Where It All Starts

We know ideas are the beginning of everything. The keyboard I'm using to write this started with an idea; the laptop I'm using started with an idea; this website started with an idea; the internet started with an idea; you and I deciding to connect though we may not know each other started with an idea.

But what do we do with a hunch?

It's not an idea yet; it's just a feeling or a nudge. It's a pause or a quick wave of inspiration we can't even form into an idea yet. Stephen Johnson explains how ideas are born and executed.


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The Daily Art of Being Human

There are over seven billion of us on this planet, over two billion online, and the noise is unbearable most days. Look at this, click on that, check my offer, attend this event, go to that store, read this article, buy that cool gadget, the list is endless. Then we're expected to share it, text it, tweet it, connect it, friend it, email it, or blog it.

The cries for attention seem unrelenting and perhaps as we have trained ourselves to sift through endless data, content, and advertising, we have forgotten ourselves? But it would be good to think we take more care with our relationships and careers. This creates strong bonds, great friendships, and successful companies.

Culture Matters

Leadership and culture are not job titles and your team is not a group of robots carrying out mindless tasks to grow the revenue for your shareholders. Like you, they have dreams and goals and a need for more meaning and passion in their work.

If you focus on the meaning of your business, significance of your people, and importance of creating a collaborative culture, the focus on revenue will no longer get in the way of creating all of your goals.

Daily Care

If you feel yourself wanting more on a deeper level, you are certainly not alone. In a busy world with too much going on, keeping relationships our biggest priority will serve us well. Letting the distractions replace the interactions is dangerous.

If you understand that everyone around you is not too different than you, have a need to belong like you, and want contribute and be a part of something like you, that will go a long way. As a leader, be human.

Your team will thank you.
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You Want the Best – Now What?

The foundation of your business is people. That’s not some fluffy nice to have statement, it has been scientifically proven. If you have good relationships in your business, your chances of success will exponentially improve. If you view that human stuff as a waste of time, or a job for someone else, your company will be built on sand.

If you asked any business leader if they would like to have the most talented people on their team, it’s fairly safe to say you would get a positive response from one hundred percent of them. Who doesn't want the best?

People are People

But if you were to subsequently ask them what specific daily steps are they personally making to ensure that happens, the answers could become a bit vaguer. I'm not referring to the employee handbook or some slick delegation process someone else oversees – steps they do themselves.

Now ask yourself those same two questions. You want the best, of course you do, but what are you doing today – not monthly or in your weekly wrap-up meetings or some all-staff email – but today, to help your team be the best?
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Technological Leaders

Virtual teaming is one of the fastest growing aspects of business today and it will only continue to grow. In our executive recruitment agency, we work with clients and candidates around the world.

Enterprise leaders are overseeing vast teams of people across large geographical areas and sometimes many are working from their home office. In his TEDTalk a few years ago, Gary Kovacs discussed the pros and cons of living in a connected world.


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HBR – Leadership Mistakes

Being a leader has absolutely nothing to do what what it says on your business card or company org chart. A few years ago, the Harvard Business Review asked a simple question. Here are some valuable responses.


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Org Charts and Other Data

It’s simple to develop responsibilities, titles, direct reports and deliverables. But how will you allow a place of teamwork to resemble reality? The organizational chart is probably necessary for you to chunk up the work, responsibilities and strengths of your business but how you build a great, sustaining and successful company is through your people. There are no short cuts.

If you have ever experienced a true open environment it can be exciting - yet to some - chaotic. And because most don't want chaos, they choose to keep things nice and neat and departmentalized. They may like being a boss everyone obeys. But we know the flaws in that model are vast.

Human Supply Chain

The perception of losing focus or control can block potential for significant growth in your organization and the careers of each person inside it. If ideas aren't shared, department walls get higher and silos deepen.

The position of Chairperson, CEO or President may appear to be at the top of the company chart. But it's actually in the middle. This is the person who sets the tone; makes the big decisions that could affect the workload of everyone else. It can be a very busy place. She must answer to the owners, shareholders, investors, customers, employees and the public. If a company relies solely on her decisions, millions or even billions can hang in the balance.

Great Idea

A former boss taught me about reversed delegation. This is where someone suggests a half-baked idea and you try to run with it. This neither encourages their further thought nor helps you with what you want to accomplish. Push it back on their plate and see what happens.

For decades we have followed an enterprise model that resembled a flow chart. Nice and clean, easy to follow, department and leaders, directors and work flow. But without an unwavering commitment to the people in your company you may simply be sharing a parking lot and florescent lights for 1,800 hours a year. And the four most powerful words you can use are; “How can I help?” The challenge for leaders who want a successful business is to make their people their top priority.

For real.
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Passion is not Ordinary

Synonyms include enthusiasm or obsession, zeal or excitement, fervor or infatuation but it can be crushed like a bug on a windshield in seconds. I see it in the enterprise, with clients, colleagues, friends and family. The work day is simply a “means to an end” which is a horrific way to spend a third of our life. Ideas are pushed down toward the lowest common denominator while good enough becomes the gold standard.

Leadership is crucial when passion is present because it must be mined and carefully protected. Passion is the reason a woman born of poverty in a shack in Kosciusko, Mississippi became one of the most successful television personalities of all time.

Airplanes and Light Bulbs

Obsession is what fuelled a man to try thousands of ideas until he found a way to harness light. Infatuation was the genesis of an idea by a man with dyslexia to create a global brand which features an airline, a media company and a private island.

It took zeal for the returning founder of a computer company to use innovation rather than budget cuts to help his creation realize the largest profits in its history.

Ladders and Climbing Gear

Passion isn’t about owning things or having money. It isn’t about beating someone or market share. It's about running toward your purpose. Look at your team, the people around you, those you connect in business and through the social web along with your family and your friends. Embrace and cherish their passion.

Corporate governance, strategic policy and revenue generation are all part of work life. But without passion, we would never had heard of Winfrey, Franklin, Branson or Jobs.
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Non-Verbal Clues

We know ideas are the beginning of everything. The keyboard I'm using to write this started with an idea; the laptop I'm using started with an idea; this website started with an idea; the internet started with an idea; you and I deciding to connect though we don't know each other started with an idea.

But what do we do with a hunch? It's not an idea yet; it's just a feeling or a nudge. It's a pause or a quick wave of inspiration we can't even form into an idea yet.

Stephen Johnson explains how ideas are born and executed.


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Everything to Everyone

You may often hear others claim they’re good with people or they can increase the bottom line. Those are excellent attributes but need to be further defined and refined. For fear of being specific and potentially losing a deal, many will promise to help anyone who asks them and that can be a dangerous tactic.

Many of us have fallen victim of the plan of trying to have an offer with a wide scope. But if we say everyone is our target customer we can be in trouble. Some feel they don't want to limit their potential. But if we narrow our focus, we can become stronger in those areas we can help the most. We often see this in the start-up world; the company starts to get legs and the offering widens which can be dangerous.

Do one thing really well

The retail space has gotten fuzzy over the last decade. You can buy groceries at your pharmacy and furniture in your electronics store. Widening the offer is watering down the focus and may appear to be working but is actually hurting many of the large companies attempting this strategy.

If you’ve ever been to a general store in a small town it’s like a different world. You can buy everything from candy to camping equipment. But if you looked at your business and more importantly how you grow your team, you probably wouldn’t think it wise to be too wide and hire generalists. Shifting into areas that get away from our strengths in order to grow revenue and market share can be tempting. Doing what we do well, more often, can often be the wiser tactic.

Sometimes offering less can create a lot more.
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Leadership and the General Ledger

The foundation of your business is people. That’s not some fluffy nice to have statement; it has been scientifically proven. If you have good relationships in your business, your chances of success will exponentially improve. If you view the human stuff as a waste of time, or a job for someone else, your company will be built on sand. And this is not something to do only during quarterly or annual reviews.

If you asked any business leader if they would like to have the most talented people on their team, it's certain they would resoundingly say yes! Who doesn't want the best?

Open Mind Policy

But if you were to subsequently ask them what specific daily steps are they personally making to ensure that happens, the answers could become a bit vaguer. I'm not referring to the employee handbook or some slick delegation process someone else oversees – steps they do themselves.

Now ask yourself those same two questions. You want the best, but what are you doing today – not monthly or in your weekly wrap-up meetings or some all-staff email – but today, to help your team be the best?

Your answer is not about better services or products.
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Work Life Imbalance

We've all heard the phrase; “leave it at the door”, which is a warning that when you’re at work, you should focus on work. But we're human and we work with humans and we have lives and issues and sadness and joy and events and those aren’t easily shut off.

In the last year, I know of a couple who finalized their divorce, someone who lost their spouse, a couple who had to say their final goodbyes to their beloved pet, someone who lost a parent, and many people who lost their job. It’s a bit tough to be a robot in those situations. It's unrealistic to expect life not to seep into our work.

Bring your life to work.

Leadership is not daycare but we are not machines. To tell people to ignore their world isn’t realistic. Sure, we have to be mindful that deadlines need to be met, but the human condition can help our professional pursuits. Many claim a life/work balance is important but few act on it.

Allowing your team to bring life to work can open up possibilities. It can unlock their minds to include situations outside of their work environment. It can create free discussion and brainstorming that may help solve issues that are too close to the team because they’re trying to apply work related tactics. It can create a more malleable atmosphere which will be more enjoyable and efficient.

Bring your work to life.

This can panic some leaders who are used to conformed enterprise where co-workers focus linearly on actual tasks within a confined agenda. Change is scary and it’s much easier to manage rather than guide people to work freely and use all of their human experience during work hours. This is not to suggest your company becomes a free-for-all but nothing in work or life needs to be zero-sum.

We all want to be loved, noticed, and appreciated. We have fear and dreams; hopes, and plans. We all want to belong and feel purpose. We are them, you are me, they are us. It's not as difficult as it may appear. And a small shift can create the positive growth you may have been seeking by reminding everyone to focus on their job.

What happens in life affects what happens at work.
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Wash Your Hands

There are products, sales, marketing, people, share price, competition and many other factors that keep business people up at night. In the documentary "The Corporation", producers examined the modern-day company. They evaluated its behaviour towards society and the world at large as a psychiatrist might evaluate an ordinary person.

They concluded if the corporation was human, her ultimate goal would be to make money above all else. If that is the sole purpose of your company, be nervous. Fiscal health is imperative but without strong internal customer service, it will be a struggle.

If you don’t treat people well, they won't stick around, or worse they may stay and have a hand in your demise. Treat them right with strong and fair leadership and those profits will actually increase. We all share an inherent human need to belong.

That doesn't stop when entering the work area.
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Look Closer See Me

We live in a time when there could be 3-4 generations working together in the same department. My perspective may not be yours but we can certainly learn from each other to make it better if we open our hearts and minds.

This is a poem attributed to a man named Dave Griffith. Some have claimed a dying man in a nursing home wrote it. What's important is what we learn from it.

What do you see nurses? What do you see?
What are you thinking, when you're looking at me?
A cranky old man, not very wise
Uncertain of habit with faraway eyes
Who dribbles his food and makes no reply
When you say in a loud voice, I do wish you'd try

Who seems not to notice the things that you do
And forever is losing sock or shoe
Who, resisting or not, lets you do as you will
With bathing and feeding the long day to fill
Is that what you're thinking? Is that what you see?
Then open your eyes, nurse you're not looking at me

I'll tell you who I am as I sit here so still
As I do at your bidding as I eat at your will
I'm a small child of ten with a father and mother
Brothers and sisters who love one another
A young boy of sixteen with wings on his feet
Dreaming that soon now a lover he'll meet

A groom soon at twenty my heart gives a leap
Remembering the vows that I promised to keep
At twenty-five now I have young of my own
Who need me to guide and a secure happy home
A man of thirty my young now grown fast
Bound to each other with ties that should last

At forty, my young sons have grown and are gone
But my woman is beside me to see I don't mourn
At fifty, once more, babies play 'round my knee
Again, we know children my loved one and me
Dark days are upon me, my wife is now dead
I look at the future, I shudder with dread

For my young are all rearing young of their own
And I think of the years and the love that I've known
I'm now an old man and nature is cruel
It's jest to make old age look like a fool
The body, it crumbles, grace and vigour depart
There is now a stone where I once had a heart

But inside this old carcass a young man still dwells
And now and again my battered heart swells
I remember the joys I remember the pain
And I'm loving and living life over again
I think of the years, all too few gone too fast
And accept the stark fact that nothing can last

So open your eyes people, open and see
Not a cranky old man,

Look closer, see me
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The Biggest Mistake a Leader Can Make?

Being a leader has absolutely nothing to do what what it says on your business card or company org chart. A few years ago, the Harvard Business Review asked that simple question. Here are some valuable responses.


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Bossy Bosserton

As our days are filled by commiserating about that stuff that may be missing from our work, we must look at the top. If you work long enough, you will eventually be given more responsibility and perhaps other people who will look to you for direction.

I once worked for a "boss" who felt compelled to raise his voice in every meeting like the alpha male pounding his chest to remind the minions who’s in charge. He also had skin thinner than phyllo pastry, so you didn't dare challenge him or he would get offended or upset or throw a tantrum. Perhaps you've met that guy.

Organizational attrition is rarely documented if one or two people leave every couple of months but over the course of a decade, how much of your team has been replaced? Do you think it could be linked to weak leadership?

The human network is more vital than ever before. Your team does not want to fear you. They don’t want to walk on egg shells around you. They don’t want to hate their jobs. They want to respect you.

Help your team; they don't want a boss.
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You Have Great Ones Everyday

We have them every day; often several times each day. We're faced with a problem, one pops to mind. They are plentiful and everywhere. We are doing something innocuous, and one breaks our consciousness. But what do we do with them?

This video is a few years old and just as valid as the day it was produced. Stephen Johnson discusses how ideas are born, incubated, and ultimately acted upon. He studies how we think about ideas and then actually execute them.

What will you do with your next idea?


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Demographics and Assumptions

We live in a time when there can be 3-4 generations inside your company; sometimes within each department or team. That can provide dynamic collaboration. Yes, age is just a number, but it's a deeper issue than birthdays. There are socioeconomic and psychographic complexities if you have teams with members in many demographics.

I'm a walking contradiction because I'm a big fan of assessments, analytical data, and research, but I'm also not a fan of sweeping generalizations. Men are this; women like that; baby boomers prefer that; millennials are like this, etc. Nothing replaces one-on-one conversations to assess each and every person your team.

There's a right way to get on the bus.

I was recently involved in an on-boarding exercise that was far less than optimal. There were a lot of assumptions; the new employee was left to "figure it out" with no formal training; while biases and assumptions made it an excellent study in how to not bring in a new employee.

Do your research and get to know the different styles and preferences of each age group within your company; then drop the data and have human conversations while adopting one key element.

Keep an open mind policy.
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Be Human. The End.

There are over seven billion of us on this planet, over two billion online, and the noise is unbearable most days. Look at this, click on that, check my offer, attend this event, go to that store, read this article, buy that cool gadget, the list is endless. Then we're expected to share it, text it, tweet it, connect it, friend it, email it, or blog it.

The cries for attention seem unrelenting and perhaps as we have trained ourselves to sift through endless data, content, and advertising, we have forgotten ourselves? But it would be good to think we take more care with our relationships and careers. This creates strong bonds, great friendships, and successful companies.

Culture Matters

Leadership and culture are not job titles and your team is not a group of robots carrying out mindless tasks to grow the revenue for your shareholders. Like you, they have dreams and goals and a need for more meaning and passion in their work.

If you focus on the meaning of your business, significance of your people, and importance of creating a collaborative culture, the focus on revenue will no longer get in the way of creating all of your goals.

Daily Care

If you feel yourself wanting more on a deeper level, it’s safe to say so does every person you work with, every partner you do business with, and every connection. In a busy world with too much going on, keeping relationships our biggest priority will serve us well. Letting the distractions replace the interactions is dangerous.

If you understand that everyone around you is not too different than you, have a need to belong like you, and want contribute and be a part of something like you, that will go a long way. As a leader, be human.

Your team will thank you.
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Open Mind Policy

Think about your mentors, those people who have helped you and your career along the way. They found somewhere deep inside to motivate your strengths and help you realize your goals. They didn't make it about them, they didn't impart their goals on you. They pushed you to be a better you.

Malcolm Gladwell opines in his book Outliers there is no such thing as a self-made person. Those who have come before us have afforded us opportunities to succeed. None of us does this alone no matter how it may appear. Marcus Buckingham reminds us that we need to stop working on our weaknesses and focus solely on our strengths.

Imagine an organization where your good work is encouraged and your shortcomings are turned into prospects for others on the team who thrive where you may not.

Asking the Right Questions

How are you preparing your team for success and leadership? Is it a collaborative atmosphere or one of fear? Are strengths celebrated more than weaknesses highlighted? Does everyone have a clear vision on culture and objectives? Is your mind open to their opinions and ideas?

Balance and fairness look good on a well crafted business plan but in the heat of the battle, they can be tough to maintain. But they must remain top priorities because without them, you will be left with managers and bosses while leadership will be accidental at best. Success will left up to guesswork.

If you are in a lead position, make time for your people or watch the very thing you are working to build begin to crumble. Leadership is not on an organizational chart or an email signature.

It resides within every member of your team
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Building Blocks of Business

The foundation of your business is people. That’s not some fluffy nice to have statement; it has been scientifically proven. If you have good relationships in your business, your chances of success will exponentially improve. If you view that human stuff as a waste of time, or a job for someone else, your company will be built on sand.

If you asked any business leader if they would like to have the most talented people on their team, it’s fairly safe to say you would get a positive response from one hundred percent of them. Who doesn't want the best?

Open Mind Policy

But if you were to subsequently ask them what specific daily steps are they personally making to ensure that happens, the answers could become a bit vaguer. I'm not referring to the employee handbook or some slick delegation process someone else oversees – steps they do themselves.

Now ask yourself those same two questions. You want the best, of course you do, but what are you doing today – not monthly or in your weekly wrap-up meetings or is some all-staff email – but today, to help your team be the best?

A hint: It has nothing to do with your products or services.
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