how to set your own goals

If one examines success of others, he will surly know that success is not sporadic. Although it is a game of chances but it is not a product of chaos. Every single success is based on a plan. There is a goal and there is a predefined way or guideline which brings this goal to life.

So if i need to apply such a statement to myself it means that my success needs to have a plan.
I have read a book by Brian Tracy and this subject got very practical advice. It was also stated that many serious performers have a written down plan for themselves and it goes as far as they expect to live.

So i have put this to a test by reserving 2 hours for myself at work in a focus room (small room with no windows and barely a place to sit). I had no idea what is going to be the outcome and how to do what I did.

Step 1:

I have split my life into 4 categories: family, fitness, finance and business

Step 2:

I have wrote down a current status of each – a small paragraph that describes its essence as i see it.

Step 3:

I have thought and wrote down a list of all the achievements for every category. The achievements were covered the things that I would consider to be an improvement or success from my point of view

Step 4:

At this step i had to create a vision of myself on my life timeline – long term to short term for 25, 10, 5 and one year ahead while basing this on step 2 and 3.

Step 5:

I wrote all the challenges that stand on my way of achieving my goals for every category or paragraph in step 3

Step 6:

I have chosen the achievements from the list in step 2 but only the ones relevant for 1 and 5 year terms

Step 7:

I have broken them down into steps to be performed in order to get them done. Some got 1 line and some got 10

Step 8:

The items from step 7 got their own bullets too.

So what was the outcome of my actions?

1. I got a 6-7 page document in a first try!

2. There are things there that i have never thought

3. I gained a real clarity of what i need to do in an actionable way.

4. This has changed my day immediately, I have walked out of this room with different self-image and different approach to my surrounding.

After 3 months I have gone over the list again and I could mark some items as completed and when you do it in such a document  – you see that you are truly one step closer to what you want to be and this is not accidental.

I gained control and I think that if I will repeat this over, I will get stronger and more effective every time although the preliminary effect was already way bigger than any expectation.

 

 

Book review – how to instantly connect with everyone

As I wrote earlier, there is a way to learn while you run by listening to audio books

In general the technique is very useful and proven itself many times over.

So I got this book: How to Instantly Connect with Anyone

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0071545859/

and I listened to it during 3 trainings and finished it with great disappointment.

There are several issues with it.

First, it is all about tricks of getting more credit  for yourself without  actually deserving it.

I have wrote about “Manipulating everything” but this was about matching the intended effect to your techniques by understanding what drives people. But his book talks about your own success and even could of good advices it has are still not enough to compensate on the egoistic techniques it has all over it.

Second, this book concentrates on the author too much. It is ok to use yourself as an example but practically setting yourself to the level of benchmark? It is too much. To much of “me me me” and “I I I” in one book.

I would recommend to read it with caution.

 

Insight of senior managers

Today I have been participation in a management course. It consists of many different parts, spread over different days.Usually at this kind of courses, there are many different techniques discussions, group activity and the list goes on.From time to time, a senior manager will visit and give a speech, mostly boring stuff.

Today was different.

I saw this person the first time. But he changed my understanding of things.

Many time I heard about the need to focus on strengths and not on weaknesses. But from reality check this did not feel right.

But today I got an explanations that finally concluded what is this about and how its done.

Dispositions section of my blog shows that I have a team of 10 which share the same responsibility.

Over the years, I have been educated that the whole team need to have nearly the same level of knowledge, speed and quality. All the extras are bonuses that whelp them advance their careers, but all the basic common qualities are just to fit to the job description.

Needless to say than no all of my employees are at the required level. We are constantly meeting and discussing how can we improve, but I always knew that we mostly discussing about reducing the damage rather than bringing success.

I learned that every team needs balance. My job is finding the strong points of every person and bringing them up to front. It would not be 100% accurate but what is? Instead of having 30% of my team doing 60-70 % of work. I can make everyone give much more output on their strong points while keeping their low qualities from doing any damage to them or to the LOB. The truth is, I never even told anyone that they are not as good as it possible, I always talked about potential and meeting it and many more motivational stuff, while trying to motivate people to do what they do not love.

Today I will make a trial, I will tell my most complicated employee about qualities that I need to be maintained on the damage prevention level, but I will empower the strong ones to the maximum.

This is the importance of a strong person in the high management position. His example and ability to explain stuff were more successful than at least 2-3 books I read.

I will more of senior managers would be able to express themselves in this manner. At least now I have a proper example.

How to deliver good results

Results are the outcome of every action, this one Is no brainer.
The issue is that the recipient of our results perceive them differently than we do. This creates a situation where we feel that our work is being discredited and the effort Is not recognized.

So what is wrong? How did this happen?
The most common scenario is : you have gotten a task. It had enough information to start the work. You work hard in order to achieve the result and deliver it to your client or service recipient. Once you are done. The feedback you get is not exactly what you have expected. I’m not talking about the worst case scenario but about the usual, non fully satisfactory feedback.

When someone request a specific work to be done, they usually specify the what is required to be done but the part which describes the expected outcome.
For example, An investigation request can produce many results including root cause analysis s verdict or consultation. In my field this request means that the investigated issue need to be fixed as well.
So hard work is not enough to deliver satisfactory.

My approach has been developed in time over many different interactions that I had with my service receivers.
I learned that its always worth to ask the requester about their intention towards task in hand. This allowed me to save time and deliver the right result in the first time.
I did waste time on asking questions and by this delaying the delivery of the results. But this is nothing compared to re-doing all the work.
Another outcome is the perception of professionalism the clients get.
They learn how to work with my organization and they get the understanding oaf the effort included in the task delivery.
Everybody wins.

What would be your way to deal with unsatisfactory goal delivery?

How to deal with smart quotes

Smart quotes fill up the internet, they are being stated in every book that is intended to improve our life and people just love to use them.

This creates two issues and they are both not in favor of those words of wisdom.

1. Appeal to authority – this is being used when some famous historic figure had something to say. For example Einstein quotes about his perception of life.
He was a bright scientist in his field and for this he is greatly admired.
No problem.
But this does not make him a morality expert or valid nutrition adviser. His achievements in physics are not extending to other areas of life. And accepting his ideas in the areas where he has no expertise is a false approach. My vegan friends, for nutritional advice contact your local diet doctor – after 4 years of training in this field he has much more authority and understanding than all quotes of famous people combined.

2. Every smart quote has few similar qualities. They are always mathematically accurate and they provide only one side of the story.
Lets analyze a very famous one.

You miss every shot you do not take.

It is smart and short, it is accurate as long as it goes for taking shots. But It shows only the execution’s perspective. It does not deal with consequences.
In real life, an action has a feedback. There is a reason why we don’t take shots – we estimate the consequences and our ability to deal with them.
Taking shots for the sake of not missing any is pure gamble. According to this sentence we all should go and take a shot at the local casino. We should risk all our money in opening businesses the minute we think of them and the list Is endless.

So what this quote teaches us? Nothing. What It does is making us feel bad for choices we didn’t make.
As social beings, we are surrounded by someones successes and failures. Our mind is full with ideas and mostly they are not original ones. When someone succeeds in an area that we though off, it appears to us that we could have a piece of this success if we would just act on our guts.
Remember all the times you had taken the shot and failed.
This experience is valuable and its worth using in the future decision making. Expensive lesson is still a lesson. And what it teaches us is that the shot itself is not enough. More is required.
Our hesitation In shot taking is our analytical ability kicking In in order to prevent you from damage.

If you feel that you do not take enough shots,  there is many things that could be done.
First thing is to analyze your Idea and estimate the Impact of Its failure and the chance of it.
Then decide if you can deal with this kind of damage.  If not, you are not ready for the shot, do not gamble. Instead, think of the Idea that will reduce your inability to deal with this kind of risk.
Any achievement is a process, crowned with success. Gamblers are rarely rewarded in the long run.

There are many quotes that might mislead us into disaster or unnecessary efforts.
What would be yours to share?

How to get more engagement from your employees

getting more engagement

From day one I have been seeking to get more motivation and engagement from my workers.
The situation is a standard one when it comes to management. But when you meet it the first time it is hitting hard.
Seems that no one wants to work the way they are  requested. All have a different vision and resistance to your ideas.

I have looked for ideas and techniques and found quite a few but none of them was helpful enough and most were based on personal approach and none was appealing directly to my abilities to manage.
In other words – everyone is a robot! Find the button, push it and success will follow.

I agree that there are techniques that need to be learned but the first and most important things is to get tot the bottom of this resistance.
My analysis of myself and my recent peers, now my workers, showed that everyone want to be a manager.
If not managing others , at least managing themselves.

Everyone has a line of responsibilities and we are getting really attached to it. We tend to protect what is ours and er think that we know better than anyone when it comes to how to do our work.

I listened to an audio book about Warren Buffet’s management techniques and I found exactly what I wanted.

The technique is very simple and answers my needs as well as my employees desire to be the boss in their field.
The idea is letting them to set goals and timelines while you just ask questions rather than giving orders.
That is it! People are competitive, they want to do more than others in order to get more benefits. They want to prove themselves to you and others and they are confident in their domain. Also, they would not like to promise less than the others so they put the stakes high in advance. They do not feel ordered but collaborative, this eliminates the resistance. And the mere fact that you bother to ask ads you an extra credit as a manager.
In other words they promise more than you would ask and they feel obligated personally because its their idea in the first place.

This is one of the examples:
Our team mates are expected to provide two 1 hour training for the rest of the team during the business year. This doesn’t sound much but with all the hard day-to-day responsibility there is not enough time left. This is the excuse you get when they under deliver. In their opinion you set them a goal that they can fail abed blame on the system.
Instead I have asked them: what are your plans this year for showing presence in team training initiative?
Their answer knocked me to the ground, no one promised less than 3 by mid year! The same people that considered the goal to be meaningless and missed it last year, this year wanted to do more of it!
After their statement, you as a manager can give advice in same manner – asking questions.
I asked maybe you can give little less so you could stand out in other area as well?
This created acceptance of the fact that they are getting more opportunities and they lowered the goal closed to the intended 2 trainings per year.

The result was exactly like I expected – the promise they made kept them working towards the goal and most of them completed the first training provision in one month. Last year I had to continuously ask for them to complete at least one before the end of the year.
This time I discussed it only once!

Now I always use this method and use other techniques only when I really need to.

Do you think I could do better?

How to become a better executioner

I have found that in my most non productive days I have been busy all day regardless to the results.

In my most effective days, for some reason, I found myself not being busy at all.
A short analysis revealed that it entirely depended on what was that thing that was driving my day.

A bad day was always sporadic and reactive.  I was handling tasks that I had no intention to deal with in the first place. I was putting off fires in a manner of speaking and the control was no mine at all.
On good days everything was managedby me, all the output was orchestrated the way I meant it and there were little to no surprises. In fact I was looking forward for them so the day would be spiced up a little bit.

This is my conclusion.
My good days were planned ahead. Not always by me but they were based on a pre-determined plan.  During those days the surprises were not so bad.
Apparently I was reacting to them in accordance to other plans and this allowed me to coordinate my efforts more efficiently.

To put this hypothesis into test I have started scheduling al my daily activities once I knew what they could possibly be. Even calls home were scheduled.
The test was successful.
Once I had a pre-written planI was able to react better, the written plan has a certain appeal to execution. A bond. Like a promise to self and it worked
I have stated using the ever note application on my tablet. It has a direct sync to anything you like and this is directly linked to the ultimate productivity tool that I was writing about last week.
The evernote has a checkbox type of bullet that i’m using to follow up on execution.

The result is amazing. I have spared myself so mu time that now I have to invent moare taks to occuoy myself during work. I’m actaully working less because all my efforts are dedicated to execution alone and there is no need to deal with time constraints .

This was felt by my team and my peers too. I’m more effective, approachable snd confident. The stress is almost gone.

I wonder If there are more techniques out ther, so I would enhance my worakdays even more.

How I saved someones career

This story is related to the previous post about delivering goals.

Few years ago, I have been a team lead in my current job. Not a manager, just a team lead and an expert in my field.
During this time part of the team was working on a very important project which was over viewed by senior management. It was time consuming and stressing everyone.
The lead of this particular project was young fellow with superb technical abilities but zero experience in management of anything.
His responsibility was managing the project and 3 contributors. Their responsibility was delivering small repeatable tasks to him. Another Important thing, they were his teammates, equals but not good professionals.

In this setting he was not able to deliver any milestone on time, he missed every date, stayed late in order to compensate their performance and still got bad feedback from his direct manager.
As I side observer I found him in big distress. He was always tired and unhappy.

After a while, he pulled me to the side for a private conversation and shocked me.
He wanted to know how to communicate to our manager that he is considering quitting the job. He was at the dead end and got no help from anyone. And apparently the only help he wanted was terminating his employment in s most convenient manner.

I questioned him and found that the 3 contributors were neglecting their tasks and his efforts to compensate or to make them work were fruitless and our manager did not accept any excuse during milestone meetings.
I asked him why, in his opinion, his manager was responding like that and he had no answer. I think that this is how a manager can get a reputation of pure evilness.

I have invested almost 2 hours rearranging his tasks and responsibilities with specific actions

1. The contributors discipline is no his concern. When they neglect their tasks, their direct manager is responsible to set them straight. Our hero was not feeling comfortable telling this to the boss because he was concerned for their well being.
I explained that they know the consequences of their behaviour when they deliberately made him compensate for their laziness. So he should not feel sorry for those who mean to harm him.
2. I told him that he is responsible to state his inability to deliver in the minute he finds out himself.
His response was that this is what the milestone meetings are for.
I explained that milestone meetings are for future plan discussions and not for surprise underdelivery reporting.
3. I explained that he was too, setting up his manager for a bad time. He was having his own milestome meeting shortly after those ones and he had to face the fact that he was coming there with bad news with no time to prepare or alert to warn him.

The manager could do a similar talk or could have put more sttention to status updates. So could senior management. But no-one bothered to see if they can assist in any way. Perhaps they did not want to. Personally I think that they could not define it themselves. This hsppens a lot in technical companies where manager is in fact a senior technical expert – chosen to lead and not a people manager ehich knows how managing is done.

1 month after this, he came to thank me. His project was doing really well, he was getting only compliments and everybody were happy while the project’s pace was actually the same!

Not much has changed. The 3 contributors continued to be ineffective egomaniacs so the delivery was not faster. But the understanding of what is going on changed the whole picture.
Our fellow was happy and he learned a valuable lesson, nowadays he is a senior team lead distinguished in our organization.
My lesson was valuable too. I was seeking for other team mates with the same problems and made a sort of seminar for effective time management. The impact was felt by all organization.
Today I am delivering the same guidance to all my employees.

I wonder if there could be more that I could do in this area

How to deliver goals on time

One of the most important activities in ones career development is being able to deliver goals on time.

What I learned during the past years is that everyone perceive this task differently. Very differently.
Most of people I know, including my employees see it as a task to deliver the end result on the predetermined date. That is it.
No more thought was given to this and the result is quite expected. Every goal or task with even slightest complication was missed and the management had to intervene and give some hard time to the person responsible.

This will go on for a while and eventually the employee will neglect other areas of his activity (sometimes personal life) or the management will reduce expectations and by this limit this person’s ability to advance career development.

I see 2 issues here,
1. The management approach is wrong because managers are responsible to give proper guidance to their workers. Not just ask for delivery or tweaking the employees daily operation.
2. The employee does not understand what is a proper delivery and what time management is.

The issue itself is a trend. Solving one symptom would not be useful in the next task and this will go on indefinitely.

Goal delivery depends on proper time management. And for me this means setting the expectations before there is an impact.
The problems and obstacles need to be communicated before they impact the dependent people or other projects.
This gives the manager the means to deal with the situation and not with the consequences. Projects or goals are not static and changes in the time consumption are legitimate part of it.
So the issue at hand Is not the delivery time but the impact it creates and this is manageable.

My advice – communicate the challenges immediately when you encounter them and management will perceive you as a reliable worker, able to deal with complicated tasks.
Managers – explain this to your workers. The negative impact works both ways so eliminate it by proper setting of expectations rather than dealing with the symptoms.

If someone has a better Idea, I would love to learn from your experience.

How do you manage your colleagues?

One of the first and certainly the biggest challenges of promotion is – managing your former colleagues. When you are facing this situation your panic grows fast, you see many scenarios in your mind and many dilemmas become your reality.

I think the most common ones are:

1. I might lose a friendship with someone

2. I may not be able to influence enough to make people do what I need.

3. I would not become a manager in the eyes of my subordinates.

Then more considerations follow:

Internal disputes between those which close to you and those who’s not so lucky, personal favor requests, team morale goes down…

I learned that this is inevitable. All of these things happen. None excluded.

So I decided to deal with the results. If there is something that I can control is – my responses and the experience I get.

And those are the consequent reactions and changes in approach:

1. My friends need to see me for what I am. If they disagree – I can listen. If after that, I decide to go with my decision – they must follow exactly like the others. If not – perhaps they are not so much of friends and our relationship is not as much important to them as I could think.

2. The influence is important and it goes up with time. In order to set it up I had to take responsibility for every decision and see what happens. It sounds trivial but looking around, you see many managers that are not sure in their actions. No need to say how badly this affects execution. No one wants to take responsibility for bad decisions of others. Consequently – if you are not responsible enough – you have no power.

3. Assignment of management position is not enough to set you as a leader in the eyes of subordinates. Trust must be earned first. I found that setting expectations did the job. I sat with every one separately and discussed their expectations of me, mine of them and then I obligated myself towards some of my intentions. When my team learned that I’m responsible for them, they stopped the guesswork and the first step of gaining the trust was completed. This also gave me realization that I need to maintain the trust – it’s not a one time piece.

Half a year passed. Do I have the trust I want to have and am I enough of a leader for my team as I would like to be.

No.

But I have enough to work with. And I still on a path to reach the level I need.

I’m reading a lot of literature about leadership and now I understand better that all I need is to be better every time and there is, probably, no end to it.

Learning on your run

One of the most important tasks is making more with less. This is crucial especially for utilization of time. All of us have the same amount of of it, the difference is how we use it for our benefit.
My self improvement goals include family, fitness and work. The key is combining them in a way that will allow enhancing one while doing the other.
Every day I run 4.5 kilometers. This takes about 25 minutes. Short calculation shows that every week I get 180 minutes of free time.
3 hours a week for thoughts or audio books. I prefer the books, thoughts are for showers 🙂

running man

I have purchased a smartphone case for running from deal extreme and it cost me 3 dollars. The audio books are not too expensive either.

So now, this is my daily routine:
1. Open the audio book on my phone.
2. Open the runkeeper application
3. Run, listen and measure

This was very fruitful.
The runs became anticipated. I finish a book in 2-3 weeks. I measure my performance and log my runs for further analysis.

Another outcome was surprising as well. The non fictional books with a “how to” material are not an easy listening. You need to remember, comprehend and apply. Otherwise the effort is worthless. Having it in small pieces helps A LOT ! Its not a blur anymore and the learning curve became much more significant.