Where Passion Comes From

Passion is longing to be what you could be, but aren’t.

Passion for leadership is the combination of falling below your imagined leadership potential and longing for exceptional leadership – at the same time.

The gap between longing and attainment is passion.

You:

ABC’s of finding your passion:

1. Accept disappointing performance. You read leadership books, blogs, and articles because you long to be better. You aren’t there yet. Pain gives birth of passion.
2. Believe improvement is possible and worthwhile. Hope makes you bold.
3. Create a Picture of the preferred future. Think about ultimate goals not the process. You aren’t sure how to get there. But, when you close your eyes and dream, you see the end.
4. Deliberate steps – action. The whole path is never clear but a step is always possible.

Others:

People fuel our passion when they make us feel we matter.

Recently, people fueled my passion, again. It happened during a presentation to a group of Human Resource professionals.

I paced the back of the room like a caged animal while announcements were made. A participant came back and said, “Can I do anything to make you more comfortable?” I’m not sure if my pacing invited the question but it made me feel I mattered.

A participant asked me to sign their program. I felt awkward and didn’t respond well. “Really?” I said. I regret saying that. After reflection, it makes me feel I matter.

About half-way through my presentation, someone asked, “What’s the future for you, Dan?” That wasn’t the topic. I almost brushed it off. Instead I gave a short reply and moved on. It made me feel I mattered.

Leaders make others feel they matter.
Any fool can make others feel they don’t matter.

Passion – the courage to act on dreams – comes from within and without.

How are you making people feel they matter?

Where does your passion come from?

Sour Faces Whining About Sour Faces

I’m sick of organizations that don’t measure what matters.

Production targets flash on computer screens. Today’s production target: 1,500 widgets. Current: 837 widgets. The message: people are tools.

Measurement reflects value.

Where is the morale meter? Morale doesn’t matter when you don’t measure morale building behaviors.

What isn’t measured doesn’t matter,
even if you say it does.

Organizations must measure widget production. No argument from me. But, where the heck are the:

1. Smile meters.
2. Compliment counters.
3. Laugh tracks. (pun intended)
4. Pat-on-the-back targets.

I’m tired of complaints about sad environments. Do something about it.

Place smile-counting buttons on every computer screen. Every time someone smiles at you, push the smile icon. Position a smile-tracking-board in the lobby for everyone to see. I’m not joking.

Go large and create columns on a public board to record: smiles, laughs, compliments, and pats on the back. Go crazy and count the number of jokes told in the office. Give extra credit for bad jokes.

Skeptics:

“What if they don’t mean it, you ask?” Who gives a crap? Just do it. Sarcastic smiles are funny. A begrudging grin is better than no grin.

Smile even if you don’t mean it.
After a while you will.

I’m sick of hearing leaders with sour faces whining about sour faces.

I’ve been places where smiles appear briefly on full moon, when the brave crazies come out.

You’re so full of yourself that you don’t dare measure morale building behaviors because morale sucks so bad in your organization. If you don’t do something about it, learn to enjoy it.

Measure:

Happiness matters. Measure it. What gets measure gets done. By the way, people aren’t tools!

How can leaders focus on happiness without losing sight of results?

Do something to enrich your personal morale. Join me, April 4th, for a FREE – LIVE conference call with Dr. Henry Cloud. Learn the surprising truth that setting boundaries extends results. INFO

How to Inspire Others

Drag others down and you’ll go down with them. The magnitude of your impact is determined by your ability to ignite passion in others.

You make a difference by
inspiring others to make a difference.

Those you inspire pull you forward. They don’t require pushing.

Five qualities of inspirational leaders:

Jeremy Kingsley, author of, “Inspired People Produce Results,” says inspirational leaders are:

1. Dedicated.
2. Loyal.
3. Visionary.
4. Planners.
5. Confident.

5 Questions:

Jeremy offers a series of questions to assess your inspiration quotient:

1. Do you absolutely believe in what your organization does and stands for?
2. Do you have a plan for tomorrow?
3. Do you enjoy planning your strategy?
4. Are you optimistic?
5. Do you motivate others easily?

I believe…

Leadership value is determined by the ability to inspire.

Don’t tell me what you can do. Tell me what you can inspire others to do.

Four surprising qualities of inspirational leaders:

1. Passion balanced with compassion. The pursuit of personal gain and glory doesn’t inspire, it threatens. Inspiration occurs when others believe you genuinely put them before yourself.
2. Strengths and frailties. The frailties you’re working through inspire others to work through theirs. Avoid whining. Focus on hope, progress, and benefit.
3. Belief. “The people who influence you are the people who believe in you,” Henry Drummond.
4. Optimism. Rise above the failures of others by believing in their future. Those who believe in others inspire others.

Lousy leaders push down. Successful leaders lift up.

“Keep away from those who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you believe that you too can become great,” Mark Twain.

Bonus:

I asked Jeremy how leaders inspire themselves. He talked about finding mentors. In his own words (2:35): 

Who has inspired you? How?

How do you inspire others?

Five Strategies for Changing Others

It’s “Sprinter” in Central Pennsylvania. Spring isn’t here. Winter hangs on. One day it’s sunny and warm. Yesterday it snowed!

Change comes slowly. Winter won’t let Spring arrive. It’s the time of uncertainty and reluctance.

Change:

Unwilling to change is arrogant resistance, fearful reluctance, or ignorant blindness. Or maybe the present is just fine.

My preference is changing others not me. Changing others enhances potential and extends capacity. Changing others feels like adding new brush strokes to paintings.

Changing me, on the other hand, feels like drilling cavities without Novocain.

Seeing Oz or not:

My focus on the future makes me wonder why you resist change. Can’t you see the glow of Oz just around the corner?

While I see Oz, you’re seeing Kansas and it looks pretty damn good compared to a fuzzy glow in the distance.

Your dreams don’t change others until others dream them.

I think about reaching forward and feel excitement. You think about letting go and feel afraid.

How to change others:

1. Work on changing you before others. Go no further until you’ve made changes!
2. Don’t demonize Kansas unless it’s already disappointing. Criticizing an acceptable present to those who built it makes enemies not allies.
3. Celebrate the people and behaviors that built the present. They build the future. Don’t insult them.
4. Talk about Oz in the language of Kansas. Connect with their passion to make a difference. Ignite aspirations. Often, inspiring others centers on helping others find courage.
5. Paint others in the picture. Help them see where they fit in. Connect current passion with future possibility. When people see themselves in the future they find courage to release the past.

Change begins by imagining new futures. Belief in the future releases Spring’s life. But, clinging to the present strengthens Winter’s grip.

How can leaders become effective agents of change?

5 Structures that Shaped Zappos’ Culture

Lack of focus wastes energy, squanders resources, and defeats hope. Focus, on the other hand, eliminates the superfluous in order to grasp the essential.

Success requires focus.

Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, describes his focus in two words, “Company culture.”

Dr. David Vik (Doc), author of, “The Culture Secret,” helped build the world renowned culture of Zappos. During our conversation he said leaders tried to replicate Zappos’ culture in their own businesses, but often failed.

Trying to replicate another organization’s culture is like putting decorations on a Christmas tree. It’s pretty at first and garbage in the end.

Doc says, “There are two parts to any Culture. The first is structure.” Culture development fails when it’s all decorations but no structure.

5 Structures that shape Zappos’ Culture:

1. Vision: What the organization is doing and wants to do.
2. Purpose: Why the organization is doing what it does.
3. Business Model: How vision is accomplished.
4. Wow Factors: What makes the organization stand out?
5. Values: What the company and employees care about.

Doc says, “The second part of Culture is people.”

5 behavioral expressions of culture:

Sustained culture development and transformation requires behavioral alignment with the culture building structures listed above. Behavioral alignment includes:

1. Habits.
2. Routines.
3. Shared language.
4. Common beliefs
5. Mutual decisions.

Roots of failure:

Doc explained failure to develop the five structures dooms culture development. It’s hanging pretty decorations on shabby trees.

Building organizational culture begins with structures not decorations.

Why focus on culture:

Tony Hsieh says, “If you get the culture right, then a lot of really amazing things happen on their own.”

Check out, “The Culture Secret,” written by a guy who helped develop the best culture on the planet.

What factors develop or transform organizational culture?

How Hammers Become Screw Drivers

Little Mary just knocked a glass of milk on the floor. That’s what two year old’s do.

There’s a group of five leaders at the table.

Bob waves the waiter over and says, “Could someone clean this up?”

Mindy says, “That happened because the milk was too close to the edge.”

Joe says, “Don’t worry, I’ll buy another one.”

Mark says, “Its ok little Mary, don’t feel bad.”

Betty says, “I’ll take little Mary to the restroom. Phil, will you get the waiter. Bob, I noticed another booster seat near the door, would you get that, please?”

Everyone employs default responses.

1. Explain
2. Comfort
3. Teach
4. Fix
5. Organize
6. Do
7. Delegate

Expand leadership potential by imagining new responses.

Put on the delegator’s hat, if you tend to fix or comfort, for example. Become an organizer - in your imagination - if you’re a doer.

Become a screw driver:

Hammers see every problem as a nail. Expand your potential by becoming a screw driver.

1. Identify default responses.
2. Imagine new responses. Ask yourself, “How does Mary handle this type of situation?”
3. Test new language.
4. Invite feedback.
5. Continue practicing your screw driver skills.

Leaders become ineffective – one string banjos – unless they imagine themselves in new ways.

Imagine you’re a screw driver. You can’t do what you can’t imagine. When default responses aren’t getting you where you want to go, imagine yourself with new ones.

What is your default response to challenges, problems, or opportunities?

What new response can you imagine that might take you further?

Wasting Time on Mission and Vision

“I think there’s so much time and effort wasted on setting forth mission statements and vision statements…” Karen Martin, author of, The Outstanding Organization.”

Pointless vision:

Compelling vision doesn’t cure sick organizations. Martin said, “Many organizations have these lofty visions and they can’t even deliver product to customers…”

Forget about it:

Martin said, “I’m a little cynical about the whole vision-mission when people can’t perform well and customers aren’t being satisfied.”

Sick organizations should forget about
changing the world and change themselves.

Aim low not high. Do less not more. The most important thing sick organizations do is get healthy.

Useful vision:

“Being able to just get your work done successfully is a more important vision for an organization than … solving world hunger, for example, if they’re not able to perform at high levels, yet.” Karen Martin.

Finding health:

Martin’s book explains the path to health:

1. Clarity
2. Focus
3. Discipline
4. Engagement.

Clarity:

Clarity is the first step toward health. Ambiguity prolongs sickness.

Band-Aids don’t help broken arms. Diagnose the real problem. Prescriptions for misdiagnosed issues make matters worse.

Fuzzy problems don’t get solved. Name them! Misdiagnosed issues cause organizations to:

1. Cure symptoms, not causes.
2. Apply damaging solutions that don’t help.
3. Waste resources.
4. Offend sincere, talented employees by misdirecting their energy.

Interview:

4 minutes with Karen Martin explaining health over vision:

Quote:

“If the mission or vision doesn’t directly effect how [front-line people] are doing their work then it’s … pointless.”

Bonus:

Facebook contributors fill in the blank: Don’t focus on organizational vision if ______.

Getting Past Excuses

If I started over, knowing what I know today, I would …

Aim higher and start sooner.
Mark Hopkins

Excuses:

Mark went on to say, “Life’s curveballs and my conservative nature provide daily excuses for not doing what I am capable of.  But my experience has shown me that anyone can hit what they aim for, or very close to it.”

Mark’s comment reminded me of a quote attributed to Michelangelo, “The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark.”

Defeat excuses:

1. Develop deep experience. Experience provides perspective for aiming high. Mark said, “I’d get my Malcolm Gladwell 10,000 hours and go make a dream come true.” Gladwell says the key to success is practicing something for 10,000 hours.
2. Follow your drive. “In order to bring my ‘A’ game I need to be working on something I am passionate about.”
3. Build the team. “I would need an amazing team that was built on the kind of trust that only comes from knowing that we care about each other.”
4. Connect with mentors. “I would need a mentor who can take the pie-in-the-sky vision that I am hesitant to even say out loud and, through experience and personal example, lead me to the point where I can see my team making it happen.”

Failures:

1. Don’t stick with one thing long enough.
2. Follow expediency rather than passion.
3. Focus exclusively on themselves.
4. Think they know more than others.

Get real:

In my opinion, building the team and find mentors are the most neglected components of the road to success.

Why do people fall below their potential?

What makes aiming high more than pie-in-the-sky?

I haven’t read Mark’s book, Shortcut to Prosperity, but the table of contents goes well beyond pie-in-the-sky thinking.

Making Dreams Matter

Dreams smolder and die unless others own them.

Passion isn’t meaningful until it ignites others.

Igniting passion isn’t pumping up. Pumping up:

1. Is fun at events but manipulative as long-term strategy.
2. Places unnecessary burden on leaders and managers.
3. Never lasts.
4. Drains and exhausts. Pumping up pours energy from you to others.

Ignition:

Healthy people all dream the same dream;
they long to matter.

Igniting passion is always about their dream not yours. Leaders are matches. Fire and heat come from others.

Flames ignite the moment others see themselves in your dream. Help them find a place and watch the magic.

They own it when they’re in it.

Release:

Pumping up is pushing. Igniting passion is releasing. Once their fire starts, step back. Don’t control it; focus and fuel it.

1. Avoid limiting. Let your dream grow beyond you.
2. Don’t correct. See where they go.
3. Keep talking big picture and results. Passion and expertise from others fill in details.

Warning:

Details kill baby dreams. Let them grow legs before detailing them to death. Talk “what” when dreams are young. Talk “how” when they can walk.

The right people:

Dream killers are everywhere. Success depends on talking to people who share your values. Casually bring up your idea and watch for the sparkle. If you don’t see it, move on. They may ignite later.

Pulling not pushing:

Passionate people pull you; you don’t push them. There’s nothing better than watching a collection of small fires become one giant blaze.

Surprise:

Keep your dream in the back, like a back-seat drive. Keep their dream in the front. Everyone wants to matter. Give them a way.

Has someone ignited your passion? What did they do?

Have you ignited fires? What did you do?

Five Ways to Overcome the Folly of Perseverance

Bad ideas were good once but nothing always works.

Quitters never win. At least that’s what we think.

The danger of perseverance is
it’s virtuous but not always wise.

Thomas Edison famously said, “Many of life’s failures are men who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”

Don’t let Edison’s statement drive you along a losing course.

Why we persevere when we should quit:

1. Self-confidence. Leaders persist when they should adapt because of perceived competence. “I can make it work.”
2. Progress. A little progress is a dangerous thing.
3. Hope. “Hope is the worst of evils, for it prolongs the torment of man.” Friedrich Nietzsche.
4. Success in the past.
5. Fear of failure.

Bonus: The value of past effort drives people to commit more effort in the present, sunk cost.

How to quit:

1. Adapting isn’t giving up. Stay focused on big goals while adjusting methods.
2. Define failure, as well as success, before beginning.
3. Ask, “What would new leaders do?” Then, do it.
4. Invite feedback from outsiders. You don’t see what others see.
5. Believe self-confidence may lead you astray.

Bonus: Never let the fear of failure and losing face make you foolish. Humble yourself.

Why do leaders hang on too long?

How can leaders learn to let go of things that aren’t working?