Leadership | Behavior Matters! - Part 4

Category: Leadership Page 4 of 8

Top 5 survival tips for small businesses – guest blog by Paul Schoening (2 of 3)

On February 14, 2012

In Communications, Employee Motivation, Leadership, Uncategorized

The following is the second of 3 posts from our guest blogger Paul Schoening, President of Plan C.  He is bringing a unique perspective on what it takes for a small business to survive.  In his first post (here) he talked about the difficulty of starting a business based on passion and how that passion is both good and bad.  He discussed how entrepreneurs need to look at building a sustainability plan and not a business plan.  In this blog are his next two tips.  Over the next few weeks, the final post will outline the final two survival tips.  Enjoy!

2.  Show me the money:  When starting a new business, oftentimes entrepreneurs focus on sales revenue or profit figures to assess how they are doing.  I know I did.  In fact, we had record sales in our final quarter as a business and yet we couldn’t make it last.  money

While it is good to be profitable and increase sales – it is absolutely critical to have a positive cash flow!  You need to have enough cash flow to give yourself time to get off the ground and pay your ongoing bills. Fast growth and increased sales are great, but this can create a sense of overconfidence that can skew your decision-making especially with early business success. Conversely, when times are challenging and a business owner is under pressure we can easily make rash decisions fueled by emotion, not logic (i.e., “how the hell am I going to pay for this?”).

One example of cash flow issues was custom cabinet seller M&J Kitchens – who had survived the Great Recession even when its revenue from homeowners and builders dropped by more than half in 2009.  They weathered the storm.  Then, late in 2011, with sales almost 42 percent higher than the prior year, they were unable to pay their bills and owner Drew Davies was forced to shut the  26-year-old company down. What happened?  M&J highlights how important cash flow is.  The issue was a “cash-flow crisis precipitated by his bank and trading partners, who Davies says, abandoned payment agreements that had been in place for decades.”  M&J’s cash inflows were coming in slower and it’s payments still needed to be made. In this instance “M&J had to float their customers—builders, architects, and home remodelers—who had slowed their payments, typically from 30 days to 60 or 90. At the same time, his own suppliers changed agreements that had been in place for decades by cutting credit lines or requiring deposits, which Davies says could tie up between $60,000 and $120,000 per month.”  After more than 25 years of business, the company was forced out of business, not because sales were down, but because it couldn’t cover its cash flow.

Source: Businessweek.com February, 2011

What happened to M&J is not atypical.  It can happen to all of us.  Which is why we need to have cash flow plan.  One way of looking at this to think about how much cash is required to make payroll, pay suppliers, and cover other expenses each month – then figure how many months of cash reserve you will need to have if things don’t go smoothly.  In my case with the bike business, I usually looked out 3 to 4 months.  I should have been looking out 6 to 9 months.  Each business is different – so think hard about what a downturn or change in situation would mean to you.  How fast do your customers pay?  How long can you push out your own payments.

One way to avoid these mistakes is by finding a great accountant or financial consultant and using them to map out a plan for this.  Look at ways you can collect money faster by offering discounts for payments early or requiring a deposit.  See how you can restructure payments on goods and services that you use.  Look at payroll differently – offset high bi-weekly pay by using quarterly or annual bonuses that provide flexibility for you and rewards your employees for great work.  If  you can’t afford to hire an accountant full-time, there are many firms that you can outsource part of the accounting of the business to or hire in for consulting.  The voice of reality (a shrewd accountant) will keep you in check.

3.  Double the time you think it will take:  Time is a resource that is often underestimated when starting a new adventure.  In the passion of developing out this great new idea, we forget about how long things can take.  Particularly the little things.   You can celebrate that you are the President or CEO of your business and be very happy to have the title. But you are also the janitor, the sales person, marketer and customer service rep. You need time to handle all of these responsibilities, take time to do research and to ensure that you are continuing your education and staying on top of the latest trends and facets of the marketplace.

Here are a few examples of some rough time estimates that an entrepreneurial friend put together for me for some of the things that he does that are not part of his core business.

  • Accounts payable: 2 hours per week
  • Accounts receivable: 1 hour per week
  • Payroll: 1 hour per week
  • Social Media Outreach: 3 hours per week
  • Developing marketing campaign: 2 hours per week (varies, but this is an average)
  • HR: 1 hour a week (up to 8 hours a week when issues arise with employees or when hiring)
  • Scheduling: 1 hour per week
  • Responding to sales requests: 1 hour per week
  • Networking: 2-4 hours per week
  • Miscellaneous (IT trouble shooting, equipment purchase/repair, responding to solicitations, etc..): 2 hours per week

This totals up to over a day and a half out of the week for work doesn’t even include business development, sales, or anything that has to do with the work that drives value for his customers (granted, he could probably reduce his Social Media Outreach – I mean really, 3 hours on Twitter, Linked-In and Facebook?).

One way to overcome this time crunch is to look at outsourcing some of the functions of your business so you can focus on the areas of which you have immediate control and greatest value-add. This might require you to increase your outflow of cash (which can be troublesome – see #2) but if it can allow you the time to focus on the important things for success, then it is worth it.  Another option is to think outside of the “box” and look at creating partnerships and alliance where you can trade services or leverage each others core competencies.

Top 5 survival tips for small businesses – guest blog by Paul Schoening (1 of 3)

On February 7, 2012

In Employee Motivation, Leadership, Uncategorized

The following is the first of 3 posts from our guest blogger Paul Schoening, President of Plan C.  He is bringing a unique perspective on what it takes for a small business to survive.  Over the next few weeks, the remaining posts will outline the other survival tips.  Enjoy!

In today’s climate, it seems like we are seeing more people start their own businesses. Often this first business is based on something that they are passionate about.  That isn’t always a bad idea, but sometimes it can cloud our judgment.

I launched my first startup in 2004 in an industry that was also my passion: Cycling. I assumed if there were enough people like me who were passionate about high-end European bike products, my business would thrive. But just because you like cupcakes, doesn’t mean you will thrive in the cupcake business.

As they say, proof is in the data…

Less than 1 in 3 new companies are still around at the 10 year mark.  The chart below shows the proportion of new businesses that were founded in 1992 that were still in business each year for the next 10 years*.

Source; www.smallbiztrends.comIllusions of Entrepreneurship: The Costly Myths that Entrepreneurs, Investors, and Policy Makers Live ByApril 28, 2008

*While these data look at the 1992 cohort of new single-establishment businesses, the failure rate percentages are almost identical for all the cohorts that researchers have looked at. So, these are pretty much the one through ten year survival rates of new firms.

For me, my passion skewed my business planning and although we had great success in the first 2 years, the final 2 were difficult, ultimately resulting in my divestiture out of the business.  Technically, we did just about everything right: created a business plan, networked effectively, and continually grew sales.  However, we didn’t focus on a sustainable business model that took into account how we’d overcome changes in the marketplace.  For me, it was a fluctuating (i.e., rising) exchange rate that we couldn’t overcome.   Here are the five, sometimes contrarian thoughts, on small business survival based on what I’ve learned:
1. Don’t build a business plan: Wait a minute — aren’t business plans supposed to be Entrepreneurship 101? What about all those popular books telling you that you can’t get to first base without a plan? Not always. To survive, you definitely need to understand the market. You need to know who your competition is, what are the products/services available in the marketplace, who are your potential customers and what is your differentiating value proposition.  But that doesn’t mean you have to create a business plan to achieve that.

One question in a 2002 survey of Inc 500 founders asked whether they had written formal business plans before they launched their companies. Only 40% said yes. Of those, 65% said they had strayed significantly from their original conception, adapting their plans as they went along.  That means that less than 15% built a business plan that they followed.   In a similar vein, only 12% of this year’s Inc 500 group said they’d done formal market research before starting their companies.

Source: Inc. Oct 15, 2002

More important than a “business plan”, you need a sustainable business model that ebbs and flows with your success and growth.  Something that allows you to quickly adapt to new opportunities or threats (i.e., rising exchange rates).

Neither Bill Gates nor Mark Zuckerberg had business plans. They did however create sustainable models for continued growth and survival.  To do this, you must understand what drives your business, your profits and your sales – and understanding what the potential hazards are.   You can help achieve this by forming a small advisory group who meet regularly to bring a “non-passionate” perspective to the table.   These people can provide you with a sounding board so you don’t get stuck in a quagmire because you are only looking at things from your “passion” base.

It is important that this group of advisors has people on it who are willing to be contrarian and point out flows in reasoning and judgment.  The group needs people who are willing to challenge your opinion and assumptions.  It is also nice to have advisors who can advise you in areas where you are not as strong or familiar (i.e., finance or marketing).   Finally, the group needs people who will also bring in ideas and create synergies with other ideas.

Focus on getting the right mix of advisors to take on these roles.  Sometimes that means a bunch of people – other times many roles can be filled by just a few or even just one.  Make sure that you set up regular check-ins with these people.  It doesn’t have to be formal – you can get together with one or two over lunch every month or quarter.  You can go to a basketball game with them.  But make sure that it happens more than just by happenstance.

Confusing your hobby and passion with a good business model is a common mistake. With my “Cycle Import” company I soon learned that it’s not always passion that creates success, but a flexible business model that is sustainable beyond the terminal 3-5 year window.   I could have used a few trusted advisors to help me look out at that time horizon before it was too late.

Comment:

Please let us know what you think by leaving a comment.  Our next blog posting will be up first part of next week…part II.

Behavior is what matters

On November 8, 2011

In Employee Motivation, Four Drive Theory, Leadership, Motivation, Uncategorized

For all my passion and research into motivation I have to respectfully admit that motivation by itself is shit. By itself, motivation doesn’t do anything. The most motivated people in the world sometimes still just sit on their butts.

What is needed is behavior.

It doesn’t matter if motivation is intrinsic or extrinsic. It doesn’t matter if my motivation applies to the A Drive or the D Drive (or the B or C Drive for that matter). If I don’t start or stop doing something (i.e., behavior) then the amount of motivation I have is a moot point.

Motivation is important in that it leads to behaviors. Motivation is one of the key elements in achieving behavior change (starting or stopping something). But it is only one part. The guys from Vital Smarts, Patterson, Grenny, Maxfield, McMillan and Switzer came out with a book called “Change Anything” not too long ago. It sheds light on this problem. While it mostly talks about individual change, but their insights can be applied to all motivation. They state that when we fail to change, “…when it comes to personal change, we think first of our own lack of motivation.” The problem with this belief is that there are a number of other factors that influence whether or not we actually change.

Change is hard. That is why motivation is important. It is the gas that powers the change engine. We need it to push through the difficult times and persist with our change effort. Again, Patterson et. al., talk about the other influences on whether or not we change – there are social factors and environmental factors. We can be motivated to loose weight all we want, but if we hang out with people who are always going out and eating big meals and just watching T.V. and if we have a packet of Oreos in the cupboard and no carrots in the fridge – it is much harder (and some might say – even impossible) to change.

When we are designing motivational programs for our employees, we need to understand that no matter how good our incentive program is or how well we activate the 4-Drives – our employees will be hard pressed to change if the social and environmental aspects are stacked up against them. If we want greater collaboration and teamwork, not only do we need to design the compensation plan so that it supports that, but we might have to look at how we configure our work space and what activities we allow while at work. If we want to get people out in front of customers more, we need to explore what are the routines that we have our employees do that inhibit this or what are the social/cultural pressures that might get in the way of this behavior.

So it boils down to understanding that while motivation is important, it cannot be the only thing that we focus on. We need to broaden our perspective to understand how motivation fits into the larger behavior picture.

And so while you might be motivated to agree or disagree with me – I’ll only know if you leave a comment (and thus, do a behavior). Click on “leave a comment” below.

Thanks.!

Karma: A few lessons from our ordeal with Hurricane Irene

On September 2, 2011

In Employee Motivation, Gratitude, Leadership, Uncategorized

This past weekend has to be one of the strangest weekends of my life. 

FRIDAY

It started with me coming off of a grueling two-day program that had frankly, stressed me out.  That meeting ended Friday at 2:00 PM at which time I headed straight home and got ready to drive two hours to a wedding.  When I got home, I quickly changed, gave the au pair marching orders for delivering our 20-month old to the grandparents, and took off my wife and 5 year old son for the trip to Mankato where the wedding started at 5:30 PM. We were on the road by 3:30 PM.

So far so good.

Then the text from Orbitz came, “MSG: DL 848 to BOS cancelled.”

Oh oh.

See, I was supposed to be flying out to Boston along with three other facilitators on Saturday to do a program on Sunday for a client.  We had known that Hurricane Irene was closing in on the east coast, but the reports that I had seen didn’t have it near Boston until Sunday.  Apparently Delta had some different information.

I  had two main client contacts – I called them both up.  No answer – so I left messages.  I then e-mailed the clients from my i-phone with this message “Flights Cancelled.  I just received a text saying our flight is cancelled due to hurricane Irene.  I am checking on getting a different flight.”  It was about 4:30 PM.

The message came back from the client at 4:41 PM, it said, “Thanks Kurt.”

Huh?  I would have liked a little more information please.

Needless to say, I was working the phone and e-mail.  I contacted Delta and instead of waiting for 42 to 54 minutes on hold, I had them give me a call back when my time was set.  Over the course of the next 40 minutes I traded more e-mails with both clients.  The meeting was still on – it seems like none of the participants were having any problems in getting into Boston (even though they were coming from around the world – Europe, Brazil, China, India and the U.S.).  They must NOT have been flying Delta. I contacted my team of guys who were flying out there with me.  I got a hold of two of them who were offering to help however they could.

So it was now about 5:20 PM and we were almost at the church.   Then I got this text from our Au Pair, “Sitting outside Grandma and Grandpa’s for 45 minutes – no one is home to take baby.”

Oh oh.

I now had another crisis on hand.  Quickly texted back that we’d try to find the grandparents, gave a few unsuccessful calls to their home and cell phones when I received my call back from Delta service (it had been in the 42 to 54 minute range).  The Delta rep searched for another option into Boston and came up with nothing available that could get us in either directly or through a connection.  All the flights were either full or cancelled.

It was 5:33 the wedding was starting.  I sat down in the pew and for the next 40 minutes tried to concentrate on the ceremonies.  Luckily there was no cell phone service in the church so I wasn’t tempted to check e-mails every minute.

Once outside the church I scanned the e-mail and text barrage.  A couple more e-mails from the client stating that the meeting was still happening.   A few more from my facilitators wondering what they could do to help.  A text from the Au Pair that she had gone home to feed the baby because our 20-month old had been hungry and thirsty.

I thought about pulling my hair out at this point but I’m bald – so that didn’t help.

At this point, my wife came outside and we discussed what we should do.  We were prepared to go home to relieve the Au Pair.  We tried calling the grandparents again.  And I was thinking through various options for being able to work the program in Boston – I thought of maybe trying to rent a car to drive out to Boston, finding other facilitators in Boston who could conduct it, try to figure out a teleportation device that could beam us there directly. I was getting a little desperate.

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Building Teams – Is There a Growing Need?

On July 21, 2011

In Leadership, Motivation, Teambuilding, Uncategorized

Back in 1997, when The Lantern Group started almost 70% of our work focused on team development.  We did everything from on-going team development consulting with managers, to team assessments,  to experiential  ropes courses, to developed a number of fun and effective team building events.  Over the years, our focus shifted to other aspects of the business and our team development work decreased until for the last few years it comprised just under 10% of our revenue. 

But this year, something has changed.

Since February we have received more inquiries about doing team building programs than we have in the past two or three years combined.  These are both big and small programs – from groups 200 plus to small executive teams of 8-10 people.  The managers and VPs that we’ve talked to have indicated that they want to do something to help increase the effectiveness of their team while also providing them with a fun activity that can be a diversion from the everyday stress they have been under.

Normally I would just count my blessings and be thankful for leads coming in.   But this drastic increase has made me wonder, “why?”  Why the increase?  Why now?

I have a few theories:

1.  Pent up need – because of the recession, companies did not have budget that they could use to help build their team and improve bonding.

2. Changes in the teams – either through layoffs or attrition, team dynamics have changed and there is a need to improve how people work together

3. Need to have fun, but with a message – again, due to the recession, many companies have had people working under significant stress, longer hours, with more responsibility.  Astute leaders see that there is a need to let their people unwind and yet they want to make sure that there are some learnings and insights to be had

4. Work itself has changed – the very nature of work has changed with more people working off-site, more technology, more need to collaborate in new ways.  Good leaders use team development programs to help sort that out.

What are your thoughts?   Do you think there is a growing need?  Please leave a comment.

Imaginary monsters are still scary

On June 26, 2011

In Communications, Employee Motivation, Leadership, Uncategorized

My 5-year old son is starting to become afraid of “monsters” in our house.  This has not been a problem until just a few days ago – but now he is reluctant to go anywhere in the house alone.   It culminated last night, when he wanted a specific book read to him before going to bed.  That book was located in our 3rd floor attic bedroom.  We were on the 2nd floor when the 5-year old requested this book.

“Ok. Go get it and I’ll read it to you” I said.

“I can’t” he said very quickly.

“Why not?  Do your legs not work?” I asked teasingly.

“I’m scared – I don’t like being alone” he replied seriously.

“But I’m right here and you just have to go up the stairs that are right over there” I said pointing to the stairs just 20 feet away.

“Can you come with me?”

“No – I’m right here and you’ll be fine.”

“But I need you to come with me.”

After 10-minutes of this back and forth conversation that included discussions on what type of monster it was, the fact that monsters were imaginary, and the fact that  he would be no more than 50 feet away from me at any point in his under 60-second journey and within easy calling distance, he was still firmly planted on the couch not willing to go get the book by himself.  I even tried my best motivation and psychology tactics to get him to go up by himself (incentives, peer pressure, challenge, etc..) – to no avail.  Then he said this most insightful statement:

“Just because its imaginary doesn’t mean that I’m still not scared.”

Wow…that’s when it hit me, I wouldn’t be able to rationally talk him into going upstairs to get the book.  No matter how many facts we agreed on.  No matter how well reasoned my arguments were.  No matter how simple the solution was.  He was going to still be scared.

I needed to respond to him on an emotional level.  I needed to make him “feel” safe.  I needed to hold his hand or walk halfway up the attic stairs or go up first and clear the attic of any monsters before he was ever going to go up in the attic alone.

Imaginary Monsters

And sometimes we and our employees are the same way.  We make up monsters.

We extrapolate all the bad things that could happen and they get blown out of proportion.  We understand all the rational discourse on why the company needs to change, but in our guts we are scared by that.  We get caught up in the emotion of how we feel about what somebody said to us and not about what they actually said or meant.  We spin our wheels in the mud worrying about not getting a project done instead of just working on it.

And no matter how rationale the argument is against this imaginary thing – we are still scared.  When people are scared – we don’t work well.  We don’t go up the stairs to get the book.  Instead we sit in our cubes and wait.  We spread rumors and try to get others to believe in our imaginary monsters too.  We worry and fret and stress.

Our brains trick us because we are not rational beings. 

We are emotional beings.  Our imaginary fears and worries are not going to dissipate with rational discourse or well reasoned arguments or even facts.  Sometimes the only way over it is to have someone figuratively hold our hand, or walk halfway up the stairs or go chase out all the monsters first.

Too often as leaders we miss this fact!

The Not So Shining Knight

As leaders we want to be the shining knight that comes in and vanquishes all the monsters.  So what do we do – we focus on the facts.  We layout well reasoned arguments.  We rationally explain away all the potential downfalls.

Our communications highlight all the great benefits of the new program – but don’t address the emotional side of things.  We discuss program rules and miss out on leading people through an example of what it is going to be like.  We provide all the facts on a new change initiative but don’t go out and show them how we have to change as well.

We don’t bring in the human side of things.

We need to get better at holding hands. We need to work on our empathy.  Communication, no matter how good, won’t solve all our problems.  As leaders, we need to lead.  We need to go up the stairs first.  We need to put skin in the game. We need to feel the pain too.

We can’t always talk people out of being scared – even when they are scared about imaginary monsters.  As a leader it is not about being right or getting the facts straight.  It is about emphasizing with what your team is going through and being there for them.  It means that we have to start thinking and acting with our more with our heart and less with our head.

That’s what makes great leaders.

Let us know what type of imaginary monsters you face…leave a comment.

Dan Wilson’s Ground Rules For Collaboration: We Can All Learn From This!

On June 20, 2011

In Leadership, Uncategorized

Dan Wilson just wrote one of the most insightful blogs on what it takes to successfully collaborate with someone (Regarding Ground Rules For Collaboration).  As a singer/songwriter and major collaborator in writing music (he has co-written songs with Adele including “Someone Like You” (number 1 in Britain for 6 weeks), Josh Grobin, Keith Urban and the Dixie Chicks (for which he won a Grammy) Dan probably knows a thing or two about collaboration.

It is evident in this article.

He wrote this with creative people in mind (artists, writers, etc.) but it applies to all of us – in business, social, charity, government, etc…

Some of my favorite highlights:

  • “Audition every idea.”
  • “Don’t worry whether it’s been done before … Originality will take care of itself.”
  • “Three very powerful words in a collaboration: “How about this?” Four words to use after them: “Or, how about this?”
  • “‘No’ is a last resort”
I think Dan could make a career as a business consultant if he ever decided to quit the music business (NOTE: Dan if you’re reading this, please don’t quit the music business!!  You have too many fans out there who would miss you – me being one of them).

How using a 9-iron isn’t the answer to a 540 yard par 5 – just like incentives aren’t the only answer to employee motivation

On June 19, 2011

In Employee Motivation, Incentive Compensation, Incentive Plans and Sales Awards, Leadership, Motivation, Uncategorized

The Approach

A few weeks ago a number of factors all convened so that I spent 5 days playing 99 holes of golf (see here).  It was fun, but I’m ok if I don’t hold a golf club in my hands for a little while.

Let’s preface by stating that I’m not an avid golfer nor am I a very good golfer.  I’m average.  I usually get out 3 to 4 times a year.  I can talk the talk, I do some things well, and others not so well.  One of the things that I was doing well during those five days was hitting my 9-iron.

And I was hitting it well.

On a pretty consistent basis I was hitting the ball between 140 and 170 yards with my 9-iron – and they were mostly straight (which is a big deal for me).  And once* I put one out there about 185 yards (*it was downhill and the wind was behind me).  Put this in perspective, according to Brent Kelly at About.com the average men’s 9-iron distance is between 95 and 135 yards.  You would need to move up to a 5-iron to reach the average distance I was getting with my nine.

Of course I was hitting most of my other clubs poorly.  I’d top my driver and it would bounce out 30 yards.  I’d slice my 3-iron into the trees.  I’d hit my five iron, but it would fade left and only go about 100 yards.  I’d totally duff my 3-wood.

So what did I do?

I ended up just playing with my 9-iron and putter.  Honestly.  It didn’t matter if it was a par 3 140 yard hole or if it was a monster 540 par 5 – I’d pull out my 9-iron and shoot.

And you know what…I played better than I usually do.  We used many of my shots in the scramble competition.  I won my head to head match.  Overall, I did pretty well using just my 9-iron.

Therein lies the problem…

I did pretty well for me – but I definitely wasn’t one of the top golfers playing.  Sure I did better than I usually do, but I know that using my 9-iron on a long par 5 is not the optimum solution.  Yes it improved my game – but I wasn’t going to be able to match the top golfers I was playing with if I only used two clubs.

I often see companies that use incentives like I use my 9-iron.  It becomes the only club in their bag.

Therein lies the problem. 

We find that we have some success with an incentive program/reward program/new initiative and we think, “hey, we’re doing pretty good here.”  Then we use the same thing again and again – regardless of the issue we are trying to address.  The problem is that using that approach, we will never be at the top of our game.  We will never be able to fully motivate and engage our employees.  We will get to the equivalent  of a 540 yard hole, which requires a creative new approach – and we pull out the “9-iron incentive” instead because, hey, “I can hit it 170 yards.”  But that probably won’t ever get you a par.  And it certainly won’t get you an eagle.

There are a number of clubs that we have to use to help drive motivation.  We need to engage people with challenging jobs, build great interpersonal connections, create a culture that people are proud of, make sure that people have opportunities to grow and excel.    But these are all harder to master, take longer to build, and have a higher probability of a major slice or hook – so we too often just fall back on the old faithful 9-iron incentive plan.

The Driving Range

So I need to go out to the driving range and start working on my other clubs – maybe starting with the 8-iron and moving down the line**.  That is the only way that I will ever improve my game and become a “good” golfer. 

The only way a company will ever become really good at motivating its employees is to start developing their skills with other methods of engagement besides incentives.

We can look at the 4-Drive Model of Employee Motivation and know that we have to engage people in bonding, learning and defending as well as in acquiring.

Get out on the proverbial driving range and see what works for you.  Add a little more job rotation.  Change the goal setting system.  Maybe some more team building.  How about a more open and communicative culture.  It takes practice.  It takes time.  There will be a few shots that go in the water…but in the end, its what is required to become a scratch golfer or a great company!

(**Of course, I think I’ll take a few more weeks off from golf to fully recover…I mean 99 holes in 5 days is a lot!)

Let us know what your favorite club is – leave a comment!

“We are human beings, not machines”

On May 3, 2011

In Employee Motivation, Leadership, Motivation, Uncategorized

I just read a blog post by Michael Lee Stallard entitled “Should Leaders Care About Employee Happiness?” in which he talks about how happiness is important to business and how organizations need both “task” and “relationship” excellence.  What struck me hard however, were two simple sentences he wrote:

“We are human beings, not machines.  Emotion matters, even in business.”

How very, very true.  “Emotion matters, even in business.”

This should be a no brainer.  We shouldn’t even need to bring this up and yet we do need to bring it up because leaders often forget this.  We lead like our employees are parts of a big organizational machine and if we just push and pull the right levers, we will get the desired output.  We build systems looking for optimal performance and use incentives as if they were the gasoline that runs our engines.

We forget that “we are human beings, not machines.”  And as Dan Ariely points out, we are “irrational” human beings.

We need to stop thinking about business as a machine, and think about it more as a volunteer service club.  Imagine you are the president of a Rotary Club and you need to get your club members to work on a project.  You don’t offer them an incentive.  You don’t command that they give up their Saturday to build a music park in North East Minneapolis or spend two years working to build a high school in Haiti (FYI – our Rotary Club did both of these – see here).  You don’t give them new computerized systems that churn out delivery plans.  You can’t.  Service clubs don’t work that way…

What you do is you appeal to their “humanness” and their “emotion.” 

  • You tap into their drive to want to make a difference.
  • Ensure that they feel that they are being challenged and give them an opportunity to grow.
  • You make sure that they have friends in the club that they bond with so they can work on the projects together.
  • You make the work as fun as you can.
  • You focus on the good that you are doing in the community and the world.
  • You appeal to people’s pride in what they can bring to the table for this project.
  • You connect them to others with similar interests.
  • You give them opportunities to develop and lead.
  • You support them when they run into problems.
  • You recognize their success and hard work.
  • You celebrate success!

Yes, if you want to be an effective leader, you definitely need to focus on the very human side of things.  Remember “We are human beings, not machines.  Emotions matter, even in business.”

Would love your human thoughts on this – click on “leave a comment” below

What was the best incentive program you’ve ever been part of?

On May 2, 2011

In Employee Motivation, Incentive Compensation, Incentive Plans and Sales Awards, Leadership, Motivation, Uncategorized

We’d like to know what you think was the best incentive program that you’ve ever been a part of – either as a participant, a designer, consultant or manager.

  • What was “it” that made the program stand out for you and make it special?
  • How was it different?
  • What did it do?

Leave a comment and let us know…just click below on “leave a comment”

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