Respect Your Time

Do other people try to waste your time?

I say try, because it is up to you whether or not you allow them to.

People will do their best to consume our time. In many cases it is useful, helpful, and necessary. In other cases, it simply uses up time that we could spend more productively on our goals.

People will treat your time the way that you do. If you give it away at the slightest request, or if you are observed frivolously using it up, people will assume that your time is that that valuable. Your time IS that valuable. Your time is the most valuable asset you have and completely unreplenishable. Use it wisely. Demonstrate to others how important it is, and they will much more likely understand.

There's no point in complaining about how little time you have. We all have the same amount.

How will you honor your time responsibly today?

-- Doug Smith

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The Gaps

Are you comfortable with ambiguity? I'm not a fan of not knowing, but I've learned that sometimes I just don't know. Try as I might, I don't understand what is going on with a customer, or a team member, or a boss. The effort to understand everything will always leave gaps. Closing those gaps could take a long time. In the meantime, keep working. -- doug smith

Ask The Question, Still

Every unasked question leaves room for erroneous assumptions. Ask the question. -- doug smith

The Problem With Compromises

Think about the last time you compromised on something. Whether it was a big compromise or a little compromise, how do you feel about it now? While we often call it "meet in the middle" it seldom does. Compromises are not automatically fair, no matter how implied that fairness is. Someone usually gets more out of a compromise than the person they are "compromising" with. If the low end is you, you don't like it -- and you remember that. If the top end of the compromise is you, you probably forget all about it even though the inequity simmers in the background. Compromises must be constantly revisited because they are inevitably unfair. If you get the chance to balance things out, your relationship will prosper. If you miss that chance, the relationship will suffer. What's your choice? -- doug smith

Service Problems

The problem with bad service is that it creates bad customers. Solve your service problem or the problem customers will multiply. -- doug smith

What You Need

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

Future Leaders

Guess what: the leaders of the future are watching you today. What will they see? What will they learn? How will they remember you? -- Douglas Brent Smith Developing Leadership Skills

Who's Misunderstood?

When someone is disappointing you they may have misunderstood your intentions. (Or, maybe you have...) The challenge to misunderstanding is that we seldom understand that we have understood. The illusion of truth is as strong as steel. Disappointment, originating in unmet expectations, requires clarity to be cured. Clarify your intentions. Clarify your expectations. Clarify, and confirm. What do you think? -- doug smith

Show Up!

"You've got to be there. Big decisions are being made!" my former boss told me a long time ago. "If your voice is in the room you might be heard..." It was good advice then and it still is. Show up. When there's a goal you're working on and an opportunity appears to advance that goal -- show up. When changes are being made that will affect you -- show up! When it matters to you -- show up. You won't always get what you want by showing up, but you never will if you don't! -- doug smith

What Is Your Strategy?

Are you comfortable with uncertainty? Or does it make you a little edgy. We live with much uncertainty. What will the stock market do? What will our customers want next quarter? What is our competition up to? How do we find and retain the best talent? What style of leadership suits our team the best? Lots of uncertainty. Unless we plan carefully, the amount of uncertainty we deal with magnifies. It grows. Take a little uncertainty, and ignore it, and it grows. Yikes. Uncertainty is not your friend. Still, as high performance leaders we must not only tolerate some uncertainty, we must embrace it. What if it is in the little in-between unknowns where the biggest change is coming? What if by staying uncertain about a certain detail we open up more possibilities. We can't be ambiguous, yet we can be open to the unexpected as opportunity. Uncertainty is not your enemy. You need some uncertainty. Just not so much that nothing gets planned, built, or created. Leaders sometime...

Growing

Mountains never stop growing; why should we? It came as a surprise to me to learn that the Rocky Mountains are still growing. Trimmed a bit by years of erosion, they are still poking their way skyward and changing in the direction of growth. As leaders we find ourselves faced with the dynamic between growth and erosion, life and decay. Standing still leads to the less desirable choice. Growth requires our attention, our efforts, our drive. Growth requires the courage to step forward, the creativity to find new ways of dealing with challenges, the clarity of purpose to know which direction you are growing in and the compassion to forgive those who slow you down. What are you doing to spark your leadership growth today? -- Douglas Brent Smith

High Performance Leadership

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