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by Rick Baker
On May 3, 2012
If you inspire people, you have the first ingredient for growing profits.
If you do not possess a magnetic personality, you can still inspire people and grow profits. You do that by developing your communication skills. Perhaps, Warren Bennis said it best1:
"successful leaders have an extraordinary, though not necessarily charismatic, ability to communicate their vision in a way that allows their people to make it their own and give it personal meaning."
Bennis boiled it down to 4 traits of leadership:
- Attention - the leader's intentions are clear, strong, and visible...successful leaders exhibit focus
- Meaning - followers understand and buy into the leader's vision
- Trust - the leader's actions are consistent with the leader's expressed vision [i.e., Integrity as Spirited Leaders defines it]
- Self - the leader has high self-regard and high regard for others...errors are seen as mistakes, a necessary opportunity to learn
These 4 traits of leadership empower people by:
- making them feel significant,
- focusing on their developing competence rather than failure,
- creating a shared sense of community, and
- making work exciting and worthy of dedicated commitment.
Making people feel significant: this matches the wisdom of Dale Carnegie who taught - people want to feel important. Stated another way, people want to be recognized in a positive light. And this explains why constructive criticism is an oxymoron. We all know this. We all forget this. Successful leaders forget it much less frequently.
Focusing on developing people's competence rather than failure: a great way to do this is to do strength assessments, embrace strengths-based learning, and provide your people strengths-tools.
Creating a shared sense of community: community has taken on a whole new meaning with the explosive growth of social media...consider, for example, the impact of Facebook. So, it now takes much more thought and effort to create a meaningful sense of community. Creative thought must be applied.
Making work exciting and worthy of dedicated commitment: again, the pace of change makes this more complicated. The businesses that figure out and make workplaces more exciting will have a chance to survive. The rest will not.
Footnote:
- 'The Leader-Manager', (1986), edited by John N. Williamson
by Rick Baker
On May 2, 2012
A year ago, I wrote about Competing - Using a Low-Price strategy….the introduction was:
At our Leaders’ workshops we tie two marketing concepts together. The two marketing concepts are ‘the PQS Triangle’ and ‘Differential Advantage’. Both of these concepts are ‘vintage’ marketing thoughts…..things we learned a few decades ago.
PQS Triangle is a picture, designed to make it clear businesses can set its marketing strategy based on a combination of Price, Quality, and Service. Rarely, if ever, can a business succeed if its marketing strategy is designed to win at all of P, Q, & S. Put another way – it is virtually impossible to deliver the lowest Price, the highest Quality, and the best Service all at once. Something has to give. For most of our Clients the thing that has to give is Price: most of our Clients are not in a position to offer the lowest Price.
Differential Advantage answers the question: Why do our Clients buy from us rather than do nothing or buy from one of our competitors?
When the PQS Triangle and Differential Advantage are combined we have the essence of the marketing strategy.
For certain businesses the marketing strategy does contain Price – i.e., the business can compete by offering better prices than their competition.
Now, about Competing – using a Value-based Price strategy:
Hanan & Karp expressed the concept concisely in ‘Competing on Value’.
"A value-based price has five characteristics:
- Price is premium price.
- Price is compared with the improved profits it contributes to a customer’s business, not to competitive prices.
- Price is recoverable by the customer’s improved profits and is therefore an investment rather than a cost.
- Price is not discountable.
- Price is applications-specific. It varies in direct proportion to each customer’s improved profits."
This, of course, is the exact opposite to competing – using a low-price strategy.
So, the spectrum of pricing strategies goes from low-price at one end to value-based on the other end.
Where do you position your pricing in that Price-Strategy Spectrum?
by Rick Baker
On Apr 24, 2012
Time Management...even though those are the wrong words...you know what I mean. I'm talking about feeling good about the pace of your work and the pace of your life. I'm talking about feeling you have control over the things you face.
A need to have a feeling of control: that's the root we are trying to get at when we work at time management.
When we believe work and life are reeling out of control, we feel uncomfortable. We feel uncomfortable because we feel rushed, confused, and too busy. When we feel like that we complain we do not have enough time. We brainwash ourselves into thinking and saying 'time' is at the root of our problem.
Let's take a more objective approach.
We know many or most of us are naturally inclined to skirt the blame for things and place the blame on others. Psychologists, for example, talk about attribution bias. Also, for some reason, when we feel we are too busy we blame it on 'time'...we say we don't have enough of it.
Time, or lack of it, is not our problem. On top of that, even if it was the problem we cannot manage time.
Time is beyond our control.
We can, however, control what we are thinking and what we are doing as 'time passes'.
Really, those are the only two things we can control; we can control the way we think and we can control the way we act.
If we want to feel less rushed, less confused, and less busy then we need to do the following:
- stop blaming the problem on ‘not enough time’
- start treating the problem as an issue of self-management
- realize self-control is one of the most important capabilities in life
- treat the symptoms of the problem: Habits – that is, replace Bad Habits with Good Habits
Link to An Introduction to Time Management - Part 2
Link to An Introduction to Time Management - Part 3
Link to 'Time' Management
Link to Successful People Have More Time
by Rick Baker
On Apr 17, 2012
"Moderation is the silken string running through the pearl-chain of all virtues.1"
Recently, I have spent considerable time thinking about moderation...thinking how often people violate the common sense called moderation, which we all know from firsthand experience and from watching others struggle without it.
So, when I read '21st Century Leadership'2, the heading "Become More Nurturing and More Demanding" captured my attention. That, according to the author, Dave Lefkowith, is the 2nd step to becoming a 21st Century Leader.
Many entrepreneurs and business leaders do need to step back and take a good look at how they go about:
- Placing demands on their followers
- Handling interpersonal activity with their followers
Spirited Leaders recommends moderation.
Like Lefkowith, we see a need for Leaders to be either more nurturing. When we think of nurturing we think of Transactional Analysis, 60-year-old behavioural psychology, which, in summary, states people behave like:
- Parents,
- Adults, &
- Children
When doing Parent behaviour we can be demanding or we can be nurturing. When in the Adult behaviour mode we are more logical and less emotional. And, in the Child mode we can act anywhere between most-accommodating to most-belligerent.
This Parent-Adult-Child behaviour model makes it easy to explain exactly how business leaders, especially hands-on entrepreneurs, can go about Becoming More Nurturing and More Demanding. Actually, Spirited Leaders recommends: Becoming More Nurturing and Making Better Demands.
How to become More Nurturing: that's simple, just think of the best behaviour either of your parents [or parental figures] presented to you. That's your best example of a Nurturing Parent...ie, how to behave like a Transactional Behaving Nurturing Parent. Clearly, in the business environment, there are limitations to the amount of nurturing. Too much is a turn off: your followers are not Children. Too little is uncaring: at least, that's the way some or perhaps many of your followers will feel.
How to make Better Demands: defining this is more challenging. Here's a question that might help. When you became an Adult, did either of your Parents ever, from time to time, still treat you like a Child? I mean, after you became an Adult, did either of your Parents continue to give you advice about money?, how to raise children?, how much to drink?, how fast to drive?...etc? If this never happened to you...then you are one of the lucky few. If this did happen to you - how did you feel? Being an adult - getting advice from your Parent - how di that feel? Remember that feeling when you place a demand on one of your followers. That's the safe way to be.
Summing up:
Make sure you maintain some desire to be Nurturing. That will be of most value when your followers are struggling at work tasks and are bringing the results of tough [after-hours] personal situations to your workplace.
Aim for more open, Adult-to-Adult behaviour; set boundaries on your emotions before and during interactions with your followers. As trust builds, present more Adult-to-Adult demands on your followers.
And, allow a bit of the Child within you to generate and enjoy workplace humour.
PS: Dave Lefkowith's Ten Steps to Becoming a 21st Century Leader:
- Broaden Your Style
- Become More Nurturing and More Demanding
- Become Less Predictable
- Focus Like a Maniac on Opportunity
- Create "Opportunity Laboratories" for Top Prospects
- Celebrate (the Right Type of) Failure
- Anticipate and Address Emerging Issues
- Create an Explicit Stakeholder Management Strategy
- Touch Individuals Deep within Your Organization
- Create Brutally Direct Self-Development Mechanisms
Footnote:
- Thomas Fuller, 'The Holy State and the Profane State', (1642)
- Dave Lefkowith, '21st Century Leadership', (2001)
by Rick Baker
On Apr 4, 2012
Ratna Omidvar was the Key Note Speaker at our Region's March 22nd Dialogue on Diversity event.
Ratna Omidvar
Ratna is the president of Maytree Foundation, a private foundation that promotes equity and prosperity. Ratna described her organization, "We are not a complaint-driven organization. We recognize problems and focus on solutions."
To provide context for her audience, Ratna briefly described her background: she was born in India and attended university in Germany; she married an Iranian and lived in Iran; and 30 years ago she moved with her family to Canada.
So, Ratna spoke from personal experience when she said "Immigrants have to decode the unwritten rules". People who come to Canada have few problems learning the written rules such as speed limits and instructions on signs. Challenges exist in the many unwritten rules. As examples, newcomers to Canada must learn:
- You may be curious but some topics are just off limits: by watching how Canadians react, newcomers can learn which topics are safe for discussion and which aren't
- Politeness, while very important, shouldn't be mistaken for interest
- Democracy belongs to all, but it belongs most to those who participate in it
Ratna talked straight-up about the Waterloo Region. She enjoys regular visits to our community, including trips to St Jacobs. While she was pleased with our effort to discuss diversity, we still have more work to do when it comes to Immigrant Civic Participation. To have our institutes reflect the diversity of our region we need to see more visible minorities in leadership roles in politics and on governance boards.
However, Ratna was optimistic about the potential for the Waterloo Region. She recommended we follow the formula of the three Is to give legs to aspiration and make reality of hopes and dreams: Intentions, Investments, and Instruments. She then focused on some examples of "Instruments", or some ideas for action.
Ratna shared five good ideas with us:
- New language for new times: use words like Inclusion and Inclusive [rather than words like participation]
- Work with local institutions where impact can be magnified: they will take your plan from concept to reality
- Measure, count, report out: What gets measured gets done; for example, count the number and percentage of visible minorities on civic boards
- Don't let perfection stand in the way of good: take the freedom to experiment with your ideas
- Beg, borrow, & steal good ideas: many communities throughout the world are taking action to embrace and help newcomers
Thank you for your very-well-presented thoughts and images, Ratna!
Footnote
Throughout Ratna's presentation I kept thinking how broadly her advice applies. It applies to people in general; it applies to people at work...people doing business. While there are many, I will provide one specific example: Immigrants have to decode the unwritten rules. That applies to all people and we see evidence of that throughout workplaces. There is a widespread need to express and clarify personal values and personal rules. If we do not make these things clear then other people can only guess what we are thinking and feeling. We can make it easier on other people. For the sake of better communication and more-prosperous business, we ought to make it easier on other people.
by Rick Baker
On Apr 2, 2012
Thought Tweet #446 Hope is not a strategy but it is an essential ingredient of leadership.
The Thinking Behind The Tweet
'Hope is not a Strategy', an interesting business book by Rick Page.
"Hope is an essential ingredient of leadership." a Deepak Chopra quote from his book, 'The Soul of Leadership'
Both are accurate statements.
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