Yasim's Blog

Keeping Priorities in Order

2011-08-07T05:52:00.002-05:00

3 Exercises to Improve Your Relationships and Life Balance

The only true measure of wealth or success is relationships, and polls show that more than 90 percent of Americans agree.

This doesn’t mean achievements in other areas are not important, but it does suggest they are the means to the end—the end being happiness and fulfillment in our families. We work hard, we build companies, we make money…. but we do it for our families so we can enjoy our relationships more.

But let’s be honest. Our lifestyles and our expenditure of time and energy don’t always reflect the priorities we claim. Why do we pay more lip service than real effort to putting family first? Why do we give so much more time and mental energy to our achievements than to our relationships?

Could it be that we have become more skilled at achieving than at relating? Are we better at setting goals for our work than for our home? And does the fact that we get more kudos and recognition for career accomplishment than for family commitment compel us to focus more on the one and less on the other?

Consider the following exercises, which have helped high-achieving, Type-A candle-burners bring their actions into sync with their beliefs. For ease of memory, each of them has an 11-letter codeword that starts with an S.

The Stewardship Exercise

Many of the world’s most successful people follow a pattern of delegating everything they can to save energy and time for the things that can’t be delegated. At the top of the “can’t-delegate” list are our families. While we can welcome help from others, the responsibility, the stewardship, stays with us.

To make sure you’re practicing stewardship over your relationships, try this:

When you’re planning for the day ahead, before you finalize your schedule or make your list of achievement-oriented have-to-dos, spend five minutes coming up with three relationship-oriented choose-to-dos that you will not delegate—one for each of your top three stewardships.

1. Ask yourself, “What is one thing I choose to do for my spouse or for someone in my family today?” This is not a have-to-do like “get them picked up after soccer practice.” It is something someone needs but doesn’t expect, something that will bring joy. It could be a note to your wife, a call to your aging grandmother. Whatever it is, write it down before you start planning your day.

2. What is one unexpected thing you could do for someone at work this day? A show of appreciation, an apology, an acknowledgement, perhaps?

3. What is one thing you could do for yourself this day? Something you need but would not normally get? Exercise? A nap? To read the first chapter of the book you bought a month ago?

The cumulative effect of the three daily choose-to-dos makes them powerful. And as you perform them, you will find yourself becoming more relationship-oriented, more balanced and more pleased with your life.

The Serendipity Exercise

So many things that nourish our relationships cannot be planned or scheduled: An old friend calls, a child needs you, an occurrence triggers a conversation with your spouse.

When these things happen, do you feel interrupted and irritated? Or do you welcome the surprise, find it interesting and take it as an opportunity?

The difference between the first option and the second may be the difference between staleness and creative flexibility, between high blood pressure and low, between enjoying and resenting the moment.

Such occurrences often are serendipitous; although unexpected, they may bring about unforeseen benefits, particularly if we’re flexible and open-minded to the possibilities.

To be more open to serendipity, try this:

Draw a vertical line down the center of your planning page. Jot your plans, schedule and to-dos on the left side of the page. As you go through the day, take notice of “serendipities,” unexpected occurrences that may prove favorable, and jot them on the right side of the page. (Note that the right and left sides of the page in this exercise coincide with the right and left hemispheres of the brain.) Challenge yourself to find (and love) at least three serendipities each day.

Keep your written record of serendipities for 21 days, and then look back and compare the value of the accomplished, structured, proactive things that happened on the left with the value of the spontaneous, reactive things you recorded on the right.

You will find that both sides have comparable value, and you will feel a greater inner balance between structure and flexibility. You will also find that better relationships often result from welcoming, appreciating and reacting well to things you could not have planned.

The Synergicity Exercise

Synergicity is a combination of synergy (working together to produce a result not obtainable by one person independently) and synchronicity (seemingly unrelated occurrences combining in a meaningful way). In this case, synergicity is created by setting clear relationship goals within your family.

We all know that effective goals involve a clear vision of what we want. The goal must be specific and measurable and divisible into progressing pieces. That may explain why achievement goals are, for most people, easier to set and to monitor than relationship goals; it is relatively easy to visualize an amount of money or an achieved position or a triathlon record, and then to chart and measure your progress in reaching the goal.

But how do you quantify a relationship goal? You don’t! Instead, you think in qualities rather than quantities, and you make it clear and specific with words rather than numbers. You write a vivid description of the relationship you want five years from now with your spouse or with a child.

Start with a sentence like, “It is November of 2015, and we have been married for 17 years.” Then describe the relationship, the communication, the trust level, the feelings. Use your imagination and your idealism.

Once the relationship goal is clear and real in your mind, the law of attraction begins to take over. You find yourself subconsciously acting and responding in ways that bring reality closer and closer to what you described. The two of you find it progressively easier to be in sync, and the synergy and mutually complementing qualities you created in your mind begin to seep into the real relationship.

You will find that none of the three exercises is easy, but as you persist, the balancing and relationship-enhancing qualities of stewardship, serendipity and synergicity will become increasingly a part of who you are and a benefit and a blessing to those you love.

The Comparing Trap

2011-06-14T22:05:00.001-05:00

When I joined the Harvard Business School faculty, I received cards and letters from friends and family congratulating me on achieving one of the ultimate brass rings of academics. I felt pretty good about myself until I visited my assigned office in Morgan Hall. In an adjacent office was a colleague who had written something like 12 books and was an internationally recognized scholar in the area of organizational innovation. He had a beautiful summer house near Cape Cod. In addition, he was gracious and supportive. There wasn't much to dislike.

So every day I came to work and walked past his office door, I felt like I was behind in the race. Compared with my colleague, I had accomplished so little over such a long career; my two measly books were more like an embarrassment, given his output. When I passed his office and he wasn't there, I was sure that he was meeting with Jack Welch or someone famous. And as much as I wanted to dislike him, I found myself disliking me because of what he had done and what I had not accomplished. Mind you, this happened almost every day. And it didn't happen at the end of the day but at the beginning. I'm sure you are asking why I didn't just walk to my office the other direction so I didn't have to begin the process of comparing? Because the situation on the other side was worse.

Two years earlier, in the mid-nineties, an MIT professor had joined the Harvard Business School faculty and one year later won the Nobel Prize in economics. Robert Merton was 46 when he won the award. He and two other economists created the trading process called Black-Scholes that impacted the ways financial markets were informed and influenced.

You see the problem. Merton had the office on the other side of my office. Bob Merton was as gracious and supportive as the colleague I mentioned earlier. When I saw him driving to work, I would bristle. He would often wave; I couldn't figure out how someone that smart could be so gracious. So there you have it. There was no way for me to get to my office without a feeling of comparative inadequacy.

Comparing is a trap that permeates our lives, especially if we're high-need-for-achievement professionals. No matter how successful we are and how many goals we achieve, this trap causes us to recalibrate our accomplishments and reset the bar for how we define success. What we've done in the past doesn't matter; real success or achievement requires something more — a title we've never held, a task we've never done, a company we've never worked for. The process of comparing requires us to keep making our target more difficult to hit. And if we manage to hit this difficult target, we simply create an even more difficult one at which we can aim. No matter how much we achieve, we are never satisfied with our achievements when we're caught in the comparing trap. I would urge you to find your own measure for providing a constant reminder that you're on track (or not) and help you avoid falling into the comparing behavior trap. Consider the following measures:

Capstone progress: Chart your progress toward your ideal position, determining if you're acquiring the experiences and expertise that make you a viable candidate for that position.
Satisfaction index: Keep track of how meaningful and fulfilling your work is; create a numerical satisfaction scale that depends on how much you're enjoying what you do and how purposeful it seems; take a reading regularly.
Learning level: Assess the knowledge and skills you're acquiring and whether you're becoming an "expert" in any one area (this is a more subtle measure, but it still can serve as a viable alternative to comparing behaviors).

It's not that high-need-for-achievement individuals can eliminate their comparing reflex completely, nor should they. Throughout history, our greatest generals, CEOs, lawyers, and other professionals have driven themselves to achieve significant objectives by trying to outdo others. Comparing becomes a trap, however, when people become so consumed by measuring themselves against others that they fail to step back and see how it's impacting their actions, and fail to acknowledge and celebrate their own unique successes. When only external factors become our metrics for success, we are setting ourselves up for misery.

Dealing with your boss.

2011-06-09T17:18:00.006-05:00

Would you like a better boss? A boss who helps you obtain valuable information, win needed resources, and secure important support for your group and for you personally — in short, a boss who's a real ally and partner?

If your boss provides these benefits, you're lucky. We hear far more complaints than praise from people about their bosses. If you're unlucky, this blog is for you, and its message is simple — your relationship with your boss is less a matter of luck than you think.

When we talk to managers with complaints, we find they usually assume the relationship rests entirely in the hands of the boss. It is what the boss makes it, and there's little they can do to change it.

Do you assume that it's your boss who sets the tone in your relationship? If so, test that assumption. Almost certainly, you have more ability than you think to shape how you work together. After all, it's a relationship of mutual dependence. You each need the other to succeed. Unless your boss is a psychopath or truly irrational, this interdependence is a foundation on which you can take steps to build something mutually beneficial.

Start by taking some responsibility for the relationship and asking yourself some basic questions:

Are you meeting expectations?
If your group isn't performing, you obviously cannot expect a great relationship. By underperforming, you're making your boss look bad. Hit your targets, work out a plan for hitting them, or re-negotiate the targets. If you don't, nothing else is likely to go right between you. Remember, too, that her expectations extend beyond simple numbers and include things like sharing key information, inclusion in certain key decisions, and even personal support and loyalty.

Do you see your boss as your coach or your judge?
In fact, every boss is both and you need to figure out when and where he tends to be one or the other. Don't fall into the trap of thinking he's only a judge. That hyper-critical assumption will prepare you for the worst because it puts you always on your guard. But it rarely reflects reality — most bosses can and will play both roles — and it will keep you from reaching out to him and obtaining the benefits of a good relationship. Better to see his dual roles as extremes between which he moves back and forth, depending on the situation. At first, in small, low-risk ways, test when and how he's willing to provide support, and move forward based on what you learn.

Does your boss trust you?
Have you demonstrated to her satisfaction your competence and character, the two pillars of trust? Does she believe you know what to do and how to do it? Does she believe in your values, standards, and intentions? Have you communicated them in your behavior and words? Any influence you have on her will begin with her trust in you.

Do the two of you see the current situation in the same way?
Do you see the problems you both face in the same way and do you agree about where you're going and how you're going to get there? Do you even understand the problems your boss faces? If you don't, he will inevitably wonder if you're helping him deal with them.

Are you able to see your boss as a person, not just an authority figure?
Behind your boss's title, there's an imperfect person just like you. She has hopes, aspirations, frustrations, strengths, weaknesses, and fears, and she's the product of her unique background, training, and experience. Do you know enough about her that you can begin to see the world through her eyes? If you do, can you use that knowledge to adapt how you deal with her, just as you use such insights to shape how you deal with anyone else?

Can you identify your boss's strengths and weaknesses?
Perhaps you can only see the weaknesses, but identify his strengths too — again, just as you would with anyone else. Have you thought about how to build on his strengths and work around or compensate for his weaknesses? You'll never have a boss without weakness of some kind. Be generous in your judgment of him, just as you hope your people will judge you generously.

Are you unknowingly bringing your own emotional baggage into this relationship?
Through years of growing up and dealing with authority figures, starting with our parents, many of us learn to dislike and distrust anyone who claims authority over us. Are your attitudes about your boss shaped by your own feelings and attitudes that are based not on experience with her personally but with others from your past?

Take responsibility for this crucial relationship. Test and probe to find what's possible. There are bad bosses with whom you will have little ability to shape the way you work together, but most bosses are just people like you, with likes and dislikes, strengths and weaknesses. It will never be a relationship of equals — that's not how the world works — but it can be mutually supportive, and even mutually rewarding.

How to create collaboration among team members

2011-06-09T17:09:00.002-05:00

The first thing to recognize about collaboration is that it is something that best happens over a period of time, with a "warm-up" period before critical work happens. Just like a runner, you don't want to do a 10K cold. You need to get things loosened up first. Recent study among college students indicate that, student moving into the workforce are even less well prepared for good collaborative experiences since collaboration requires empathy, being able to look at a problem from other peoples' perspectives.

Unless you are going for a "Team of Rivals" approach, sustainable collaboration is best when the people know and trust each other. Ideally they have met in person, know a bit about each other personally as well as professionally, have a sense of communication and work styles, and what the individual strengths, weaknesses and points of view are.

Companies need to consciously and actively help people get to know each other in these ways as much as possible before they are put together on projects. Many projects start quite abruptly and happen intensively and quickly, so if there is some level of familiarity and trust beforehand, it will make the work much more efficient when the team does come together.

Helping People Warm Up for Collaboration

Some ways to purposefully help people prepare for successful collaborations:

* Give people public forums to introduce themselves, and talk about their professional and personal backgrounds (prior companies and hobbies are both fruitful ways of understanding someone). True trust and empathy starts to happen when there is the even a slight emotional bond, not just a professional one. I'm not saying you have to turn your workplace into one giant therapy session. But militaries around the world understand this deeply — the bond between soldiers is consciously built up to be very strong, because they have to collaborate and trust each other under the most difficult circumstances. How can you create camaraderie?

* In-person familiarity should be the default, but in large organizations this is hard to scale. Make use of social networking tools to faciliate the process.

* Find the people who are networking hubs in the organization, and introduce newcomers to them. Think of your organization as a party. Who can you introduce a new person to who will help them get to know the rest of the group the quickest?

* For more prolonged relationship building, have a mentoring program where a newcomer is paired up with someone who's been around a while. You may even have a "networking" mentor who is different from the usual expertise mentor.

* Mix up disciplines. Don't segregate engineering from marketing, HR from finance, and so on. Make it easy for people to absorb others' perspectives just by walking around. Mix levels of seniority together for the same reason. (At frog we have completely open workspaces with no cubicles, and all the disciplines are mingled together, as we want teams, who might only work together in that specific combination of people for a few weeks, to be able to hit the ground running. The warm-up should have already happened.)

* Provide project spaces where teams can work continuously, all sitting together. If you just have individual workspaces (e.g. cubicles) and group meeting rooms (e.g. conference rooms that must be booked far in advance and vacated after an hour), then you are missing a key tool for facilitating collaboration, team-, and trust-building.

* Celebrate wins publicly by crediting the whole team, not just individuals. Get teams to talk about what worked and didn't work with their collaboration, so that others may learn. Get people into a mindset of thinking consciously about how and why a collaboration is working (or not). Don't let it seem like a magic black box process that gets chalked up to luck. Take a step back and analyze it just as you would any other process.

What's Good for Collaboration is Also Good for Innovation

The great thing is that all these methods to aid collaboration also build a company's effectiveness at innovation. Why? Because:

* Innovation comes from putting ideas and perspectives that have never been combined before. Good collaboration makes this happen more efficiently.

* Innovation involves risk-taking, and that doesn't happen if there's no trust that others will cover you when there is the inevitable stumble. The methods for building trust for collaboration help people more readily take risks as a result.

* Most innovations can't be accomplished by individuals toiling away, or even by single organizations working in isolation. We need people around us to fill in the skills and knowledge gaps, and to tell us when we're full of crap. Collaboration is a critical skill for any organization wanting to do actually bring innovations to market.

Challenges to Pursue by Jim Rohn

2011-05-24T11:25:00.001-05:00

Challenges to Pursue by Jim Rohn

Here’s a list of 15 challenges to pursue, excerpted from the 2004 Jim Rohn Weekend Leadership Event—his last recorded weekend event.

Review Your Performance. Whether it’s communication, whether it’s activity, whether it’s a CEO, whether it’s on the job. Here’s what my father said: “Always do more than you are paid for to make an investment in your future.” Now some unions would argue with that. My father was so unique. Review your performance—your language with your children. Say, “Have I been too harsh, too strong, too stubborn? Should I have learned to be easier and mixed more compassion with the tough stuff I have to deal with?” And yes, prayer will help. Ask for help to say the right thing, not to ruin it all by poor communication.

Face Your Fears. That’s how you conquer them. Don’t dismiss them; face them. Say, “Here’s what I’m afraid of. I wonder what I could do to change that.”

Exercise Your Willpower to Change Direction. You don’t have to keep doing what you’ve been doing the last six years if it’s not yielding the benefits you want. My mentor helped me review the last six years so I wouldn’t repeat those errors the next six. Pick a new destination and go that way. Use your willpower to start the process. You don’t have to repeat last year. Clean up the errors. Invest it now in the next year. Watch it make the difference.

Admit Your Mistakes. Sometimes you have to admit them to others. Parents have to do it. We ask our kids to do it. We have to do it. Here is one of the best phrases in the English language: “I’m sorry.” The reason those are good words is because they could start a whole new relationship. It could start two people going in a whole new direction. Simple, not easy. You get this done, the turnaround can be dramatic. The early years can be big in payoff. Here’s the big one. Admit your mistakes to yourself. You don’t have to babble about them to everyone in the neighborhood. But it doesn’t hurt to sit down and have a conversation with yourself and say, “There’s no use kidding myself. Here’s where I really am. I’ve got pennies in my pocket and I’ve got nothing in the bank.” That’s what I said after a Girl Scout left my door. I had a conversation with myself and I said, “I don’t want this to happen anymore.”

Refine Your Goals. Start the process. Set some higher goals. Reach for some higher purpose. Go for something beyond what you thought you could do.

Believe in Yourself. You’ve got to believe in God and you’ve got to believe in the community. You’ve got to believe in the possibilities. You’ve got to believe in the economy. You’ve got to believe that tomorrow can be better than today. Here’s the big one. Believe in yourself. There isn’t a skill you can’t learn; there isn’t a discipline you can’t try; there isn’t a class you can’t take; there isn’t a book you couldn’t read.

Ask for Wisdom. This is communication of the highest source. Ask for wisdom that creates answers. Ask for the wisdom that creates faith to believe things are possible. Ask for wisdom to deal with the challenges for today and tomorrow, to deal with the challenges your family brings you. Don’t wish it was easier; wish you were better.

Conserve Your Time. Sometimes we get faked out. Bill Bailey says the average person says, “I’ve got twenty more years.” No, Bill says you’ve got twenty more times. If you go fishing once a year, you’ve only got twenty more times to go fishing, not twenty years. That fakes you out.

Invest Your Profits. Here’s one of the philosophies that Mr. Shoaff gave me. Profits are better than wages. Wages make you a living, profits make you a fortune. Could we start earning profits while we make a living? The answer is yes.

Protect Your Family. These are troublesome times. At school—troublesome times. Protect your family as best you can from the hidden dangers, the lurking evil one.

Live with Intensity. You might as well turn it up a notch or two. Invest more of you in whatever you do. Be a little stronger; be a little wiser. Step up your vitality contribution. Put everything you’ve got into everything you do and then ask for more vitality, more strength and more vigor, more heart and more soul.

Find Your Place. If you just work on a job, find the best place you can serve well, and sure enough they’ll ask you to occupy a better place. And if you keep doing a job well, do the very best you can. That’s your best way out. Here’s a Bible phrase. If you work on your gifts, they’ll make a place for you.

Demand Integrity from Yourself. Integrity is like loyalty. You can’t demand it of someone else; you can only demand it of yourself. Be the best example of loyalty, and you’ll get some loyal followers. Be the best example of integrity, and you’ll have people around you who have integrity. Lead the way.

Welcome the Disciplines. Can’t give you much better advice than that because disciplines create the reality. Disciplines build cities. A well-disciplined activity creates abundance, creates uniqueness, productivity.

Fight for What’s Right. It’s a fight we’re in. The storyteller says “And there was a great war in heaven.” One of the writers of later Scripture said, “I fought a good fight.” That’s extraordinary to be able to say. I fought for my kids, and I fought for what was right and I fought for good health, and I fought to protect my company and I fought for a good career that would bless my family. I fought a good fight. It’s good to fight the encroachment. Opposites are in conflict, and you’re in the middle. If you want something valuable, you’ve got to fight for it. Then this writer also said, “I fought a good fight and I kept the faith.” See, that’s the deal. Keep faith with your family. Fight the enemy and keep faith. Fight the illness and keep faith. Fight the evil and keep faith. I can’t give you much better advice.

Be an Optimist Without Being a Fool

2011-05-19T22:36:00.003-05:00

There are quite a number of motivational speakers and self-improvement books out there with a surprisingly simple message: believe that success will come easily to you, and it will. There is one small problem in this argument, however, which unfortunately doesn't seem to stop anyone from making it: it is utterly false.

In fact, not only is visualizing "effortless success" unhelpful, it is disastrous. This is good advice to give only if you are trying to sabotage the recipient. It is a recipe for failure. And no, I'm not overstating it.

But how can this be? Isn't optimism a good thing? Yes it is. Optimism and the confidence it creates are essential for creating and sustaining the motivation you need to reach your goals. Albert Bandura, one of the founding fathers of scientific psychology, discovered decades ago that perhaps the best predictor of an individual's success is whether or not they believe they will succeed. Thousands and thousands of experiments later, he has yet to be proven wrong.

But there is an important caveat: to be successful, you need to understand the vital difference between believing you will succeed, and believing you will succeed easily. Put another way, it's the difference between being a realistic optimist and an unrealistic optimist.

Realistic optimists (the kind Bandura was talking about) believe they will succeed, but also believe they have to make success happen — through things like effort, careful planning, persistence, and choosing the right strategies. They recognize the need for giving serious thought to how they will deal with obstacles. This preparation only increases their confidence in their own ability to get things done.

Unrealistic optimists, on the other hand, believe that success will happen to them — that the universe will reward them for all their positive thinking, or that somehow they will be transformed overnight into the kind of person for whom obstacles cease to exist. (Forgetting that even Superman had Kryptonite. And a secret identity that took a lot of trouble to maintain. And also relationship issues.)

One of the clearest illustrations of the dangers of unrealistic optimism comes from a study of weight loss. Psychologist Gabriele Oettingen asked a group of obese women who had enrolled in a weight-loss program how likely they felt they were to reach their goals. She found that those women who were confident that they would succeed lost 26 pounds more than self-doubters, as expected.

But Oettingen also asked the women to tell her what they imagined their road to success would be like — if they thought they would have a hard time resisting temptation, or if they'd have no problem turning down free doughnuts in the conference room and a second trip to the all-you-can-eat buffet. The results were astounding: women who believed they would succeed easily lost 24 pounds less than those who thought their weight-loss journey would be no walk in the park.

She has found the same pattern of results in studies of students looking for high-paying jobs after college, singles looking to find lasting love, and seniors recovering from hip replacement surgery. Realistic optimists send out more job applications, find the courage to approach potential romantic partners, and work harder on their rehabilitation exercises — in each case, leading to much higher success rates.

Believing that the road to success will be rocky leads to greater success because it forces you to take action. People who are confident that they will succeed, and equally confident that success won't come easily, put in more effort, plan how they'll deal with problems before they arise, and persist longer in the face of difficulty.

Unrealistic optimists are only too happy to tell you that you are "being negative" when you dare to express concerns, harbor reservations, or dwell too long on obstacles that stand in the way of your goal. In truth, this kind of thinking is a necessary step in any successful endeavor, and it is not at all antithetical to confident optimism. Focusing only on what we want, to the exclusion of everything else, is just the kind of naïve and reckless thinking that has landed industry leaders (and at times entire industries) in hot water.

Cultivate your realistic optimism by combining a positive attitude with an honest assessment of the challenges that await you. Don't visualize success — visualize the steps you will take in order to make success happen.

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We're a month into the new year. How are those 2011 goals coming along? Probably not as well as you hoped. If so, you far from alone — in fact, studies suggest that more than half of the people who made New Year's resolutions this year will have broken them by now.

Real change can be hard to come by, and it's tempting to want to start lowering expectations, or throw in the towel on your goal completely. But don't despair, because it's not too late to push the Reset button, and try tackling those goals again. This time around, you'll be better armed.

Most of us place blame for our failures in the wrong places. We believe that we lack the talent, or the willpower, or some other innate ability, to get the job done. But one of the first things you learn when you study achievement for a living is that innate ability (to the extent there is such a thing) tells you nothing about your chances of reaching a goal. My own research, along with decades of other scientific studies of motivation, paint a very different picture — that in fact, like so much in life, it's really all about strategy.

Here are two scientifically-tested strategies that can spell the difference between another year of disappointment, and the significant, lasting changes you have been looking for.

1. Get specific. No, really. Very specific.
Whenever people tell me about their goals, I hear them say that they want to "get ahead at work" or "eat healthier" or "spend less and save more." To which I respond, "OK, but what will success look like? How will you know when you have reached your goal?" Usually, that's followed by a long pause, a look of confusion, and a reply something along the lines of "I hadn't really thought about that."

Taking the time to get specific and spell out exactly what you want to achieve removes the possibility of settling for less — of telling yourself that what you've done is "good enough." Thousands of studies have shown that getting more specific is one of the single most effective steps you can take to reach any goal.

Instead of "getting ahead at work," include a concrete long-term goal, like "a pay raise of at least $_____" or "a promotion to at least the ____ level." Also detail the specific medium-term steps it will take to get there. Has your manager asked you to improve in a certain technical area? Do you know that there are interpersonal issues holding you back? If you know you need to communicate better, make your specific goal something like, "listen attentively without interrupting."

When what you are striving for is vague, it's too tempting to take the easy way out when you've gotten tired, discouraged, or bored. But there's just no fooling yourself if you've set a specific goal — you know when you've reached it and when you haven't. If you haven't, you have little choice but to keep working toward it if you want to succeed.

2. Think about what you want and what stands in the way. Mentally go back and forth.

This strategy is called mental contrasting, and in a nutshell, it involves thinking optimistically about all the wonderful aspects of achieving your goal, while thinking realistically about what it will take to get there.

First, imagine how you will feel attaining your goal. Picture it as vividly as possible in your mind. Next, reflect on the obstacles that stand in your way. For instance, if you wanted to get a better, higher paying job, you would start by imagining the sense of pride and excitement you would feel accepting a lucrative offer at a top firm. Then, you would think about what stands between you and that offer — namely, all the other really outstanding candidates that will be applying for the same job. Kind of makes you want to polish up your resume a bit, doesn't it?

That's called experiencing the necessity to act — it's a psychological state that is crucial for achieving any goal. Daydreaming about how great it will be to land that job can be a lot of fun, but it won't get you anywhere. Mental contrasting turns wishes and daydreams into reality, by bringing into focus what you will need to do to make them happen.

In studies my colleagues and I have conducted — looking at situations ranging from 15-year olds doing summer prep for the PSAT, to HR personnel trying to manage their time better, to singles trying to find a romantic partner, to pediatric nurses trying to improve communication with parents — the results are always the same. Mental contrasting reliably leads to greater effort, energy, planning, and overall higher rates of achieving goals. Taking a few moments to mentally go back and forth between the future you want, and the hurdles you'll have to overcome to get there, will help you find both the clarity and motivation you need to succeed.

In identifying the factors that led to greater success, Wiseman uncovered some interesting gender differences and corresponding tips for success. For example, men are some 22% more likely to achieve their goals if they set specific objectives and write them down. Women are 10% more likely to achieve their goals if they go public and share them with their family and friends.

Perhaps the optimal approach though is to do both these things which is something that Wiseman recommends. Write down your goal together with a list of specific behaviours that are stepping stones towards achieving your goal and then share these with a trusted colleague — maybe one that you who you wouldn't want to lose face with.

The Most Important Question a Manager Can Ask

2011-05-08T22:37:00.001-05:00

When is the last time you asked the group you manage, and the individuals in it, this simple question:

What can I do to help you be more effective?

What question could be more central to being a good boss? If you want to manage and lead successfully, you've got to know what the people doing the work need. So why not ask them? But the truth is, this question is not asked by bosses nearly enough.

You'll get a variety of answers, especially in the beginning — including non-answers ("Gee, nothing. Keep doing what you're doing.") and requests you can't do much about — personal problems, company policies you can't change, complaints about colleagues who make this person's work life miserable, as well as personal requests you can't or won't address (such as "Raise my pay" from someone whose performance is mediocre). Take everything under advisement, if you can't respond immediately. Promise to take action when you think it's warranted but resist efforts to "delegate up."

You will also get answers that are implicit or even explicit criticisms of you. Respond to these by explaining yourself, but don't argue or react defensively. Admit mistakes, if appropriate. At the least, respond with, "Let me think about that. Thanks for telling me."

Discuss, listen, explain, educate, and, above all, understand what the person or group is saying. Be caring but candid. If you can't change company policies or pay grades, explain that. If you disagree with what you're hearing, talk about that respectfully. These are opportunities for both or all of you to learn.

Beyond such answers, however, you will hear ways you really can make people more effective. Finding that may require discussion, careful listening, and respectful probing, and a willingness on your part to hear hard things and to change. Perhaps you really do need to step back and let people do their work; or, perhaps you should get more involved. Perhaps some group work processes need to change. Perhaps you need to talk to a colleague who heads another group about how uncooperative her people are. These things are often easy to do and can make an immediate difference.

Once you start these discussions, you'll find they don't take much time, except when they deserve more time. And they pay dividends. They build trust, they help people work together better and do better work, they identify and remove obstacles.

They also make you more effective because they reveal what's on people's minds. Like it or not, what people think is what they think, and you need to know what that is. Above all, you need to know what people expect from you, the boss. If you don't know what they expect, and their expectations are unreasonable, you can't negotiate new ones and you'll go on disappointing them.

In many organizations, expectations are assumed to flow in only one direction — down. In fact, they flow up as well, though few organizations pay much attention. Too bad. Being a boss is a two-way street. People are more likely to rise to your expectations if you try to understand and rise to what they expect of you.

Nine Things Successful People Do Differently

2011-03-29T18:43:00.001-05:00

Why have you been so successful in reaching some of your goals, but not others? If you aren't sure, you are far from alone in your confusion. It turns out that even brilliant, highly accomplished people are pretty lousy when it comes to understanding why they succeed or fail. The intuitive answer — that you are born predisposed to certain talents and lacking in others — is really just one small piece of the puzzle. In fact, decades of research on achievement suggests that successful people reach their goals not simply because of who they are, but more often because of what they do.

1. Get specific. When you set yourself a goal, try to be as specific as possible. "Lose 5 pounds" is a better goal than "lose some weight," because it gives you a clear idea of what success looks like. Knowing exactly what you want to achieve keeps you motivated until you get there. Also, think about the specific actions that need to be taken to reach your goal. Just promising you'll "eat less" or "sleep more" is too vague — be clear and precise. "I'll be in bed by 10pm on weeknights" leaves no room for doubt about what you need to do, and whether or not you've actually done it.

2. Seize the moment to act on your goals. Given how busy most of us are, and how many goals we are juggling at once, it's not surprising that we routinely miss opportunities to act on a goal because we simply fail to notice them. Did you really have no time to work out today? No chance at any point to return that phone call? Achieving your goal means grabbing hold of these opportunities before they slip through your fingers.

To seize the moment, decide when and where you will take each action you want to take, in advance. Again, be as specific as possible (e.g., "If it's Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, I'll work out for 30 minutes before work.") Studies show that this kind of planning will help your brain to detect and seize the opportunity when it arises, increasing your chances of success by roughly 300%.

3. Know exactly how far you have left to go. Achieving any goal also requires honest and regular monitoring of your progress — if not by others, then by you yourself. If you don't know how well you are doing, you can't adjust your behavior or your strategies accordingly. Check your progress frequently — weekly, or even daily, depending on the goal.

4. Be a realistic optimist. When you are setting a goal, by all means engage in lots of positive thinking about how likely you are to achieve it. Believing in your ability to succeed is enormously helpful for creating and sustaining your motivation. But whatever you do, don't underestimate how difficult it will be to reach your goal. Most goals worth achieving require time, planning, effort, and persistence. Studies show that thinking things will come to you easily and effortlessly leaves you ill-prepared for the journey ahead, and significantly increases the odds of failure.

5. Focus on getting better, rather than being good. Believing you have the ability to reach your goals is important, but so is believing you can get the ability. Many of us believe that our intelligence, our personality, and our physical aptitudes are fixed — that no matter what we do, we won't improve. As a result, we focus on goals that are all about proving ourselves, rather than developing and acquiring new skills.

Fortunately, decades of research suggest that the belief in fixed ability is completely wrong — abilities of all kinds are profoundly malleable. Embracing the fact that you can change will allow you to make better choices, and reach your fullest potential. People whose goals are about getting better, rather than being good, take difficulty in stride, and appreciate the journey as much as the destination.

6. Have grit. Grit is a willingness to commit to long-term goals, and to persist in the face of difficulty. Studies show that gritty people obtain more education in their lifetime, and earn higher college GPAs. Grit predicts which cadets will stick out their first grueling year at West Point. In fact, grit even predicts which round contestants will make it to at the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

The good news is, if you aren't particularly gritty now, there is something you can do about it. People who lack grit more often than not believe that they just don't have the innate abilities successful people have. If that describes your own thinking .... well, there's no way to put this nicely: you are wrong. As I mentioned earlier, effort, planning, persistence, and good strategies are what it really takes to succeed. Embracing this knowledge will not only help you see yourself and your goals more accurately, but also do wonders for your grit.

7. Build your willpower muscle. Your self-control "muscle" is just like the other muscles in your body — when it doesn't get much exercise, it becomes weaker over time. But when you give it regular workouts by putting it to good use, it will grow stronger and stronger, and better able to help you successfully reach your goals.

To build willpower, take on a challenge that requires you to do something you'd honestly rather not do. Give up high-fat snacks, do 100 sit-ups a day, stand up straight when you catch yourself slouching, try to learn a new skill. When you find yourself wanting to give in, give up, or just not bother — don't. Start with just one activity, and make a plan for how you will deal with troubles when they occur ("If I have a craving for a snack, I will eat one piece of fresh or three pieces of dried fruit.") It will be hard in the beginning, but it will get easier, and that's the whole point. As your strength grows, you can take on more challenges and step-up your self-control workout.

8. Don't tempt fate. No matter how strong your willpower muscle becomes, it's important to always respect the fact that it is limited, and if you overtax it you will temporarily run out of steam. Don't try to take on two challenging tasks at once, if you can help it (like quitting smoking and dieting at the same time). And don't put yourself in harm's way — many people are overly-confident in their ability to resist temptation, and as a result they put themselves in situations where temptations abound. Successful people know not to make reaching a goal harder than it already is.

9. Focus on what you will do, not what you won't do. Do you want to successfully lose weight, quit smoking, or put a lid on your bad temper? Then plan how you will replace bad habits with good ones, rather than focusing only on the bad habits themselves. Research on thought suppression (e.g., "Don't think about white bears!") has shown that trying to avoid a thought makes it even more active in your mind. The same holds true when it comes to behavior — by trying not to engage in a bad habit, our habits get strengthened rather than broken.
If you want change your ways, ask yourself, What will I do instead? For example, if you are trying to gain control of your temper and stop flying off the handle, you might make a plan like "If I am starting to feel angry, then I will take three deep breaths to calm down." By using deep breathing as a replacement for giving in to your anger, your bad habit will get worn away over time until it disappears completely.

It is my hope that, after reading about the nine things successful people do differently, you have gained some insight into all the things you have been doing right all along. Even more important, I hope are able to identify the mistakes that have derailed you, and use that knowledge to your advantage from now on. Remember, you don't need to become a different person to become a more successful one. It's never what you are, but what you do.

I believe Poem

2011-03-24T04:04:00.001-05:00

I believe that what comes first is family

I believe in making the most of a beautiful day

And it’s not the end until everything’s okay

I believe absence makes the heart grow fonder

I believe you will lose if you sit and wonder

I believe every experience teaches you a lesson

And nothing cures better then a drinking session

I believe that the sun shines after the rain

I believe if you don’t get hurt you’ll never gain

I believe in not doing things the easy way

I believe that being selfish doesn’t pay

I believe there is nothing better then a good laugh

I believe the whole world is a stage

I believe we only get better with age

I believe that dreams do come true

I believe there’s destiny for me and you

I believe that good things come to those who wait

I believe something good comes from something bad

I believe that for tears of happiness there are tears of sad

I believe the good you do will be rewarded well

I believe sometimes there is no explanation

I believe money can’t buy people’s affection

I believe you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone

I believe a new day arrives with every dawn

I believe a smile can be contagious

I believe in living with no regrets

I believe that life is as good as it gets

I believe the little things are worth the fuss

I believe you have each friend for a reason

I believe you will get punished for treason

I believe that to learn you have to live

I believe that to love someone you have to give

I believe one moment can change your life

And there’s still help when you’re in strife

I believe everyone has one true friend

I believe in the power of a song

And things will change before too long

I believe living is the best experience

I believe in not laughing at other people’s expense

I believe to always look on the bright side

I believe that life is just one big ride

I believe when I die people will grieve

But it’s ok because I believe"

The Four Personas of the Next-Generation CIO

2011-03-18T07:44:00.001-05:00

Five years ago, Chief Information Officers (CIOs) were on top of the world. These executives played mission-critical roles in driving multi-million dollar projects that delivered massive change. However, a global recession and the inability of CIOs to deliver on business value have tarnished their status. Today's CIOs are under pressure to deliver on requests for innovation, cost reduction, connectivity, and a growing demand for business intelligence.

Just as previous technology and business shifts have changed the role of the CIO, the new, more consumer-oriented business models of the social revolution will favor a new breed of business and technology leader. These leaders will have to navigate myriad converging and disruptive technologies, align new initiatives to both business value and technology feasibility, and identify strategies to leverage existing investments to fund innovation.

Consequently, the role of the CIO will evolve. Many next-generation technology leaders will still come from traditional tech backgrounds, but business leaders with a technology bent will also have a shot. As overall business strategy planning ties closer to IT strategy, four personas of the next-generation CIO will emerge:

1. Chief "Infrastructure" Officers focus on cost reduction, and account for 65% to 70% of the overall IT budget. Most of this CIO persona's projects prioritize keeping the lights on and managing legacy environments. Disruptive technologies such as virtualization and cloud will play a key role in cost reduction. These infrastructure officers tend to focus on the technology side and internal-facing activities.

2. Chief "Integration" Officers connect internal and external ecosystems. With 5% to 10% of the overall budget, this CEO persona must bring together a hodge-podge of business processes, data, systems, and connection points with legacy systems and newer cloud-based approaches. Projects touch external systems and often address post-merger integration environments. These integrators tend to focus on the technology side and both internal and external activities.

3. Chief "Intelligence" Officers empower the business with actionable insights. Representing between 10% and 15% of the overall budget, this CIO persona must improve business-user access to information. A key theme includes placing the right data to the right person at the right time on the right interface. These intelligence officers tend to focus on the business side and internal facing activities.

4. Chief "Innovation" Officers identify disruptive technologies for pilot projects. Investing 5% to 10% of the overall budget, this CIO persona must drive innovation on a shoestring. Typically from business backgrounds, these leaders move fast, fail fast, and move on. They tend to focus on the business side and external activities.

Most of today's CIOs fit squarely in the Chief Infrastructure Officer persona, dedicating their time and resources struggling to keep the lights on. Shifting into the Chief Integration Officer role will be a smooth transition for most of them, but only a few with a business bent will grow into the Chief Innovation Officer role. On the flip side, many business leaders with a technology bent will evolve into the Chief Innovation Officer and Chief Intelligence Officer roles.

Among the companies we study, we're seeing three different approaches to accommodating the different CIO personas:

1. One CIO can deliver on all four roles this by upgrading his or her skill sets.
2. A shadow CIO-like organization could emerge on the business side to fill the roles of Chief Intelligence and Chief Innovation Officer.
3. A CIO could have lieutenants charged with one or more of these functions.

Delivering the Speech of My Life

2011-03-16T20:32:00.003-05:00

The transformation from a firebrand speaker to a crowd pulling speaker was in focus and intention. At first, my focus was all on me: "I'm going to screw this up so bad." "I have nothing intelligent to say, and this guy will see through me in about three seconds." "I'm Italian. I'm dumb. I can't compete with these smart people."

But over time I decided I wanted to win. And to win I was going to have to convince the judge — to move him or her somehow. And then it became fun. Because it was no longer about me. It was about my audience: getting listeners from here to there — changing their mind — actually having them leave the room thinking differently than when they entered. And that's powerful.

It's been a blast ever since.

Here's some of what I've learned in my years of public speaking. If you have to knock it out of the park, follow these basic rules:

Know your goal. When the speech is over, what do you want the audience saying about it and you? What difference do you want to make? Most speakers never ask this of themselves.
Memorize your speech. That's right. Memorize every word of it. Deliver it in front of a mirror five times, six times, ten times. Then deliver it while your kid is screaming in the background, to develop the confidence that you can recite it no matter what distraction pops up. Why memorize it? Because nothing will put an audience to sleep faster than someone reading from a prepared text. Because when you memorize it, it stops being about getting the words right and starts being about getting the feeling right. Imagine if Andrea Bocelli didn't memorize the words to the songs in his repertoire. How much room do you think there would be for him to feel them?
If you don't want to knock it out of the park, don't follow rule 2.
Practice the transitions. What will get you from one point to the next? Is it "if," or "when," or "then I." Know and memorize the precise construction of each transitional sentence. It's in uncertainty about transitions from one point to the next that people lose their grace in public and start saying "aaahhhh."
Don't fear silence. You want to silence a room? Don't talk. Be silent and look at the audience. Five seconds. Seven seconds. Just taking them in. Connecting with them. But never do it for effect. Do it to get intimate with your audience. It silences a room like you wouldn't believe. Why? Because it's not normal. Audiences are used to speakers filling every nanosecond with the sound of their own voice, leaving zero time for reflection. Audiences are used to being avoided, not appreciated. When they come upon someone who can command their own silence, they understand, "This person is serious."
Never, ever, ever use PowerPoint as your speech notes. The slides are for your audience, not for you. The moment they see you rattling through a list of bullets that you should have had the courtesy to memorize, they put you in a category with every other boring presenter they've ever seen and you've lost them.
Give something of yourself. Don't be afraid to feel something in front of an audience. Don't be afraid to say something that will make you feel something, and that will make the audience feel something.
Be yourself. Don't feel you need to mimic the testosterone level of a motivational speaker. You will look and feel fake. Robert Kennedy never tried to copy Martin Luther King's rhetorical skills. RFK was soft-spoken. He owned that. And as a result, was every bit as affecting as King.
Don't speak in abstractions. Say what it is that you mean. Plainly. Avoid the lexicon of your own trade. People are sick of it. It doesn't mean anything to them anymore. Speak in human.
Feel what's happening in the room and use it to connect your speech to this moment. In this way, if your mike goes out, you can make a joke out of it, rather than it making a nervous wreck, and a joke, out of you.
Make eye contact until it scares you. Distribute your eye contact around the room. Not for effect, but because you genuinely want to connect with the people in front of you.
Don't miss your own talk. It is a privilege and an honor to be asked to speak. Take the opportunity to commune with other human beings. It's like getting to watch a falling star.
Come from a place of love for your audience. That's mastery. When you allow yourself to feel the humanity of your audience, you have succeeded in taking the focus off yourself. There is a universe of difference between this place and a PowerPoint presentation. This is the place from which change is made. From here you can move mountains.