Strategic Discipline Blog

We’ve all met people who bring their enthusiasm and passion to work with them.  Greg McKeown who co authored the book Multipliers with Liz Wiseman is one of those people.   It reminded me of the significant difference that we need to be aware of in our organizations: are our people fueled with enthusiasm and passion for what it is your business does for your customers?  A good question to develop a subsequent blog around.  
Greg’s passion surrounds his pursuit of a question that’s driven him even before writing and contributing to Multipliers, “How can we access more of the intelligence and capability already inherent in people everywhere?”

It’s possibly one of the most damning statements that can be made about a person or business.  It’s the equivalent of Jim Collins, “Good is the enemy of great.”

Last blog I discussed the importance of rituals and routines in developing accountability.  A recent article in the New York Times caught my attention since it focused on successful companies and the importance of getting the right people to make a business great.  People decisions are extremely important to making your business successful, and too often we fail to recognize how keeping the wrong people in our business holds us back.  We don’t see this as a piece of the accountability puzzle.  

“I’d get up at 4:30 AM, exercise, read something inspirational, and then have a healthy breakfast.  That was my routine.”  My client was explaining why he decided to re-gage our coaching work.  When we were working together this had been his faithful morning regiment, every day. For the past year or better he explained he’d not been following this routine and he found his business and personal focus suffering. 

Dan and Chip Heath, the authors of Switch, How to Change When Change is Hard, and Made to Stick recently sent out a newsletter FIVE TIPS FOR (FINALLY) GETTING YOUR NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION RIGHT that suggest ideas gleaned from their research that I’d like to suggest you peruse as you consider making your New Year’s resolutions.

What’s the easiest way to initiate strategic discipline?  Start with a daily huddle.  Perhaps your people are accountable already.  Perhaps they have metrics that they measure each day so they know how productive they are.  Perhaps they never get stuck.  And finally quite possibly you never have miscommunication.  Even if you can answer yes to each of these you’ll find the daily huddle brings a marked improvement in communication, accountability, and performance. 

It would hardly be Christmas and the holiday season if most of us weren’t feeling some stress.  It’s a little known fact what the real source of stress is.  What you are stressing about right now?  Most of us are hurrying to get our Christmas gifts purchased, and hoping we don’t forget anyone.  Some males even make it a habit to shop the very last day, Christmas Eve for their significant other.  Add this to your current to do list and it’s no wonder some of us border on insanity this time of year. 

Last blog Bad Performance is Your Responsibility we discussed how ultimately the results you are getting from your people is your accountability.  The bottom line here is that in order to get the 40% discretionary effort from your people which leads to higher performance you need to identify the behaviors that are producing poor outcomes and arrange consequences that will stop them.  Next identify the behaviors that will produce desirable outcomes and arrange consequences that will positively reinforce them. 

At the Growth Summit are many of our Gazelles clients.  Verne started the program on Tuesday morning sharing a video promo from NBC on a new prime-time series “School Pride.”  It’s extreme make-over for schools.  The show tells inspiring stories of communities coming together with public-minded companies like Logical Choice Technologies and many others to renovate aging and broken public schools. Cameras follow students, teachers, parents and community members as they roll up their sleeves and rebuild their own schools, concluding with the unveiling of a brand-new, completely transformed school.

It was before FM radio had taken the lead in listenership from AM.  That’s how long ago this story is.  I was the sales manager for a 3000 watt FM radio station in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.  My first year as a sales manager had been difficult.  We hadn’t managed to meet the previous year’s sales numbers and I was challenged to meet the new projections or the outcome would be back to a sales position.