Daily Brief

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 8:55 — 8.7MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS | More

Look at your life right now. Look at yourself. Look at the folks who surround you, the ones you spend the most time with.

Who do you fuel?

Who fuels you?

Who do you drain?

Who drains you?

You know the answer. We all do.

I suppose there are people in our lives who are innocuous, but we don’t spend much time around them. If we did, they would cease to be innocuous. By innocuous, I mean they’re neutral. Safe. They neither fuel nor drain. They just are.

Most of the others who surround us are one or the other. But let’s keep going with this exercise.

We’re all capable of draining energy in ourselves and in others. We’re all capable of being providers or fuelers of energy, too. I don’t imagine any of us are 100% one or the other, but one or the other dominates our character. Without being so nitpicky, start with yourself. Which are you? Pick just one that best characterizes how you see yourself. Do you drain? Or add?

Do you care which one best characterizes you? Do you care how others see you impacting their lives? Does it matter to you if people feel one way or the other about you?

Well, of course it does. At least if you have any degree of emotional intelligence and any desire to be a good influence on others!

Let’s stay with you for a moment. What is it about you that causes you to draw this conclusion about yourself? What do you DO that compels you to see yourself as a drain or as somebody who adds energy? (By the way, it’s pretty terrific if you’ve got such high self-awareness you’re able to admit you’re a drain!)

List out the things you do – the actions you take that contribute to your drain/add identity.

I’ll help get you started – and if you’re wrestling with which you may be, these may help:

Are you critical? Do you always find fault?

Do you “should” people? Or “should not” people? Do you second guess everybody thinking you know best?

Do you care more about what you think and what you have to say than listening to others? Are your ideas and opinions always best (or right)?

Do you lack curiosity about others? Are you indifferent to understanding others and why they think or feel as they do?

Do you draw conclusions with limited information?

Do you consider others valuable?

Are you interested in your growth and in helping others grow?

Do you regularly find ways where you can improve? Do you regularly look for opportunities to serve others by helping them improve?

Do you give compassion easily to others?

Are you interested in the feelings, thoughts, and opinions of others?

Are you curious about what others think?

Do you search for evidence before jumping to a conclusion about others, or about situations?

I know such things aren’t binary, but let’s look at them that way. Yes or no. Sure, we all have our days. Even jerks can have a good day where they’re kind. And the most kind among us can have a bad day where they’re jerks. But again, we mostly live our lives in a default way. I’m challenging you to figure out your default as it relates to energy – you either drain or you add. Which is it?

Now, what do you want to do about it? Anything? Maybe you don’t care. Maybe you feel how you are works, so why mess with it?

I’m going out on a limb to say you’re interested in growth and improvement. Otherwise, I don’t know why you’d even be listening to a podcast entitled, Grow Great. 😉

There are remedies for everything if we want there to be. We can fix anything in our choices and behavior if we want to. So it begins with your desires for yourself. Would you like to improve your ability to add power and energy to others? I think all those questions can help you figure it out. Do the work. It’s worthwhile.

What about the time you spend with others? Go down the list of people who surround you. Ask yourself the same questions about these people.

It may be ideal if you could jettison the drainers from your life, but unfortunately, that’s not realistic. You can reduce their impact though. It starts with giving them less time and attention. For most of us, it starts with reducing their impact on our heart. That is, we have to figure out ways to care less what these people think. Their opinions just can’t matter. Not if they’re drainers!

This is a common problem. People give too much power (energy) to the drainers. For some reason, over the course of our lives we may have gotten too close to these people. So we’ve grown to value their opinions, even though quite frequently they have toxic opinions.

Look at them for what they mostly are – a drain. Drains empty things. Drains add nothing. Ask yourself why you give so much value to the drains in your life? Figure it out and make up your mind that you’re going to plug that drain by eliminating (if you can) or greatly reducing (more likely possible) their presence in your life.

Adders (fuelers) are all too rare, but they’re out there. People who are hopeful, optimistic value adders. These people can talk with us for mere minutes and we feel like our tank is getting fuller. They just have that positive impact on us. We may not understand why, or take the time to figure that out. I’m asking you to give it the time and attention it deserves. Apply those questions to the people who surround you so you can more clearly know WHY certain people are adding energy to your life. That’s how you’ll be able to find others who can fill some spots in your life. And it’ll all help you find ways to be more like that yourself.

We all have the same time today. Our hours and minutes are what they are. How we spend those minutes is up to us. The impact we have on ourselves and others is up to us. While we might be able to be neutral, being neutral is a bad thing. It means our presence in somebody’s life doesn’t matter. That’s almost never the case.

Instead, we’re either draining energy from others or we’re adding it. It’s up to us to decide, then to take the proper action so we’re fueling ourselves and others. As often as possible. As consistently as possible.

Be well. Do good. Grow great!

RC

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 6:05 — 6.1MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS | More

Harry Truman said that.

The reward of suffering is experience.

He was right, of course. Failure, pain, and suffering can be our best teachers. It’s up to us to leverage them properly. Not an easy thing to do.

Figuring it out involves time – often times extended time – when we don’t have it figured out. Up to the point where we finally do figure it out, we spend much more time failing. Success is on the backend.

One of my grandsons has a pogo stick. My granddaughter saw it for the first time and instantly wanted to try it. She’s a few years younger than her pogo stick riding cousin. She hopped on it, gave it try and failed. This went on for a bit. Minutes. Had I calculated it, I’d have figured that every second or minute spent trying resulted in failure. But that experience was paying off. She just couldn’t see it. Yet.

More minutes passed. More experience being gained. We watched from the kitchen table through the back glass doors as she attempted to balance so she could find some sort of rhythm to the mad contraption. Still, it could have been computed as 100% failure.

Until it wasn’t.

Such things reinforce why one of my favorite sayings is…

Everything is hard, until it’s easy.

Suddenly, she’s jumping up and down on the pogo stick. At first, two hops in a row, then a fall. Then three hops before she falls. Pretty soon, she’s on it and hopping as long as she wants without falling.

I’m a fanboy of guitar playing and guitars. No, I don’t play. But I see interviews with guitarists by other guitarists and a common question is asked.

How long have you been playing?

People answer. Mostly in terms of years. It’s likely they started measuring the time when they first began to learn. My granddaughter could answer that question about her pogo sticking. She’s been doing it for about a week. Fact is, she’s been vastly more successful in the last week than she was at the very beginning. Experience paid off. So it goes with guitarists, too.

If the reward of suffering (or failure) is experience…and it is…then the reward of experience is figuring it out. How do you price that? You can’t.

Those first painful months (or years) spent learning something new (in my granddaughter’s case, those first few minutes) are necessary. You just can’t get from here to there without enduring the suffering.

It’s easy to speak gloriously about such things, but it’s not much fun. Many times, it’s downright painful. That’s why Harry’s quote is spot on. It’s SUFFERING.

Proof that suffering is the price we must pay for success is found in my not being able to play the guitar. I got my first nice guitar about 40 years ago. A Martin acoustic. But I didn’t enroll in lessons, instead opting to try to teach myself. And this in the pre-Internet days. No YouTube videos to watch. Just books to review. It was boring. And physically painful. You don’t learn to play guitar – or much of anything else – without enduring some pain. For guitar playing, you need callouses on your fingertips so you can properly fret the instrument. You have to keep practicing in order to get the callouses though. And I never did put in enough time to do that. Eventually, I gave up. But I’ve owned an acoustic guitar for 4 decades now. Some days I imagine, “What if I’d stuck it out? Can you imagine how accomplished I might be after 40 years? Why I bet I could play most anything I really wanted to.” But here I am with a nice guitar in a nice case sitting less than 10 feet from me and I can’t play a single chord.

The barrier separates the winners from the losers. The barrier is in the suffering. Enduring the pain of the process so you can gather enough experience to figure it out.

So kick that Instagram feed to the curb. Stop comparing your failure – the time you’re spending suffering so you can gain experience – to the success of others. You’re seeing them post suffering. My granddaughter started her pogo stick adventure because her cousin was able to jump and jump and jump at will. For as long as he wanted. Without any risk of falling. She never saw him struggle. She only saw his success.

Thankfully, she’s a determined little girl. She wasn’t going to quit until she could do it as good as he could.

What’s your commitment to the struggle? How determined are you to get the experience necessary so you can figure it out?

Be well. Do good. Grow great!

RC

P.S. Connect with me on Linkedin: ConnectWithRandy.com

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 10:08 — 10.4MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS | More

On Sunday’s CBS 60 Minutes’ show, there was a profile on Samuel L. Jackson. During the interview, reminiscing about winning movie awards, he said, “Winning an award won’t move the comma on your checks. Only putting butts in seats will do that.”

What does the audience want to see? That’s his approach to his work. No wonder he’s the highest grossing actor of all time!

What about you? What does your audience want? Are you devoted to giving it to them?

It’s a maxim old as dirt. Find out what people want and give it to them.

What promptly follows are mentions of the innovations that people didn’t ask for. Enter the Apple iPod, Ford’s Model A, Sony’s Betamax and a ton of other new products.

But people overlook the obvious. People DID want to take music with them. The Sony Walkman was displaced by the technology of the Apple iPod.

People DID want to be more mobile. The horse and buggy gave way to the Ford Model A.

People DID want to record TV shows so they could time-shift their viewing. That inability gave way to the ability enabled by the Sony Betamax video recorder.

More modern advancements of innovation are the result of human desires and human challenges. Technology serves both the desires and challenges. We can grow too fascinated with the tools or tech, but at the root of all marketing is our desire to have something we don’t, or to fix a problem we have.

What’s your equivalent of butts in the seat? What are you doing to improve that?

Sometimes I work with city governments or non-profit organizations. Unlike entrepreneurial based enterprises, they don’t focus on sales or revenues. But they’re still serving an audience. So no matter what type of organization you’re leading, you have an audience to serve. How well you do that will determine your success. Make application as it suits your operation.

More. Bigger. Better.

That’s the goal. You’ll have to figure out the measurements. Maybe it’s more customers. Maybe it’s more patrons or donors. Maybe it’s more sales tax revenue via economic development.

Maybe it’s bigger sales. Or it could be a bigger impact.

Better could be more efficient. More effective. It could also more profitable. It’s not being complacent with current results but focused on striving to make anything, or everything better.

Samual L. Jackson has been intent on maximizing his earning power as an actor. He’s been focused on delivering performances that please the audience. Jackson knows where his bread is buttered. Fans pay his way so he’s intently focused on making them happy.

He’s been quoted as saying that not everybody goes to the movies to have their life changed. The man knows he’s an entertainer. He’s good at it, too. Which is why his movies have grossed over $12 billion globally. He’s number 1 for good reason.

If you want to move the comma on your checks – either personally or for your organization – then you have to know who and what you are. Jackson knows his job. He also knows his audience.

Figure out who you are. Figure out what you are. Stop trying to be something else. Lean in hard to own your uniqueness.

Figure out who your audience is. What do they want? What do they need that you can provide? Don’t challenge it, or argue with them. That’s a surefire way to lose. The market gets to decide, not you. Give the market what it wants.

That doesn’t mean you compromise what you believe or what defines you (or your enterprise). It means you figure out how to make it fit with the demands of the market. Samuel L. Jackson has created his own genre in order to give the market what it wants. His market wants to be entertained. He knows there’s lots of latitude in that. Humor. Anger. Rage. Gentleness. Physical. Thoughtful. They all work and he’s made them all work at different times. In his own unique way.

Brand. It’s your brand. It’s the YOU that nobody can replicate. If you’re not standing out, then you’re losing. Your uniqueness and your organization’s uniqueness must stand out. It’s counter-intuitive for many because we love to copy cat success. But that’s the fast path to mediocrity, or worse.

Who else is like Samual L. Jackson? Go ahead. Think about it.

I recently watched a biography on actor Walter Matthau. The same could be said of him. Who else was like him? He didn’t have leading man looks, but he played leading men quite often. He was uniquely himself, even though by all accounts he was a gifted actor.

I’d argue that both Jackson and Matthau figured out they could move the comma on their checks by giving people what they wanted and doing it in a way unlike anybody else.

If you want Samual L. Jackson there’s just nobody else who will do.

When your audience wants something…will somebody else do? Will somebody else do it better than you? Then you’ve got work to do. Don’t despair, but stop trying to be like everybody else. You’re surrendering your best opportunity to have a bigger impact.

Be well. Do good. Grow great!

RC

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:26 — 5.5MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS | More

Friday night during the halftime studio show of the NCAA Men’s Basketball tournament on CBS (a game between Duke and North Dakota), Kenny “The Jet” Smith made a comment. He said he’d commonly say something to the teams he played on.

We just need to win the next ten minutes by 4 points. If we do that every 10 minutes of the game we’ll win by at least 16 points and it’ll look like a blowout.

Breaking down a challenge into smaller, bite-sized approaches proves effective no matter what we’re trying to accomplish. It’s especially helpful when we’re battling something that seems bigger than we are.

Entrepreneurs can most easily do this with sales/revenue goals. A million dollar monthly goal spread out over 24 selling days in the month means we need to hit a daily target of just under $42,000 in gross sales every day. Sales managers are notorious for figuring out such things and leveraging that info with the team in hopes they’ll maintain the energy necessary to hit the monthly goal.

The psychology is fairly simple. We can conceptualize achieving $42,000 in a day easier than achieving a million bucks in 24. And Kenny’s basketball teammates could see themselves achieving a 4 point lead in the next ten minutes. Thinking about blowing out an opponent by 16 at the end of a game? A much tougher mental feat. Yet they’re pretty much the same thing. Certainly the same result.

Mind games are important because how and what we think matters.

I don’t claim to understand how the human mind works. I just know that it does. And that it works differently in each of us, but we’re all able to see the reality of smaller achievements. It’s the benefit of thinking small.

I’m in the early stages of a startup, a human development company. It may never get off the ground, but we’ve got lofty plans for it. Our concentration is on one single customer at a time though. The focus is at the smallest level so far as scale goes, but by concentrating on a single point where we touch a customer, we’re embracing the power of thinking small. The impact will be made bigger.

We want to make sure we’re not underestimating the power to positively help one person. It’s hardly the stuff that makes folks excited about a startup, but we’re contrarians like that. We don’t care.

Our longer term goal is to impact more than one life, but there’s just no point in getting ahead of ourselves. Fact is, if we’re not able to have the impact on a single life – the impact we believe we can deliver – then nothing else matters!

What are you hoping to accomplish today? This week? This month? This quarter? This half? This year?

For years I’d track sales per hour in retail stores. Days were made up of hours. Helping people focus on this hour kept energy and urgency that could contribute to achieving daily goals.

Getting ahead of yourself when you fall behind can be tempting. Don’t do it. It’s easily seen in sports when a team falls behind. Panic never helped anybody achieve more. Or better.

When you fall behind is the ideal time to think small. Get one small win. Frankly, many times any win will do. Folks are currently obsessed with their NCAA brackets. We’re down to the final 16 teams. Some games have been close. Others, not so much. In a basketball game, teams get on a scoring run. If you’re subjected to an opponent who has momentum, you just need one basket. Or one defensive stop. Then you build on it. We see it happen every year in the tournament. Many times.

Thinking small can help you win big when you’re pursuing momentum. Or when you’ve lost it. It just works.

Be well. Do good. Grow great!

RC

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 11:40 — 11.8MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS | More

(Yikes! Look! A video version. Don’t get used to this. It’s a one-off because a few of you asked. Your wish is my command. -Randy)

“Coach me and I will learn; challenge me and I will grow; believe in me and I will win” is the quote from Dr. Robert Halgren, Michigan Science Olympiad Site Coordinator. And I like it very much. I also agree with it. Not just for athletes, but for entrepreneurs and leaders, too.

Confidence is mysterious. I don’t claim to understand it. I’m not sure anybody does. But I am sure it makes an E-N-O-R-M-O-U-S difference in our outcomes. I’m equally sure that expressions of confidence – within ourselves and the expressions of others in us – have a big impact. A positive impact.

Over at the hobby podcast – LeaningTowardWisdom.com – I’ve begun a project called Craving Encouragement. Sparked by the many interactions I was having with high achievers I began to direct questions and conversations about times when people had been encouraged in a meaningful way – a way that was so powerful it changed an outcome in their life. As I watched people’s eyes widen, and their cadence quicken, it was obvious every single person understood the value of encouragement – expressions of belief.

I broadened the conversation to include anybody and everybody. Ordinary folks. People like me. People like you. People seen by others as financially successful. People seen by others as not so financially successful. People with a long list of accomplishments. And people who struggle to list much of anything.

I discovered something I knew was likely true, but something I hadn’t thought of so deeply until I began this effort. No matter who we are, or where we come from, or what education we have (or lack), or how accomplished and financially successful we are (or aren’t)…we all CRAVE encouragement. It quickly resonates with every single one of us.

Are expressions of belief in you so rare that you can instantly think of THE time when somebody encouraged you in a way that impacted your life? For many of us, the answer is, “Yes.” Yes, they are that rare.

I wondered why. Why is that true since we all understand the value it? Why is this true when we’ve all experienced our own positive impact by the expression of belief others offer us? It’s so powerful and so universal…why don’t we do it more?

Entrepreneurs and leaders were asked, “When is the last time you offered such strong encouragement to somebody that you walked away confident it would make a positive impact in their life?”

Thankfully, sometimes I get a fairly quick response. But sadly, more often than not – the same people who just told me of a time when somebody encouraged them – these people struggle to remember a time when they did it for somebody else.

Why?

They don’t know.

Many are too embarrassed to try even though it comes naturally for us if we’ll just lean into it. Others have such a jaded view of the world and others, they honestly find it difficult to find something worthy of encouragement. Such a cynical viewpoint is deadly to productive output. They’re like that little boy in the movie, Sixth Sense. Everywhere they look they see idiots, not dead people. The idiots have done nothing worthy of encouragement. “I think you’re an idiot. Keep it up, I believe in your ability to constantly disappoint me.” That’s not quite what I’m going for. 😀

Believe In Me

As we end this week let’s give this some practical power. It starts with how you feel and what you think. Firstly, let’s make YOU the aim of your own belief and your own encouragement. Self-encouragement. Self-belief.

Does it begin with you saying it, then convincing yourself of it? Or does it begin with you really believing it, then expressing it? I don’t know. Or care. I know both matter. I’m rather sure the order you put them in – whatever order works for you – is of no consequence.

There have been times in my life when I struggled to believe so I began with self-talk. Was I fully convinced? Did I truly believe? No. Not even close. But I somehow knew if I put language to what I wanted and what I knew I needed, then it couldn’t hurt. It helps that I have a deep belief in visualization. For me, visualizing details – as many details as possible – is a powerful tool. Try it, if you haven’t.

Belief isn’t fake, even though I’ve often prompted it with talking to myself first. I challenge myself with the truism, “Great leaders see the future first.” Attempting to always prove that I’m a great leader (perhaps more accurately a good leader working to become great), I want to see the ideal future and encourage myself to pursue it.

Words are just words until and unless they become what we believe. But words can help. Choose them wisely. Be thoughtful in how you speak to yourself.

Now, let’s aim outward, our expressions in and toward others.

You naturally know others are silently saying, “Believe in me.” Just like you’re silently saying to others.

So do it.

Starting today look for the things – the positive things in others worth encouraging. If you’re in the habit of being critical, thoughtless and filled with judgment — well, you’ve got more serious to work to do. Work that no 10-minute podcast is likely going to help. Stop being a miserable human being. Figure out what happened to your heart. Find out where along the way you lost your compassion and get it back. If you never had it, then the depths of your problems will likely require years of professional help. That’s way above my pay grade.

It’s probable that you’ve not developed the habit of being an encourager. Change that. Today.

As you walk around, interacting with others, pick people you already believe in, but you’ve neglected to tell them. Make today the day you tell them. That way you don’t have to work too hard to get in touch with your belief in people. Branch out from there.

I Will Win

Again, let’s start with YOU. You will win when you can express belief in yourself and it’ll be amplified when others express it in you. I know it’s popular to talk about not caring what anybody thinks or says and I get it. We can’t care more about other people’s opinion of us as much as we care about our own opinion. I even did a show about this just 2 days ago (episode 170).

But let’s face the truth – people matter. The people in our lives matter. We matter in the lives of others.  I don’t want to contribute to the popular belief that we’re so powerful we don’t need others. It’s simply not true! We need each other.

I’ll end this week by making an appeal to the U.S. based entrepreneurs in the audience. Do you believe that the people who surround you can accelerate your success? How would you feel if you were surrounded by 6 other entrepreneurs on a regular basis to share experiences, insights and to work together to maximize the opportunities in each other’s businesses? Find out all the details by visiting ThePeerAdvantage.com. It’s a 7-member peer advantage group just for entrepreneurs. All the meetings are online, done virtually using a video conferencing platform. I encourage you to apply – the application is short and doesn’t commit you to anything except a brief phone call with me so I can answer your questions and find out more about you and your company.

I believe in you. My mission is to help more of you win, not just in your business, but in your whole life.

Be well. Do good. Grow great!

RC

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:33 — 5.6MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS | More

A problem prospects have and don’t want

A result prospects want and don’t have

Most businesses operate in one or the other. A few may operate in both ways.

Over time we often get complacent and stop looking at such basic things. Big mistake. Fundamentals are often where the real power is found.

Over time we lose sight of our business fundamentals because fighting fires become our habit. And each day has a variety of distractions that must be managed. Like taking time to do important things – like rest or exercise or meditating – our schedule forces us to concentrate on the urgent, pressing matters. That’s why perfectly intelligent people – like us – can neglect our health and wellness. We know what to do. We just don’t discipline ourselves to take the time to do them. Often, until it’s too late.

Today, I’m urging you to get on with it. “It” being putting the fundamentals of your business model back in the foreground of conversations.

Let me suggest something to you – an exercise to conduct with your leadership team. Carve out 45 minutes of uninterrupted time between now and the end of next week. Give this meeting one agenda item – just one: to discuss the value we provide our customers.

Write it on the whiteboard:

A problem prospects have and don’t want

A result prospects want and don’t have

Don’t dominate the conversation, but lead it. Pose the question, “Where do we provide the most value to our customers?”

Listen carefully. Make notes.

Let the team engage in debate and dialogue. Disagreement is fine. You may learn something. So may your team.

Does the team see it the same way? If not, is that a problem?

Where are the constraints and challenges?

Where are the opportunities?

How can we do better?

I’m a big fan of Jack Welch’s view of strategic planning. It’s just two questions and this discussion is a great time to ask your team to wrestle with them.

1. What can our competition do within the next 18 months to nail us to the wall?
2. What can we do to our competition within the next 18 months to nail them to the wall?

Your customer base is the business coin. It’s where the real value is in your business. There are two sides to that coin: the haves and the have nots. Get your team very clear on those and then turn people lose to evangelize it throughout your company. It’s time to take your business to a whole new level.

Be well. Do good. Grow great!

RC