10 Things I Wish I Knew When I Was 20
1. TAKE RISKS WHEN YOU CAN
Have you ever noticed how many immigrants own their own businesses? Many of them came to America with little to nothing and therefore had nothing to lose. What a perfect time to start a business! If you aspire to start your own business, or try a new career, do it before you have too much to risk losing!
2. CONFIDENCE IS MORE THAN HALF THE BATTLE
Whether you are trying to attract that perfect partner or presenting in front of a boardroom of executives, confidence is absolutely key. If you lack self confidence, fake it for now and find it quickly. Pick a hobby or join an organization that will help you build your self confidence. For me, completing Navy Flight Training was the ultimate self confidence booster!
3. DON’T UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF NETWORKING
With the advent of the Internet, you really have no excuse. You must network. I have example after example of how networking has helped me over the years. Enough said.
4. DRESS FOR THE JOB YOU WANT
Pretty straight forward, if you want a promotion, dress like your boss, not like your peers.
5. DON’T FEAR CHANGING COURSE
There is more than one solution to your life’s puzzle, If you can’t find the right spot for the next piece, it’s OK to move to another corner of the puzzle! I went to school with a plan to work on Wall Street, but spent my first 8 years out of college in the Navy and ended up working in high tech sales. There will be twists and turns, embrace them, it’s part of life’s grand journey!
6. PUBLISH YOUR GOALS
It’s the best way to ensure you hold yourself accountable for yourself. If you don’t write them down, more than likely they won’t get done.
7. FOLLOW YOUR PASSION
A large percentage of successful people and millionaires didn’t do it for the money, they did it because it was their passion. Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Walmart, they were pursuing their passion, not a quick buck. Do what you love and you’ll never work another day in your life!
8. CHOOSE YOUR ATTITUDE
It’s a well know quote, “it’s not what happens to you, it’s how you react to what happens to you”. This is the key to choosing your own attitude. It’s one of the only things that you have complete control over and it can be the difference between being generally happy or being consistently pissed off!
9. LAUGH AT YOURSELF
When I finally learned to accept myself for who I am, along with all of my faults and idiosyncrasies, was the day I learned to laugh at myself. More importantly, stop worrying about what others think of you. Of all the people you will encounter in life, 50% will like you, 25% will dislike you and the last 25% will always be making up their mind. You are who you are and your ideas and actions mean something to someone so stop trying to please everyone. Abraham Lincoln said you can please all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.
10. MAKE MISTAKES NOT EXCUSES
The best life lessons come from our mistakes. Some of the best and brightest sight their mistakes as the best learning moments in their journeys. Embrace your mistakes and own up to them, don’t make excuses, no one ever got ahead in life by being excellent at excuses.
The Corporate Tune Up
Is your organization running on all cylinders? Is your organization capable of running on all cylinders? You may be getting the most out of your current infrastructure, but is you organization’s capability optimized, set up to produce 100%? An inefficient organization will never reach full capability or capacity. Don’t confuse inefficiency with under-capacity. When a cup is only half full, this represents under-capacity, not utilizing everything that’s available. However, if you picture a paper cup being squeezed such that it can’t hold as much as it once did, this represents inefficiency. An inefficient organization will never reach its full capability or capacity, it is not possible as some of their potential is being squeezed right out of them. When an organization has learned to yield its maximum potential, we can call this the “optimized organization”.
Are you in need of a corporate “tune up”, are all of your organization’s cylinders firing but you’re just not getting full power? Maybe suboptimal performance, processes and/or behaviors are holding you back. Let’s consider your organization’s weaknesses. I’ve always said a home builder is only as good as his worst contractor. Every contractor plays such an important role in the building of a house that one bad contractor can ruin your whole reputation, and in home-building, reputation is everything. This is the weakest link concept, “only as strong as your weakest link”. An offensive line in football is much the same where one weakness can be exploited by the defense and can overshadow the other stronger linemen. Have you identified your weakest links and ensured that you are leveraging their strengths and not exploiting their weaknesses? In the book, “First, Break all the Rules”, authors Buckingham and Coffman say you shouldn’t try to change or improve people’s faults, instead you should focus on their natural strengths. Through proper resource utilization, you can minimize the weak links in your organization.
Once you have your people in the right roles, how do you optimize even more? The concept of synergy, the sum of two parts being greater than the whole, is a big factor when looking at optimized efficiency. When you have a micromanaging environment, where 2 or more people are focused on the same task, the output is very often less than the whole. When you set your people loose, you can truly achieve a synergistic effect as an empowering environment and culture creates a synergistic effect. In most assembly line style manufacturing environments, the line workers are told to optimize the process they’ve been given. In empowered environments, not only are they optimizing the process they’ve been given, they are also always looking for ways to improve the process, “expand the cup”. There are many documented cases from automotive assembly lines where the line workers had the best ideas for improvement but in most cases, they were never asked. In the cases where their opinions were sought, amazing improvements were often the result. So by making continuous improvement everyone’s responsibility, you create a synergistic effect by getting more out of each and every employee.
Why are processes suboptimal in the first place, why didn’t we just get it right the first time? There’s a story of a young mother cooking a roast for guests and before she puts it in the pan, she cuts a portion of each end off the roast. When one of the guest inquires into the genesis of this unique chef’s secret, the mother replies, “well, that’s just the way my mother always did it”. The reality is that her mother’s roasting pan was too narrow for most roasts, so she had to cut it to get it to fit into the pan! Many organizations today operate under this same mantra, “that’s just the way we’ve always done it”. Well, has anyone stepped back and asked why we’re doing it this way? The status quo may have worked at one point, but as markets, resources and priorities change, you have to change your processes too, organizations must focus on “continuous improvement” to ensure that they are always optimized for the best performance.
Yogi Bera once said, “We’re lost, but we’re making good time!”. You may think you’re making good progress, but are you certain you’re “not” taking the long way? You may feel like you’re doing the best you can and when you’ve finally topped off that cup, it may appear that you’ve succeeded, but then you take a step back and realize that you could be expanding your capability and getting more into that cup after all. This is what separates good organizations from great ones, the latter make “continuous improvement” a habit and are always looking for new ways to expand the cup. So if you want to keep your organization in its peak working condition, always look for opportunities for that next tune up!
Head Games
The mind, at the risk of sounding cliche, is truly a powerful thing. The power of persuasion by your mind, whether it’s internally or externally initiated, is truly fascinating! One of my favorite TED talks is Dan Gilbert’s lecture on happiness, where he reveals the mind’s amazing ability to rationalize any situation. He reveals a surprising slide that shows equal rates of satisfaction between lottery winners and paraplegics. Dan explains that when presented with a situation that can’t be changed, the mind has the ability to not just merely adapt to, but to actually accept the situation as for the best.
A simple but interesting example from my own life occurred when I left the Navy and started my career with IBM. My first 6 months was to be spent at a training site in Michigan with about 25 other new hires. Since most of us lived in other states, I agreed to share an apartment with a colleague. When we were informed by our chosen apartment complex that the only apartment available didn’t have a dishwasher, we were at first disappointed (who wants to do dishes!), but eventually convinced ourselves that this would be just fine. As it turned out, not only did we manage to rationalize the lack of this little luxury to the point of satisfaction with the situation, but our minds had truly fooled us. You see, we lived in this apartment for a full 6 weeks, scrubbing away at those dishes, only when the sink could be heard calling mercy, before I noticed an appliance in our kitchen that looked amazingly like a dishwasher! Yes, we were dumbfounded for a few moments, wondering why we didn’t notice it earlier. The mind is a powerful thing!
So how do these head games apply to leadership and management? Motivation can be both internal (a self motivated individual) or external, as from a management perspective, where the genesis is typically purely external. Just as we can convince ourselves that we’ll be better off without that dishwasher, a good manager can motivate someone to believe they can do better, or in the negative case, to believe that they are a failure or worthless. Some minds are strong enough to overcome negative input and actually turn it into a powerful self motivator. External motivation can come in many forms including competition, peer pressure, fear and even from a simple motivational poster.
I mentioned before the mind’s ability to self persuade, both from internal and external sources. Some of the best examples of internally generated self motivation are from the sports world. Examples such as Babe Ruth’s called home run in the fifth inning of Game 3 of the 1932 World Series. Or Tim Tebow’s emotional declaration in 2008 that he would push himself and his team to play harder than any other in the country, after a shocking early season loss, only to convincingly run the table and win the National Title. These are cases where individuals were able to convince themselves of the possible, not that they willed it to happen, but they significantly increased their odds by believing that it would happen.
The skillful ability to motivate yourself or someone else to achieve a goal, or to some level of achievement, is only eclipsed by a great leader’s ability to inspire someone from within. Inspiration actually creates the desire (or want) to achieve from within where motivation convinces an individual that they should do something. When you walk out of a inspirational movie, you want to go do something great, not because the movie or actors told you to, but because the story inspired you from within to want to do so. A great leader has this ability to make you want to do something without actually having to specifically direct you.
Leaders have the ability to inspire, generating your own internal motivators, whereas managers motivate, creating an external source of direction and cause. So whether you consider yourself a leader, a manager, or a follower (the reality is everyone has the chance to be all of the above at one time or another), be aware that your actions, words and thoughts have great influence on not only others, but yourself as well. This video clip is a simple example that demonstrates this with a coaches ability to motivate a player, a player’s ability to inspire his team, and the mind’s ability to fool oneself to accomplish something that was previously thought impossible. Remember, when it comes to persuasion of one’s mind, everyone has their head in the game!
A Case for the Back Seat Driver
On a recent back roads trip to visit a remote customer, I decided to use my trusty GPS system for guidance. There I was, cruising comfortably along, assuming that I had set the GPS up correctly and entered the right address for a successful journey. Then, out of the blue my friendly on-board computer says, “In four hundred yards, continue straight”. Interesting that this machine just wanted to assure me that I was still pointed in the right direction. I really hadn’t received any directional instructions in a while, so quite frankly, I was beginning to wonder if I was still on the right track. It really was rather reassuring to have that interim positive update!
In general, giving consistent feedback is a good philosophy to follow, and unlike the typical back seat driver, the goal here is to focus more on positive feedback. In any organization, whether you’re dealing with your lower performers or your number one star, everyone needs a nod now and then to know when they’re on the right track. It is often believed that your superstars don’t need as much attention, that they’re self motivated. Everyone benefits from motivation and recognition, even your best performers. A perfect example is a star athlete or even a renowned scholar who has always performed at the highest levels and succeeded above most others. Even with a rich history of success and accolades, the one thing at the top of their mind is will they be tapped for the highest recognition. In the case of the star athlete, it’s probably the hall of fame for their sport, and for the renowned scholar, it could be the Nobel prize. So you can see, even your most talented employees are most likely still wondering if they’re fully appreciated.
Furthermore, recognition shouldn’t be reserved for the elite few. We should never assume that someone knows they’re doing a good job and knows they’re appreciated, that is the quickest way to accomplish just the opposite. If your goal is to keep everyone engaged and in the game, they have to know that their work matters, and their good work matters even more. There are many ways to recognize everyone’s solid work or positive outcomes, and even a simple mention of an accomplishment at a team meeting will go a long way. As long as your recognition is justified, and also selective enough as to not be overdone, it will continue to be a very effective motivational tool. So go ahead and and be that back seat driver, just remember that even your best drivers will appreciate hearing from you now and then.
Ghosts of Heroes Present
For the past month, the untimely passing of Michael Jackson has dominated the press. I won’t deny that he was a very talented artist, however the cult like worship of him and the fanfare surrounding his funeral is just hard for me to comprehend. My role models are my father, veterans and heroes of American wars past and present, inventors and entrepreneurs, our founding fathers, selfless public servants, you get the idea. Sure there are artists (musicians, actors and actresses) that I enjoy and athletes that I admire, but I see them as people, just like you and me, who happen to have a unique talent. On the other hand, it’s those people who use their talents to change the world, protect our freedoms, and truly make a difference who are the true heroes worthy of fanatical worship ( I am not necessarily suggesting we should worship them, just that they are worthy!). If we held public servants and teachers in higher regard, and publicly supported our soldiers as much as we do our favorite artists and athletes, this world would be a much better place. The overzealous infatuation with the stars of the media is not an intellectually healthy pastime. It is fine to be passionate about an artist or athlete (I know many who are big fans of Michael Jackson), however when this passion comes at the expense of engaging in healthy obsessions, then it becomes counterproductive to society. It is healthy obsessions that have produced this country’s great innovations and companies, artists and athletes, and the reason many still go into public service with a passion to help others. Yes, I included artists and athletes. These are great vocational choices, and they do provide a service to society, but it’s obviously better to aspire to be one rather than excessively idolize one.
On the subject of star athletes, who have really become larger than life in recent years, there’s been plenty of press lately due to huge off season multimillion dollar contract signings. Now, I believe in free market capitalism and I also understand the supply and demand economics of pro sports. As long as people are willing to shell out big money to watch the games, and support their teams, then the sports leagues can justify the big salaries. The fundamental anomaly I see however, is with the food chain, the circle of life for a pro athlete so to speak. Our school districts across this nation are struggling to fund their budgets and in some cases canceling sports programs, and yet there is a seemingly continuous flow of millions into our pro sports teams. If you think about it, school is basically the initial training ground for pro athletes (both intellectually and physically). It seems a little ironic and self defeating that we would allow our schools to suffer, jeopardizing the very core of youth development, all while applauding the bigger and bigger contracts when we land that star player on our team. Neglecting the very source of today’s treasured sports heroes presents somewhat of a paradox. This would be like fishing a lake dry only to realize that there are no fish left to repopulate the lake. Please note, as a fiscal conservative, I am not suggesting that we over tax pro athletes and owners so we can fund our schools. I am only pointing out the moral conundrum that this presents.
My goal is to put a little perspective around priorities today and give us something to think about. If you’re reading this, you probably already agree with most of what I’ve said here, but unfortunately, much of society doesn’t quite get it and the media’s untiring coverage of celebrities and athletes only fuels the fire. Not so long ago, our heroes included astronauts, soldiers, scientists and explorers and our values were much more grounded. I’d hate to see this spirit fade away and become mere ghosts to that of the (less deserving) modern day media heroes. That is why it’s vital that we exercise the personal leadership to keep the focus on the right priorities (and maybe the media will follow, someday). Thank a veteran, hug a nurse, teach history, coach a youth team, invent something, drop off cookies at the fire station, volunteer with Junior Achievement, go to the school bake sale, support your PTA, learn an instrument, run for your school board, and of course, call you dad. The bottom line is never lose sight of the people and values that should really be at the top of our list. By keeping our priorities in check and personally investing in each other, we will sow the seeds for a fundamentally better tomorrow.
America The Amazing
The United States of America is celebrating its 233 birthday this July 4th. To understand fully how truly young our country is, let me provide a little perspective. Most are aware that the vast majority of other countries and civilizations have existed for thousands of years, with the oldest civilizations dating to about 10,000 years old or so. This by itself makes The United States seem like an infant on this earth, but also consider how long some of the great ancient world powers existed. The Persian Empire ruled the ancient world for about the same amount of time that we’ve been a country. The (Western) Roman Empire ruled for over 500 years and the Eastern Roman Empire (The Byzantine Empire) existed for over 1000 years. The British Empire was the dominant world power off and on for about 300 years. So not only are we far younger than just about every other country by a long shot, there have been numerous empires whose rule lasted longer than The U.S. has existed.
In our short 233 year history we have gained our independence, survived a civil war, settled 50 states, contributed to victories in 2 world wars, and sent a man to the moon. In the days leading up to America’s birth in 1776, under the leadership of our founding fathers, all 13 of the original colonies unanimously signed the declaration penned by Thomas Jefferson. This Virginian was chosen deliberately to ensure we had the vital support of the South in our quest for independence. The differing relations between the North and South continued for many years, leading us into a Civil War in 1861. Although this was the deadliest war in U.S. history, under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln, it effectively ended slavery and created an even stronger Union that would go on to become a world superpower. Between 1917 and 1918, after joining the Allied Powers in WWI, The U.S. was able to mobilize 1,300,000 troops to Europe in just over a year, and at its peak was sending 10,000 fresh troops a day to France, all by ship. This rapid mobilization caught the enemy unprepared for America’s involvement and was key in our ability to turn the tide of the war . Just over 20 years later, after losing nearly all of our battleships in the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, we entered and fought a war on 2 fronts (Europe and The Pacific), and against all odds, The U.S. helped defeat The Axis Powers. I deliberately used the words “helped defeat” when describing the outcome. You see, it is true The U.S. sacrificed about 400,000 lives in the war, however, in contrast, our ally the Soviet Union lost over 25,000,000 (civilian and military).
Our population’s growth has been unprecedented. Shortly after our country was born at the turn of the century, our population was just over 3 Million. Today, about 10 generations later, our population is estimated to be over 300 Million. To accommodate America’s rapidly growing population, a celebrated General from WWII, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, launched what has become the largest system of highways in the world. From 1956 to 1993, 42,000 miles of Interstate Highways were built connecting all corners of America, enough to circle the earth just about twice. Finally, also this July, we will celebrate the 40th anniversary of the 1969 Apollo mission which magnificently achieved John F. Kennedy’s goal of putting the first man on the moon. When Neil Armstrong announced, “The Eagle Has Landed”, it was revealed that the lunar module only had 17 secs of landing fuel left, a miraculous event that was only seconds away from disaster! Over the next 3 years, we would send 5 more manned missions to the moon. The United States is still the only country to have flown a man to the surface of the moon.
Over the course of our history, The United States produced the following inventions: Bifocals, Refrigeration, The Telegraph, The Revolver, The Combine, The Printing Press, The Potato Chip (Yum!), The Motorcycle, The Game of Baseball, The Vacuum Cleaner, The Fire Hydrant, The Phonograph, The Fountain Pen, The Skyscraper, The Escalator, The Tractor, Cotton Candy, Air Conditioning, The Hearing Aid, The Bulldozer, Sunglasses and who can forget, The Wright Brothers famous Airplane. The list could go on and on with modern day technological inventions, but you get the idea, The United States is truly the land of opportunity where your only limits are the boundaries of your imagination.
If you are fortunate enough to be a part of this great democracy, as a citizen or as a guest, I hope you recognize and appreciate all of the rich history and amazing gifts that America has to offer. In her brief 233 years, she has accomplished so much and we should feel pride every day. America is rightfully named “The Land of Opportunity”, and it should be clear, if you put your mind to it, anything, and I mean anything, is possible. Happy Birthday America!
Less What More Why!
“Mr. Watson, come here, I need you”! The famous words of Alexander Graham Bell which ushered in a new era of communication. Do you think Thomas Watson had any idea why Mr Bell needed him, well in this case he surely did, they had just invented the telephone! Many times in our communications, it isn’t so clear what the genesis of the message is, and the true context of the communication isn’t so obvious. One recent Saturday, I sent my young daughter next door and told her to ask for some “brown twine” (I needed to tie a clematis vine to a post). Well, without understanding why I needed brown twine off she went. I wish I could have been present for that conversation next door because you see, she promptly carried back a bottle of “white wine”! I can hear my neighbor now, “Are you sure he didn’t want white wine, there is red and white, but no brown wine”! Had I simply explained to my daughter why I needed the brown twine, she easily could have accomplished this task on the first try.
Another simple example from my life. I treated my son and 4 of his friends to a day of paint ball, renting them all of the equipment and buying them a “starter pack” of paintballs. Well, they were burning through paintballs much faster than I anticipated with these semi-automatic paint ball guns (markers). So after yet another refill, I told them to “not shoot until you see the whites of their eyes”. Soon enough, they were back for yet another refill with seemingly little improvement in paintball conservation. So this time I simply said, “it costs me a nickel every time each of you pulls the trigger”……ahh, the lightbulbs went on as they all realized that although this was my treat, they were needlessly costing me more money by firing with reckless abandon. Well, as you can expect, the paintball burn rate improved dramatically from that point, they now clearly understood “the why” behind my request.
Often times in our everyday business communications (especially in superior to subordinate exchanges) we are too quick to exclude the context of the message or request. This not only makes it more difficult to successfully accomplish a task, but it also gives the recipient the feeling of just being a worker as opposed to being a key step in the process or part of the bigger picture. This is often referred to as being “engaged”. A recent Gallup study cited that an engaged team delivers greater customer advocacy, improved productivity and increased profitability. I’ve talked about the importance of empowerment, but empowerment is useless if you can’t get the team to engage. The former CEO of GE, Jack Welch, said, “getting every employee’s mind into the game…there’s nothing more important!”.
Here’s an analogy from the football field. Imagine if a quarterback only told the offensive line their blocking scheme without informing them of the play? Not only would this would severely limit their ability to adjust on the fly and improvise when necessary, but it would also make them feel like they’re not really a very important part of the team.
Oftentimes organizations will try to function with a style akin to the traditional military chain of command. The top of the pyramid makes the decisions, the middle passes on this information and bottom executes with little room for interpretation. These line workers end up being like the doomed soldiers, immortalized by Alfred Tennyson’s, The Charge of the Light Brigade:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
The men Tennyson was writing about were not born with the willingness to obey without question to their deaths. Although they might not understand why, they react without hesitation because they’ve had countless hours of military training, teaching them to unconditionally follow orders. Their inherent creative intellect had to be suppressed before they could go into battle. Although this is very effective for soldiers, it just isn’t the best strategy for most other organizations.
This concept of more effective communication is closely related to my earlier post, “Don’t Forget to Share”. The more you share information and the more effectively you communicate within your organization, the better chance you’ll have a fully engaged workforce. The bottom line is not only should you be over communicating within your organization, you also need to be careful to ensure that everyone understands the important details behind your communications. So let’s review, communicate early and often and be clear about the context of not just what you’re doing, but why you’re doing it!
“22” A Rally Cry
Long ago a ship set sail with a full crew from the West Coast of Europe. They encountered calm seas and the navigation was sound. They made it to their destination in the Southern Atlantic on schedule and didn’t encounter any major issues while en route. Although this is a terrific outcome, it’s not a very exciting story. Not the kind of story that produces legends or great non-fiction literary works. My point is that, during tough times, like the rough economic situation we’re experiencing right now, is when new leaders are born. This post is about finding your motivation to succeed in not just good times, but in tough times as well. If you look carefully, you’ll find extraordinary opportunities in times like these, this is your window of opportunity to step up, differentiate yourself and truly make a difference.
Now what is the title “22” all about? In 1914, Sir Ernest Shakleton, with his 28 man crew, set sail on the Endurance on a expedition to achieve the first land crossing of the Antarctic Continent. I won’t get into the details of their multi-year adventure in this post, but let’s just say that things didn’t go as planned. To net it out, just a few months into their journey, they lost their ship to the crushing grip of the ice pack and spent the rest of their journey stranded in isolated, sub-zero cold and barren conditions. Through the skillful planning and leadership of Shakleton, and the determination of his crew, they managed to find food, create shelter and opportunistically changed camps many times as they made strategic moves in an effort to survive this ordeal. In the end, Shakleton secured their own rescue by launching himself and 5 men in a life raft on a 16 day journey through rough and icy seas back to the island of South Georgia where they launched the expedition many months prior. Shakleton returned with another ship to pick up his crew and it would be almost 2 years from the time they left civilization until their ultimate rescue, and amazingly every member of the crew survived this 22 month ordeal.
So the simple phrase “22” has become the rally cry for my team in these tough economic times. With determination and resolve, anything is possible, and the inspirational 22 month journey of Ernest Shakleton and his crew is one more source to fuel an “anything is possible” attitude that can drive one towards continued success. I recommend Dennis Perkins, Leading at the Edge for a leadership account of this extraordinary saga.