When you really look at a business, at the people that work there, it’s like a rich, flavorful stew—comprised of varying background, perception, desire, ability, expectation, history and hope. Each person that shows up is completely unique. Within the whole of it, there will never be two or more people with an identical worldview. Never. Each person holds and will continue to hold a singular perception of everything. It’s the nature of how we humans perceive and process the world. Not to freak anybody out here, but that’s the truth of it. It’s no wonder then, that it can be challenging to create alignment and a collective outcome amidst all this distinctiveness. In the past, the proposition was so incomprehensible, that control seemed the most appropriate solution—to command people to line up and operate more or less mechanistically. It was a ‘push’ mentality designed to externally steer people towards the desired outcome. Or, to use pain or pleasure to extract the desired action. Regardless of its form, it was relying on an external force, something outside each person, to generate a result. Being externally driven or pushed is fatiguing, uninspiring and in the end, oppositional to excellence. It’s an old, outdated mindset that no longer serves the aims of a company or anyone in it. Business leaders, HR and managers of all stripes need to get clear on this. Attempting to initiate action and performance through largely external means will not create extraordinary outcomes. It will limp people across finish lines, but it will never cause them to cross with a high head, strong gait and eyes set on the next race. The force that stimulates people to be good, great or remarkable is located firmly within each person. That’s where the big energy and initiative is located. The way to help people unlock that storehouse and invite it in to the workplace, is through creating spaces that sincerely call it forward. Trust, transparency, alignment, clear vision, appreciation, connection, support, humanness…all, pull people forward and into higher levels of achievement. When the external environment is supportive and inviting, the internal vibrancy and capacity is much more likely to be activated. That’s the more powerful pull—making the act of pushing simply a waste of energy. Activate action in your people. Let the energy of desire, commitment and purpose do the heavy lifting.  Discover more here! 8 Powerful Ways to Energize Your...

  Ever feel like you’re drowning in a tsunami of information? Online articles and white papers, inter-company reports and metrics, emails and Tweets—the waves of information keep on coming. Somewhere along the line, information began proliferating like some unrestrained bacteria and continues to spawn exponentially. I’ve come to refer to this phenomenon as the great data dump. Even as I say this, it may seem I’m hypocritically contributing to the morass. This is, after all, a blog I’m writing. However, it’s not the existence of prolific data that I’m referring to here. It’s the ever-present challenge of mastering two distinct skills in response to this tsunami: content curation and disciplined digesting. Both of which have become competencies that are must-haves for anybody in business. Curating content requires the spirit of an explorer and the focus of a microbe researcher. It’s a job of dual and opposing practices. The explorer is open-minded and casts a wide net while the researcher maintains a clear focal point, undeterred by passing temptation. In this digital information age, replete with flash, pop-ups and tantalizing lead ons, it’s a powerful skill to develop. Disciplined digesting is about mindfully placing your attention where it most needs to be while a three ring Barnum & Bailey Circus does its best to get you in the tent. I’ve mentioned Pavlov’s dogs before—this skill requires dismantling the Pavlovian effect. My sense is that we’re going up against a boatload of primal wiring and conditioned learning here. To digest information in a disciplined way, focus in needed. Without these skills in conscious development mode, an entire workday can be frittered away like rice at a wedding. Thrown up in the air and landing where it may. Our need for awareness and conscious action has never been more necessary than now. The numbers of entities powerfully clamoring to capture our attention is locust-like—they are everywhere and continuing to grow in numbers. It’s up to each of us to reclaim where we place our attention and when. In essence, effectively captaining our own ship. Greater clarity and focus are more easily accessed through a calm mind. Here are 6 ways to bring calm into the workplace. 6 Ways to Create a Calming Moment…at Work...

  According to Woody Allen, “Showing up is 80% of life and success.” In many cases, I believe that…but not in all. When it comes to work and business, simply showing up doesn’t usually get the job done. It’s a great start, but the more important question to ask is, “how much of who we are gets to show up?” As a business leader, professional advisor and former employee, I’ve observed the many ways in which people ‘show up’ at work. In fact, I adopted my own retinue of ‘showing up’ personae over the years. These personae represented parts of the whole, but rarely the whole itself. Depending on the work environment, certain aspects got to show up and certain aspects were safeguarded outside the company walls. The whole enchilada was rarely made available. That’s a problem. Why? Because the extraordinary, the remarkable, the above and beyond, even the really good, is a product of the whole enchilada. A plain flour tortilla is not extraordinary. How fully and completely any given person is showing up at work matters. In fact, it’s huge. Leadership cannot survey their employees with the question “hey, how much of you is showing up here?” And, oftentimes, employee’s couldn’t answer because they don’t know. If, however, your people are bored, tired, angry, disconnected, apathetic, disillusioned, uninspired, disengaged—there’s your answer. How much is showing up? Only that which keeps their job in place. The flour tortilla. Companies and leadership have it within their power to invite the whole person to the party. It’s just that so few do. Either because they don’t know how, they don’t know the whole is missing or they don’t care. For those forward-thinking leaders who get it, who recognize the power of the whole person showing up at work—those leaders possess the ideal mindset to catalyze remarkable things. For leaders who state categorically that it’s the sole job of the employee to inspire themselves—well, I hope they’re satisfied with flour tortillas. Tired of your people just going through the motions? Interested in energizing and activating your workplace? It all begins at the leadership level. The leader leads the way. Discover 6 Steps You Can Take Today! 6 Steps You Can Take Today to Jump Start Your Company Culture...

  We have become so accustomed to leaders possessing a handful of culturally lauded qualities that we have forgotten some of the most critical aspects of remarkable leadership. Good looks, affability, charisma, confidence, easy talking, boldness and even height figure largely these days. Much of the appraisal is based on the visual—do they look the part. Then, do they sound the part. And, finally, do they act the part. Of course, content plays a role in our evaluation, though at times that can be difficult to assess. Now, I tend to look upon leadership less from the context side and more from the content side. I believe leadership, whether it be to one or many, is a pretty big deal. Whether it’s the guy who owns and runs a small service station or a person in political office or the CEO of a financial behemoth—if you inhabit the role of leading people, you have stepped into a place that requires more. It is not about being the ‘top dog,’ it’s about being the kind of person that earns the respect, loyalty, trust and support of those that follow. Our current culture has placed an enormous amount of ‘cred’ on the concept and trappings of celebrity. Interestingly, the Latin root of celebrity is celeber, which means honored. As a culture we seem hungry to honor someone and something. Or, to be honored ourselves. When it comes to leadership, this hunger may be fierce enough that we anoint too quickly. That in our haste to receive or offer this homage or honor we are asking too little from ourselves as leader or too little from others as followers. It’s time to appraise leadership from a deeper place. As a leader, it’s time to develop from a deeper place, regardless of the container in which one leads. Character, integrity, honesty, service, vision, compassion are the stuff of real leaders. They are the core qualities that create and animate the kind of leaders that are needed today. There are more than enough surface-level posers out there playing the role of leader and too few being a leader of real substance. Being a leader of substance requires a commitment to development and growth. Titles and letters, degrees and accreditation are mostly accouterment and not that which matters most. Beyond the surface lies the real truth of genuine leadership. It’s woven into the core and substance of the individual, who they are today and who they are actively becoming. We are all served by those who are able to demonstrate our potential as human beings, who live and act in accordance with a higher truth. That is the stuff of true leadership. The rest is...

  Over the years, business has been fervently looking for ways to control and reduce costs. There’s BPR, JIT, TQM, BPM, BPMN, BMM and more. All essentially systems designed to monitor, maintain, or reduce costs. Here’s what I find fascinating: amidst all of this focus on reduction there is little focus placed on amplifying and expanding the value of the company’s number one asset—the people that work there. The paradigm of ‘cost containment and reduction’ largely captures most of the attention. Here’s the thing, the number one asset of most organizations—the people—lies largely untapped. There’s that asset, showing up everyday, running at levels oftentimes well below potential. If a piece of equipment demonstrated similar efficiencies, the mechanics would be swarming. Yet, with people, it seems leadership is confounded as to how to enhance this vital asset. Simply stumped. In many ways, it’s not surprising. When it comes to working with people, the modus operandi has largely been ‘management’ oriented. A process which is in need of a significant refresh and quite possibly, a total replacement. It is simply an outdated tool. When you review what has occurred in the process improvement realm over the years, it’s replete with new ideas and innovation. When you review what has occurred in the people improvement realm…mostly different versions and varieties of ho-hum management. Let’s face it, many business leaders are unsure of how to legitimately increase the commitment, engagement, performance and productivity of the people in their company. The legacy of command/control and carrot/stick management practices, even in their more palatable forms, continue to be instituted. As such, they will continue to maintain what they have always maintained—most people doing just enough to not get fired. That is a waste of a remarkable resource. Without question, it makes sense to manage costs and reduce them where appropriate. But, it makes equal or more sense to expand upon the value of an asset that’s in place and showing up everyday. Getting out of the ‘reduction’ mindset with regard to people is essential. The name of the game on the people front is personal/professional expansion. Not from the old paradigm of “get more out of them,” but rather by increasing their connection, allegiance and willingness to do the job well. That’s the 180—people performing not because they are afraid of the repercussions if they don’t, but rather because it matters to them that they do. Is your company or management in need of a 180? How about your people? Give us 30 minutes. We’ll get you moving in the right direction. Schedule a Needs Discovery...

  Recently, I watched and shared a video featuring Life is Good cofounder, Bert Jacobs. If you’re not familiar with the company, he and his brother created this impressive business based primarily on selling tee shirts with simple messages and artwork. From the very first moment I saw their tee shirts hanging in a sports store I was smitten. The message “Life is Good” felt like a welcome reminder and healthy balancing agent. Their slogan got me thinking about the idea of not only “life” being good, but also of “work” being good. These two guys had obviously found a way to create a revenue-generating enterprise based on passion, fun, heart and contribution. A company that seemed to be about work and not struggle. They were clear about what they wanted, aware of their abilities, open to receiving input and guidance from others and intent on enjoying the ride. In addition, they had a larger goal than personal gain alone—the company’s gain was to be shared and extended outward. Now, there are business folks out there that may regard such thinking as Pollyanna or do-gooder. Many of us have become so inured to the idea of personal gain being the prominent objective of work and business that the idea of a broader perspective can seem irrational or suspect. More likely, that’s more of a conditioned perspective than an examined consideration. When you look closely and lay the two paradigms side by side, a legitimate argument is formed for the “Life is Good” guys. Their model unites and aligns energy for the good of the company and its numerous benefactors. The traditional model oftentimes has people pulling away from one another and towards themselves. That translates into energy that is un-harnessed, chaotic and in opposition. In essence, those people are likely working for another company altogether, one called Me and Mine, Inc. Life is good. Work is good. If not now, it can be. It’s all in what you see and make it. Life is Good decided to make their company and the way they do business good for all concerned. Rather than remaining in their van selling tee shirts, their philosophy magnified their business into a tee shirt empire. Now, some may call their philosophy Pollyanna, but not I. I would call it nothing short of head-based, heart-based genius. Make work good. Discover “5 Tips” to get good going. 5 Straightforward Tips to Become a Better Leader...