Do not pass Go if…

I am in the home repair and improvement business.

If my company can’t do one job well, we shouldn’t try to do two, three or four in a day.  We will just make a mess.

Fix the one.  Do one job well.  When you can deliver on that, then go on to two at once.

You don’t want to scale a broken business.  You’ll be multiplying your problems.

Does your company excel at delivering “one”?

If they want it bad enough, money is not a problem.

The more your customers want it, the less money is an issue.  

The less they want it, the more money is an issue.

How do you make them want it?

Conduct a Friction Audit

Your company does things, but how fast and at what cost?  

Are there too many steps?  Too many people to approve things?  Too much bureaucracy?  

Does it take too long?  Do things have to wait a week on a list for something that takes 4 minutes?

Are there bottlenecks?  Are some people in the process unmotivated?

Remove the obstacles and take your foot off the brake of your business.

You don’t need confidence to begin

You begin, and confidence eventually comes.

Waiting until fear disappears to begin will have you sitting on the bench learning nothing forever.

You get experience and confidence by acting without it.

Jump in.

Focus is better than busy

Even the guy at the top is human.  We all think being busy is good.

We confuse being busy with being productive and using our time well.

Ask: what is MOST important?  Not what is most in your face, like ringing phones, texts, notifications, email, meetings, and a cluttered desk.

You can change/delegate/eliminate, reschedule/and restructure those things IF you feel they were keeping you away from the REALLY important things that would make tomorrow meaningfully better.

Prioritize. Your first priority is to determine what your priority is.

Then focus on that.

Do not fill your days with lower-value work when the highest-value work is left undone.

What is your one priority that, if done well, would really move the needle tomorrow?

A private person living a public life.

Being a leader is kind of awkward in some ways.  People are always watching you.  Some talk, and some gossip.

They expect you to be perfect, and some, who are not your friends, like to point out when you stumble.

People don’t talk about the weaknesses of the guy at the bottom of the totem pole.  They talk about the weaknesses of the guy at the top.

While you may be pretty good at being the leader of your company, they expect  you to be great at everything.  And we know that people with deep strengths may have deep weaknesses.  They are not balanced.  That’s why they got so good at doing what they are doing.

You may be a great leader of an accounting firm, but you can’t dribble a basketball.

You may know how to lead a team, but your kids (or spouse) don’t listen to a word you say.

You may be a good marketer, but you have to call someone to fix a doorknob.

How you handle these things is up to you.  For most leaders, it’s probably best not to parade your personal life all over the place.  Keep work and home separate.  

Further, don’t hide anything. If a weakness is exposed via some event, admit it and don’t take yourself too seriously.  If you’re not embarrassed by it, others will gossip less.

At work, you may have some strengths and some weaknesses.  Here’s a secret – other people already know.

Don’t try to fake it or you will hurt your company.  Hire people with the strengths you lack and let them do that part of the job.  

You have to lead yourself first. 

If you can do that well, the rest will turn out just fine.

Unstoppable Problem Solver

Pressure and Deadlines

A leader or manager who is constantly under pressure and deadlines will not be a happy camper.  Their health can be affected, and they may hate their life and leave their job.

However, for people who have well-balanced schedules or have a little slack, a deadline can be a good thing to boost productivity.

A deadline forces you to make decisions and get stuff done, and squeeze out all the fluff time in between.

They say that a project will take up the time allotted.  I find that to be true.

If we have more time than we need, we take it. If we have less, we make it work.  If there is NO deadline, it may never get done.

A good leader knows this.  You may give a project out to a person or team, and create an artificial deadline to create urgency within the team.

And remember – work that needs to get done doesn’t have to be all done BY YOU.  It just needs to get done.

A deadline helps.

Salespeople who don’t want to win bad enough

Sales is competitive.  You need to field a real competitor.

You know this.

A salesperson who wants easy days and will be happy with mediocrity should go somewhere else.

We want people who want to win and hate to lose.

Couple that with character, being nice and good people skills, and we will teach them the rest.

Do you have salespeople who do not fit this description?

Response-Ability

Being a leader or manager is a big responsibility.  You are in charge of other humans, their happiness and productivity, and the results they get for others, whether they are internal or external customers.

When things don’t go well, it gets to you.  Problems nobody else can or will solve.  And people can make things complicated.

When these problems come, you can react or respond.

Reaction is seldom good.  

Responding well is better.  And how you respond will define your entire career.

If you respond well, you will get respect, make lots of friends, make more progress, and have people stay with you.

If you don’t, you will struggle in many ways.

How is your “Response Ability”?