Watch Out For Detours

Are you easily distracted?

I've known some people who are so blessed with brief attention spans that they are easily distracted. They'll start one thing and then move onto another before they've finished what they're working on. Many people are fine with that. It drives me crazy.

It's easy to get distracted. And, it's easy to see what looks like a short cut and grab for it just to make it possible to move onto something else and just to put to rest the stress of it sitting unfinished. Sometimes that works, but sometimes it is something to be extremely careful about.

What looks like the shortest path to success can turn out to be a sizable detour.

Bunny trails, distractions, detours - whatever you want to call them, simply pull us away from our goals. They delay success. They get in our way.

An occasional detour is fine - but I do my best to avoid getting seduced by the simplicity of a false answer. If the goal is challenging, there probably aren't any easy answers and anything that looks like a short cut could prove to be a detour.

How will you safeguard yourself from detours today?

-- Doug Smith

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High Performance Leadership Combination

We can rationalize anything without making it justified. Leaders should always ask: who is this good for other than me? High performance leadership does NOT mean performance at any cost. It means performance that serves a noble cause while also benefiting people. High performance leadership is a combination. Results without relationships are shallow and temporary. Take care of both, and you'll be a high performance leader. -- doug smith

What You Need

Use what you've learned to become what you need. -- doug smith

Busy

What to do? High performance leaders prioritize based on mission, vision, values, and goals -- of course! And also, we prioritize based on what will just plain do some good. What's the point in leading unless it is to make a better world? There are enough needs in the world to keep everyone busy improving things. Keep going! -- doug smith

Your Reputation

More authority means higher levels of responsibility. More power requires more service to others, not less. What you do with your power is who you will be known as. Also, how you use the power you have creates who people will remember you as. How do you want to be remembered? -- doug smith

Start With Kindness

When you start with kindness you don't have to stay there, but you probably will. It works better for others. It works better for you. If you're human, you'll probably relapse. It does take practice to stay the course. The course starts by starting. When you start with kindness, it becomes more naturally the way. High performance leadership develops from the core leadership strengths of clarity, creativity, courage, and compassion. Build one of those strengths today thru some act of kindness and the others will get stronger as well. -- doug smith

Decide

What do you want? Are you getting what you want? Intention is direction. Decide. And, then go. -- doug smith

Show Integrity

The goals we seek bring a lot of pull to them. We get wrapped in them. It's useful and it's powerful when we care about our goals so much that they propel us forward and keep us working even when we're tired, beyond the boundaries of our usual limitations. But they should not take us beyond the boundaries of our usual values. They should not trick us into bending the rules just because the rules are in the way. Truly high performance leaders of character who are focused, and centered, and noble maintain integrity. No cheating is ever worth the outcome. Integrity is so rare that many people don't even recognize. If you do, be thankful. We need leaders like you. To truly understand integrity you've got to keep it. Even when it's hard. Even the lines are blurred. -- doug smith

High Performance Leadership

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