Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

I had the pleasure of attending an exclusive company event this week where executives were provided information on initiatives, goals, strategic imperatives and time to network, learn from each other and prepare for the next steps with the organization. It was a wonderful event by all accounts.

One of the many benefits this tremendous company offers is to bring world-class talent to inspire, educate and develop our people.  This year, we were fortunate to hear from Nick Saban. (We were also provided a copy of his book, How good do you want to be?)

By all accounts, Mr. Saban is a class act. He’s a championship winning coach but more importantly, beyond X’s and O’s, he’s a leader, a developer, a recruiter and a culture builder. He may have a reputation of being hard…but it was clear that he is hardest on himself:

•thinks much more about the 3 championship games his teams lost than the 7 his teams won

•starts planning for the next season the day after the championship game (no “celebration relief valve”- he credits this to his father instilling a strong work-ethic)

•was asked how he would describe himself in one word and he said demanding – because he’s a gentleman and didn’t want to use the first word that came to mind

He says there are 3 types of leadership

-Laissez-faire- take things as they are

-Transactional- very results-oriented

-Transformational-developing people/players to be the best they could be

It took him years to evolve from transactional to transformational.

He gave several examples of the development challenges even with top-notch talent. Here is one…

One of his star players passed a fraternity one afternoon and heard racial slurs directed toward him. The player defended himself and ended up in a squad car. The officer brought him to the coach instead of the police station, a deal worked out in advance. (Whether success-driven privilege or a proactive coach taking responsibility for his players, you decide.) 

He asked the player what he was thinking and the young man said he was raised to stand up for himself. Understandable, but…Coach Saban said, “Son, you will enter the NFL draft with your talent. You could go in the first round and make $30M a year or get an arrest on your record, go in the 3rd round and make $3M a year.”

The star athlete said “Coach, you’ll never have another problem with me.”

We don’t all have professional football talent or the financial opportunities that could be realized with good choices, but we each have the ability to embrace discipline, make sacrifices and maximize our potential. It’s not easy but it is attainable. How good do you want to be?

What choices are you making each day to realize your full potential?

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric

Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

It’s a fairly common exercise when you are trying to improve your position in life to “begin (the rest of your journey) with the end in mind.” Answering the questions:

•What kind of legacy do I hope to leave? 

•What will people step up to the lectern to say about the impact I made, or didn’t…?

Will your funeral be packed with adoring mourners in a mega church or will you be able to fit your crowd into a small chapel? Will your grandchildren be grown with children of their own or will they even be able to process the service and your loss?

What kind of an impression are you leaving on your family, your community, your company, your institution or your industry?

Were you an investor or a miner or an occupier – just taking up time and space?

Did you generally make people happy, angry or just indifferent?

Truth be told, I’m flying back from a two-day business meeting where face-to-face made a difference and one of the many teams I am fortunate to be part of grew closer together.

Travel troubles were also part of the trip. Taking the last flight out for the evening is like throwing dice at the craps table in Vegas. You really don’t know when you’re gonna roll a “snake eyes”. We were delayed for hours, the sky club closed well before the delayed flight took off and my attention span was gone after leaving it all on the table at our business meeting.

I’m staring out the window of the commercial jet on a clear night with an incredible light show below and wondering…how do I fit into this big puzzle? What will people remember about me? If I am fortunate to leave a lasting impression, will it be the kind I would be proud of? More importantly, if not, am I willing to take the necessary actions to be the person I want to be and be remembered as?

I LOVE my family – but I could share it more often

I VALUE my coworkers contributions but I could lift them up individually and collectively more regularly

I CHERISH my time in prayer but I could be praising Him more consistently

The thought of writing your eulogy is morbid to some and awkward to others. However, the reflection can be transformative. Be honest with yourself, be kind to yourself and think about what you need to do to leave the legacy you’re capable of.

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric

Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

One of my bosses at the early stages of  my professional career shared his belief that no matter what decisions you made, you would end up at the same (or similar) finish to your career (position, compensation and degree of satisfaction). 

A very successful business friend worked her way to CEO of a $Billion + business then went into a successful second career as a politician. She created incredible value and enjoyed what she did. She argued that work-life balance was not her goal. She might be the epitome of “if you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life.”

A strategic advisor who I hired, while running one of the businesses I was provided the opportunity to turn around, said more than once, “You make your job as hard or as easy as you choose to.” It has taken me decades to begin to accept that. I felt there were easier jobs and harder jobs and I was drawn to the harder ones.

I was taught as a child in our family businesses to :

•Do the right thing, not the easy thing

•Leave things in better condition than I found them

•Idle hands are the devil’s workshop

Therefore, I don’t idle well. Does that mean that I made things harder than I needed to? Does that mean I don’t know how to relax? Does that mean I could have taken more time off, spent more time with my family and ended up in the same place at the end of my career?

Today, somewhere between the start of the fourth quarter and the start of the ninth inning for me, I think … it depends. 

It depends on the type of effort-was it working smarter or was it working harder? 

It depends on the choices-I sacrificed many, many, many nights away from home to perform work my peers elected not to.

It depends on the amount of integrity-I’ve been accused of coming across as righteous. I see things pretty black and white, it’s right or it’s wrong. No short cuts. The gray always felt like a convenient way to describe when someone applied a liberal amount of discretion instead of following the law or sound business judgement.

It depends on the actions- doing what you said you would, sticking to your convictions, understanding that, especially in a leadership role, you must put the needs of the many over the needs of the few. I believe if I do my job well and take care of the company, the company will take care of me.

Has my approach to my earning years been more idealistic than realistic? Perhaps. 

I live with the choices I made. I work hard to improve on the choices that weren’t as successful as I’d like, and practice gratitude regularly for the countless blessings I’ve received.

Wherever you are on your career path, you’ve experienced elation and disappointments and a whole lot of things in between. You make choices every single day that support where you’ve been, where you are and where you are going.

As you start this year, I encourage you to go through the mental exercise of visualizing your career path. If you could fly a drone with a high definition camera so high that you could see the starting line, the point you are at this very moment and the terrain you’ll need to traverse to cross the finish line, what choices will you make?

-Easy route?

-Hard route?

-Fast pace?

-Slow pace?

-Pay it forward?

-Grab all you can before the music stops?

My advice…

Make a graceful exit. The longer you have to plan, the more graceful, altruistic and exemplary it could be.

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric

Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

In ancient Greece, there was a wooden ship that Theseus sailed from Crete to Athens. To preserve the ship, when old planks decayed, Athenians would replace them with new wood. Eventually all of the planks had been replaced. So, is it the same ship? Is it a totally different ship?

We are not ships where boards can easily be replaced. What I’m referring to is your habits, your choices, your behaviors, and your reactions to things that happen. 

Do you change them out like decayed boards? 

Do you know when a habit or behavior or reaction is no longer reliable and must be changed out? 

Assuming you become self-aware and do take action, is that still you or do you become new? 

Maybe you have certain boards that decay faster and they need to be changed out more frequently?

What steps do you take to weatherproof those particular boards to reduce the times you have to change them out?

Changing habits is incredibly hard. 80-90% of your approximately 6,000 average thoughts per day are considered repetitive, according to research. Once our story is created and repeated day after day and many times a day, you come to believe what you have reinforced over and over and over. Unfortunately, most of those thoughts are negative (decayed boards), attributed to be a primal survival instinct.

What does any of this mean?

You have the ability to change your boards as fast or as slow as you’d like. Most change very few because it is so difficult. Others continue to maintain their vessel as long as they live for quality and fullness of life.

You don’t have to be completely new in order to be your very best…just keep learning, and adapting to your situation.

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric

Good evening, Team! It’s Friday!

I woke up in a different state and a different time zone than I started out the day before. Throughout the night, I was awakened multiple times by everything from the battery-powered leaf blower to a bathroom break to the innocent-looking alarm clock that a previous hotel guest set to go off, way too early … but once it went off, I was up for the day. Then a text from my dear wife came indicating she was ill and had been up half the night and couldn’t go to work.

At the hotel restaurant, greeted by signs that required that I wait to be seated, I stood while several servers and the hostess held a conversation in a mostly empty restaurant almost out of sight. I made eye contact with one helper who chose to ignore me…. I would have selected a different venue but we were meeting for business just down the hall in half an hour. I walked toward the gaggle of servers and was then seated. I was curt and eventually embarrassed I couldn’t look past the staff shortcomings. The tip did not reflect my situation. The food was (also) below average but I gave a standard 20%.

After our business meeting, several of us shared an uber ride to the airport. The vehicle smelled badly and the driver kept the window open to mitigate the odor. I preferred less wind on the highway but said nothing.

Once in the airport, I had to remind the gate agent of the upgrade I was selected for. Once seated, the family behind had a “kicker” to ensure I didn’t nap. The family across the aisle had a sad baby that probably dealt with ear pain after visiting grandma and grandpa for the holidays so much of the plane learned of the discontent.

We are surrounded by reminders that this world has flaws. Things don’t always go well or as we had hoped or planned. Sometimes the whole day can be filled with things that rob us of our peace and test our patience, leaving me now quiet rather than stewing.

It is at this point that I start counting my blessings.

•I am healthy

•I’m getting home before dark tonight

•I will be able to comfort and dote on my almost never ill wife

•I am gainfully employed

•I am loved

Friends, it was just a Friday. It could be considered crappy or at least inconvenient, but I choose to see it as a good day.

Blessings,

Eric

Good Morning, Team! It’s Friday!

Christmas is over, the New Year is coming and we could all use a transition-period refresher as we welcome another trip around the sun.

I recently celebrated a milestone with family where a few friendly barbs were thrown as the kids tried to pretend they didn’t learn a thing from their old man. Wisdom follows age if you’re learning from your mistakes.  We all make some and the bold make more. If mistakes cause you to stop aspiring, you’re not reaching your potential.

I think I taught my kids plenty and one of the things they witnessed was resilience and the rebounding that followed.

Failure teaches us quite a lot and success might lull you into a false sense of reality. We live in a broken world and you can get hardened by all the crap, you can get soft from luck mixed with your efforts you like to call success or you can balance it all out and realize you are never as good as you think you are and you are never as bad as your critics claim.

When life serves you lemons…

•Whoever you are, whatever you do, wherever you live – you have people who depend on you and care about you. Don’t let them down with less than your all. Don’t sell yourself short. Don’t allow anyone to gaslight you.

•Tomorrow is another day and a chance to improve on what you did today.

•No matter how easy things look for someone else, we all face challenges of some kind. Fight your battles with honor, integrity and no regret.

…you make lemonade!

Gallons of it.

Have a blessed weekend!

Make it your best year yet in ‘25.

Send me a note and tell me what you plan to change when it comes to making mistakes and learning from them … starting today.

Eric

Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

How did 2024 go for you? 

•Was it full steam ahead?

•Steady Eddy?

•Not so awesome?

•Total dumpster fire?

“Life” has a way of serving up a variety of slow-burning, energy-draining, and soul-crushing experiences that when the wrong combo hits you, it can be debilitating.

When you are down, it’s amazing how easy it can be to let situations or other people define who you are and how you’ll respond. Recovery is the best answer and most of us find a path to it, usually with the help of those close to us and invested in our well being.

*If you’re going through hell, keep on going.

*If you’re coming up for air, take your breath, rest, reflect and reengage.

*If you’re out of the woods but still hurting, disoriented or pulled backwards by negative thoughts…forgive. Forgive yourself, forgive your oppressors and separate the past from your future.

We all have our stories that shape us, our reactions, our disposition and our choices. Rather than get pulled into the negative cycle again and again and again…take the time necessary to plan the next, unique move you will make as a wiser, stronger, resilient person who has something more to show the world.

So much more

•Age doesn’t define us, but we do tend to use it as an excuse 

•Experiences like those mentioned above can be your casket or your catalyst. It is a choice and letting bad actors or shitty circumstances define the rest of your life is a total shame

I’ve seen my share of agony and I can wallow like a champ if I put my mind to it, or more correctly, when I don’t put my mind to it.

As you plow into 2025, take action!

You are so much more than your circumstances.

You have so much more to give than you have so far:

-charity

-grace

-mercy

-elegant solutions

-cherished friendships

-more minutes per week at the gym, taking walks or listening to live music

So,

•Flash that smile

•Share your heart with loved ones

•Make your list of what you plan to do better in 2025 and leave people wondering, what got into [Johnny/Jean/Karen]?

Have a blessed weekend!

Happy Holidays!

Prepare … to be So Much More

and remember

Eric

Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

Skepticism has a bad rap. In today’s world, with instantaneous information from everywhere, all the time, there is an absolute overload … and everyone chooses their filters and interpreters … or someone will shove theirs down your throat.

Why should anyone be OK with someone complaining about fact checking? Whether in a debate or in everyday life? It’s as if to say, I’m going to lie to your face and remove your ability to respond to that feeling in your gut that you’ve been lied to. Is the goal to inform, influence or confuse?

I’ve been inundated with requests for money recently. Fourth quarter push, hurricane impact, I got on someone’s mailing list after giving to a couple of charities I believe in. Habitat wanted my credit card info over the phone…nope. I’ll go online. St Jude wants your charitable contribution while sitting on $ Billions, with a “B”, in cash reserves. Nope…I have choices where to give.

Social media platforms have somehow justified that stealing your information is in your best interest. We fire up Artificial Intelligence outlets to ask questions that we quickly implement answers to without a second thought of where it came from. Did we stop caring about intellectual property or the implications of mega-scale idea theft?

If something seems too good to be true, it probably is and you should trust your gut. If multiple entities are vying for your money and will do whatever they can, legally or otherwise to separate you from your hard earned compensation, stand firm, ask questions, push back and freeze your credit. If you’ve been lulled into the idea that there is a get-rich-quick path or just do it because everybody else is or I deserve that because…come back to reality and understand hard work and dedication are the building blocks to success.

If I sound like a curmudgeon or a conspiracy theorist, I am not. I believe that a healthy dose of skepticism will lead to refined discretion and help you filter out more of the crap and bad actors. Grace for the rest.

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric

Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

The new word for retired is transitioning. My theory is there are so many baby boomers that could retire but they’ve broken every other norm, why not this one too. Something like 10,000 a day are still able to retire and many do. I had the opportunity to pull the pin … but for a number of reasons, I chose to transition and this is to another challenging and exciting opportunity.

Arriving at the next gig, someone asked how long I’d been off and I told him. His response, I hope you took that time to enjoy yourself. I smiled. I could have done more but as most people know who know me, I don’t idle well. Instead I took the time to: 

•start my consultancy back up

•get up to speed with my network 

•attend an industry conference

•get to know several new groups of people

•attend a graduation

•attend a family wedding

•attend Mom’s 90th birthday celebration

•attend a family reunion

•spend time at a couple of lake cabins

•take a motorcycle trip

•spend time with friends in warm places

•fly with my lovely wife to a place we hadn’t been before

•visit children and grandchildren

•celebrate a milestone anniversary

•attend the Minnesota state fair

•try out electric bikes on local trails

•golf

•walk most every day

•exercise more regularly 

•dream about my next career move

•pray about my next career move

•read

So yes, I definitely enjoyed my time off…and life goes on.

I ran into several people on my journey this year who highly recommended retirement and were enjoying old and new hobbies. Others were still very active in business as consultants or fractional executives. Some were volunteering, writing books or traveling extensively. All have chosen a path that fits their situation.

My latest transition will continue to allow me to grow people and business, which is what I love to do.

Someday I might retire…but not today. Right now I’m off to see what’s over that next mountain.

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric 

Good morning, Team! It (’ll soon be) Friday before Labor Day weekend!

I’ve been reading “Speed of Trust” by Stephen M. R. Covey, son of the guy you’re thinking of. Each of us has our own internal definition of what trust is but I like the way (younger) Covey puts it,

“Trust is a function of two things: character and competence. Character includes your integrity, your motive, your intent with people. Competence includes your capabilities, your skills, your results, your track record. And both are vital.”

In my opinion-

To trust someone implicitly in a professional setting is foolish. As President Adams once said of his successor, President Jefferson, 

“I do not believe that Mr. Jefferson ever hated me. On the contrary, I believe he always liked me…Then he wished to be President of the United States, and I stood in his way. So he did everything he could to pull me down.” 

Jefferson being Adams’ Vice President, one might have expected different behavior. Adams eventually found a way to forgive Jefferson although he felt he had been disloyal, extremely partisan and politically ambitious. The two remained friends until they died.

To trust someone implicitly on a personal level is the basis of a genuine and mature relationship. Those worthy of implicit trust in our lives are extremely rare; spouse, parents, children…adult children that is. While this sounds jaded on the surface, implicit trust takes place when there aren’t rational reasons to do so. (Your ass is hanging out there) and if you survive one or two miscalculations in life, you’ll be hyper-focused on those rational reasons from that point forward. Trust me.

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric