One Way To Stop Being Mediocre

Most training delivers only temporary motivational highs, so what should training companies do differently?

It's not the training companies that are the problem although sometimes the problem IS a bad trainer/speaker. Most times though, the problem is the people who hire the trainers and speakers.

Companies keep hiring the wrong trainers/speakers because they are trying to fix what they THINK is the problem. Most training addresses usually only the symptom and not the root-cause. Example: poor time-management is a symptom of poor self-discipline and an attitude of mediocrity (good enough). A time-management course will not solve the underlying issue and so, for a few days, there will me a motivational high which will dissipate over time and you will be right back to having the same issue in a few weeks or months.

The same can be said of communication skills, change, leadership, motivation, productivity, stress and team building: all useless training until you address the underlying values and attitudes. Besides, if these really were the problems, you would have solved the problem years ago. They already have been given the skills so why isn't it working?

If sales are down and you have a well-trained sales department, throwing more sales training seems wasteful. They have already been trained and were doing well up to now. Something else is going on. Sales managers, look past the numbers and see what's really going on. Maybe this recession has your sales team scared. Scared sales people do NOT perform well. Address the root-cause, not the symptom.

You can't expect brain-based training (courses and trainers who only know how to appeal to the brain), you have to get past the brain to that place where all of the reasons, excuses and justifiers for not wanting to be better are: attitude. "How to" is great if you have addressed the "why" people do the the things they do. Without the "why" (the underlying attitudes), your training will fall flat and end up in a pile of mediocrity - just like every other organization before you.

When you read the testimonials from trainers and speakers, read them. If they have a lot of "You were great" testimonials, then they will deliver a temporary motivational high. What you want to look for in testimonials is how an organization is different/better after training. Or better yet, an evaluation NOT filled out in the session - but filled out 3 months after.

Speakers/trainers take the stage for one of three reasons:
1) for the applause (ego stroke)
2) catharsis (working out their own problems using your group as therapy)
3) to make a difference regardless of applause or evaluation scores

Most trainers/speakers (80%) could fit easily into the first two choices. Only 20% actually do what they do to make a difference and without need to manipulate your people into getting high evaluation scores and standing ovations. (Any speaker/trainer who quotes evaluation scores needs to be liked. Attendees rarely score a trainer low who they like.)

If you want lasting results, you want training that makes your people a bit uncomfortable, makes them squirm and makes them voluntarily want to have better than mediocre results. Address the root-cause, not the symptom. But, if your people just want to have fun, hire a clown but don't call it training.

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Psych Minors and Leadership

Years ago I enrolled in a college Psychology course in the hopes of getting a little bit more information on how the brain processes information. I had no intention of becoming a Psychologist. I just wanted the introductory course information on the mechanics of the brain.

While attending the course, there was a great notion passed around: there is nothing scarier than a Psych minor. Yep. Bang on. Being lumped in with a bunch of other first year Psych students made for some interesting discussions: especially from those who, in their first year, already fancied themselves a Psychologist. Nothing scarier than a Psych minor - except maybe a weekend Leadership grad.

Companies who send their middle managers off to weekend leadership courses need to be open and transparent about why they are sending a middle manager to the course. Is it because you think that a particular middle manager lacks some basic people skills and could use some of the personal development skills found in the course? Or are you actually sending your middle manager to leadership school because you believe that either he or she has the potential to do great things with themselves, to be a great leader of others and potentially achieve top spot in senior management?

No really. Be honest. Tell the truth.

Because if you let a middle manager believe that the reason they are going to leadership school is because they have a shot at becoming CEO one day, then that middle manager could return to work Monday morning and with an ego trip as big as the second coming of the messiah. You will have created the perfect recipe for a staff revolt - putting further distance between management and employee.

Here's why. Just like the notion that there is nothing scarier than a Psych minor, the same is true about many first-time leadership-course grads. If you are not clear why you wish someone to attend the course, they may perceive themselves to be higher up the food chain than they actually are - which means they return full of self-importance. Because that is how they would have attended the course, what they got out of it may not be what you wanted them to learn. They might be thinking themselves a future senior manager. You might be seeing them as a last chance to improve some basic skills or be fired. So be honest.  

If you don't think that your middle manager has some basic people skills then don't send them to leadership school to get it. If you do, make sure you are completely forthright in discussing why they are going: to get some basic people skills to be a better person - not because they are being considered for promotion.

Better yet, consider sending your people who lack basic people skills to a personal development course. Save leadership for those who would one day lead. But remember, you don't become a leader overnight in exchange for money no matter what the course-offering claim might be. That leadership course is simply a starting point to a life-long commitment to self-improvement. If you think you can buy your way into leadership then you, after three whole days, still don't understand the Attitude of Leadership - and you wasted your money.

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Connectedness Attitude And The Environment

I'm as environmentally conscious as the next guy. Uh no, let me take that back. Most people are so average that they don't think about the environment until someone tells them to think about it. So no, I guess not. I am not like the next guy. I think for myself which leads me to my thought here today: why would an organization launch an environmental initiative when their corporate culture is stagnating, their mediocre service sucks and their apathetic staff turnover rate is high?

I mean, before you clean up an ocean, wouldn't you want to first clean the beach?

Organizations are focusing on environmental policies and bringing eco-speakers into their organizations. Now, I don't have a problem with protecting the environment. In fact, I applaud it. But if you are going to tackle the environment, shouldn't you make sure you've cleaned up your environment first; your work environment - your corporate culture?

Aren't there a whole lot of more important issues that need addressing during an economic downturn? Have your people been reassured about their future? Have you halted the waning morale eroding your corporate culture? How about stopping your high-turnover or helping management find a direction? What about your incredibly ordinary customer service? Shouldn't you be developing a sense of greatness that changes people's lives (both your employees and your customers) before you attempt to change the world?

Come on, focus on the crucial things first: making sure there are jobs to go to tomorrow so that you are able to lend a hand to the environment. Make sure you are operating from a position of strength with your eco-program so that you don't have to slash the eco-program budget later because you were focused on the wrong things for survival.

This could end up as a colossal resource waster: trying to pursue an eco-friendly direction for a company with a bad attitude - people who bring plastic water bottles to work each day and still toss them out instead of recycling but don't care that they do it. You've got to change the unworkable attitudes inside the building before you can convert them to eco-evangelists. Don't get ahead of yourself. Make your people "service evangelists" first. Clean up problem areas before you create new ones. Fix the attitudes that will undermine your eco-program before you try to establish an environmental Attitude of Connectedness.

I agree all should be on-board the environmental bandwagon. But if your organization is achieving mediocre results, shouldn't your focus be on becoming an organization of greatness first - an organization whose example others will follow? Face it, if the culture stinks, you'll end up with an eco-program of mediocre results too.

Launching an eco-program while your people fear for their future makes you look completely out of touch with what your people want and need. That's not a message you want to send if you want to attract and keep good people, increase your customer base and become an organization of greatness.

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Think For Yourself

Soloman Asch, a Polish-born social psychologist, was one of the first to show that people blindly follow others in order to fit in. In fact, the findings from this experiement from the 1950's would probably be even worse today.

Asch chose some 123 unwitting test subjects to, one at a time, sit amongst 8-10 other so-called "test subjects." The 8-10 other were not actually test subjects. They were "plants," planted into the experiment with full knowledge of the details.

Each test subject was shown these test cards below and each was asked to identify the line that looked closest to the Reference line and to voice their choice out loud. The actual test subject would voice his or her choice last.

The 8-10 plants all gave a wrong answer forcing the test subject to either go along with the majority or stick to his or her guns and voice what he or she thought was the right answer. 75% of the test subjects gave into peer pressure and knowingly gave a wrong answer. When asked to explain why they chose the wrong answer, the subjects blamed their poor vision or said, "There were so many against me that I thought I must be wrong."

You know the right thing to do at work. You know how to treat a customer with respect. You know how to show up on time and do your real work during the day. You know how to not take advantage of your employer by checking out early or surfing the Net because you're bored. You know that the customer is the lifeblood of your organization. You know that stealing paper and paper clips is still theft. You know that talking about co-workers behind their backs is petty and mean. You know that whining and complaining about the job affects your co-worker's productivity.

So when you see your co-workers doing the opposite of what you know to be right, how come you sit back and say nothing? Because you are part of the 75%. You will give up what you know to be right so that people will like you. You don't want to cause problems for your co-workers even when they are blatantly doing the wrong thing, treating customers with disrespect, stealing office supplies or backstabbing.

Grow a spine. If you don't speak up you then you, by default, give your blessing to this kind of behaviour. Not speaking up only fosters more of this behaviour. And if you're worried about someone losing their job because you said something, then let me ask you this: are you OK with working with morally bankrupt, disrespectful, backstabbing thieves?

Where's your Attitude of Leadership? Think for yourself. Set a standard. If you don't stand for something you will fall for anything.
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A Thanksgiving Attitude of Gratitude

This is the Thanksgiving weekend in Canada. I'm not sure why Canadians celebrate 6 weeks earlier than the US (actually, the first celebration of Thanksgiving was actually celebrated in Canada in 1578...43 years before the pilgrims arrived in Plymouth). Perhaps the pilgrims hung out here for our Thanksgiving and then spent some time devising a plan for what theirs would look like when they landed (could have happened.) Maybe they took a little sabbatical in Canada after the arduous journey across the Atlantic - you know, kind of a long, long-weekend to get rested up before they made history just south of Boston. Anyway, this is the weekend that Canadians give thanks.

You don't need to actually have a special day to give thanks. You are allowed to be thankful all of the time. Thanksgiving day is simply to remind you of what you should be doing the other 364 days of the year - being thankful for what you've got.

This year, during the toasts at the dinner table, more people will probably be giving thanks for having a job. There will also be a higher number of people who are giving thanks for their families, their health and their roof over their heads despite being jobless. I guess as Canadians, we could be thankful for the how quickly the economy has turned around. We are one of the first G8 countries to emerge from recession. We still have a ways to go but we are on our way. Things will be better soon.

An Attitude of Gratitude is needed to weather the tough economic storms. Finding your internal gratitude for all of the things that life throws at you not only makes you stronger, but actually increases your chances of success.

• Gratitude helps you attract more opportunity and better relationships.
• Gratitude generates far more success than does a sense of entitlement.
• Gratitude allows people to sleep better at night with less worry.
• Gratitude makes people happier, less stressed and overall better workers.
• And finally, people who possess an Attitude of Gratitude are chosen as leaders, are promoted more and are chosen for job positions more often than those who choose not to show their gratitude.

If ever there was a case to be made to give thanks for whatever it is life has handed you so far, that last point is the one that matters. Give thanks for all of it.
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Passion Is Useless On The Job

You don't need passion to be good at what you do. Believing that you need to be passionate is a load of rubbish. That's old-school thinking. It may have once been a commonly held belief but it doesn't hold water anymore.

Your level of focus and engagement on the job has nothing to do with your passion for the work. And your passion for the work should not be the lone factor in determining your ability to do the work. You can be passionate about something and totally suck at doing it. Should that take away your passion? No. But you need skills and ability before you are going to be able to do the job well. Passion without ability is dangerous. Therefore, passion really is useless and means nothing when it comes to the performance of your duties.

In fact, I might be passionate about basketball, but come on, at 5' 6" I suck at the game. I might not be passionate about cooking but I could have become a chef - I'm that good at it. I like to cook but I wouldn't say I'm passionate about it. For me, cooking is more of a relaxation exercise and a creative expression. It's my right-brain release. It's not my passion. I can enjoy it just as much when someone else cooks too.

Passion has nothing to do with your ability to be the best. If you have passion, well, good for you. But it's not necessary to do the job. You don't even have to like what you do to be exceptional at it. The attitude toward your work ethic is MORE important in developing excellence than is your passion. Your attitude toward doing the job with greatness has nothing to do with passion.

Anyone who says you have to be passionate in order to be the best is probably an old-school motivational speaker whose belt and shoes still match. What was believed 20 years ago doesn't work today.

Today, your attitude toward your results is what matters. You can like the work, be exceptional at the work, be the best at your work without being passionate about it. You simply have to be focused and engaged - not passionate.

I, instead, would counsel organizations to hire someone who is passionate about their spouse and who is also exceptionally skilled at their job. Take that passion home and use it on your spouse. People in strong relationships perform better at work anyway. People in rocky relationships are more likely to be distracted. When there's balance in life, people tend to make better decisions and get better results.

Focus, engagement and attitude - for the job. Passion - for the bedroom.
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Take Your Seat At The "Big" Table

This weekend marks Thanksgiving in Canada. Apparently, we Canadians say "Thank you" first ... just in case it's a competition.

I remember being a kid at Thanksgiving and sharing the fold-out card table with the other kids while the grown-ups sat at the big table for turkey dinner. I remember the first time I got my chance to take MY seat at the big table and what a great feeling it was to be recognized as a grown-up. But I had to ensure I conducted myself as an adult for fear of losing my place at the big table.

At your job, do you sit at the big table or the fold-out card table? Simple question. Profound answer. Are you in the big strategy meetings or just the social planning (play) meetings? I think it's incumbent upon every single employee to shoot for sitting at the big table. I think that by your employ, you are required to earn your place at the big table.

You are not just an employee. Likely, you are a customer as well, or your family members or neighbors are customers. You have a certain influence that they, outside of the company, do not have. This is especially true of people who work for phone companies, utilities, grocery stores, banks, government, oil companies or any company or organization whose products or services you purchase.

It could be argued that if you left the organization tomorrow, you would probably still be a customer - so technically you are a customer first and an employee second. So take your place at the big table and advocate on behalf of your fellow customers. Force those who have also seated themselves around the table to see that they too are customers first and employees second.

Stop the me-me-me mentality of cutting services to make bigger and more obscene profits at the expense of your revenue stream (your customers). Explain to your co-workers that when you focus on customer satisfaction levels first, your quarterly financial statements improve.

An Attitude of Service must prevail. An Instigational® Attitude will start the discussion. An Attitude of Gratitude will cause you to be thankful for not only your customers continuing to do business with you but your ability to take your seat at the table of influence and do something great on behalf of your customers.

You, by your employ, have an influence within your organization that those outside of the organization do not have. Don't squander your opportunity. Force your organization to rise above mediocrity and into greatness. Greatness, after all, is just one step beyond mediocrity. All it takes is one idea or suggestion to rise above the other ordinary, boring organizations who wallow in their mediocrity. You can do something great here.

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How To Be A "Great" Customer

My car is in the shop. The garage promised it would take just one full day. So, when the dealership garage called just after lunch asking to keep the car a second day, I asked why?

"One technician is off sick today so we're a little backed up," they offered.

So now their problem has become my problem. I'm sure that this is not the first time a technician has ever been sick. Does your business grind to a screeching halt because one person called in sick? Wouldn't you have a backup plan? Wouldn't you do your best to keep your promise to your customers without excuses?

I scheduled my appointments around my car being out of commission for one day, not two. That means that if I leave my car with them for another day, I have to reschedule all of my appointments. That means my business and several other businesses are affected by one guy calling in sick. Would you expect your customers to have to endure your internal staffing problems?

Why should it be the customer's job to solve the garage's problem? It's real easy for the garage if the customer is willing to lower their standard of service expectation and simply lay down and take whatever they give you. But that would make you a lousy customer. A "great" customer is not a pushover when it comes to service. A "pushover" customer does not inspire business to get better. It creates an environment where service actually gets worse. A "great" customer, on the other hand, is the customer that challenges business to get better at delivering service. So, here's how you become a "great" customer: you say no. You refuse to accept mediocrity and challenge it. You simply force them to be better.

"Great" customers (customers of greatness) don't let mediocrity reign supreme. Great customers set a standard and expect the people they deal with to rise to it. Great customers make businesses keep their promises and their word. And if those same businesses try to slide, great customers will make them pay. 

I suggested a rental car. They hummed and hawed and reluctantly agreed. Had they been the first to offer a rental car I would have been over the moon with a excitement and would have professed my undying gratitude for a "wow" service experience. But, sadly, that's not how it went. 

An Attitude of Service isn't just for business. Every customer should have one too. Become a "great" customer. Stop being a pushover. Don't lie down and just take whatever they hand you. Stand up and ask for what you want. The answer is always "no" to the questions you never ask and the standards you never set. When it starts costing businesses money because they don't keep their promises, then and only then will service start to improve.

It's easy to complain about how bad service is. But what are you doing to help improve it?

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Mediocre Wanna-be Experts Can Do Damage

This question showed up on one of the networking boards from a "professional" speaker: "I've been asked to write an article on Cultural Competency as it relates to one's speaking skills. Can anyone help me define this term more clearly?"

Did someone just admit that they have no clue about the subject matter on which they are writing a contracted article? Will this article appear in a publication in which the writer will be seen as an authority on the subject? Will there be a disclaimer at the top of the page which reads: The author of this article is not an authority on the subject of Cultural Competency and, in fact, had no prior knowledge of the subject prior to this article. Please read this article for your amusement only as the author writes it from neither a depth of knowledge or a depth of experience on the subject? No it won't.


Some unsuspecting reader will probably ask the author to facilitate a workshop on the subject - a subject the author has neither knowledge nor experience in - just because they wrote an article. Asking a (un)professional speaker to speak on a subject not within his or her realm of expertise is like asking a car salesman to sell yellow-cake uranium to a foreign country. But sales is sales right? How about selling a photocopier to a person who wants to buy a postage machine? Both make imprints on paper - close enough.

Unfortunately, many (un)professional speakers will take the work and the money and they will be, at the very best, incredibly mediocre. At the very worst, they may actually do damage to your organization.

You may think that speaking is speaking right? Change that attitude. Think of it as professional training where people's minds, hearts and livelihood depend on the person at the front of the room speaking from either a depth of knowledge or a depth of experience.

Change your attitude on professional speakers being experts in everything. They are not. Do not allow these amateurs to mess with your people's minds. If the speaker you're looking at has more than 3 different areas they claim to be an "expert" in, keep searching. If you're expecting to make your organization better, get a real expert. Pay the money and do it right. Don't "cheap out" when it comes to your people. You can't afford it.

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Attitude of Soliciting Advice, Expertise and Wisdom

Once upon a time, we asked our questions of people with experience and we called them "mentors" or "advisers." Either way, we looked up to them. They were hard to find because they didn't advertise their advice for a fee. You had to know someone who knew someone and had to make an appointment to get an hour or so - which was as valuable as any treasure. Wisdom was (and still is) rare.

Today though, coaching schools are turning out coaches who have no experience in the areas they claim to have expertise. Not all are like this but there are many. Here are just a few examples:

• There are divorced relationship coaches.
• There are broke financial coaches.
• There are wellness coaches who smoke.
• There are leadership coaches who have never led anything.
• There are management coaches who have never managed.
• There are sales coaches who were mediocre sales performers at best.
• There are business coaches who have never owned a business.
• There are life coaches who are 24 years old.

Huh?

But then there are coaches who ARE experts in their areas of expertise. There are people who have done it. These are the people/coaches/mentors we should be asking for advice and willingly paying for.

The experience and expertise (wisdom) in some heads is worth paying for. Others, not so much.

Wisdom over schooling always. Choose wisely. 
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The Ethical Attitude of Consulting

Do you know the difference between "ethics" and "work-ethic?" I'm sure that in your head you know the difference but probably a little harder to put into words. So let me help you. Simply put, "ethics" are the internal gauge of what makes something right or wrong for a person. "Work-ethic" is the level of intensity that someone has for their job or whatever task they might be working on. That's a simplification but apt.

So, if someone were to solicit advice to help them improve work-ethic, would you be likely to offer some long diatribe on "ethics" in the workplace or would you offer some solutions to perhaps help make people more engaged in their work?

A question was asked on the LinkedIn business networking site recently that addressed "work-ethic." A Leadership Development Consultant, a Management Consultant, a Director of Franchise Sales and others didn't pay attention and gave long answers about how important "ethics" are in the workplace while offering not one word that addressed the question. The Consultants got it wrong: one who addresses "Leadership" and the other "Management."

Consultants are contracted by companies to help better their workplaces and are paid handsome funds to improve them. But, you can't help if you don't stop talking long enough to listen to the question. (Even after two other members offered clarification on the question - "work-ethic" not "ethics" - people still answered it wrong.)

They were sloppy. They gave opinion without reading the question. They assumed. Now, they look like an opinionated, loud-talking, look-how-smart-I-am, smarmy amateurs. And they did it in front of millions of readers.

There are more people talking than there are listening. You know that. You probably work with some. People don't think before they go off half-cocked, shooting off their mouths. Some of them call themselves Consultants and are too quick to offer answers to questions that they themselves don't fully understand.

People who willingly take on contracts that they are clearly underskilled for may have a good work-ethic but not good "ethics." If it's not your area of expertise, you can't offer expertise - just mediocrity. If it's not your area of expertise then, before you do damage to an organization, do the "ethical" thing: pass.

Oh, and try to understand the question before you start talking. You look much smarter when you do. Details.
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Support, Follow-Up and Service Attitude

51% of consumers choose the companies they will do long-term business with by "Attitude" factors: approachability of staff, friendliness, exchange and return policies, after-sale service, support and troubleshooting and how easy it is to talk to someone. A smaller number, 44% of consumers choose "product knowledge" as their main purchasing decision (so why companies only train in product knowledge and not Attitude factors is a complete freakin' mystery to me).

More people are using the Internet to research before they buy. They get product information as well as reviews from users and customers before they set foot in a business. Yet businesses still train their people primarily in product knowledge. What they don't do (and they should) is train people how to smile and enjoy what they are doing. 

Customers are "revenue" and you, the employee, are "expense." Let's be clear on the respective roles in business.

So how is it possible that some supposedly-smart, well-educated and experienced VP of Customer Service could make the intentional decision to remove direct contact between their customers and the service/support centers. Who could possibly think that an automated phone tree that requires you to press six or seven menu choices, talk to a voice robot, submit a service ticket or wait on hold for a half-hour is GOOD service? How could anyone with that attitude even be remotely considered for promotion to VP of Customer Service? Whoever made that decision is an idiot.

You may have spent an extra two years of your life getting your MBA, Mr. VP, but your customers have spent a lifetime developing their expertise as a customer. Their experience trumps your schooling. Try not to be so book-smart and common-sense stupid. If your attitude in Customer Service isn't focused on your making it easier for your customers to interact with you then your attitude sucks.

This isn't the 2007 drunken orgy of economic delights anymore. People aren't throwing their money around madly buying anything they can get their hands on. This isn't a time when customer service doesn't matter anymore. This is 2009 and we're in an economic time when families and business alike have pushed their "reset' buttons. They want value. They want quality. They are willing to pay a fair price. And most of all, customers want service - to feel like their business means something.

The "un-service" attitude you took in 2005-2007 when you installed your automated responses, phone-tree-like systems and help-desk tickets need to be re-thought. Customers want to communicate with you and buy from you because you can be reached. Making it harder for them to do so will only annoy them.

In a time of social networking, when communication and connection is supposed to be improving, why is service getting worse? Why is it that a customer can communicate with a CEO on Twitter but can't get anyone in that same company's customer service department to return their calls? How can people speak directly with Presidents, public figures and celebrities around the world but have to wait on hold for a half-hour and before finally speaking to someone in a South Asian country, thousands of miles from the people who sold them the product? How is that possible? Because apparently the companies could care less. If they cared more, they would do more. But by their inaction, their corporate culture and corporate attitude says, "good enough." Their corporate attitude is that everyone has come to expect that level of service. They believe that they don't have to do any better than their mediocre competitors.

The truth is, the more barriers you put between you and your customers increases the likelihood that your customers will view your company unfavorably and at the first opportunity will take their business someplace else.

And stop lying to your customers. You know that framed Mission Statement in your lobby claiming you offer superior customer service? Well that's a lie. You force your customers to jump through hoops to be able to talk to a real person when they need help so you are NOT offering superior service. You offer mediocre service. Superior customer service is doing what the others refuse to do.

Shut down the voice mail trees, the too-many-choices phone menus, the 24-72 hour response to emails and half-hour wait times on hold. Instead, give your customers Live Chat online in real time, comprehensive FAQ sections on your web site that offer real solutions to everyday problems and give them "how-to" videos online so that they can use your product correctly and even fix it themselves if they have a problem. Most of all, let a real person answer the phone in a timely manner - even if they are in another country. Just give customers a human to talk to that your customers don't have to wait a half-hour or more to speak to.

You're not the only ones who are busy. Your customers are too. Customers vote with their dollars. Don't make them jump through hoops. That attitude sucks and, when the time comes that someone else is willing to treat your customers better than you, your customers will spank you financially for treating them like they don't matter to you.

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Change Attitudes To Change Culture

So, what's really the problem?

This is a very interesting question. Unfortunately, most organizations don't ask that simple question the right way. They make assumptions when what they should be doing is clarifying what their problems really are.

Here's a perfect example: forcing your people into Time Management courses when time management isn't really the problem, it's the symptom. Chances are, if the vast majority of your people are using their time unwisely then your organization is probably suffering substantial apathy -- because nothing more than that is being asked of these people. That apathy is the result of poor workplace attitudes and a corporate culture that says how you use your time isn't really important.

The same could be said for employing Communication courses. Are you holding a communication course because every one of your people is poor at communicating or are you holding the communication course because one or two people don't seem to communicate well? Most times, it's a few bad apples that have no idea how to communicate effectively and unfortunately, the rest of staff is penalized as a result. But if it's an entire organizational concern, then communication isn't the issue. You have a poor culture of communication or an attitude that says good communication isn't important.

In both cases, accountability is waning, responsibility is absent, and a genuine, productive attitude is completely missing in the workplace. It's obvious: your people could care less about their coworkers. If they did care, they would take the time necessary to ensure that their messages are fully understood. Open communication would be the rule as opposed to the exception.

Having an attitude of respect for your coworkers is perhaps the most critical component of developing a strong, workable corporate culture. If senior management does not demonstrate their commitment to their people through their words, communications, honest feedback and demonstrated leadership example then there is no way that the employees will feel that they have to make an effort either.

And management, not by their policies or directives, but by their very example has created a culture of apathy, a culture of disrespect, a culture of wasting time and a culture where no one speaks to each other.

If you believe that your organization needs to address company-wide concerns like communication or time management, then I am willing to bet dollars to doughnuts that the issue is not communication or time management but is, in fact, the workplace attitude issue -- it's part of your culture. And you won't fix it without addressing the attitudes that created the problem in the first place.
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Attitude w/ ATTITUDE

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Culture: Why Most Companies Will Never Achieve Greatness

Excerpt from my forthcoming book, "Your Attitude Sucks - Fixing What's Wrong With Corporate America."

For most organizations, there has never been a more challenging year than this one. Literally, the bottom fell out of the market. But here's the interesting note: many have managed to figure out that it wasn't the recession that knocked their business down, it was the THREAT of the recession, the let's-wait-and-see attitude until this whole thing shakes out. Businesses weren't hurting as much as they were cautious. So they pulled in spending until the worst was over.

But I began to ask myself, "why wouldn't any smart, forward-thinking company not provide some sort of training to their people in down times? Surely this would be the time to do it." (That question led me to a very honest answer).

I spent the summer, writing, thinking, working, studying, tearing down what I know, building up ideas, researching, focusing and honing in on what corporate North America was doing. I came to a few honest conclusions about the corporate world and as a result, came up with a presentation (which turned into a full-day of sessions) called the 7 Attitudes to Greatness.

It has never been more clear about what needs to change in corporate North America: Attitude and the resulting corporate culture.

The culture of any workplace is simply the collective result of the attitudes in the building. Culture is the collective RESULT of every workplace policy, initiative, direction, vision, response and recruitment of talent. In other words, your culture is a direct reflection of your attitude in the workplace. Culture is the RESULT of the corporate attitude. Simply put, if the vast majority of people at your workplace think it's a lousy place to work, then yours will be a lousy company to do business with. Apathy and mediocrity will run rampant and morale will hover near rock bottom.

Change the individual attitudes and you change the culture. Culture and Attitude are the key drivers behind any organization's results in sales, marketing, customer service, management, leadership, change management, innovation, health and safety, communication, motivation, performance, work-life balance, recruitment and retention, problem-solving, productivity, stress, teamwork and most of all, financial performance. Everything is driven by attitude and culture.

Here is one of the most amazing statistics I've ever found that really illustrates how important attitude and culture are on financial results: Organizations with strong attitudes financially outperform their competitors by four times. That means organizations who have a confident attitude combined with a sense of service will make four times as much money as companies who are mediocre.

But many organizations apparently don't want to make four times as much money. Some companies are completely satisfied to remain mediocre or they would be choosing to improve their culture, attitude and performance and make four times as much money. They apparently could care less. As long as the doors stay open, that seems to be good enough. As long as everyone has a job, good enough. As long as the company doesn't go belly-up, good enough. Meanwhile, on the other side of the board, incredibly few organizations openly choose greatness. 

If you recall, earlier, I mentioned that companies holding the line on spending led me to a very honest answer. Here was that answer: the vast majority or organizations are simply mediocre - one mediocre organization checks to see what the other mediocre organizations are doing and does that. One follows the other, right or wrong. They have mediocre service, they hire mediocre people, expect mediocre results and equip their people to do a mediocre job. They are satisfied with sitting in the middle of the pack, attracting middle of the pack kind of people and getting middle of the pack ideas at their meetings.

Most organizations, it turns out, are afraid to be great. They are afraid of leading the pack for fear that they become a target for other organizations to challenge. They don't like the spotlight and avoid it. They've seen what hackers try to do to Microsoft and don't wish to be the same sort of target. Media scrutiny is intense on the big players - think of Wal-Mart and the media glare of their association with third-world garment manufacturers. So they are satisfied with sitting near the top-of-mediocre pack as long as no one takes a shot at them.

Being great comes with a price. People will attack those who are great. Why? It is so much easier to try to tear down something great than it is to rise to greatness yourself. When lazy and mediocre people tear people and organizations of greatness down, it makes them feel as though they magically elevate themselves.

When organizational leadership lacks confidence, that lack of confidence permeates throughout the entire organization. They hide behind ridiculous automated phone trees when you try to reach them. They use their voice mail to screen their calls because what they are doing seems more important than what any customer may want. They take days to respond to email inquiries. Ask them something out of the ordinary and they have to check with a manager. Ask to speak to a manager and the only one just left for lunch. These organizations have mostly become faceless, nameless places who employ faceless and nameless employees whose collective apathy for their work oozes through their pores.

In spite of the fact that 51% of customers choose a business based on Attitude issues (friendly staff, exchange and return policies, approachability, helpfulness and after-sale service), these same organizations won't equip their people with personality tools to be in that 51 %. Instead, they focus their efforts on arming their people with product knowledge training - useful but not if there aren't any customers. And even though they have been product trained, ask a question about the product and if you are not met with a blank stare, you get a big sigh as though you are being a huge bother to them. They are dripping with an I-could-care-less-about-this-job attitude.

Yet management has the audacity to whine and complain that they can't find enough good people and the good ones they find they can't keep. They talk about Employee Engagement being their greatest challenge when, in fact, the easiest way to engage an employee is to make him or her believe that the work means something and that it's part of a mission for the greater good. Instead, they give lip-service to a mission of delivering exceptional service while making it difficult for the customer to be satisfied when there is a problem. By their actions, they actively choose mediocrity, train their employees in barely the basics of the job, rarely solicit ideas from their people and wonder why they have a hard time motivating their people.

They barely talk to their employees especially during this downturn. That leaves employees feeling tenuous about their job security and fearful about the future. They remove any training budget that could actually help their people (and consequently their customers) in a downturn which professes the loyalty of senior management: to saving money not investing in their people. No one achieves greatness by cutting and slashing budgets. When senior management holds onto their cash it demonstrates how much loyalty management has to their people. And once the economic situation recovers and the markets open up again, these same organizations will be surprised at how many of their people take a job somewhere else. The organization demonstrates no loyalty to their people and are surprised that their people hold no loyalty to their employers.

But management has become obsessed with leadership - that new trendy buzzword. In a vast sea of sickening mediocrity, organizations don't want to be seen as mere managers, that's so "last year." No, they want to be seen as dynamic leaders of great organizations. They see leadership as some sort of Utopia of power and influence to be achieved when, in fact, leadership is not an outward accomplishment. It is an inward attitude of how one chooses to live life. Leadership is a lifelong commitment to self-improvement. But people don't have patience. They want drive-through McLeadership and they want it now. In the same way they could get married while sitting in a car instead of having to endure all of that bother of standing up in a chapel, people don't want to do the work to be real leaders. They don't want to do the work they just want to have the title. They don't want to invest that much time. They see McLeadership as some sort of Viagra pill: just swallow and you're good to go. McLeadership (a.k.a. Leadership Lite) seems to be good enough.

In the same way that every schoolchild gets a "Participant" ribbon just for playing, McLeadership doctrine says that anyone can become a McLeader: intelligent or moronic, qualified or debutant, experienced or fresh out of university. In a desperate attempt to achieve McLeadership nirvana, people have become self-anointing. Never before has it been so easy to become a McLeader. Never before have access to McLeadership courses been so numerous not to mention that every third profile on LinkedIn touts McLeadership Expert credentials of which there is no real certification to become a Leadership expert.

Corporate managers are invited to walk away from their restricting straitjackets of old-style management and instead are lured into donning the fresh, white, apostolic, flowing robes of the new Church of McLeadership. It is the biggest corporate cash-cow to come along in years. Training companies have simply re-branded their management courses and jacked the prices for participants who now willingly pay thousands of dollars to be anointed "leader" over a weekend. And these McLeader courses can be taught by any bum off of the street. There are no qualifications necessary to teach McLeadership. There are no national or international standards for McLeadership courses to comply with. And with 350,000 different Leadership titles alone on Amazon, how many opinions are there on what leadership is? Who cares? People are buying right now.

"Sell. Sell. Sell. This won't last long," is the chant from the Church of McLeadership.

Organizations refuse to accept that leadership is not something you get in exchange for money and that a marginal manager on Monday will not become a leader of men and women by Friday. A manager who could barely find his ass with both hands on Monday will not be leading others to greatness by week's end.

Mediocrity is rampant. "Good enough" has become good enough. But there is good news: to be outstanding, all that is required is to be one step above mediocre. Anyone can win in that market. That should be encouraging news to any organization looking to be the best in their field.

But you have to want to be the best in your field in order to be one step better than mediocre. Sadly, most don't. And so they wallow in mediocrity just like everyone else. They accept mediocre performance from their people. They accept mediocre ideas. They accept mediocre management. They accept wallowing somewhere in the middle of the pack as okay. They train their people to be simply competent -- not outstanding -- just competent - and more often than not miss that mark too.

If your people are good but not great, if your management is good but not great, if your sales numbers are good but not great, if your attrition numbers are good but not great, if your safety numbers are good but not great, if your innovations are good but not great, if your service is good but not great, if your results are good but not great then you have a corporate culture of "good enough." Don't deny it. It's right there for everyone else to see. Your results prove it.

It's a sad case of mediocre people wanting to seem to be great without actually doing the work. And this, ultimately, is what is wrong with corporate North America: the delusion of mediocre organizations thinking themselves great without actually wanting to do the work, making the investment and earning it honestly. That delusion is an ATTITUDE. And that's what I want to change.

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Measurement Stifles Organizational Growth

"Tell me how you measure me and I will tell you how I will behave." That's how people go to work when they know they are being measured. Think what happens in a meeting once you bring a video camera into the room. What was once an honest discussion and exchange of ideas becomes a watered-down, preening for the camera. That is exactly what measurement does to an organization. Measurement stifles creativity.

Measurement forces people to only do what they are being measured on. After all, if you're not being measured to be innovative (and that can not be measured because in order for measurement to occur there needs to be a benchmark) then employee's attitudes are, "don't waste your time with stuff you won't get points for."

Organizations have for years done exactly the opposite of what science knows. Dan Pink points out that research clearly shows that rewards and incentives do not work and, in fact, retard performance. The bigger the incentive, the worse the performance. Yet, business still insists on hanging onto the attitude that offering rewards and incentives works regardless of what the science says. In the same way, an argument could be made that measurement stifles creativity and forces people to do only what is in their box. In the same way, the argument could be made that those who are at the top of a heavily-measured organization scored the best scores inside the box.

How in the world can you encourage creativity by being overly-measured? Measurement requires a benchmark before it can be considered a measure. If there is no benchmark (because you've never done it before) then any time, creativity or activity spent outside of the scope of measurement would seem like a complete waste of time. If people appear to be wasting time, they will not score well on metrics. Conceptualizing ideas, daydreaming, thinking, studying and watching can not be measured as productive. But that's where innovation comes from. Innovation comes from an Instigational® Attitude.

It is those of Instigational® Attitude who are the innovators, pushers of boundaries and agents of change within an organization. They don't stand on tradition and actually abhor it. They go in search of new ways to operate more efficiently. But innovation is where an organization gets to jump out in front of the mediocre pack and do something different, daring and divine. Measurement retards that same innovation.

If you're working on things outside of the measurement scope then you appear to be wasting time. People don't want to be seen as time-wasters working on stuff that isn't being measured. Therefore, the very act of measurement retards organizational growth and innovation.

Organizations are painting themselves into their own corners by hanging onto the attitude that measurement is necessary. It's how the consultants have had too much influence over organizations and their employees. It seems fairly simple to me: measurement or innovation but you can't have both. Develop your Instigational® Attitude and go find new ways, better ways to serve your organization and your customers. Make your measurement off the charts.
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Attitude And Your Corporate Culture?

No one person can change corporate culture. No one person can dictate that this is the way our corporate culture is going to be. You can forget the "you need a visionary leader to change the culture" crap because that doesn't work either.

Culture change has the highest failure rate of all types of major change at over 80%. Lots of energy, money and reputation is invested in change with a 20% chance of success. Here's why it won't work: you can't build a new 2000 sq ft house on an old 1500 sq ft basement foundation. It doesn't fit. You've got the wrong foundation to build your new house on.

Too many companies are trying to "change" their corporate culture by thinking that it, in and of itself, is what needs changing. But corporate culture is the RESULT of the workplace. Corporate Culture is the collective ATTITUDE of the organization. If you don't change every single one of the individual attitudes within the organization, the collective attitude only changes slightly and therefore, you have wasted time, money and effort and will be right back looking at the same problem this time next year.

Let me explain. Time-management is not a problem by itself - it is a "symptom" of a self-discipline problem. You don't fix self-discipline with a simple time-management course no more than you fix a severed arm with a band-aid. The problem lies deeper than what you might see on the surface. In the same way that organizations attempt to shift the corporate culture by addressing the results of their current culture, they are simply addressing the symptoms, not the root cause. If you don't address the root cause, you won't fix the problem. You will simply mask it for only a short while.

Middle management, although they may feel powerless to change something so big, can in fact be the biggest influences and facilitators of change of culture. But it is going to take some work. Middle management needs to make it a priority to get everyone's gripes, comments, perceptions and whining out on the table and address each of them, publicly. Even Dr. Phil says, "you can't fix what you don't acknowledge."

Once each of the issues have been addressed and satisfied, you will begin to shift the attitudes of the employees. Once you begin a mass-shift by the employees you begin to shift the culture.

Culture is not top-down. Culture is not decided by management. Management may want to influence the culture but they don't necessarily create it. It is always bottom-up. The employees drive the culture. Whatever they bring to work each day (perceptions, attitudes, power-struggles, dissatisfaction, etc - and yes, management can influence how employees perceive their workplace) will become part of your culture if you don't address it. It is always the employees' collective attitudes that determine your culture. And that always starts at the bottom.

In fact, in case you missed it, I recently created a video Blog post on Corporate Culture. Here' is the link to my YouTube Corporate Culture video and my YouTube Channel.
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Attitude Is A Specialty

People are always free to offer their opinions and most have opinions on things they didn't realize they had opinions on. People who don't work in the area of organizational effectiveness or corporate culture still may have their opinions on how organizations can better their collective attitudes but that doesn't mean we have to take their advice.

I have opinions on a lot of things that are clearly not within my realm of expertise: who should stay and who should go with the NHL's Calgary Flames, which models of car should GM discontinue or which brand of maxi-pads do the best job. Clearly, these are not my areas of expertise. But it doesn't mean I don't have an opinion. I just wouldn't offer it as gospel.

So, when I stumbled onto a question on the LinkedIn bulletin board this morning that was right up my alley, I had an expert opinion. The question being asked was, "does attitude drive behavior or does behavior drive attitude?"

I was the eleventh person to answer the question and, strangely enough, the only person who works in the area of Attitude. Several motivational speakers before me had offered their simple platitudes: attitude is everything, it pays to be positive, a team with a focused attitude can accomplish anything, yadda, yadda, yadda and other motivational drivel that we've heard for years. In virtually every answer though, people equated the word attitude with positive attitude. This is a big mistake and a poor assumption.

My caution to you is to make sure that if you are soliciting advice, that you are asking people in the know. If you needed a wedding catered, you wouldn't ask the hot dog vendor on the corner. Sure, he may have some experience with food but it may not be the experience you require. In the same way, if you're looking for counsel or advice in one particular area of either your life or your business, ask an expert. Get good advice one time so that you don't compound your problem by having to go back and fix it again based on the poor advice of a non-expert.

There is much corporate discussion on "specialists versus generalists." Personally, I don't think there's much room left for generalists anymore. You only have to look to the retail sector to see evidence. Those who were once the behemoth players are slowly having their market share chipped away by specialists -- niche marketers. Even Wal-Mart is a niche marketer -- their niche is price and nothing else.

The speaking industry is no different. There are specialists and generalists. Motivational speakers are the generalists (they say stuff that makes people feel good for a while but nothing really specific) and there are specialists who address problems and issues with surgical precision.

The challenge for generalists in this economy is their inability to address specific problems and challenges with any degree of authority. For example, if your organization was facing growth issues -- either upwards or downwards -- then I would recommend my friend Marty Park. If your organization was facing performance issues than I would recommend my friend, Ken Larson. In the same way, I would hope that if your organization wanted to tweak its corporate culture, which is the corporate attitude, I would hope that you would choose me. After all, Attitude affects culture and the way your organization handles change, communication, customer service, health and safety, leadership, work life balance, management, productivity, problem solving, sales, corporate social responsibility and virtually every department within the organization. Each one of these areas has an effect on bottom-line financials. Improve the attitude and you improve the financials. The proof is that organizations with strong attitudes outperform their competitors financially by four times.


The motivational speaking industry is hurting right now because, in an economy of counting pennies, organizations want something more than platitudes that pump their people up for a few hours. They want real-world solutions that leave an organization different. Experts do just that. Experts know that low motivation in their employees is a symptom of something within the culture. That's why motivational speeches rarely change an organization's culture - because the speech addresses only the symptom and not the root cause.

So, what was my answer to the question that started this discussion? Attitude drives behavior in every single circumstance. Every event in our lives presents a choice. We make our decisions and then we act. Then, the results of our actions go back to either add to or take away from our ingrained attitudes. But every time, it's Attitude first.

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Your Mediocre Attitude Sucks

It all started innocently enough as I was looking for casters. I had this idea for a piece of exercise equipment and decided to build a prototype but I needed casters - those swivel wheels that go under office chairs, carts, etc. I had to ask three sales clerks where to find them in the big box hardware store before the third clerk actually looked in the computer to figure out where they stocked them. Reluctantly, I purchased four casters from them. It turns out that it wasn't just the service that was lousy. The casters were too noisy, not smooth enough and they marked the floor.

Next day was a visit to Casterland - a store that deals only in casters. They had exactly what I was looking for. I brought them home, installed them with great success. I should have gone to the specialists in the first place. The service was better and the product was top notch. The shopping experience was outstanding. Lesson learned. Oh, and the casters weren't more expensive. They were less expensive than the big box hardware store.

Then that night, while watching an episode of Hell's Kitchen on television, it struck me that out of all of the burned scallops, raw lamb, overcooked steaks, forgotten garnish, raw halibut, contestants sweating in the food and a general willingness to attempt to sneak substandard food past Chef Gordon Ramsay that it dawned on me: one of these very mediocre finalists is going to be head chef at Araxi in Whistler, BC. Are you kidding me? (Araxi should be concerned about this kind of marketing on their behalf.)


You don't even have to be good. You just have to be lucky enough to qualify for the show in the first place. No one on the show seems outstanding in any sort of way. All of them seem to buckle under pressure. All of them have their good nights and their bad nights. The only thing that seems to be consistent is their collective inconsistency. And yet, despite their overwhelming mediocrity, one of them is going to win the big prize. All that's required is to be best of mediocre. There is no contestant who is a clear front runner. They are all equally mediocre.

While reading a blog post from Seth Godin recently, he made mention of a Washington Post columnist recently laid off because his blog posts didn't get enough web traffic. In the old days, when people read newspapers, there was no way to tell which columns readers were reading. But in today's digital age, a simple hit counter tells the tale. In today's digital age, you can't skate by by just being mediocre. Are newspapers about change? You bet they are. Reporters and columnists are going to have to start writing what we, the customer, want to read - giving us, the customer, what we want instead of just spouting their opinions and not being concerned whether or not we are reading it.

A recent trip to Best Buy illustrates how mediocre service has become. I was looking for a simple desktop microphone for a computer that plugs in through a USB terminal. I asked one of the associates. His reply, "I don't think we sell those."

I asked him if there was someone he could ask to which he turned and did exactly that. He returned several moments later claiming, "No we don't sell those."

His department supervisor happened to be walking past at that moment and I turned to her and asked if she could point me in the direction of desktop microphones that plug-in through a USB terminal. She reached past me down to the bottom shelf and pulled up the very microphone I had been looking for.

I turned to the first sales associate and simply said, "I guess you do sell these."

His reply, "well I asked someone and they said we didn't."

This would have been a great opportunity for the sales associate to simply make the customer happy. All he had to do was smile, apologize for his error and move on. But he didn't. It was more important for him to be right than it was for the customer to be happy. That is so incredibly mediocre. Any organization is capable of doing that and sadly, most do. Best Buy finished below mediocre in that instance.

Then, this morning on the LinkedIn bulletin board came this answer to a question: "There is what is called the 20-80-20 rule of management. 20% of people will hate you no matter what. 80% will have no opinion either way. 20% will love you no matter what."

Is it just me or can you do the math as well? It adds up to 120% doesn't it? The question was answered in this way by a self-professed MBA. He used the letters right after his name in his profile. He seemed proud of his MBA. Sure, we can cut the guy a little slack for making an honest mistake but here's the problem: he didn't check his work before he submitted it. That's a mediocre effort. How many other times does he submit his work without checking it? Putting that answer out in front of millions of people without checking his work made him look sloppy - sloppy with an MBA. That's mediocre.

Had someone without an MBA made the same mistake we would have simply passed it off as though they had no idea what they were talking about. But this guy was an MBA. He should know what he's talking about. He should have checked his work. But he didn't because he gave a very mediocre effort. If you're going to live by the title you had better be meticulous. People are watching. But even with an MBA, "good enough" seems to be good enough.

And that's the problem in corporate North America today. Mediocrity is rampant. "Good enough" has become good enough. But there is good news: to be outstanding, all that is required is to be one step above mediocre. Anyone can win in that market. That should be encouraging news to any organization looking to be the best in their field.

But you have to want to be the best in your field in order to be one step better than mediocre. Sadly, most don't. And so they wallow in mediocrity just like everyone else. They accept mediocre performance from their people. They accept mediocre ideas. They accept mediocre management. They accept wallowing somewhere in the middle of the pack as okay. They train their people to be simply competent -- not outstanding -- just competent - and more often than not miss that mark too.

If your people are good but not great, if your management is good but not great, if your sales numbers are good but not great, if your attrition numbers are good but not great, if your safety numbers are good but not great, if your innovations are good but not great, if your service is good but not great, if your results are good but not great then you have a corporate culture of "good enough." Don't deny it. It's right there for everyone else to see. Your results prove it.

To go from mediocre to greatness requires the adoption of seven attitudes:

• the Attitude of Money, Security and Safety,
• the Attitude of Resilience,
• the Attitude of Connectedness,
• the Attitude of Gratitude,
• the Attitude of Service,
• the Attitude of Leadership,
• the Instigational® Attitude.

The difference between greatness and mediocrity is one step. Sadly, you probably won't make that step because where you are seems to be good enough.

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The 7 Attitudes to Greatness

There are 7 distinct Attitudes that can bring either an individual or an organization to Greatness. I have built a presentation around the 7 Attitudes and they can be seen in the video below.



If you can't see the video here, click the link to view it on YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHCTDRADnL0


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Attitude At Work

20% more people suffer heart attacks on Mondays. Why do you think that is? Attitude about going to work and the stress it creates? Speaking of stress, over 1 million people are not at work today across North America because their attitude toward their jobs has left them stressed and they are home "sick."

On the bright side of Attitude, businesses with good employee attitudes financially outperform businesses with bad employee attitudes by four times?

Care to know more about how Attitude affects your organization? Watch the video.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFD8_bvoGyM

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The Crisis of Leadership Attitude

There's a crisis of leadership - it's a crisis of what leadership is? Leadership has been dumbed-down to the point that everyone can be a leader (in the same way that everyone gets a "participant" ribbon just for taking part). No one is left out anymore. That means leadership has become some hybrid "leadership-lite" compared to what it was 20 years ago.

The crisis is that there is too much focus on trying to turn morons into leaders. Some people were never meant to lead - they were meant to follow. And if everyone has a shot at being a leader, who's going to follow?

But there are too many fly-by-night leadership organizations popping up offering to turn your marginal managers into exceptional leaders - for a price. These are the organizations who are dumbing-down leadership.

You talk about leadership more now than you did 5 years ago as though it is something everyone MUST aspire to. No it isn't.

Example - Sean Connery's character in the movie Finding Forrester said, "Writers were meant to write for readers who were meant to read."

Leaders are meant to lead the followers who are meant to follow. Even the animal kingdom has the Alpha. And no amount of money, reading or instruction will ever turn a worker-ant into a queen.

Sorry, but you don't become a leader in exchange for money - no more than you become a Ph.D. from buying a diploma on the Internet.

The leadership crisis is:

• that you have become far too preoccupied with leadership;
• that you are so busy reading any and all of the 350,000 books on leadership;
• that you are so busy following everyone else's idea of what leadership is that you are actually following (think about it);
• that you have conversations about leadership only to try to find a place for yourself in it;
• that you ask the same questions each day on the bulletin boards as though no one has ever answered that question;
• that you are aspiring to be a leader because it's fashionable - for the next couple of years anyway;
• you think that if you don't talk about leadership like an expert then you will be perceived as being a mere follower;
• that managers don't manage anymore - it is beneath them to do hands-on management because they are leaders;
• that you force yourself into delusional thinking that yes, anyone can be a leader;
• that you use "leader" in your titles now only to prove your own ego-driven arrogance;
• that you are following the advice of either your peers or self-anointed leaders (which means that the real leaders are likely sitting back, amused at your feeble attempt to find leadership).

Leadership is a life-long commitment to personal excellence (not perfection). It doesn't happen overnight or in a week. It's not a quick fix. It is a lifetime of self-examination, self-acceptance, self-study, self-esteem, self-confidence and self-"consciousness." Leadership has nothing to do with leading - that is simply a by-product of the process. Leadership is about taking control of your own life, your own affairs and your own purpose/mission on this Earth.

Emerson said, "What you are sir, speaks so loudly that I can hardly hear what you say." Now that's leadership. When someone says that to you, only then will you be ready to lead others. Only then will others readily follow.

Leadership is an Attitude. It is NOT a position. It is not a series of traits to be checked off like a grocery list. It is not power. It is not control of others. It is not better than management. It is not being the CEO.

If "leadership" identified a position then you wouldn't need to use the word "position" (as in, she is in a leadership position) behind it would you? It would be understood - but it's not. Because leadership is not a position nor a measure of success.

Leadership is an attitude; a state of mind; a state of being; a life-concept. Until you grasp the difference, never will you ever fully attain leadership in your own life.

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Attitude w/ ATTITUDE

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Is It Labour Or Work?

It's Labour Day as I write this. Labour is defined as productive work, especially manual work which is done for wages.

Given the choice, most of us would like to be able to define what we do on a daily basis as labour. But is it? Is what we do really considered labour? I am not asking the question as to whether you work or not, I am asking whether the work you do could be considered labour. My feeling is that if you don't come home at the end of the day sweaty, smelly and clothes dirty and you probably didn't do labour. If you sit at a computer terminal all day it's work, not labour.

Yet most of us enjoy the benefits of the Labour Day holiday regardless of whether we labour or simply work. Perhaps we don't give enough credit to the folks who do labour.

This year marks an increase in the minimum wage in the United States. The US federal minimum wage now stands at $7.25 per hour with a few exceptions. If you're a waiter or waitress in many states you might be paid as low as $2.65 per hour because you have the ability to earn tips. Those tips you earn become part of your hourly wage determination. However, if even with tips you still have not earned $7.25 per hour on average, your employer is required to make up the difference. But heaven help you if you're an agricultural worker in Massachusetts because you can be paid as low as $1.60 per hour (room and board may make up the difference).

It's rare that you see a white collar job for minimum wage. Minimum wage recipients are usually people who labour for a living. And why these people continue to work for such low wages might be a mystery for some, it's the difference between groceries on the table or not for others.

Unfortunately, some folks look down their noses at those who labour for a living. They look down their noses at the people who built their 5000 ft.² house, the people who carved their marble countertop, who make their yards look beautiful, who ensure their luxury cars continue to run well, who prepare their lunches in restaurants, who work in the blazing sun to harvest that lettuce in your salad, who catch the crab and caviar, who come running in the middle of the night when your toilet overflows, who repair the potholes on the streets and who handle airline baggage so that you and your family might vacation in a country where there is no minimum wage for workers who come home at the end of the day sweaty, smelly and clothes dirty.

There are people who work and then there are people who labour. If you can work from home as well as an office, it's probably work -- not labour.

There are families who depend on the fruits of labour -- the paycheck. The people who labour are willing to share their holiday with you. How about you cut a little slack for those folks whose jobs may not be as glamorous as yours but are equally as important. Every job serves someone else. That's an Attitude of Service.

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Attitude w/ ATTITUDE

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Sex and Drugs and Money

Baby Boomers did not have their acquired wealth handed to them by their parents (for the most part) - as many Gen Y have had happen. In making that claim, I am neither condemning nor applauding that fact. Also, this post is NOT a rash generalization but is based on fact that Gen Y is perhaps the wealthiest of all of the generations in history by transference - it being handed over without effort.

Where did the money come from though? How did Boomers become wealthy enough to just start handing it over to their kids without the same questions being asked that the parents of Boomers would have asked? I don't believe that in the vast majority of cases, this conversation has ever taken place between Boomer parent and Gen Y child. The child has simply come to expect that there is always money and that their having lots of it whenever they need it is a right.

If you were blessed enough to always have money with no history to give you context of how it may have been acquired, could you truly understand how some people are poor or homeless? Would the belief not be that poverty is simply some abject result of unemployment?

Since Gen Y was, for the most part, raised in an environment of always having money (or the illusion of it in order for parents to not be embarrassed by their financial situation), many Gen Y have not had the discussions of their own parent's history of family finances. I believe that not having that conversation between parent and child withholds one of life's greatest lessons on the difference between rights and privileges - a discussion far beyond just money.

Without historical context, the child becomes defenseless against the realities of life because he or she does not possess the attitude of money, security and safety which would shield them from fluctuating markets, tenuous employment and/or being chosen for promotion within their chosen career. It also leaves them somewhat defenseless in recessionary times, market downturns and in their ability to plan for their financial future (although many parents have introduced their children to financial planners but without first establishing how the money comes to be in the first place).

In the same way a parent would have a serious discussion about sex or drugs, a parent needs to explain their own history around money and family finances and how their familial financial situation came to be. They need to discuss their own first jobs, their bad bosses, their glee at receiving their first paycheck and the lessons learned about money over a lifetime.

However, let's make sure that there is not too much time spent on the topic of how little there may have been growing up (or how they had to walk 40 miles to school uphill both ways in 5 feet of snow in pajamas while walking barefoot because the newspaper that normally served as shoes couldn't be delivered due to the snowstorm) and instead plant the seed of how one earns one's wealth. It is imperative that parents explain to their children that wealth is not a right but a privilege. As soon as children and young adults begin to treat money as a commodity in which they earn as opposed to one in which they are entitled to, they will not only set themselves up for greatness in the area of money, but also in developing an Attitude of Gratitude, an Attitude of Service, an Attitude of Resilience, an Attitude of Leadership, an Attitude of Connectedness and an Instigational Attitude - the other six attitudes in the 7 Attitudes to Greatness.

Oh, by the way, this topic was inspired by a Monty Python sketch, The Four Yorkshiremen. Watch it and then have a REAL discussion with your kids about how you grew up. I'll bet they have no idea.

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Choice of Managers or Leaders - Pick Managers

"Leadership" is becoming an over-used and under-defined buzzword that has created more fly-by-night companies to come crawling out of the woodwork with promises of turning idiots into leaders. Don't buy it. The whole "Leadership" trend will only last another few years and then we're going to be looking to the rock-solid managers to manage us out of the implosion of the "leadership" industry.

Get ahead of the trend - become a good, competent and solid manager.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ilk892DBB4
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Time Management Is A Symptom

How long would you let a workmate pop headache pills for a recurring headache before you said something? Three days? A week? A month? How long would you let it go before you offered your opinion that there's a bigger underlying problem in which he or she should really see a doctor?

Treating a symptom with a few pills doesn't resolve a problem. But that's exactly how most organizations operate: they treat the symptom and not the root cause.

Time management is a symptom. It is not a strategy for addressing a root cause. When an employee is consistently late in meeting deadlines, seems to have a procrastination problem or doesn't seem very organized then the standard thinking is to enroll the employee in a time management program to solve their time management issue. But in actual fact, time management isn't the issue. Self-discipline and attitude are the issues and no amount of time management training will solve it. Why? Because the concept of time management is based on the premise that all people have good self-discipline and strong work-ethic. But if they don't, time management doesn't work.

What if the problem isn't time management, just poor personal management based on a poor self-image? Treating that with Time Management would be a monumental waste of time.

Time management is a symptom of a larger problem. If you want the symptom to go away you treat the root cause. The root cause is usually attitude. And here's how you overcome a time management symptom. You're going to need to address three specific attitudes: an attitude of leadership, an attitude of resilience and an attitude of money, security and safety.

Adopting an attitude of leadership doesn't mean that you have to be in management. It means that you simply have to have enough self-confidence to be able to take control of your own responsibilities. That's part of an attitude of leadership.

An attitude of resilience says that whatever you're facing right now you are able to handle whatever is in front of you no matter what. It's an attitude of resilience that gets you through the tough times and allows you to feel more control and feel less overwhelmed.

An attitude of money, security and safety allows you to feel safe and secure in the performance of your duties. When you feel safe and secure in your abilities you feel less overwhelmed, less stressed and more in control.

Allow people to feel that they have control over a situation and they will rise to an occasion. Time management won't be necessary. Besides, if time management really worked, you would have solved all of your problems years ago.

Time management is a symptom -- attitude is the root cause. Work on attitude and time management solves itself.

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Culture Is Your Company's Attitude

As much as one person may want to take credit for the culture of an organization it is impossible. The culture is a gathering of the collective attitudes of the individuals within the organization.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-_hYVAgLI0

As much as you may want to, having meetings to discuss a new culture strategy will fall on deaf ears if the attitudes of the individuals are left unchecked. Culture, is the collection of individual attitudes assembled in your organization. If you don't treat the individual attitudes, you will never successfully change your culture.
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