Good vs Great
Good organizations have great plans
Great organizations have great plans and are also able to adapt those plans when things go wrong.
Is your organization adaptable?
Have a great day and a Happy New Year
Lawrence
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Obstacles
One of the challenges when coming upon an obstacle is to determine whether it’s something to overcome or something to avoid.
Too many people see obstacles and go the other direction. They don’t realize that many of these obstacles can be overcome with some thought and determination. By avoiding all obstacles, it’s easy to never grow as people or as an organization.
On the other hand, some obstacles are not worth trying to overcome. Trying to do so will just result in major frustration and loss of time.
There is no rule to figure out whether to overcome or avoid but make sure you are making your decision taking as many factors into consideration as possible so you can grow as much as possible without wasting time on insurmountable obstacles.
Have a great day!
Lawrence
NPU
NPU stands for “Next Person Up”. Is the NPU for your team ready?
This means, if you are a restaurant owner and your head chef suddenly leaves, are you prepared?
If you are an insurance agent and you are dependent on one person or organization for all of your leads, do you have an alternative if that option dries up?
If you are a college coach and your assistant coach suddenly leaves do you have someone ready to step up and take their place?
It’s easy to think you have a strong team when you have good people in all positions but are you also prepared for when something happens? Do you have the NPU ready to go?
Have a great day!
Lawrence
Multitasking
We can read email, write a report, listen to music, post to a facebook wall, answer a phone and tweet, all at the same time.
Or, we can do something really well.
It’s great being able to multitask but it’s even better to do one thing at a time really well.
Create the opportunity to concentrate on one thing and then move on to the next thing. Not everyone can do this but if you can, give it a try
Have a great day!
Lawrence
Sometimes the star, sometimes the support
Some people are stars in their groups. Some people take on the support role. It’s difficult to transition from one to the other but there are some people who do this very well.
As a soccer fan, I see a great example on a regular basis in Park Ji-Sung from South Korea. When playing for his national team, he has been a superstar who has led his country as one of their biggest superstars. For many years, the success of South Korea’s soccer team has gone through Park Ji-Sung. When not playing for his national team he plays for Manchester United in England. While he has played a pivotal role for Manchester United he primarily plays the role of a support player. He demonstrates an incredible work rate, does a lot of the running some other “stars” don’t like to do and has proven to be extremely valuable to the team but is not looked upon as one of their stars. Not many players are able to go back and forth between star and support player yet Park Ji-Sung has done it for years.
In the business world, this problem gets seen frequently when a company gets bought or is merged into a bigger company. The entrepreneur who is accustomed to making the final decision frequently struggles with having to go through the bureaucracy of a larger organization. The founder who used to risk his own money now has to get permission since it’s now shareholders money at risk. This is one of the reasons so many entrepreneurs end up leaving within a couple of years of selling to a larger group.
Being able to be a star in some situations and a support person in other situations can make you even more valuable to all organizations.
Just something to think about
Have a great day!
Lawrence
Is our testing process working?
An attorney has been successfully practicing law for 20 years, do you think he can still pass the bar exam?
An ER doctor has been working in various ER’s for the past 15 years, do you think he can still pass the boards?
If these people can’t pass the required tests needed to enter their fields, is it right to require newcomers to pass these?
One reason experienced attorney’s would struggle with passing the bar exam is the exam is testing their knowledge of the law in general while most of them have been working in a specialized field for years. If someone wants to enter one of those specialized fields, they learn mainly through on the job training. Would it not make sense to tailor their education specifically toward those fields and have the testing requirements geared toward specific fields?
A college soccer coach might have his “A License” but if you were an athletic recruiter wouldn’t you want someone who is “certified” in college recruiting, coaching administration, keeper training etc?
Shouldn’t we look at more specific training and more specific testing when looking for specialists?
Just something to think about
Have a great day!
Lawrence
Write right
Anyone who has read more than a couple of my blog posts knows I don’t spend much (any) time editing my posts. I typically write these early in the morning and don’t allocate more than a few minutes to write. Because of this, there are the occasional grammar, spelling or punctuation issues (some might say more than just occasional). However, if I’m writing a formal business report, it’s done with a completely different style, it’s edited and much more time is spent making sure it’s done right.
Others might feel this amount of detail and effort should be made in all writing but the reality is, in my case, if I had to do that, I wouldn’t write these as I don’t have the time.
Sadly, I’m seeing more and more people who don’t understand the importance of writing more formally in business settings. Just the other day, I received a serious business correspondence using “4” instead of “for”, using “u” instead of “you” and using many other abbreviations, acronyms and “…” instead of taking the time to write it out properly.
While this person might have felt they didn’t have the time to write more professionally, I just looked at it as an immature way to communicate and ended up not taking it seriously.
If you want people to take your writing seriously then write right (or is that write correctly?)
It might take a few more minutes but using the example of the person who wrote me, they could have either taken a few more minutes or not written at all because what they did write was just a waste of time
Just something to think about
Have a great day!
Lawrence
It takes time
So many people are in a hurry to be ultra successful but they forget that it frequently takes time.
If a college basketball coach had the following records his first 3 seasons he would probably be fired
17-13
10-17
11-17
Luckily Duke decided to give Mike Krzyzewki some more time and now he is one of the most successful coaches of all time.
If a football coach gets fired from a job with one team after 5 seasons with the following record, he might not get a second chance
6-10
7-9
7-9
11-5
5-11
Luckily the New England Patriots decided to give Bill Belichick a chance and the rest is history.
When looking at investments they always put in the disclaimer that “past performance does not guarantee future success” (or something similar). This is true with hires as well. Look past records and look for the traits you think will enable success in the future
Have a great day!
Lawrence
Lean on Me
I watched the movie “Lean on Me” the other day and while it’s a truly inspirational movie it’s also worth watching for some of the business related lessons.
Everything from getting rid of the problems from the start to creating a common enemy to instilling pride to the importance of discipline to understanding that caring is not always an easy thing.
If you get the chance, watch the movie. It’s not just about the yelling and autocratic behavior, there are some very good business concepts built in.
Have a great day!
Lawrence
Action vs Results
Some people are so concerned with getting something started they don’t take into consideration the ultimate results (“just do SOMETHING”)
Others are so concerned with the results they end up taking no action at all (“don’t do that, we don’t know if it will work or not”)
To be successful, one must look at the desired result and then work backwards to figure out the actions to get there. Going in the opposite direction is too scattered for consistent success.
Have a great day!
Lawrence
If there is one thing Lawrence Fine is most passionate about it's teaching. From sharing his knowledge about soccer as a soccer coach, he now shares his expertise in the field of human resources and the Internet. (More...)