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The deep end

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“The deeper the wound, the bigger the scar, the longer the heal.”
Mother Nature
Ever cut your knee wide open trying to be Evil Knievel jumping your bike on a ramp in the gravel alley where no sane person would pedal that fast traveling over a greasy chunk of plywood on top of cinder blocks with a “chopper” (three bike forks jammed together so the front wheel looked like it was going to fall off before you even started toward the ramp)?  Maybe that was just me.
Pushing the limits of our reality is common.
Risk/Reward is a formula that works in the United States better than most environments.
•If we’re talking capitalism, it’s the best test bed I know of.
•If we’re talking a specific work environment, I never knew how to sit still and do what I was told. (Neither did most people who preferred to stand out and were willing to pay whatever price came with taking the risks associated with the perceived reward).
•If we are talking matters of the heart…this may be where it all comes together.  Last week I presented the argument that emotion wins the most influence.  You are entitled to have a different opinion.  (Let me hear it through your comments.)  When someone is filled with drive, desire, passion…whether toward a career, a family or a higher cause…it is hard to dampen the enthusiasm using reason and logic.  A passionate soul is something to behold (and even more challenging to contend with).
I love many things in this broken world.  I have been told more than once that I “care too much”.  I think the best way to interpret that is to say, I’m purposely out of balance.  I have something to prove.  I want to make things better:
For my family
For my employer
For the industry I associate with
For my clients
For myself (since we’re being honest here)
What better place to start than areas requiring significant improvement?
As a young kid, I knew the chance to “fly”, if even for a scant second or two, would be amazing.  That same feeling of flying is extended infinitely longer in a meaningful career scenario.  Reward: successful and sustainable divisions, companies, and emerging leaders.
Risk: bumps in career path, sacrifice of time and life balance, perceived narcissism.
While I navigate the troubled waters with no life vest, no navigation equipment and a make shift oar, I’m looking at a wide-open ocean and it’s intimidating…and exhilarating.  I’ve convinced myself that prosperity is nothing more than a state of mind.  Willing to take the bull by the horns, once again, recognizing risks to avoid and driven by rewards, the acquired taste that is impossible to forget, I push past the crashing waves toward … the deep end.
Have a blessed weekend!

Egos, Pathos, Logos

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
“Leadership is influence.”
John Maxwell

Aristotle postulated there were three ways to influence in a conversation or speech:
Ethos-Character
Pathos-Emotion
Logos-Logic
In his own words,
Persuasion is clearly a sort of demonstration,
since we are most fully persuaded when we
consider a thing to have been demonstrated
Of the modes of persuasion furnished
by the spoken word there are three kinds. […]Persuasion is achieved by the speaker’s personal character when the speech is so spoken as to make us think him credible. […]

Secondly, persuasion may come through the hearers,
when the speech stirs their emotions. […]

Thirdly, persuasion is effected through the speech itself
when we have proved a truth or an apparent truth by means
of the persuasive arguments suitable to the case in question.

    • —- ARISTOTLE,

“Rhetoric”, 350 BCE

Aristotle was a scientist so I can about imagine he preferred the logos (logical) argument.  After all, facts typically win a case if arguing in front of a judge or jury, where influence can be a life or death matter.  Think DNA evidence.
I submit that Pathos dominates today.  When Aristotle says “stirs [the] emotion”, when someone gets riled up or angry about something, the listener’s intelligence goes down, some estimate as much as 30 points, and reasoning may give way to the emotional state.  Think OJ Simpson trial.
Perhaps to be the best leader, you should consider employing all three elements.
•Stay in your lane.  If you don’t have credibility or the character to carry a topic forward, employ additional resources to quickly establish yourself.
•Understand how most others might feel about your topic (indifferent, excited, upset…)-maybe survey in advance to better understand your audience when possible.
•Understand the facts surrounding your topic/position/vision.
I’ve heard several aspirational leaders stand in front of their organization and say, “We are going to double revenue in [x] years.”  The questions under the breath of the audience (at least those listening) are:
-How are we going to do that?
-What’s in it for me?
-Can I trust this person enough to sacrifice my life preferences for the company’s all in the hopes that it will come back to me, with considerable gains, in the future?
-Do we have the resources?
-Will we get the training required in a timely manner?
Cover all your bases before getting in front of your audience.
Now go win over some hearts and minds.
Have a blessed weekend!

Huge pain

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

I’ve said more than once I’m a sucker for a well articulated thought or a collection of words that have specific meaning to me.
This phrase hit my ears last night and it struck me three ways simultaneously.
Number 1:
You’re a HUGE PAIN in my ass…
A severe inconvenience we choose to tolerate because we think it noble or necessary.
Last night I spoke with two different fellow executives who shared considerably different stories but ultimately can be categorized by their tolerating huge pains in their organizations.  The first is an entitled 3-month-in employee who genuinely felt he should have been consulted on how performance bonuses were distributed for the company. 😂
The second story was more disturbing as the big hurt has decades of leadership training but still behaves more like a mediocre mid-level manager, demanding respect through authority and steering communication hierarchy, overwhelming process and riding in on their high (white) horse 😡…when they should be educating, entrusting and empowering.
Number 2:
HUGE PAIN can be a level of intractable physical pain that words cannot describe and most people cannot comprehend.  I know this subject well but have been reminded by medical professionals and those who suffer from it that I know nothing if I can’t feel it.
One of the founders of the Minnesota medical marijuana distributors shared with me the story of the soldier in Afghanistan  who was badly injured with a bullet in the back and how good he felt on marijuana but is also a very law abiding citizen so returning to the states posed a conundrum.  Opioids are no long-term solution.  Finding relief proved to be a significant challenge with potentially fatal side effects.
Number 3:
A broken heart can cause HUGE PAIN.  Commonly described as an ache…but I’m here to tell you that any amateur who writes off a broken heart or a crushed soul as an ache hasn’t really been hurt, they were simply bruised.
We each have stories of pain and injustice, whether rooted in good intentions or a product of addiction or some other primary factor.
No matter the source or severity of your pain, there are solutions at your disposal.
*If employees, you can educate or exit.
*If intractable pain, there is mitigation through medication or meditation.
*If emotionally-based, there is time to help fade the memories and eventually allow for absolution.
Nothing is dire.
Have a blessed weekend!

Dinner party

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505E7D34-DA5E-4903-974E-F7AC55D6991EGood morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
Stop me if you’ve heard this one already…  Guy walks into a bar, sits down and and starts talking with an educator, an accountant, a banker and a couple of engineers. (Belly laugh-that’s a doozie, judge)
{I apologize for the Caddy shack reference for those who missed that.}
I’m actually writing this on Friday morning (surprise) as my Thursday evening was filled with, as last evenings host put it, “maybe the most intellectual dinner… [he’d] ever been a part of.”  It was a tremendous discussion filled with civil discourse among other healthy exchanges.
What on earth, might you ask, does this have to do with leadership?
[whisper] He didn’t call it a saw sharpening thingamajig.  Maybe he scrapped this together and hit send before he meant to.
Allow me to complete the thought.
Leaders are many things, great communicators near the top of the list.  For the self-deprecating in the room last evening claiming a lack of social graces, each and every participant shared openly, articulately and demonstrated that their vocation did not define their leadership capacity.
This dinner brought together business owners in a social setting with the noble intent of supporting a good cause through silent auction, supporting a new business (the restaurant) and then getting to know each participant better at a social level.  Business dinners happen thousands of times a day across the globe but invariably, those conversations are dominated by one or two attendees with an agenda.
We were all a shade guilty of describing how we might be living vicariously through our remarkable children.  May each prosper in ways we could have only dreamed of and whatever our attempt at prepping them for adulthood looked like, we secretly hope it helped more than hindered.
Get to the message, Michel!
Money line:  what appeared to the naked eye or uninformed observer as a half dozen people enjoying amazing cuisine in a new restaurant was actually a room full of influencers who, at no stretch of the imagination, touch millions with their products and services.  No one taking a victory lap, just a curious group learning more about each other.
If what took place last night was an example of how other leaders recently in Hanoi or daily in D.C. could accomplish, this would be an entirely different world.
Encouragement:  When you communicate from this day forward, be more conscious of what you say.
•Remove any hidden agendas.
•Speak more from your heart than your head.
•As my old pastor Jerry used to say, As you go out into the world this week, remember, everyone is fighting a battle of some kind, so be gentle.
Have a blessed weekend!

Recycle ♻️

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Good Morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
It’s Engineers Week, 2019!
When asked what inspired me to become an engineer, my answer is simple, my Father.
A few universal truths that came together for me when I was growing up in a family business:
1. Necessity is the mother of invention.
2. We are shaped by our environment.
3. Always leave things better than you found them.
It was necessary to make enough money to eat and Dad seemed to never catch a break so he made due with what was in front of him.  Kind of an old school McGyver, we made a living and we shaped lives with the broken stuff no one else wanted or knew what to do with:
•Crushing concrete removed from the streets of Fargo when they separated storm sewer from sanitary sewer systems, converting it to aggregate used for commercial and industrial parking lots
•Hauling coal cinders from the local college-served as an effective binder with local soils spread as a layer under concrete mentioned above
•Repairing (or heating homes with) used wooden pallets from the old Steiger factory
•We drove and (constantly) repaired tired iron, the twice retired fleet vehicles people had given up on.  The cost of entry was within our range and most people had forgotten about them before we resurrected those vehicles from various shelter belts
•Even the house we lived in was moved into the neighborhood and the garage moved in later was an old storage building we sided and made pretty (or at least acceptable so the neighbors didn’t petition us to leave)
There is ALWAYS more value, untapped potential, a new way to look at the pile of confounding and complex issues right in front of you.
I am proud to say that my two sons have become successful engineers and I have been blessed to grow up in the engineering world designing, managing and leading projects, efforts, people, divisions and companies who apply the same three universal truths mentioned above.
Dad started in the mechanical engineering program at Notth Dakota State College but never finished the program because the pressure to provide for his family won over school.  His broken dreams have been recycled and turned into a legacy his grandsons keep alive today.
Have a blessed weekend!
published early because,
Although it is highly unlikely you’ll find an engineer tooting their own horn since it lacks humility and is an impractical use of their time.  If you find or know of a wicked problem solver, a creative and critical thinker, give ‘em a back pat, atta boy, thumbs up or buy ‘em a beer.  It’ll be enough.

The good, the bad and the ugly

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

 

Why is it that we only reflect on our lives in times of elation or agony?

 

Mediocrity doesn’t inspire us to think about ourselves as citizens of humanity.  Some see average as comfortable, good enough becomes acceptable and we drift along without regular and comprehensive appreciation for our condition.

Have you seen the commercials about OK is not OK?

Brakes, babysitting, major surgery?  Examples where OK is …not OK.

What about every day that you:

  • Go into the office?
  • Go to school?
  • Watch your grandchild?

Shouldn’t each day be exceptional?  It’s a conscious choice.

The awesome that creates elation and the horrible that actuates agony force our hands and we let the situation drive our feelings and emotions.  The rest of the time, we tend to let OK be OK.

The ugly part is the majority of the time when we groan our way through life without full appreciation for how well we all actually have it.

Be alive today.  Smile and greet people.  Thank God for the breaths you take.  Understand your purpose and strive to achieve it.

 

Make it a blessed weekend!

 

Silencing the noise

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
Sharpen the Saw series, #3
When someone refers to peace, what does it make you think of?
•Quiet?
•Tranquility?
•Calm?
•Chill?
•Zen?
Is there a certain time of the day where you find this peace?  Do you wake early and ground yourself in prayer or meditation?  Do you assume the downward dog position, drink green tea and nibble on yogurt?  Maybe you wait until evening and turn off all blue screens and read or talk to a friend or loved one.  Perhaps you do things throughout the day to manage your peacefulness.
I think many of us try to find daily peace by silencing the noise, if only for a brief respite, before the world bullies it’s way into our calendar.  Some of us have simply given way to the pressure and swing open the barn doors willingly and let the mayhem begin with a large mug of caffeine, an overdose of national news, a crappy commute and day after day in the pressure cooker hoping for a couple of weeks of vacation a year, just to breathe.  Simple math tells me 2 out of 52 is a small number and may likely not be enough.
Quality of life and success are relative and unique to each of us.
-Maybe peace isn’t part of your equation.
-Maybe you prefer to be busy every waking moment.
-Maybe you need no rest or time to think.
OR
-Maybe no one dare suggest it to you…and you haven’t slowed down enough to realize how badly you need it.
A troubled heart, wearied mind and crushed soul could all use restoration through peace.  Here are a few suggestions:
*The disconnect doesn’t have to be dramatic, it could start with a simple breathing exercise.
Sit in a dark, quiet spot for a couple of minutes.  Close your eyes.  Inhale through your nose for three seconds and exhale through your mouth for six seconds.  Repeat two more times.
*Get a massage at regular intervals.  You’d be surprised how stress manifests it’s way into your muscles.
*Go for a brisk walk or run.  When you focus on your physical surroundings and God’s beauty instead of the troubles swimming in your head, it brings peace.
*Maybe you pony up for a set of fancy headphones where you can slip them on and literally silence the noise.
Whatever you do and however you do it, make it a more regular part of your life.  Live longer, happier and show up better to the people around you.
Have a blessed weekend!

Cold!

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ab009813-d8a8-46fc-8541-c9ab76f8a9cc

Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!

What do you do when it’s reportedly so cold outside that schools close, the Post Office doesn’t deliver mail and the weather reporters can’t wait to parade in front of the camera outside while they warn others to stay inside?
It’s a confusing time we live in.
When I grew up in this Upper Midwest, snow and bitter cold was called … Winter … and we expected any time from November to April that it could be nasty outside and would prepare accordingly.
I saw a blurb about the Kentucky governor calling people soft (regarding how they reacted to the weather this week) and I’m not really on that bandwagon.  My larger concern is the media has spent so much time explaining how quickly your face could freeze, they forgot to say “cover it up”…so most people just stayed home.
Be prepared and be safe, but don’t be afraid.
Have a blessed weekend!

The right thing

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
We’ve all heard the phrase, “Do the right thing.” and we typically understand what that means.
•Eat your vegetables.
•Call your Mother often.
•Help the elderly to safely cross the street.
…and there’s the more serious…
•Don’t do anything illegal, immoral, or unethical.  (If questions on this one, refer to the Bible under Ten Commandments for clarity.)
What about the gray area?
For instance:
What do you do when someone “interprets” their actions as within the bounds of acceptable but most  know, through good business judgement or common sense, that it’s not.
It’s hard to spend a significant amount of time in business without encountering marginal behavior.  Anything from selective listening to blatant misuse of intellectual property to mismanaging funds or misrepresentation of current state of employment or abuse of power for personal gain.
What do you do if you encounter this?  (hint: Here is where it gets hard and why leadership is so critical).  Leaders know that you become what you tolerate.  Does that seem harsh?  Stated another way, In what environment is lying, cheating and stealing acceptable or sustainable?  If someone you know does tolerate that kind of environment…Does that sound like a place you’d like to be associated with?
It’s pretty easy to convince yourself that it’s not your place to intervene or to question someone’s actions.  We whisper little safe messages in our head like, “Wouldn’t it be embarrassing to accuse someone of doing something wrong only to find out they weren’t?”
Perhaps a well-phrased, well-meaning question would be appropriate and enough to expose bad acting and inspire reflection?  Reaction to the question by the suspect would certainly provide clarity to the inquisitor.
My contention is that most everything negative we hear and read about in the headlines today:
*Data privacy abuse
*Intellectual property theft
*Illegal immigration
*Extortion
*Collusion
is nothing more than a lack of leadership, the courageous people willing to ask the right questions at the appropriate time.
… and it is mostly preventable.
Does it really take
•Congress in numerous highly publicized and mostly ineffective hearings or
•economically disruptive tariffs
before we are willing to tackle things that are clearly wrong?
Pay attention.  Show interest early.  Take charge of the environment you are responsible for.  Provide guidance and leadership instead of assuming it’s someone else’s problem.
Have a blessed weekend!

Optimization

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Good morning, Team!  It’s Friday!
Second in the Sharpen the Saw series.
Our peer advisory board met again this week to discuss attention management.  The content was practical and worthy of implementing.  The concept of categorizing issues into easily recognizable groupings with imbedded ranges of urgency seems so obvious but rarely done well.  A very cool optimizing tool.
We also heard one of our members talk about customer stratification which was intriguing, innovative and sophisticated.  Separating core customers from opportunistic customers, service drain customers and marginal customers.  Details can’t be shared but it definitely has merit, if you’re courageous enough to implement.
The best part of Monday was the dinner I was blessed to be asked to be part of.  Great conversation with delightful friends (I never use the word delightful so you know it was good).  Food was delicious.  But topping it all off was the conversation.  Cerebral, at times, like the blogosphere and the junior high student debating Lao Tzu influence vs. Confucius.  Each had significant impact on modern society.  I didn’t read the junior high students blog but I was inspired to research the topic and can relate to wisdom from each:
Lao Tzu
•“When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.”
Confucius
•“Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising every time we fall.”
The emerging theme from all of my interactions this past week was optimizing:
Time
Customers
Friends
Self
This week was a reminder for me that we are awash in high value information.  When we fail to take the time to reflect, meditate, or simply enjoy a good meal with good company…we lose much more than we gain.  Until we implement what we know, it’s as if we never learned anything at all.
Have a blessed weekend!