How I Avoided Becoming a Wuss

How I Avoided Becoming a Wuss - By David Spiegel

"The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are."

Joseph Campbell

Responding to my email from yesterday, I heard from a dear friend. She commented "Loved this thought for the day!".

It made me smile.

It also gave me pause to remember how and when she and I first met. We were freshmen together entering college, away from the comfort and safety of our parents homes. We had the same major at the time, music.

It was during those early days of being on my own, that I chose to pledge a fraternity. I truly believe this experience was a significant part of me becoming the person I am and not the wuss that I could have been.

This was not what anyone would consider the party animal or jock mentality frat that you often see portrayed in movies. It was however a place where the notion that you stand up to a challenge, rather than run away from one became part of who I am.

It would have been easy to spend my college days anonymously,getting by and following a path that some "adult" laid out for me. Instead I chose not only the road less taken, I often chose the road that had not been ventured down at all. The fraternity and the young men who would become my brothers, played a big role in that Journey.

I have played and coached in a lot of sports over the years. In wrestling, I learned to put on my headgear, walk confidently to the middle of the mat, shake hands firmly with my opponent, looking him straight in the eye, acknowledge the ref and then have at it.

It didn't matter that with in seconds I often ended up flat on my back staring at the ceiling.

It didn't matter to me that my opponent had been the district champ a year earlier.

It didn't matter that he was undefeated and had just been named athlete of the week.

Look him straight in the eye, shake his hand and wait for the whistle.

What did matter was that no matter how often (and believe me it was quite often) I ended up staring at that ceiling, when it was over I popped back up, walked upright to the middle of the mat and shook hands with my foe once again looking him straight in the eye.

It's called character.

The frat experience, hazing and all, solidified that character building. Life is not always easy.

Soft is no way to go through life. You get bumped and bruised along the way. You shake it off, you dust yourself off and then you get back in the game, the game of life. All the while standing tall and looking at whatever is in front of you squarely in the eye.

That's a big part of this game of life.

When I think of how I want to show up for that game, I am reminded of my first football coach saying "gentlemen, when it's game day, it's time to pull up your jockstrap, stick you hand in the dirt and have at it!"

Building character.

That's how you avoid becoming a wuss.

-- David Spiegel

Comments

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

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

Strong Self-Esteem

How do the people on your team feel about themselves? How about you? How do you feel about yourself? Self-esteem matters. The way we see ourselves influences the work that we do. If you want healthy, vibrant, vital work from your team, why not make sure that the way that they think about themselves is strong? There are few things stronger than healthy self-esteem. To strengthen self-esteem among your team members: Appreciate good performance by providing specific compliments Spend time talking one-on-one with team members just to let them talk about what interests them Smile The list is longer than that of course, but start with those three things and you'll like the results. And that is good for YOUR self-esteem, isn't it? -- doug smith

Side Hustle Blues?

As a leader, do you ever sing the side-hustle blues? That's when your team seems distracted because they're tired from working multiple jobs. When I worked in food service it was all around me: team members who were already wrestling with variable schedules and also juggling multiple jobs. Maybe because they enjoyed their other gigs -- like the musicians, actors, artists, and writers on the team. Or maybe because otherwise they couldn't make ends meet so there were the side-hustles in driving, delivering, retailing, and add-on food service shifts. People are wonderful and their potential is unlimited but their physical selves are not unlimited. Which can bring on the side hustle blues when people are tough to schedule, hard to motivate, and just plain tired. You'll never eliminate the gigs that team members enjoy, nor should you. Those are not the ones really sapping the energy as much as those that they are in only for the money. Employees won't need an only-for-t...

Don't Jump!

I do it. You've probably done it, too. It gets us into trouble misinterpreting and reaching false conclusions. Slow down. Ease up from that jump. Stop that jump to conclusions and you'll avoid many big falls. -- doug smith

Focused Truth

Focused leaders have zero time for inauthentic messages. They tell the truth unconditionally and insist on the truth consistently. Be a leader who can handle the truth. Be a leader who tells the truth. -- doug smith

Lead with Compassion

Does your team know that you care about them? How do they know? Is it from your flexibility? Is it from your discipline? Is it from the time that you take to talk with each and every one of them on a regular basis? Times are tough for many team members. They are wrestling with issues that we don't even know about, plus some issues that we DO know about. How leaders respond makes the difference between a functional team and a dysfunctional one. Go for the functional, fully moving forward team that delivers on performance. Build trust, build relationships, spend time getting to know your team and letting them get to know you. The payoff is immense. Lead with clarity, courage, compassion, and creativity. If you don't know where to start, start with compassion. Leading with compassion builds trust. And trust propels high performance teams to success. Go for that success. You can do it. You're the boss! -- doug smith

All Edge in Moderation

I once had a boss who, during my performance evaluation, told me that I was doing a good job as a leader but that I needed to develop more of an edge. I wasn't quite assertive enough. She was concerned that people might take advantage of me. I worked on my edge as a result. I sharpened it thru steady practice. I had an edge to end all edges. At the next evaluation, what do you think she suggested? "You need to dial that edge down a bit," she laughed. It's not either/or. Assertiveness is valuable and necessary. Aggression, not so much. You don't have to dull your edge -- just don't cut yourself with it. -- doug smith

Try Not Lying

High performance leaders communicate without lying. That's harder than it sounds. So hard, that hardly anyone ever does it. -- doug smith

High Performance Leadership

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