Sunday 30 December 2012

Trust is the big key to your success in 2013. How trustworthy are you?

Below is my final sparkenation for 2012.

For your reflection all my weekly sparkenations for 2012 are here.

Politicians everywhere are demonstrating daily, sadly, that they can't be trusted.  The erosion of trust has us gridlocked everywhere.

As a business owner/leader what will you do about this? How many of your actions erode trust with your employees, your customers, all your stakeholders?  And what will you do about it?

Trust is the big key to your success in 2013. How trustworthy are you?

"Technique and technology are important, but adding trust is the issue of the decade."
Tom Peters

"The moment there is suspicion about a person's motives, everything he does becomes tainted."
Mahatma Gandhi

Be the difference you want to see in the world.
Ian
I work with business owners/leaders of medium sized business and leaders of divisions in multi-national companies to lift employee performance by enhancing their gifts.



Thursday 27 December 2012

The most significant business move you can make in 2013 - the shift from performance management to performance leadership

Be the difference you want to see in the world.
Ian
I work with business owners/leaders of medium sized business and leaders of divisions in multi-national companies to lift employee performance by enhancing their gifts.




Thursday 20 December 2012

A nobel peace prize, time magazine person of the year, what’s next?

I wrote the following blog on the 21st January 2009, the day after President Obama’s inauguration.

“From 'Yes we can' to Now We are

As a speaker I watched President Barack Obama's inauguration speech in awe and with tears in my eyes. As a fellow human being I was struck by his use of the word we. I felt in my heart that this is the beginning of a ‘now we are’ time like never before in history.

I am trusting that the 20th January 2009 is the day we will look back on as the day we really began to

make poverty history
provide clean water for every human being
stop people dying from preventable disease
make peace with one another regardless of our religious or political beliefs
collaborate to tackle climate change
build sustainable businesses
allow every human being the opportunity to have a home, earn a livelihood, receive an education and health care
free the world from violence

I am pessimistically optimistic!”

Since then we have made some progress yet I am disappointed. So I suspect are you and President Obama!

We still have a broken financial system in addition to the problems mentioned above and perhaps above all we are stuck with a broken political system.

In the prologue to my Changing What’s Normal book published in June 2011  I wrote:

“From a distance Barack Obama seems to me to be a warm, wise, and wonderful human being, and one of the most articulate people of his generation, perhaps of all time.

He was given a Nobel Peace Prize based on what he might do, rather than on what he had done, in my view.  It is a false hope unless ...

Despite his personal significance Barack Obama is primarily powerless to change what is normal in our world.  His “Yes we can” has become “No we can’t”, unless ...

In an excellent book, a New York Times No. 1 bestseller Switch - how to change things when change is hard, the authors Chip and Dan Heath propose a great three-phase process for change: direct
our rational mind, motivate our emotional side, and shape the path of change.  Their book is about behaviour change that will rarely happen unless ...

Most training or change programs undertaken by millions of people every day fail to lead to behaviour change unless ...

The unless I refer to is: unless intention changes.

The Republican politicians in the United States of America’s parliament have an intention, it seems to me, to replace Barack Obama, a Democrat, with one of their own.  This intention drives everything they do.

The members of the Liberal/Nationals coalition party in my home country, Australia, have the same intent. They want one of their own as our Prime Minister, and it drives everything they do.

This kind of intention has political parties, not in government, all over the world by the throat, and we are all choking as a result.

This kind of intention means good, sound ideas, put forward by politicians in power, rarely see the light of day and compromise and inaction is the result.

Success depends on where intention is.  Right now the political intentions of most are in the wrong place and, therefore, we are heading as a human race to the wrong place.

Consider just two facts, undisputed by any thinking person:
1. How most of us live in the world is unsustainable.
2. More than 6 million children under the age of five die every year, that’s 16,000 per day, simply because they do not have the right nutrition.

We have the solutions to both these problems and many others we are failing to solve.  Why have we failed?  We have failed because the intention of most is about I rather than we, which means winners and losers.

Changing what’s normal is about changing our intention to one where everyone can win.”

Mr. Obama’s recent award by Time Magazine is also I feel one of hope.

I am optimistic that Mr. Obama will take significant actions in his last four years in office that will make the world a better place however no matter what he does, no matter how inspirational and influential he is, each one of us must bring our best to the table.

The world is not going to end tomorrow. The Mayans never said it would!  Their insights are not about the end rather a new beginning.

Bring your best to 2013 and may we together end the world as we know it and usher in a new world where 'Yes we can' has become Now We Are.


Be the difference you want to see in the world.
Ian
I work with business owners/leaders of medium sized business and leaders of divisions in multi-national companies to lift employee performance by enhancing their gifts.





Monday 17 December 2012

We get what we gift

Regardless of your beliefs about Christmas I think it is a great time of the year to think about two key aspects of performance leadership, namely celebration and charisma, and then take action.

In my Enhancing Their Gifts System celebrating is a key component.  People using the system celebrate every time they achieve a milestone or goal in their performance possibility plan and continually have appreciation conversations with their colleagues when they achieve and accountability conversations when they don’t.  Every 90 days system users and their performance partners formally ask what’s worth celebrating and what could be better and then upgrade their plans for the next 90 days.  These are wonderfully positive and productive conversations because many informal exchanges have taken place in the 89 days preceding.

What’s worth celebrating in your life and work?

What’s worth celebrating about the life and work of your colleagues?

Share your answers with people you work with.
  Doing so, providing you then take action, will improve your relationships.

What could be better in your life and work?

What could be better in your business relationships with others?

Share your answers with people you work with.
  Doing so, providing you then take action, will improve your relationships.

Create a plan that begins January the 1st 2013 and write down how you will keep doing what’s worth celebrating and what you will do to change what could be better.  You just might be staggered at the profound results of taking this simple action providing you do what you write down of course!

The ancient Greek word charisma means gift or talent.  There is nothing flashy about real charisma.

What are your gifts/talents?

Are you bringing these special gifts/talent to your work on a consistent basis?

We get what we gift.


There is no greater present that you can give to your world than that of your best self.  That unique, special, one-of-a-kind that you are.

Take time out in the next 10 days to really focus on what your gifts/talents are.  Ask those closest to you to tell you what’s special about you. Then bring that person to everything you do in 2013.

In the past 18 months I have lost my best friend, my dear Mother, another woman who was like a second mother to me, and our beloved dog who was with us from 8 weeks of age till his passing at 14. I am grateful for the massive difference these beings made in my life just by being who they were. Life is too short to waste a second.

Celebrate your life and the special gift/talents you were born with or have learned or nurtured and grown or maybe even are yet to unleash, and bring all of them to everything you do in 2013. Celebrate with others their specialness, their true charisma.  Help people to enhance their gifts.

Make 2013 your best year yet.
Ian

PS The power if giving lies in the non attachment to getting back.  Give to others freely with no expectations of getting back and paradoxically you will receive in kind a 100 fold.

PSS My friend and one of the accredited mentors of my Enhancing Their Gifts System Gary Ryan is giving away a great online course for young professionals!
It’s only available until Midnight Friday 21st December 2012 (Australian Daylight Saving Time)

I highly recommend Gary’s gift.  Details here.  
Gary is aiming to give away his course to 10000 people.  Please pass on this post to any young professionals you believe would benefit.


Tuesday 11 December 2012

The one action you can take in your business in 2013 that will make all the difference

Google talent management models and you will discover a plethora.

Google talent leadership models and you will find a lot of the same models.

This research suggests we are still searching for what 21st century leadership and management actually is.

Is success in the future about leadership or management? is a question I am often asked.  My answer is that success is always about both leadership and management, never one or the other.  Therefore it is essential to understand,  appreciate and value the difference between them. 

This is where there is often trouble.  For many management is still seen as controlling people and dictating what they feel, think and do and don’t feel, think and do.  This is a nasty hangover from the industrial revolution where it was assumed we could treat people like machines.  The headache this hangover has been allowed to cause is a massive barrier to progress in the 21st century in almost every aspect of our lives.  It is a fundamental reason for non-achievement of what is possible in business, politics, education, family, religion, you name it.

Further we have got carried away with leadership often seeing it as a cure all.  We are drawn to individuals who offer us hope and fail to remember than unless we take action ourselves hope is nothing more than a wish.

I define leadership as the art of inspiring people to bring everything remarkable that they are (that unique and special person that each of us is) to everything they do.

I stress to anyone who will listen that leadership is usually a massive failure without management.  I define management as the practice of making it simple for people to bring everything remarkable that they are to everything we do.


Leadership is primarily about inspiring and influencing people.  Management is primarily about systems and processes that help people to bring their best to their work.  We need both leadership and management working in harmony with one another and at the same time.

Most talent management or talent leadership models address many components such as recruitment, induction or onboarding, engagement, learning, performance, remuneration, succession etc., etc,. etc.

The better models also address how leading and managing talent fits with business goals and how deploying talent in special ways means achievement of these goals and beyond.

The problem with most models and frameworks and approaches is that they are beyond the desire and sometimes the capacity of micro, small and medium sized business owners and leaders because they are too costly, too time consuming and too complicated to implement. My Enhancing Their Gifts System is different of course and was specifically designed to address these challenges and more.

I have never met a micro, small or medium sized business owner/leader who isn’t time poor.  I have rarely met one of these people who easily invests money in people either. And certainly I have never met anyone who wants anything to do with people to be complicated!

Uppermost in my mind in my work always is helping my clients to invest wisely in time, giving you very high value for money service, and making leading people for you as uncomplicated as possible.  And I add a fourth challenge for my clients and one for me.  Most business owners/leaders don’t yet know how to lead people or how to design systems and processes that are good for people in uncomplicated ways.  My challenge is that more often than not you don’t want to admit that you don’t know how and your silence is often deafening!

We humans are complicated.  Inspiring us isn’t complicated and nor is co-creating appropriate management systems and processes when you know how.

The one action you can take in your business in 2013 that will make all the difference is to admit that you don’t have all the answers, particularly when it comes to dealing with people, and to seek help in the areas where you don’t yet have the skill required.

Admitting our shortcomings is simple to do.  Simple is rarely easy!

Some things to consider.

Would you leave important financial matters in your business to people who don’t have the expertise?

Would you leave important legal issues in your business to non-lawyers?

Would you trust the supply of essential items for your business to people who can’t deliver?

I am sure your answer to all three questions is no.  Why are you battling on and struggling with getting the best out of your employees?

The most important words I have said to the many mentors I have engaged for my personal development and the development of my businesses is “I don’t know.”

Being prepared to say “I don’t know” is a tremendously freeing up statement.  And it opens the door for the most valuable learning of our lives.

You don’t have the time, energy, or the money to any longer put your challenges with your employees on the backburner.  Learn how to truly lead people and co-create with them systems and processes that make things simple for them to bring their best to their work consistently and you will change your business and your life forever.

Please, uncomplicate your life and take the one action you can take in your business in 2013 that will make all the difference, admit that you don’t have all the answers and seek help in the areas where you don’t. Free yourself from worry and guilt which Wayne Dyer once described as life’s two most useless emotions.

My clients tell me that I see what most people don’t and say what most people won’t.  I am candid and contrarian.  I have also learned to be caring and compassionate.  I am not for everyone though. 

Three possible choices for you.

1) Give me a try by taking up a complimentary Monday morning mentoring session.  Details here.

2) Contact one of my accredited mentors.

3) Contact someone you already know who has expertise in leading and managing for people and engage them to help you ensure that 2013 is off to the flyer that you deserve.

Be the difference you want to see in the world.
Ian

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”
John Watson

PS
I was delighted to contribute to an ebook produced by my friend and colleague Gihan Perera for the seventh year in a row. 

Please download Expect More From 2013 with our compliments here.

Wednesday 5 December 2012

Expect More From 2013 - complimentary ebook

For the seventh year in a row I am pleased to have contributed to an ebook produced by Gihan Perera on strategies for success.

The ebook contains 39 insights from leading experts in Personal and Professional Development.


Please download the ebook here with my compliments and please forward the link to your friends, family and colleagues.

Be the difference you want to see in the world.
Ian
I work with business owners/leaders of medium sized business and leaders of divisions in multi-national companies to lift employee performance by enhancing their gifts.




Monday 3 December 2012

Sustainability can be really simple

My mother-in-laws brother is in his late seventies.  He and is wife travel a lot in a modified utility that is their home away from home. The caravan part of the ute is made mostly of recycled stuff.  The vehicle runs on oil from fish and chips shops!  My “uncle” buys the oil from your average fish and chip shop owner whenever he needs to.  Mostly he gets it for free. He then cleans the oil and puts it in the ute.  These entrepreneurs made a trip recently of several thousand miles for a cost of $25!

Sustainability can be really simple.  It just requires your entrepreneurship, some ingenuity and particularly not listening to the naysayers.  My “uncle” had plenty of people telling him he couldn’t do what he has done.

The great author science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke had some great insights into what can happen with ideas.  My paraphrase as follows:

people tell you that it is a crazy idea, and it will never work.
Next people say your idea might work, but it’s not worth doing.
Finally people say I told you that it was a great idea.

“Information is not knowledge, knowledge is not wisdom, and wisdom is not foresight. Each grows out of the other, and we need them all.”
Arthur C. Clarke

What information do you have that you could turn into insight, then an idea and then get inspired enough to turn the idea into innovation?

Get going now.  Don’t wait for anyone.  Most likely you will find sustainability in your life and work very simple too.

Be the difference you want to see in the world.
Ian
I work with business owners/leaders of medium sized business and leaders of divisions in multi-national companies to lift employee performance by enhancing their gifts.