the importance of developing and using daily affirmations. These are statements about yourself to yourself that you repeat every morning to yourself and at any other times of the day that you find helpful. I have to admit that I have failed to keep up to date with my daily affirmations, so as a result of that speaker’s encouragement, I have developed and am utilizing the following daily affirmations.

1.      I am perfectly resourced to accomplish the goals and objectives my creator enables me to imagine.

2.      My failures do not define me, they refine me. I learn from both my failures and successes, and I am continually moving forward as I apply what I am learning.

3.      Every day, I choose to be a positive person, realizing that I and I alone determine my response to my circumstances.

I realize that these affirmations have some phrasing similar to other affirmations I have read, but they do capture for me what I feel is important for me to remember every day. Not only do I repeat these affirmations on a daily basis, I also live them out every day. I believe these affirmations, and, as it was pointed out on that call, to fail to live them out would be basically an act of hypocrisy on my part.

Do you have some daily affirmations that are significant for you? If not, take some time today to formulate a few daily affirmations and start repeating them and living them. You could also pour some value into my life and others by sharing some of them in response to this post.

Don't Call a Timeout!

I see it happen again and again. An individual or a team works hard to build momentum. Every thing starts coming together, phenomenal results are experienced, momentum is totally on their side. Then it happens. They take a break, go on a well-deserved vacation, have a celebratory few days of R & R away from the office. Everything can just coast for a few days or a week. The problem is that the only direction anything can coast is down hill. All the momentum you worked so hard to build is quickly dissipated.

Let me offer a few observations:

• When you have momentum, build upon on it, don't just try to ride on it.
• When you are succeeding, start laying the foundation for the next level. What you are doing now has gotten you to where you are, but where do you want go from here?
• When momentum finally does peter out, go ahead and take a break. When you get back, things will be at about the same place as you left them.
• The tide of business and opportunity ebbs and flows. Determine the cycles of your business and life and build momentum as you have opportunity.

When momentum is working for you, don't call a timeout. You can take a break later.

Whose Help Do You Need?

John Maxwell repeatedly says, "One is too small a number for significance." I enjoy my times of solitude and reflection. I need those times to evaluate my day, focus on what I need to do tomorrow, and formulate an agenda for my next steps; but when I'm ready to take action on my thoughts and ideas, I need a team around me to move me toward the accomplishment of my most significant dreams.

Peyton Manning had a dream of winning one more Super Bowl championship ring. His team played itself through the playoffs and into Super Bowl 50. He did not have a particularly good game as a quarterback in the Super Bowl, but he didn't need a fantastic game that night. The Bronco defense held Cam Newton, the league's MVP, in check that night to produce a victory. The Denver Broncos had a dream of winning the Super Bowl, and it took a total team effort to do it. No single player could win the game.

In almost every significant endeavor, it is the work of team of people that gets the job done. A head coach needs a staff of competent assistant coaches to put a solid team on the field. A quarterback requires the protection of a good offensive line in order to complete a significant number of passes. Even the best players in the sports world need a room full of team members, coaches, and trainers to produce a successful, winning organization.

Let me ask you a question, "Whose help do you need to accomplish your significant dreams?" If you don't need anyone's help, I doubt your dream is as significant as you think.

Remember this, "One is too small a number for significance."

How Important Is Your Dream?

How important is your dream to you? Wilbur and Orville Wright had a dream of building and flying a heavier than air machine. Scores of other inventors had the same dream, yet what set the Wright brothers apart was what they were willing to do on a daily basis to realize their dream of flying.

Here is what they did on a daily basis to realize their dream of flying:

·         They devoured the aviation literature of the day.

·         They exhaustively studied the flight of birds.

·         They built a kite model of their design and studied its flight.

·         They developed a wind machine to study the effects of wind on the wings of their design.

·      They flew their design first as a glider.

·       Finally, they designed and mounted an engine on the plane and successfully flew it at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

·       They experimented with the plane and learned how to fly greater distances and at greater altitudes.

·        They improved their design enabling the plane to be piloted with turns and other maneuvers.

·         They trained others to pilot their design.

·         They effectively marketed their invention and aggressively protected their patents and copyrights.

The dream of flying is what motivated the Wright brothers, but it was their personal work ethic that drove them to devote a portion of every day to making their dream a reality.

Again, how important your dream is to you?  What you are willing to do today to make it a reality?

Past...Future...Present...The Order Is Important

I hear a lot of discussion about time management. I am of the opinion that time doesn't need anyone's help. Time has managed to elapse at a steady pace without my help. The bottom line is that I cannot manage time, I can only manage myself. It is up to me to take the 24 hours with which I am blessed each day and utilize it in a manner that results in personal growth, cultivated relationships, and increased productivity. With that in mind, I offer the following time utilization principles:

• The past is a place for reflection, not a place of residence. Reflect on the past and seek to learn lessons from your experiences that which will enable you to move forward. The most significant thing about the past is that it has passed. Learn from it, and move on.
• The future is a destination to be pursued, not a destiny to be endured. Look ahead to determine where you want to be and what I to become. Develop the strategies that will enable you to achieve your significant goals. Then pursue them with enthusiastic determination.
• The present is a place for continued progress from the past toward the future. Future success is determined by what you are willing to do today to move toward achieving your significant goals and dreams.

Learn lessons from the past. Create dreams for the future. Use today to move toward experiencing those dreams.