One Generation Behind

It's not fair. It's not exactly logical. But how true do you think it is?

Every generation creates its own problems -- and must solve the problems of the previous generation.

Maybe it's the advance of technology. Maybe it's the quality of thinking. Maybe it's the incubator of time. What do you think?

-- Douglas Brent Smith

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There Is No License for Laziness

I like to take a day off once in a while. I enjoy long walks with nothing to do but walk. It's not all about outcomes and goals. But those outcomes and goals ARE still important. We earn our leisure, don't we? The trouble with casual laziness is that it's contagious. And, laziness is persistent. And, before you know it, laziness becomes a way to be. Don't be lazy. (That's me, talking to myself. Listen in if you want to!) I like to come up with crazy ideas. I like to do weird work. I like to take long walks with nothing to think about but thinking. I've lived long enough to be eccentric. But not long enough to be lazy. Now, get busy... -- Doug Smith

No Complete Failure

"Make failure your teacher, not your undertaker." -- Zig Zigler You know that we can learn from our mistakes. You might also know that failure carries many valuable lessons. I like the expression that comes from NLP (Neurolistic Programing) "there is no failure, only feedback." There's always something to learn. Any effort that results in learning is not a complete failure. So it's up to us. While we would never choose to fail at anything (oh horrors!) sometimes we will. Whether we learn or not is completely up to us. Find the learning. Find the success. What have you learned today? -- Doug Smith

Win The Game

It would be nice to win the game. But, do you ever feel like you're in a game that keeps shifting the rules and making it easy to make progress but impossible to win? You've probably noticed lots of game elements creeping into service. Points, incentives, expiring coupons followed by new expiring coupons, leader-boards...on an on a relentless attack on service comes from playing a game designed -- you guessed it -- to maximize profit. If the customer is happy, fine, but the point is to make money. Not to put too fine a point on it but that's a lousy point. What if there could be something better? What if customer service excellence became playing a game where the customer always wins and that makes you happy? You don't have to. "give away the store" to achieve a winning game for all of the players. Just stop stacking the rules against customers and watch how much more they will want to do business with you. -- doug smith

Leading Relationships

While looking for something else, l found this quote: "Appreciate you without judging. Join you without invading, Invite you without demanding. Leave you without guilt." -- Virginia Satir It reminded me that part of a leader's role is in leading relationships. That's not the same as directing or controlling them. Leading relationships has more to do with taking personal responsibility for what you bring to a relationship -- whether that's at work, in the community, at home...anywhere. Relationships can not be taken for granted. To truly lead, we must remain attentive to the kinds of relationships we are co-creating. Appreciate you without judging We don't always have the answer, but we usually think that we do. Effective leaders listen with their whole being. We bring our soul to the game. We wait to be touched before reaching out to correct. We appreciate and allow for differences. Courageous leaders correct dangerous situations, but hold ...

The Benefits of Supervisory Training

When was the last time you had any leadership training? How often do the supervisors in your organization get training? If you are like most organizations, it's never enough. Some teams go without any supervisory training at all and expect supervisors and managers to learn as they go, on the job. Unfortunately, while it is memorable to learn from your mistakes, it comes at a high cost. People get tired. People leave. Important accounts go away. Customers complain. And teams struggle without the skills and knowledge it takes to build cohesive teams that are capable of solving problems, improving performance and achieving goals. Admittedly, I can be expected to support training since I'm in the business. Still, take a closer look at your own leadership career and decide for yourself. Are leaders better off with more training and development or with less? Supervisory training can generate benefits that pay off long after the training is over. Here are just a few of the things sup...

One Kind of Choice

It is not always the answer, but surprisingly often it is: It's easier to hire a motivated worker than it is to motivate an unmotivated one. That's not the end of the story. It could be great hiring advice though. Whatever the technical skills are for people you are interviewing to hire, be sure to ask some questions about motivation that can't be answered with a yes or no. Questions like: When were you the most motivated in your life? What kinds of work motivate you? What's your approach to a work day when for one reason or another you don't feel very motivated? If you had been here for one week, what would we see that shows us how motivated you are? Start there, and follow-up with more questions. Give each candidate time to convince you whether or not they will bring motivation to your organization. You can teach people almost anything, but it's always easier if they are already motivated. -- doug smith

What to Blame

It's better to blame the product than it is to blame the customer because you cannot fix the customer. -- doug smith

Keep Growing

Photo by Brian Miller How do you handle setbacks? I've had some big setbacks lately, mainly on the interpersonal side of my life, and I'm rolling with them. Evolving. Growing. But growing can hurt, and before you get to the top of the soil the garden looks really dark. Keep growing. Challenges I've never expected have emerged, pushing and shoving me around like some stranger in a subway. The tunnel is long and dark and cold. Keep growing. Work waits to keep some level of focus. Friends call and help. Crap keeps flying and even Facebook feels like a persecution chamber when things have turned against me. But I remember... Keep growing. Life's most difficult moments are not requested. We don't savor them. We don't celebrate them. But given the awareness to discover what led us to this point and what we can learn, we can grow. Keep growing. I'm hoping you are having a great week my friend. I'm hoping that you are learning and achievi...

Talk About What Scares You

Have you ever avoided talking to someone about something? You know it's important. You know it's likely on their mind. Until you talk about it nothing will change. And yet, there's so much anxiety or apprehension attached to the result or the relationship that you both keep quiet. Things don't change until you talk about them. Fear about talking about something is usually unfounded. Maybe we're shy. Maybe we feel unqualified. Maybe we don't want to feel pushy. I've been in those types of situations and what I've discovered is the conversation is usually nothing at all to fear. What tends to happen is a great sense of relief from getting the subject out in the open, real progress on the issue at hand, and a deepening of the relationship. What will it take to talk about the things you're afraid to talk about? If we want to communicate for results, we need to find ways to overcome our fears. -- Douglas Brent Smith

How Developing Leadership Is Like Learning To Fight Fires

Developing leadership skills has similarities to training to be a fire fighter. You need a combination of study, direction, and experiential application. But the experiential part of the training should build according to your skill level. A first day fire fighter trainee for instance never sees any real fire – they could easily get hurt or hurt someone else. The really difficult tasks must build on skills that have been learned before. Knowledge must be internalized and feel fully integrated before you apply it on a dangerous ground – and leading others can often be dangerous ground. Leadership develops in scalable stages I’ve been both a fire fighter and a manager and so I can find many similarities in the development process. You can be a novice and inexperienced fire fighter and still contribute to the effort of the crew, provided that you are surrounded with more experienced, patient, and yes even insistent fire fighters who will be assertive and courageous enough to keep y...

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