Are You Willing to Move Carts?

The real reasons why some people progress and others don't

I have been looking for years to separate out the reasons why some people progress in their careers and others don't. Trying to understand what causes some people to be successful by most definitions and others to stay stagnant in their lives. On this quest of over ten years, I of course had my break through revelation in the most logical and classiest of places; the WalMart Parking lot.

As much as I live for wally world shopping trips, I declined to go in and volunteered to stay with two of our three children in the car. My wife, Alyssa,  took our youngest son, Grayson into the store on a life or death mission for M & Ms, which all parents know are a necessity for potting training at least one of your children (whether you want to admit it or not.) While she spent a solid five minutes in our shopping destination of choice (or lack there of), I got down to serious high quality observation and research on success that would make Malcolm Gladwell jealous.

Naturally the one parking spot that was open had carts near the front of it. Two carts in fact, pushed haphazardly up against the gold Mitsubishi in front of me as I pulled into the space. My first thought was to get out and put the carts back in the cart return that was only two stalls over but just then the people who belonged to the vehicle next to the carts came out of the store and delicately tried to get into their car without touching nor moving the carts. This was challenging because one of the two was right in front of the passenger car door. They successfully found their way into the vehicle and eventually pulled away. At this point, I thought, I am going to sit here and just watch what happens.

Just say "Hi": Simple tips to catapult a career

I work with a guy who says "hi". He is the type of guy who you aren't sure how he gets anything done because when you see him he is in your office, or someone else's office  or talking to one of his team. He is the type of guy that is rarely found in his own office but instead out where the action happens chatting with people. He always looks too happy to be busy and he is always spends way too much time talking to people to get stuff done. Right?

Let's call this guy Charlie. Charlie is actually one of the most productive people I have ever worked with. Not only is he getting results faster than most other people I have interacted with but he also is looked at as the model of discipline in this organization. On top of that it is clear that he will have more opportunities in his career with this same organization. Why is this? How does this seemingly oxymoronic set of events work together? Is he just friendly with the right people?

Well… the short answer is yes. But in a different way than you might think.

Here is what is really happening:

Every day he is stopping by multiple times per day to say hi, at the same time he's talking about what is going on in the business, what is going on that's really good, giving you his fellow co-worker recognition for doing something right or getting that result, telling you how it impacted his team, how it will impact the business, checking in on something that he has going on that involves you, a project, a task, a deliverable. Or he is spending time with his team (where they work) developing them, coaching them, keeping tabs on how they are doing with encouragement and support.

He doesn't spend a lot of time in conventional water cooler type conversations talking about the latest TV shows and politics. He doesn’t spend much time focusing on things that aren't going to generate results. Despite this he still has built some of the best relationships I have seen and has a high degree of respect from the team that he works with. The most common things said about him "I really like that guy!" and "he sure gets things done".

Here is why this works for him. He gets collaboration and accountability from the people he works with because people like him (and he provides the same for them). People like him because he cares enough about them to go out of his way spending maybe 60 seconds a day talking to them about what is important in their world and what he has in common with them. Often this might only be things he needs from them or simply touching base with how something is going but this shows constant follow up and care to his coworkers.

 I will not be surprised if Charlie continues to get amazing productivity and results from all the teams and people he works with and I would also not be surprised if this leads to another promotion for him in the next calendar year.

So although everyone has different personalities and priorities I would challenge you to take a small lesson from real life and, like Charlie, get out of the comfort of your work-space every day to be someone who says "Hi"

63,000 Opportunities Waiting for You. Self Start Here...

Have you ever read a posting for a job that says "looking for a self starter" or talked to a sales manager about who was successful on his team and he says "well that guy is a real self starter" (then his next sentence is "wish the rest of them could be more like that"). Everyone wants this "self starter", why is that? You will hear them called go-getters, spark plugs, ambitious, workhorses and many other things, but I think the 63,000+ job postings on indeed.com that are looking for a self starter have it right! They are looking for someone with initiative and someone who starts things themselves and without waiting on others.

Everyone wants this from the people they hire, but after years and years of hiring people and working with managers who hire people, I bet that very few of these job posters will find their self starters. I also bet that those who are self starters will find that they really have their pick of companies, locations, professions, promotions or even the possibility to start their own company, grow it and post their own ad looking for self starters! This is because this trait, which requires the willingness to not wait on others for permission and the strong possibility of making mistakes, taking risks and experiencing failures, is somewhat rare in the marketplace.

Seth Godin devotes a whole book to this concept of initiative and the self starter (Poke the Box), Dave Ramsey references this type person suggesting traits of ownership and initiative in "Entreleadership". The reason this concept sells is because it is uncomfortable to take initiative, it can be embarrassing to fail, and it can feel scary to do something others aren't doing. In a country that creates societal incentives for mediocrity and avoiding taking the reigns to start things yourself, this is a hot commodity. Sadly everyone wants to know how to do this but more importantly, as Seth Godin points out, they have to be sold on the idea because it is against the societal norm.

When I consider this, it is both frustrating to me and exciting at the same time. Exciting because, as a serial self starter myself, I find that there is so little competition in the job market that is so desperately pining after self starters. Frustrating because I see countless societal incentives that cause good people to make limiting choices that do not lead them down the road of self starting.

The most recent example of this is at the organization where I work; we have a lot of people there that have potential. Potential but feel they are stuck in their situation. One woman in particular, we will call her Tiffany, was working in a job that earned around $16 per hour and performing well. Performing well but not performing great. Not performing great because she viewed herself as limited in what she could do.

Tiffany was limited because she had a special needs child and if she earned any more in income she would not receive the medical insurance from the state that she so desperately felt she must have. If she didn't have it she would be a bad mom. Tiffany had shown snippets of potential and snippets of self starting but this wasn't unleashed until a manager saw some of this and spent hours with her selling her on the idea of what she could accomplish. After two month of convincing she took a promotion and is now a stellar performer because she gets to start things herself everyday. She ended up getting a large raise to go along with it that paid for the insurance and all is well!

The reality is though that most of us will not experience Tiffany's situation. We will not have a manager there to sell us on the idea of what life could be like if we removed our objections to becoming a self starter. Most of us have to do this on our own. I would like to offer the reason that like Tiffany, it could change your life. So, practice, now! by starting something, regardless of the outcome, failure or success. You will learn along the way. It's the learning that causes you to grow. 

Please comment on any self starting you have done, big or small. How do you will yourself to take initiative?

4 and 1/2 Mistakes to Avoid for your 2013 goals

Over the last few years my wife, Alyssa, and I spent some time to write down year long goals for various different areas of our life. Some of you might do the same thing and you have no doubt experienced the power of focused intensity on one particular area of your life. It is amazing how just by taking the time to give thought enough to create a SMART goal that you are committed to, will make it much more likely that it will happen.

I wanted to share some things that we have made mistakes on involving our goals, that way it will hopefully save some of you from having to go through some of the same pain.

Mistake #1: The invisible goals!

I am ashamed to say that we have taken a bunch of time to establish goals, in detail, by writing them down ,  agreeing and committing to them, making sure each one is both challenging but not unreachable, and then putting them away never to be seen again. Unless of course you really just like not getting anywhere fast, you should instead both write them down and then display them someplace prominent like the refrigerator or kitchen where you will see them often.

Mistake #2: Well it sounded good…(Head nodding without commitment)

It is apparently very possible to spend a bunch of time creating a number of goals that one person in the relationship isn't very committed to. And guess what happens when you are not truly committed to a goal from the beginning? You guessed it! Success in this area does not last very long.

This means you will have to be committed enough to really talk through what both of you want as a couple. We also found that some goals, like health for instance, should really be set on an individual basis. My goal for this year is to get to 12% body fat and there is no way my wife can be the one to come up with that goal and have it be effective. It is important she be there when it is established so that she can commit to supporting me.

The only exception to this might be something like "Work out together as a couple 3 times each week" or "Run the Portland Marathon together in September" In the case of the latter you may or may not even train together.   This will likely be the case for Career and potentially Social as well. I would suggest making sure that goals in the areas of Financial, Spiritual, (need I say) Relationship and Family all are collaborative and not individual goals but more importantly make sure you are not head nodding to anything you are not truly committed to. Take the time to talk it out and respect each other enough to come to something you are both dedicated to. Otherwise it can take the great activity of setting goals and turn it around to become something that you resent later on during the year when it is clear that there is no real commitment.

 Don't mess this one up!

Mistake #3:  I can't see that we are winning

This sounds silly as I am writing this but somehow in the past we have been able to simultaneously have goals (during the same year) that we achieve because we see that we are having success with them and have others that are not working because we did not take the time to realize the importance of this. For example; one year we had focused on removing all forms of debt as a financial goal and took the time to chart it out over the course of the year and review our progress every single week while updating our accounts and budgets. At the same time we completely abandoned our relationship goals part way through the year because we had not done some of the up front or maintenance work that caused success with the other area.

What caused the difference in our behaviors and over the long run was very simply breaking the large goal down into smaller pieces and at the same time making sure it is measurable in a way that is prominent and visible to us. The financial goals we saw how much debt we were paying off and later our savings and investments growing while our relationship goals we made no attempt to break down into smaller chunks. This is not only particularly effective by making a large goal more realistic, but it gives you small wins that help you push through to the end. The way I am writing this blog right now is just by writing 2 paragraphs each day. This little at a time approach helps you build momentum toward accomplishment with each small win.

Mistake #4: What was that goal again?

Virtually nobody writes down their goals. Statistically most of the people reading this haven't written down their goals. Not you? Of course not! Me either (wink, wink).  Ok you got me, I have made the mistake of not writing them down and guess what usually they didn't happen. This is applicable anywhere! I used to set weekly goals for myself when I was in sales, my boss would always try to get me to commit to something higher and then I would record it and turn it in for the week. Guess what! I would generally hit whatever I wrote down (or in this case put in excel) As long as I was committed to it, when I put it in that self prophesizing spreadsheet, all of a sudden it was more likely to be achieved. The act of writing your goals down makes it real and causes you to commit to them on a different level, I know logically this should not work but humans are often not logical creatures (we only think that we are.) 

Mistake #4.5: Wait a minute, I have to start?

Start right now! Today, if you have not already taken this step, it is not too late. Make sure you are focusing on goals, not resolutions, that are specific and measurable while getting you where you want to go long term. You are not a static being. You are always growing in the right way or the wrong way. For example in your relationship with your spouse you will actively grow together or unintentionally grow apart. Remember avoid our mistakes so you don't have to learn the hard way. 

Go Happen to You!