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Friend of a friend

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Good Morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

Who dare challenge the power of relationships?
I once had a leader who was convinced that relationships played second fiddle to competence and capabilities.
I know another leader who is so good at creating, fostering and promoting relationships that he changed his title, removing President thus hiring someone in that role and directed his focus to develop stronger relationships inside and outside the organization and less on day-to-day operations.
This could be about personalities and preferences but since this blog is supposed to be about leadership, I’ll stay on topic.
You’ve seen me quote “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”  Attributed to Maya Angelou but others before her captured the same sentiment.  This isn’t about who said it first but that many great leaders acknowledged how critical it is to have a strong relationship above all else.
In the professional setting, relationships are labeled connections/part of your network.  When someone thinks two company representatives might benefit from knowing each other, they would refer one to the other.  I just made one of those virtual introductions last evening with the sincere desire for the relational value to be accretive.
In a personal setting, relationships are typically considered to be friends.  When someone thinks two people would benefit from knowing each other, they play matchmaker.  Friends helping friends.
In each case, the risk is high because if the referred relationship doesn’t materialize, it may backfire on the original relationship.  Tricky business.  Worth the risk.
Your mission, if you choose to accept it, would be to make at least one new friend today.  Smile, shake a hand, show some genuine interest and invest in humanity today.  Lather, rinse, repeat.
Have a blessed weekend!

Farr from Dallas

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

Greetings from Irving, TX where I attended the latest industry conference bringing an interesting mix of economists, private equity, venture capital, insurance, accounting, legal, HR, and governance experts and business partners along with buyers and sellers and of course valuation and deal facilitators.  This is the business of architecture and engineering.  Most of it occurring off-site on the golf course, at the Tex-Mex restaurant or in the bar or patio when the wait staff has punched out for the night/morning and the only lights left are from the fireplace and the stars.
This year we heard from multiple keynote speakers that:
•the economy is OK
•hard lessons are still being learned when growth exceeds practicality … and someone has to clean up the stadium after the big game (metaphor for aggressive growth and a “business as usual” message meets with the reality that multiple acquisitions leads to  a fractured culture, disparate systems and an integration nightmare).
•the second futurist in 3 weeks of travel was almost more than I could endure.  We heard from the high-priced “meteorologist” who could be dead wrong and no one would be able to find him to call bullshit on his observations/nebulous predictions.  Watch out!  The future will be here before you know it and everything we saw on the 1962 Hannah-Barbera Jetson’s cartoon has come true.  (I guess that’s why we call our Roomba by her stage name, Rosie.)
•venture capital will likely be the gas behind disrupting the AEC (architecture/engineering/construction) space as we get better at genuine innovation.
Michael Farr, regular financial cable TV contributor, kicked things off and was his regular, solid, practical self with a no politics message and an easy path to understanding of what we do and how we might consider strategic and tactical steps in the next year.  China is no longer the force it was at and the US is still the best place to invest.  If the infrastructure spend happens, as it should, we should see another decade of good investment.  If you can get a 5-7% return on your money in the next few years…be happy with that.
What can you take away from this as a leader?
Investments, regardless of the nature, are a critical part of a thriving economy and should continue.  Not always following the pack but always following a well-formed thesis.
Innovation, nicely described as the invented ladder to pick all the apples on the tree rather than the few you can reach from the ground, is a key to future prosperity.
Intuition, where experience rests in your gut, cannot be dismissed but should be open to challenge.  Things are changing … and becoming complacent will be the death of you and your business.
Have a blessed weekend!

Do it

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

I was in Portland, OR last weekend to visit my daughter Aarika.  She now works for Nike on their global campus and I was fortunate to get a walking tour of the impressive site.  Along with stunning architecture and inspirational statements like above, the entire site is masterfully woven between the natural beauty that is Oregon.

My first goal in making the trip was to see Aarika in her new element and make certain for myself that she was happy.  The career move was exciting for her and she loves her new digs downtown in a LEED platinum building.  She has done well and I am proud of her and excited to see what comes next.

I was also fortunate to see my former business partner Tammy and her spouse for breakfast to catch up and reminisce.  The whole trip filled my bucket, sharpened my saw and allowed me to gather beauty and inspiration.

AA7AD888-321D-454D-BDD7-71D772A58D46We went to Multnoma falls, stopped at a viewing point for the Columbia river and found a few establishments to enjoy some wine and tasty treats.

The beauty was overwhelming!  The inspiration was moving and the unspoken lessons on how to coexist were powerful.

If you’ve been reading between the lines, I’ve been searching for life-work-harmony for as long as I can remember.  Just recently was I able to articulate what it was and now I enjoy finding it and writing about it.

Here’s my latest take as I continue to calibrate my thoughts around work and family and self and life.  The writing on the bench up top, on the Nike campus reads, “Believe in something even if it means sacrificing everything”.

I believe in lots of things:

•God

•Humanity

•Love

I think I’ve sacrificed a lot:

•Family time (for career)

•Self (for family)

•Career (for the greater good)

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There were tons of more photo opportunities in Oregon than I shared here but the inspirational quote that resonated for me was the power of faith and sacrifice.

Each of us makes choices every day that impact the harmony in our lives.  Most of the time, I have noticed, more impetuous than deliberate.

My challenge to each of you is to be more mindful of the choices going forward.  Ask yourself, “At what cost?”  Is it critical to sacrifice everything?  Can you accomplish what you long for without impacting all you’ve worked for?

Have a blessed weekend!

 

 

 

Situational awareness

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
I jumped back into multi-modal travel again this week and was reminded why my annual blood pressure check was so low last month after a 4 month break…and today, it is not.
On my trek back from the East coast, I was in Philadelphia waiting for a delayed flight and relatively calm.  Listening to some music after a stint in the SkyClub.  I spy with my little eye, at Gate D8, far from ideal conditions where the poor passengers exiting the plane have no clear path to the main walkway and the gate agents.ssss….ssss…s.s.ssssss, well they announced that passengers waiting to board should stay back while passengers exit but some aloof, preoccupied, who-knows-why-it-didn’t-strike-them folks that the announcement pertained directly to them, paid no attention.  Apparently thrown off by the request “May I have your attention please?!”.  One passenger with spikes in her cheeks (yes, you read that right) and tattoos on her arms probably wanted each person to stop and take notice  of her choices but most of us preferred that people arriving, arrive so people boarding could…board.
What should you take away from this tiny rant?
For starters, it is not that I take exception to piercings or tattoos.  Quite the contrary.
My dismay was rooted in two grown adults who figured announcements were for others and even after the stream of people started to plug the encumbered path, these two specific road blocks sat comfortably along with the gate agents.sssss…ssss, while the delayed passengers had one final test of patience before their work day was over.
Look up, look around, be prepared, be aware, don’t be that person who becomes so engrossed in your self or your electronic device that you miss the bigger picture, whether its at gate D8 or at home or at the office or with a client.
The early life lesson for me comes from Mr. Kittleson, my driving instructor, who used to say, “View the total traffic picture.”  What’s in your windshield, mirrors, periphery? Move your head and body and watch out for blind spots.  (Note: Just because you have cameras and sensors and bright lights doesn’t excuse you from taking control and exhibiting mastery of the cabin you are piloting.  Those are aids but) Ultimately you are responsible for being a conduit for production rather than a barrier to improvement.
My personal and immediate awareness helped me to realize I’d be better to walk to the end of the terminal and think about something / anything entirely different rather than watch the spectacle or wait for the candid camera crew to pop out of some hidden room and laugh at all of us wondering how someone could be so disconnected from their surroundings.
Have a blessed weekend!
Bonus lesson inspired by the gate agentssssssssssss:
•Don’t forget to do your job and
•Leave things better than what you found them.
Peace be with you!

The fighter

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Good Morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
In the past few weeks, I’ve run across a large number of strong personalities that made me feel…normal.
What do I think qualifies someone to earn the title of fighter?  Here are some examples:
•The education administrator who navigated through a significant gender bias to influence the process and lead larger volumes of children to maximize their future by better choices, earlier.
•The business owner who persevered through decades of building a brand in architecture only to be forced to fight to a near-death, four-year legal match for the business and emotional freedom with the thought-to-be life partner.
•The owner-operator who demonstrated loyalty to a fault to a business partner who responded by taking advantage, misinforming, benefitting from the out-of-balance relationship and finally walking away from an anemic and failed transition.
•The physical education instructor working to help people take control of their out-of-control bodies but frustrated to a high level by the half-hearted posers wasting energy while lugging around their tubs of goo.
•The talent recruiter who modeled the way for future business partners by speaking up in her workplace when things weren’t handled correctly, providing direct and candid feedback professionally and ultimately moving on to a new company to influence an industry in a new way where her efforts were supported and appreciated.
What’s the common denominator?  Are each predestined to wage war every day?  If so, why?
I think it is because each one cares to a degree most fail to understand.  Perhaps cares “too much”.  When you have a persevering passion that mows over political correctness because the results-orientation is so intense…is it wrong?
I think it requires that we ask ourselves:
•For what cause?
•And what cost?
I admire the fighter.  Raise a glass and celebrate the fighter in your circle today.  When you care so deeply about something that you are willing to do what it takes to make it right…jump in the ring!
As Teddy Roosevelt wrote:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Have a blessed weekend!

Why?

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
I may have posed this open-ended question before but find myself coming back to it regularly.  Here is how I respond to it today.
If we “suddenly” find blessings; love, an abundance of work, a major life milestone comes to a long-awaited close, a tax windfall, extraordinarily beautiful weather or a host of other things, we are quick to claim justification like “I worked hard for it…and therefore deserve it”.
However, if we encounter pain or suffering; anger, conflict, sickness or death, we tend to ask “Why is this happening to me?”
Are we lucky or unlucky?
Is it destiny?
Divine intervention?
I’ve traveled a fair amount during my career and when calling home at night, I heard the famous phrase, “This ALWAYS happens when you’re gone!”  Whether a flat tire, the furnace or A/C quits, a letter from the IRS or some other thing that makes your stomach tighten up and ask yourself … “Why?!”
In the scenario above, from my perspective, stuff IS always happening, not just when I’m gone.  It might be that many things get fixed when I’m at home and no one even knew it was found, fixed and forgotten rather than frantic, fretted over and flailing (like a partially broken toe nail).
Leadership includes how we react to things that come across our desk as well as the things we face proactively.
Why did something bad happen?
•Why did the stock market crash?
•Why did a bunch of employees leave?
•Why did a major client change course?
Sometimes, you don’t and won’t know.  But you might want to strengthen the found it fixed it and forgot it muscle because that’s what leaders do.  Don’t question why.  Be prepared to find solutions when things go wrong.
A final thought…when you look at a peer, someone you admire and are tempted to say, “Joanne has it easy.  Things are always going her way.”  It might be prudent to pause and recognize Joanne is facing the same stuff day in and day out, albeit her own version, but the appearance of everything going her way is likely the way in which she faces and responds to each thing.
Have a blessed weekend!
As my old pastor Jerry Carlson used to say, “As you go out into the world this week, remember, everyone is fighting a battle of some kind, so Be Gentle.”

Life / Work Harmony

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Good morning, Team!  It’s (Good) Friday!
You’ve probably heard the buzz phrase “work-life balance”.  I’m compelled to ask,
“What’s balanced about your world today?”
Do you spend a perfect 8 hours sleeping, walk 10,000 steps a day and drink 100 fluid ounces of water, and stay below 1,800 calories of the proper kind of nutrient-rich foods each day?
These are great goals to aspire to but my bigger question is, how do you respond to the days you don’t accomplish this?
Do you get angry at and down on yourself?  If so, what does that look like and how does it ultimately help or hurt your efforts?
Now let’s turn our attention to your career.
Do you set goals for yourself?
Do you review them often?
What do you do when some of your goals aren’t met?
-Are you hard on yourself?
-Do you end up putting in more time at work to somehow “make up” for the goals that are “slipping”?
-What are the impacts to you versus the people you love?
In a moment of self reflection, I would say I wasn’t smart enough to ask myself these questions early enough to make a difference in some of my key relationships.
I chased the rabbit.  I spent inordinate amounts of time trying to meet a number, whether set by me or someone else, and lost sight of why I was working so hard.
Note: For clarity sake, you won’t stomp the work ethic out of this author, but there is room for refinement, room for improvement, such as:
Focusing on quality, not quantity-
Be present and engaged in your role, whether CEO or any other position.  Be just as present and just as engaged at home or with friends.  Aspire for balance but achieve harmony (defined as: the quality of forming a pleasing and consistent whole).
Have a blessed weekend, a blessed Easter and seek harmony!
He is risen!

Look ahead

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

Have you ever spent time looking backward and wondering what things would have been like if…?
I read a recent post (forwarded from a close friend) that put it in terms that make it difficult to not get it.
When author Sue Hawkes writes “You can’t focus on what could’ve been and at the same time move toward what you intend to be.”
This is a universal reference, not just vocational.
It might be easy to assume I’m referring to the promotion, contract continuation or some other form of career-oriented missed opportunity.
How about financial?:  Didn’t get that house loan and now I’m stuck in this [less desirable domicile].
How about relational?:  My buddy took her on a date before I had the chance and now they’re married.  I guess I’ll just be a bachelor the rest of my life.
How about spiritual?:  I lost a loved one and I don’t get how God could allow that to happen, so I stopped believing.  I’m only going to trust the things I can see and on my own abilities.
Here’s a small exercise you might find value in.
•write down ten things you aspire to be as you look ahead.  Start each sentence with “I intend to be … (fill in the blank).”
Ex:
*I intend to be a better listener.
*I intend to show my loved ones more often how much they mean to me.
*I intend to be an extraordinarily inspirational leader.
•make them specific enough to be actionable
•review your list at least once daily and look at it each day for the following month.
Look ahead.  Leave the “could’ves” behind. No one has the capacity to carry all that old baggage while on your journey forward.
Have a blessed weekend!

S is for stupid

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
I was chatting with my good friend Jim this week.  We were talking about some of life’s lessons that we stumbled across or maybe that we were steamrolled by and it’s less humiliating to say we stumbled across them…
I made some cocky remark about what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, thinking I had gained a fair amount of “strength” when he said emphatically, No! It’s when you realize the big red “S” on your chest stands for Stupid, not Superman.  (If you can’t count on your friends to keep you in-line, who can you trust?)
So here is what that comment conjured up for me.
As an engineer and a fix-it person, I enjoy repairing broken stuff AND making it better.  Example-we’re selling our house right now and anything from replacing a light bulb in a hard to reach spot I didn’t want to pay someone else to do, replacing a 3-way switch, putting in longer screws on a kitchen cabinet hinge or darkening a ding on a wooden cabinet (that turned into a 4 hour job)… if it looks better, works better, IS better, it makes me proud to be associated with it.
When you start to think you may be “Super”, instead of simply part of the selected vessel to repair, replace, or rejuvenate something, you may lack humility or the basic understanding that much of the things in this broken world require attention, but it’s never an individual sport.
No one is leaping tall buildings with a single bound or stopping freight trains without an exceptional Team to make shhhtuff happen.  That big Red S you painted (virtually) on your chest isn’t for Super.
I had another close friend, no longer with us, explain the phenomena where you sacrifice so much you start to believe you are entitled to more…appreciation, recognition, compensation, adoration or [fill in your own descriptor].
Truth is we all make choices:
•How much time you spend at work.
•How much time you spend at home.
•How well you listen.
•How vulnerable you’re willing to make yourself.
•How you choose to see your accomplishments as compared to giving credit to whom it actually belongs.
Level Five leaders know that your Team and the extraordinary people who comprise your collective brand wear the virtual “S”.
Don’t be stupid.  Take a minute today to thank the people around you who make you feel good enough to think you are, or ever were, Super.
Have a blessed weekend!

Soft

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

I saw a sign last night when leaving a local establishment that read “work hard, play hard” and I think I resemble that message.  But if you only know hard and nothing exists to contrast it, what’s to say one man’s hard isn’t another man’s soft.  When referencing hard, are we talking difficult or rigid or complex?  Conversely, what connotation does soft have?  Easy, kind, weak, gentle, smooth?
Executive coach Damien Faughnan told me that the ‘soft stuff is the hard stuff.’  In the spirit of the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu, this is meant to challenge the way we might normally think. The soft stuff (kind, respectful, whispers, and assuming noble intent) can be hard (challenging) when we think we know the “truth” and we just want to get things accomplished.  We (and I mean ME when I say we) want others to immediately understand things to the same level that we do and beyond comprehension, share the same level of urgency to get things accomplished as soon as humanly practical.  A sign of this might be when you’ve explained something for the third time and you start talking to yourself… “[They] just don’t get it!  It’s clear as day.  I need [them] to just get it done or I’ll just do it myself.”
Here’s where soft (tone of voice, concern, fruits of the spirit-love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness – enter the equation) and when you have a demanding boss, board members, shareholders or other stakeholders full of anxiety and expectation, the natural reaction is to reflect that down to your Team.  But we all know, as Maya Angelou said, “People don’t care how much you know until they know…how much you care.”
I called out tone of voice above because mine is not soft (normally).  It has been my experience that a hard message spoken softly is better received than an easy message is, when delivered with the wrong tone.  How easy is it to maintain a calm demeanor and articulate a message when you’re being stepped on from multiple angles?  It’s not.
So…the soft stuff is the hard stuff.
Be gentle today.  Think about others needs before yours or maybe trust yours will be met when you meet others first.
Have a blessed weekend!