Archive for Discipline
What does your daily agenda say about you?
Posted by: | CommentsHow would you describe your life? Are you achieving what you desire? Are you accomplishing the things that are important to you? Do you consider yourself a success? How do your prospects look for the future?
If I could come to your house and spend just one day with you, I would be able to tell whether or not you will be successful. You could pick the day. If I got up with you in the morning and went through the day with you, watching you for 24 hours, I could tell in what direction your life is headed.
When I tell this to people at conferences, there’s always a strong reaction. Some people are surprised. Some get defensive because they think I would be making a snap judgment about them. A few get ticked off because they think my claim sounds arrogant. Others are intrigued and desire to know why I make such a statement.
Here is why: I believe that the secret of your success is determined by your daily agenda. If you make a few key decisions and then manage them well in your daily agenda, you will succeed.
You will never change your life until you change something you do daily. You see, success, doesn’t just suddenly occur one day in someone’s life. For that matter, neither does failure. Each is a process. Every day of your life is merely preparation for the next. What you become is the result of what you do today. In other words…
You are preparing for something.
The question is, What are you preparing for? Are you grooming yourself for success or failure? As my father used to tell me when I was growing up, “You can pay now, and play later, or you can play now and pay later. But either way, you are going to pay.” The idea was that you can play and take it easy and do what you want today, but if you do, your life will be harder later. However, if you work hard now, on the front end, then you will reap rewards in the future.
Think about it: What are you preparing for today? Success or failure? Does your daily agenda indicate that you make a habit of paying before you play? Answering these questions is a good predictor of what you will become tomorrow and in the future.
From Today Matters
Level 3 – Production: Making Things Happen Separates Real Leaders from Wannabes
Posted by: | CommentsThe 5 Levels of Leadership is almost here, and I’m excited. This is my best material, and it’s been tested and proven for over 30 years. I know the 5 Levels work.
Here on the blog, I’ve been going over the levels, and this week it’s time for Level 3: Production.
But before I get into the definition and value of production in a leader’s life, I want to clarify how the levels work. Remember the graphic? The 5 Levels are like a building – all the higher levels rest on the lower ones. Every leader must pass through every level to get to the next one. Level 2 builds on Level 1. You can’t be a Level 3 leader until you’ve mastered Level 2: Permission. But once you’ve built a relationship with your people, you’re ready to focus on producing results.
The Production level is where leadership really takes off and goes to another level. Production qualifies and separates true leaders from people who merely occupy leadership positions. Good leaders always make things happen. They get results. They can make a significant impact on an organization. Not only are they productive individually, but they also are able to help the team produce. This ability gives Level 3 leaders confidence, credibility, and increased influence.
No one can fake Level 3. Either you’re producing for the organization and adding to its bottom line (whatever that may be), or you’re not. Thomas Watson, the founder of IBM, noted, “The outstanding leaders of every age are those who set up their own quotas and constantly exceed them.” That is a good description of Level 3 leaders. They are self-motivated and productive. As a result, they create momentum and develop an environment of success, which makes the team better and stronger.
Another benefit of leadership on Level 3 is that it attracts other highly productive people. Producers are attractive to other producers. They respect one another. They enjoy collaborating. They get things done together. That ultimately creates growth for the organization.
Leaders can get to Level 1 for an almost endless number of reasons: They show promise. They have connections. They play politics. They have seniority. The organization is desperate. You name it, and someone has probably become a leader because of it. Leaders who are naturally good with people or who take pains to learn people skills can move up to Level 2. But some people never move up from Level 2 Permission to Level 3 Production. Why? They can’t seem to produce results. When that is the case, it’s usually because they lack the self-discipline, work ethic, organization, or skills to be productive. However, if you desire to go to higher levels of leadership, you simply have to produce. There is no other way around it.
Leading difficult people: Disorganized Debbie
Posted by: | CommentsDo you know anyone who’s always busy but never seems to get anything done? Maybe this person works for you. How do you lead someone who’s motivated and a doer, but still doesn’t contribute any meaningful results?
Meet Disorganized Debbie. She works hard and wants to succeed. Unfortunately, she looks like a rocking horse: always in motion, but never moving forward. Debbie can’t or won’t organize her work, which means she can’t achieve what she needs to for your organization.
We’ve been spending the past few weeks talking about leading difficult people. You can click the names to read about Fearful Fred, Slumped Susan, and Excited Eddie. Now let’s discuss how to understand, listen to, and lead Disorganized Debbie.
Understanding Disorganized Debbie:
- Behavior: Unfocused
- Motivated by: Direction
- Strength: Relational Connection
- Weakness: Disorganization
Listening to Disorganized Debbie:
- Privately sit down and discuss Debbie’s disorganization.
- Listen to her frustrations.
- Examine her mess.
- Determine whether she wants to get organized.
Leading Disorganized Debbie:
- Give her a lot of personal attention.
- Ask her to show you her to-do list.
- Help her organize tasks by priorities.
- Teach her time management.
- Monitor her progress often.
- Leave no room for options or uncertainty.
Growth Plan:
Help her establish a planning system (eg: Franklin Planner, DayTimer or to-do list app)
Do you lead a Disorganized Debbie? Or do you struggle with priorities and organization yourself? Debbie can only change if she wants to, but if she learns how to prioritize and keep up with all of her tasks, she can become an extremely energetic and effective employee.
Quitting is more about WHO you are than WHERE you are.
Posted by: | CommentsBack in December, I wrote about the importance of starting well. In the comments, many people agreed with me, but they also pointed out the critical nature of continuing after you start. They were right. Like I said at the time, starting and finishing are the two covers of the book. The main part – the pages – represents the day-to-day labor needed to achieve your goal.
Unfortunately, in many ways starting is the easy part. Ralph Waldo Emerson observed, “The great majority of men are bundles of beginnings.”
What about you? Are you merely a starter? When the enthusiasm for a new idea fades, when the passion cools, when the odds against you increase and the results diminish, when it looks as if success is impossible, will you maintain your intensity and keep going? Are you tenacious?
Consider the fact that Admiral Robert Peary attempted to reach the North Pole seven times before he succeeded. Oscar Hammerstein produced five shows that were flops on Broadway before staging Oklahoma, which had a record-breaking run of 2,212 performances. Thomas Edison failed in his attempt to create a workable lightbulb 10,000 times before creating one that finally worked. To achieve your dream, you need to be able to keep going when others quit.
To develop tenacity, keep in mind that…
Quitting is more about who you are than where you are.
Everyone faces difficulty when working toward a dream. And if someone fails, he can make excuses for what went wrong, how the unexpected happened, how someone let him down, how circumstances worked against him.
But the reality is that the external things do not stop people. Those who achieve their dreams don’t have an easier path than those who do not. They just have a different internal attitude about the journey. The great artist Leonardo da Vinci once declared, “Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed on a star does not change his mind.”
The one who achieves the dream sees the journey differently.
Instead of thinking, “Not enough people believe in me. I’ll never make it,” he says,
“My belief in myself is enough; I can make it.”
Instead of, “It’s taking too long to realize my dream,” she reminds herself,
“Dreams are realized one day at a time.”
Rather than, “Enough is enough! I’ve taken enough hits!” she declares,
“I’ve come too far to give up now.”
Instead of, “I don’t have the strength to hold onto my dream,” he tells himself,
“Hold on a little longer. The darkest hour comes just before the dawn.”
Novelist Harriet Beecher Stowe said, “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”
And I love how H.E. Jensen expressed an achiever’s way of thinking: “The man who wins may have been counted out several times, but he didn’t hear the referee.” The only real guarantee for failure is to stop trying.
So when things go wrong, when the obstacles seem too great, when the difficulties get to be too much, when your dream seems to be impossibly far away, your job is to simply keep going. If you stop, it won’t be because of what happens around you. It will be because of what happens in you. Choose to see things differently. Success is probably closer than you think. Just keep moving forward.
Complicated problems need creative solutions
Posted by: | CommentsI’m still traveling this week, but like everyone else, I was horrified to learn of the tragic devastation that occurred in Japan. I lived in California for many years, where earthquakes were a fact of life. But I never experienced anything like the quake that hit Japan last week. And of course, the tsunami took a bad situation and made it even worse.
I won’t attempt to give advice to the people of Japan right now. What they most need from us is prayer and relief efforts. But one thing I do know is that they will need to be creative in overcoming the difficulties they are now faced with. And we can all benefit from becoming learning more about that topic. So let’s talk a little about creativity.
To face the greatest challenges of life, we need to cultivate creative thinking. In times of crisis, you need to tap into every good idea you have. Of course, the best time to increase your creativity is before the crisis occurs. This can be done by establishing the discipline of creative thinking. Here are a few ways we can do that:
1. Spend time with creative people.
Make a habit, both inside and outside of work, of spending time with creatives. Let their way of thinking challenge and influence yours.
2. Look for the obvious.
When problem-solving, many of us make the mistake of looking only for the “big” solution. Creativity means exploring all ideas, even the obvious and seemingly insignificant ones. Often the simplest solution is the best solution.
3. Be unreasonable.
Logic and creativity can work together quite well, but sometimes rational thinking gets in the way of being creative. Be willing to look at unreasonable ideas. Often they expand your thinking and lead to breakthroughs that you might otherwise miss.
4. Practice mental agility.
Creativity requires flexibility. Rigid, bureaucratic thinking is in direct opposition innovation and creativity. So make a habit of considering every idea, no matter how difficult it might seem to implement or how much change it may require.
5. Dare to be different.
Being creative means standing outside of the norm. You must cultivate a willingness to challenge every rule and assumption.
6. See problems as opportunities.
Sometimes the only difference between a problem and an opportunity is the word you use to describe it. Whenever you face a problem, take a step back and ask how it could be described as an opportunity—to innovate, build, and improve.
The discipline of creative thinking will change you—and for the better. As jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “The mind, once expanded to the dimensions of larger ideas, never returns to its original size.”
My prayer is that people who have spent years cultivating creativity are already at work in Japan – and the Middle East, and around the world – to serve people and bring solutions to hurting nations. May we keep them in our prayers.
