Stepping Out when There is No One Listening

It is easy to write when you have a deadline to make.

It is easy to cram ideas into a document when there is a guaranteed audience to read it.

Often when we start there is no guarantee of an audience, no fixed chance of someone taking the time to listen to what we say.

Doubt pervades us; ‘what if no one buys our product’, ‘what if people don’t like me’.

So we shrink back to the safer zone of doing nothing, or working for someone else and stifling our gift.

Sharing your ideas comes with risk. Yes you can mitigate some of it by clever planning and marketing but the risk that comes with being open and baring your creation cannot be downplayed and written under.

At some point you have to step out in faith.

(PS for those who may have noticed the hiatus I lost a regular column deadline, the psychology of the process and its effect on my writing has been interesting.)

I have been reading lately. There is nothing shocking or revelatory about this statement as I usually have a book on the go, reading is simply part of my culture. The recent source of literary focus has been ‘Crucial Conversations Tools forTalking When the Stakes are High’ by Patterson and Co. (it is worth the time studying). It was recommended by someone who I highly esteem so I jumped onto Amazon and downloaded it the same day. I read the first chapter and then my internal resistance started to kick up a fuss. It took me an entire month to get onto Chapter 2. I found every excuse not to read it; there was not enough time, I was too busy, I was too tired, there was a good movie that needed watching. The real reason for all the pushback was that this book demanded change of me. In it I could see a number of my own personal faults neatly dissected. It was like walking into biology class all over again and seeing a rat splayed out across the table with little labels neatly pinned to its innards with the same vomit inducing effect. This was not a simple change either; it is change that is going to take time, effort and a lot of practice.

Change is the sort of concept that dredges up an entire spectrum of emotion in people, from the energetic reds of excitement to the mysterious grumbling radio waves of discontent that settle in the pit of your stomach. Some people get a kick out of it; others (70% of the population) find it something they would rather not do. There is so much that can change as well-jobs, systems, where you park, what you eat, how you style your hair, company policy. Just the sheer thought of changing so much can paralyse people into indecision.

Here is the irony, even if you do nothing change still happens subtly over time. You age, things wear out and need replacing, and people will come and go in your life. Relationships are never static-even if you think they are. There are always new opinions being formed. The weather changes daily. Like it or not change is here to stay.

So how do we manage change? How can it be moved from this big scary monster in the room to something that can be embraced by everyone?

Do not change just for the sake of change. New CEO’s sometimes make this mistake to shake it up and stamp their authority over everything. Others change because ‘everyone is doing it’. Change can happen for a variety of reasons. Change in a crisis may be different to the planned redundancy of a product line. Be aware that it will impact people differently depending on each situation. You will need to tweak your communication and management to each situation. If you find that you are shifting gears from one crisis to another continually then perhaps a hard look at yourself in is order.

Do not mistake change for growth. Not all change is beneficial. Be careful what you change; process altering, system tweaking and restructuring departments may not be the real issue. It may be behaviour that needs to shift in order to improve production and that takes a different set of skills to alter. A long hard look at both the content and condition of your organisation may be in order-especially if you have already changed recently and it did nothing.

Internal change of things within your control is far more effective than trying to change external forces. You cannot change the weather. You can however change communication between staff, shift company culture, and encourage a healthy work accountability.

Find a mutual purpose between the you, the instigator of change, and those that are being affected by the change. This can require time and effort to prevent push back. Find a common goal that appeals to those who are possibly bearing the brunt of any shift and dialogue with them on it. Spend time before and during the shift coming up with a common ground that you can both build off. This can provide a metric for measuring how effective your change will be. If your common ground is ‘improved production methods allowing for ease of production and less time wasted getting the job done’ then that is what you need to measure to show that the change was worth their while. Set up small goals to achieve that reinforce the change and desired effect.

Change and growth can be painful and annoying-ask any teenage boy. The clearer you are about what needs to change, why it should change and the desired outcome before you embark on the journey the better the results will be. If you are not clear what you want then you will be unable to communicate that to others, there will be no buy in and you will fail horribly. Not only that the next time you try change something everyone will remember how you performed last time and you have the extra negative expectations to overcome.

Well managed, well executed change for the right reasons is well worth it and sets you up for the next shift. Where possible spend the time getting it right.

Truth and Lies

Ten years ago I invested a chunk of change into two courses about truth. One was a yearlong study of principles that were universal and could be applied into any situation. The other was based on cognitive psychology and had you look at where you were telling yourself a ‘truth’ that simply was not real. The content of both courses has been invaluable over the years. In a rapid turnover world it is testament that both are still available and running a decade later. I’m not here to sell you a course today; I am here to talk about truth.

We live in a world with a lot of information but not a lot of truth; that has been said before, and not just by me. The internet has become a self validating tool for almost any point of view. Pick an opinion, search it online and you will find a dozen articles supporting your belief. Of course you were right. Now search for the diametrically opposed position and another dozen articles appear. Try it. Pick something a little out of the ordinary “women should or should not wear trousers” for example.

No wonder people have such trouble sticking with the truth. Advertisers and marketers make a living out of manipulating truth to make their product more appealing. Products may not quite live up to what you interpret the advert as but it is too late as the small print got you. Some people go as far as becoming pathological in their lying; taking it to the point where they live the lie so well that they believe it is true even when shown otherwise.

In a world with so much misinformation we are breeding a generation of people who struggle to trust and who struggle with commitment. Recent studies highlighted the personal relationship issues for the Millennial generation, findings that can be attributed to not quite being able to trust completely. Part of the lack of trust has to do with how easy it is to manipulate the ‘truth’ online. A friend of mine went on a Tinder initiated blind date this week-he was disappointed because the girl he met looked very little like the edited and polished photos she had on her Instagram. If they are having this much trouble with trusting a partner then just imagine the trouble they are having trusting your word as a professional or as a brand.

This is why when someone who lives the story that they tell comes along people, after a little scrutiny, embrace them. Integrity, more than ever, is becoming a pathway to success. People will watch what you do far more than they will listen to what you say, and the two better match up. A track record matters more than ever when gaining credibility.

What can you do that enhances truth in your business?

Refuse to deal with liars. Call them out. Get rid of them. Sideline them. Surround yourself with people that you can trust and rely on.

Do not live a lie yourself. Tell great stories but do not make false promises, if anything under promise and then over deliver. If you cannot see yourself living up to your advertising then pull the ad.

Do great work. More than ever showing up consistently and reliably and producing something that matters in a manner that makes your clients happy is going to build your reputation bigger and faster than a fancy advertising campaign. The internet, the very thing that makes truth hard to find, is also the biggest amplifier of people sharing their experience of your work. Sure some people will try manipulating that too, you can hire ‘bots’ to post positive reviews about you should you wish, but the truth will eventually come out. There is no quick trick to greatness and success.

The Fastest In The World

If I asked you to name the fastest man in the world today the chances are you will name one of the big sprint heroes of the day. There is much hype around the Men’s 100m event in the world of televised athletics. It is a big prestige event that draws a lot of our attention due to the media focus on it. There is incredible build up, a bit of rivalry. Hours of training and dedication boil down to a short stretch of rubber. The gun goes and less than ten seconds later it is all over. Meanwhile the guy running the marathon has another two hours and 42 kilometres to go.

We are becoming conditioned to the sprint. The internet has generated a short attention span. Its blitz media and growing demand for more generates a pressure to operate in short iteration cycles. There is a tendency in a crisis economy to look to flip the quick deal, make your money and move on. In your mind the faster you can keep flipping the more you make. So we trade instead of producing, import and sell rather than creating an export, and we complain when the economy is not fixed overnight.

There are no quick fixes to the economy. Yes there are a few policies that could be quickly changed, but the outworking of those decisions is going to take a while. It may take a generation to restore and rebuild. The bottom line is we are in it for the long haul. Zimbabwe (or anywhere in the world for that matter) is a marathon not a sprint and your business needs to be prepared to face it.

Marathon running is as much about psychology as it is physical training. You need a focus that will get you through the rough periods. That focus needs to be positive as opposed to negative else it will just reinforce failure. A great place to start is the impact you are having on your community with your product. There is an idea that ‘social entrepreneurs’, those who focus on finding solutions to social, cultural, and environmental problems, are on their own little class of business. I don’t think that this is true. All entrepreneurship solves a problem. That solution will have an impact on society directly or indirectly. Hence I would argue that all entrepreneurs have a social component (or should have). There is a tendency to focus only on the money in business-after all it is a key metric in sustainability and makes investors happy. It is, however, a poor motivator. If you are going through a rough patch there is a good chance that the money (or lack of) is giving you sleepless nights. Look to the impact on lives. Look to the relationships you are building. Look past your selfish profit margins to others. Look for the positive, generate optimism and then go deal with the money.

The long haul needs people. In the short term it is easy to do it on your own, it is easy to burn people with your deals because you never have to deal with them again. The long term needs relationships that you can rely on. The long term needs community. The better we can build a solid, positive community of people around us the better we will last the storm. Community allows money to circulate within it rather than having it externalised. A strong community realises the power and benefits of building something that lasts, even if there are differences of opinion. I sat in two meetings with the same professional grouping over the last month. The first meeting was destructive and confrontational and ended in a walk out. The second was like looking at a different crowd of people; it was positive, the discussion was constructive, differences of opinion were acknowledged and a way forward was reached. The primary difference was that in the month between meetings one member of the community had spent time and effort meeting with individuals and getting them to focus on the benefit to the professional community and their clients rather than just individual members opinions.

Lift up your head and see the long term. Then dig yourself in and prepare for it. Then, with that focus, get on with the daily battles that get you there. Before you know it you will be at the end of the race.

Principles for Surviving a Crisis...but really for any time.

In the mid 1700’s a whirlwind hit the English landscaping scene. That local hurricane was a designer by the name of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown. He was responsible for transforming the gardens of over 170 locations. I’m not talking here about just potting a few roses, rather redesigning the look of acres of estate, especially the entire view from the front of the house. He moved mountains of earth before there were bulldozers, uprooted and replanted trees, created lakes where there were none; all in the name of creating natural beauty. Looking at his work today, much of which has survived some 250 years later, it is easy to think that the stunning landscapes he fashioned were the natural thing. Appealing to the eye due to inherent artistic principle, his vistas were designed to stand the test of time. It is one thing to have someone create a garden that has the potential to last, it is another to have it maintained faithfully for 250 years. Today you may be standing on a precipice with your business, staring at a proverbial hole in the ground and wondering how in earth you are going to transform it into a lake, one that lasts a day let alone few years, when you are in the middle of a drought.

The principles that you need are the same now as then. They are the same regardless of your position; whether you find yourself as a CEO, a sole trader, a middle level manager in the private sector, or a government employee. They matter in times of crisis as well as in less stressful situations.

Give an account of your actions and your finances. Be accountable to yourself, to your spouse, to staff, to investors, to the taxman. You are not an island. People need the surety that comes with knowing how things are being run well and that dealings are open and transparent. Accountability keeps you above board in your actions and stops you from unscrupulous dealings that have far greater ramifications.

There needs to be an openness and engagement that comes with accountability. In the current crisis many people are not being paid on time. If you find yourself in this situation with your staff talk to them, let them know what is going on. Do not just leave them second guessing and grumbling. Who knows, part of your solution may come from those you have never bothered to listen to.

You cannot expect what you do not inspect. This is the reverse of you being accountable. Inspect your business; keep tabs on what others are doing. Call out negative behaviours. Just as a garden needs regular weeding so does your business. Inspecting helps you realise where to trim, nurture and fertilise staff. Tighten your belt, keep tabs on your cash flow, plug the leaks.

Look forward and at the same time face current reality. Vision is important. See possibility before it is there. This was one of Mr Brown’s key assets. He could evaluate an estate in an hour on horseback and already have an idea of what could be done. His work was designed with the long term in mind-trees grow over the years and that would need to be taken into account when planning. I would love to see more twenty and fifty year plans coming from our cities, plans that are implementable in the long term and not just changing with a new mayor.

Vision on its own does not pull you into action-it is the comparison of the vision to the current reality that brings about the drive. I have a dripping tap in my house, if I never look at it and realise that it is dripping and wasting water then I will never fix it, it will just keep merrily dripping away.

One of the reasons people refuse to look at the current problem is that it becomes a way of avoiding the work. Digging a garden is hard. Work requires effort regardless of how you look at it. Do the work. There is no point having a solution to your problem and then not actioning it. You will be surprised how many people avoid taking action simply because they talk themselves out of it.

Keep dreaming, keep building, keep digging, keep striving forward one step at a time. Above all do not fall into the trap of doing nothing.

Getting Others to Tell Your Story: A Lesson from Jungle Book

Very few books have ever brought me to tears. In Runyard Kipling’s ‘The Second JungleBook’ the wolf pack central to the book fights a long and hard battle against a group of invading wild dogs. At the end of it, the former pack leader, Akela, dies after helping the pack achieve victory. It is a poignant moment, drawn out as, aided by a teenage Mowgli, fully cognisant that his time is near, he staggers to his feet and sings his final farewell. As a young teenager reading it for the first time and having grown very attached to the character during the book I was deeply and emotionally moved (unlike the sanitised and totally non-literary death of Akela in the current Disney film which merely passed as an annoying incident). Then I dried my eyes, closed the book, put it back on the shelf and carried on with my life. No change in behaviour necessary.

The last couple of weeks we have been talking about telling your story; the story of your business, your product, what drives you. It is great to have a strong and emotional story, but your story is only of value to your business if it motivates people to action. The aim of telling a tale is to promote behavioural change in the listener. This could be to get the consumer to buy your product or it could be to get buy- in from your staff to behave in a particular manner towards your clients (which in turn makes them buy your product). Beyond just the act of increasing your profit margin, you really want them to tell your story to others.

In the same way that I can retell you the tale of The Jungle Book, you want your clients and staff to pass your story on as they recount their experience of interacting with your business and product. I remember the first time some friends of mine stayed at the Ritz-Carlton in Chicago. These were seasoned travellers, well used to hotels and travel. They came back raving. There were stories of everyone knowing your name, experiments with leaving clothes on the floor, the comfort of the beds; you just could not shut them up. They told the hotel’s story. The hotel’s website is full of stunning pictures, but it does not do the justice of a personal recommendation from a friend backed up by emotional stories of an incredible experience.

So how do you get others to tell your story? It starts with you. Firstly create a suitably emotional tale that moves people to action. Then back it up with your own action. No one likes a hypocrite so your story better be true. Give people a reason to behave in the way you want. Reward and affirm staff who emulate the behaviour you desire. Check that the client interaction experience matches the values you have put into your business. Look for other stories that reinforce your story. So if you are a restaurant owner and you see a waiter doing something that makes a client’s experience incredible (for example offering a free dessert to the guy who is trying to impress his lady but you can see is a little cash strapped) take that story on board and tell it alongside yours.

Give your staff the opportunity and freedom to make the choices that enable them to tell your story. A lot of businesses hamstring their staff with rigidity and rules. Take the waiter in the restaurant for example. Enabling a waiter to give away something, not bank breaking, but allowing them once in a while to make a decision to enhance a client’s experience without consulting management is liberating. It liberates the waiter to think and react to ‘on the floor’ moments, it liberates the manager to trust the waiter. Of course there is accountability, of course there are limits, but it is not rigid and restrictive.

Too many end-of-line client interactors are merely robots doing a job without the power to enable decisions. So the clothing store clerk has no idea about fashion, no idea about colour interaction, no idea how to read a client coming into the store and direct them to the appropriate section. Nor do they want to because advising a client goes beyond their job description and if they did they would probably get rapped over the knuckles because, after all, their job is to merely take the money, not to create a shopping experience. If you want to see a local store that is getting it right visit an Electrosales branch. Every salesman on the floor knows how to help me, and if he can’t he knows who to call. It makes going there a pleasure. It makes me want to tell their story.

Tell, empower, act, and tell it again. This process takes time but it gets results. Until next time, in the words of Akela, “Good Hunting!”