A NEW YEAR!! And “one more trip around the sun!” It’s New Years resolution time! Let’s not start this new year with new goals and new resolutions before we examine our “old goals.” By the way, did you write them down anywhere? Good for you! Let’s take a few minutes to think about where we are with our “old goals.” Are you where you thought you would be or anywhere near where you wanted to be a year later? We should all spend a few minutes looking in that rearview mirror I have mentioned before and see how far we have come. Now take notes!
I once knew a fellow who each year had a bunch of new goals to attain, but he never seemed to look back at the year just ending. He was more interested in charging forward (sometimes a good thing). What seemed to always happen to him was that he put all his energy and charging as if he were in a rocking chair. Lots of energy and lots of movement, but he never got anywhere.
When I asked him about this, it was as if I had intruded on his planning and did not recognize or appreciate the great enthusiasm he had. It was time for me to leave, and still he rocked!
As for you and me, let’s take some honest time looking back. While we don’t usually get very far by only looking in the rear-view mirror, it is great to see where we have been before we open a new map for the continuation of the journey.
Last month I commented on “trust” and quoted from Covey’s book The Speed Of Trust. Last week in my readings, I came across a survey by the U.S. News & World Report-Harris Poll that tells us that regardless of political leanings or personal demographics, most of those surveyed ranked trustworthiness as the number one top trait they wanted in a leader. However, many of those surveyed noted a scarcity of trusted leaders both in business as well as in politics. The other top traits mentioned in the survey included honesty, transparency, reliability, ethics, and respect.
And old friend of mine, Bill Marvin, was always quoted as saying; “What did you learn from your staff today?” Well Bryan Mulder of Pizza Ranch recently said that he asked himself this question every day. In doing so he came to the realization that employees (I prefer to call them team members) “will only stand as tall as the bar is raised.” (It is our role as leaders to live up to the expectations that we have for our team.) He goes on to say, “to think otherwise is just another way to define insanity.” Interesting thought? In my coaching days I noticed that my left tackle could not block anyone! So, we learned not to run the ball in his direction. He was doing the best he could, and we worked on it every day. Keep raising the bar. So what did YOU learn from your team today?
Should you reconsider? Did you ever notice that we (people) tend to become defensive and that we all too frequently attack or lobby for support from our team when challenged instead of pausing and reconsidering what we could learn? So here is a question for you: is it more important that we feel right, or is it more important that we be truly right? I know, you’re the boss/owner, whatever you say is “right,” but does the team see this as their reality of what is right?
“SUCCESS is often no more than going from one failure to the next with undiminished enthusiasm.” - Sir Winston Churchill
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