“I read a blog today,

Oh Boy!”

[With thanks for the unconscious melody, to The Beatles]

Contrary to a blog post I just read, MOTIVATION does NOT come from inside you!

It is DESIRE that lodges itself deep within each human being (and of course most animals).

Motivation is an influence that’s exercised and exerted from the OUTSIDE.

It is what activates or triggers desire.

To say someone is “self-motivated” simply means that person is in touch with her or his desires, and that some external things or events (or other person or people has) have activated, stimulated, or triggered those desires, increased awareness of them, and brought them to the surface.

This little bit of wisdom is as important to marketing strategists, sales professionals, and online content writers and designers seeking to trigger emotional buying motives, as it is to business owners and managers.

• We’ve chatted here often about the practical motivational applications of Maslow’s Theory of Needs Hierarchy.

Decades later, it is still a constant and still the most valuable motivational tool for business and organization leaders.

It requires leaders to pay ongoing attention to what things most make themselves and those around them “tick,” and recognize that needs can change instantly. 

• Herzberg’s research adds yet another dimension of reality that we often assume that we know what other’s needs are, but are frequently wrong . . . and that financial and job enrichment rewards are important, but in motivating for true job satisfaction, gaining some sense of achievement is what really matters most.

Okay, now that we’re past all that textbook stuff, let’s take a closer look at leadership. Motivating and inspiring others to perform optimally is a primary challenge and responsibility.

Whether the prompts to action are directed toward problem solving or innovating (or producing innovative solutions), or selling (which may of course combine all of the above), there is an over-riding need to turn on the reality spotlight!

The point is if you are out there on the front lines of sales and/or management–and aim to be successful–you’re not likely to have the time or patience to mollycoddle (cool word, huh?) a bunch of theoretical approaches about how to do your job.

Theory talks. Reality walks.

Now, here’s the killer: if you don’t do the reality booster-shots hourly or daily, your leadership effectiveness stands to suffer big-time.

Remember those on-the-job moments when a boss expected you to be internally-motivated and told you to do something “by the book” that turned out to be dumb, wasteful, irrelevant, insensitive, or ineffective (maybe all?)? Just a small example.

What about the boss who got you excited about doing something that you always wanted to try or to learn, but thought you’d never get the chance? THAT is external motivation of your internal desire! Also just a small example.   

How can you reach inside those you are responsible for leading, to locate and push those magic buttons that ignite their rocket launchers?

One good answer: 

Igniting people’s individual rocket launchers requires full understanding that the strength of your role performance as a leader is determined by how well you can get to know your SELF and others’ individual selves.

Your ability to make great things happen depends on how effectively you size up other people’s qualifications, energy drives, interests, instincts, capabilities . . . and desires!

The more you can know yourself, the more easily you can know others. When you know what others want and need, you’ll know how, when and where to reward and challenge them most productively.

But keep it on your back burner that a personal crisis or even minor oversight on your part or on the part of any of those you lead, can change the dynamics of the relationship and the tasks at hand overnight or within the hour, even within the minute! And that can change what you need to do to help others make a difference. 

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www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116  Hal@BusinessWorks.US

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Well, It’s Your PEOPLE,

Of Course!

Whether it’s your spouse helping with bookkeeping while you run a home-based business, or it’s a workforce of 3 or 300 or 3000, if you are not doing a GREAT job of motivating each of them, your business will never get where you want it to go.

Having the world’s greatest business plan, fat investors, and full access to cutting-edge tech systems and equipment means zip without committed support from those who work with and for you! Your PEOPLE are your most important asset!

And that kind of support only happens with your consistent leadership by example.

Job one is to do whatever it takes to figure out how to best open each individual’s mind, then open it, then keep it open.

Because open minds open doors.

 

The more people are encouraged to think for themselves, and to think in innovative terms, and to always think first of customers, the more opportunities they will create — for both the business and themselves, which translates to steady growth.                                                   

3 Key questions to ask yourself (and answer) in order to succeed and grow:

_______________________________

1)   Can you readily identify and separate your internal and external customers?

2)   Can you really tell the difference?

3)   What percentage of every day are you marketing to them?

This set of questions and answers is all about your ability to market your people, market to your people, and market through your people.

Successful entrepreneurs focus intently on these (above) fifty or so words . . . take a minute!  

 _______________________

Do you think that the meaning of customer service is to have dedicated customer service people?

Successful entrepreneurs charge every employee with customer service responsibilities all of the time. Parttime assistants as well as the most senior officers need to be able to handle every customer service issue at any time.

Customer service interruptions should be the rule, not the exception. 

Can you “ask, don’t tell” with the words you use? Unless you’re a creative director guiding designers and writers, can you “engineer, not architect” with verbal pictures you paint? 

When you lead by example, can you diagram ideas, and resist “giving orders” in favor of putting others and yourself on the same side of the solution table?

Successful entrepreneurs recognize that marketing through their people means being careful with what is said and how it’s said.  

Are you breeding entrepreneurs (and can you manage them)? Or are you breeding investments in the status quo (and can you manage that)? Are you encouraging enough reasonable risk-taking? Are you rewarding failure when great efforts are expended?

Do your actions take the 5-step direction of:

1) THINK

2) CREATE

3) THINK

4) INNOVATE

5) THINK

?????

Creativity only happens when thinking stops, and innovation requires re-activating THINKING in order to take the creative ideas all the way through every step of the strategic process from concept to launch, with all anticipated needs addressed. 

Then THINK AGAIN — Assess the innovative plans and designs.

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302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

If you failed to teach a

key employee 

something important

today, are you

missing the boat?

     With what I presume to be 55% of American employees being UNhappy [See yesterday’s blog post below this one], there’s very little “happiness-transition” wiggle room for a business owner or manager to exercise. The first important step, though, in the direction of kicking up productivity is to more fully engage employees in the day-to-day operations of your business. 

     Should you flat out trust the one person who seems most likely to head off to a competitor? Should you risk sharing critical product development or service expense information with people who you’re not confident will even be there in six months? Does it make any sense to encourage the employee your classmates would vote “Most likely to be brain-dead,” who you’ve kept around to do the slug work nobody else will touch? Sometimes the least likely people rise to the occasion. Think on that one.

     How about — instead of asking those questions about your employees — you ask some questions of your SELF? Where, for example, are you and your business headed right now? Where do you expect to be in five years? How (what’s the process you’ll use) do you expect to survive the next five months? What will you be doing differently then than you’re doing today? Why are you waiting five months?

     Keeping on that track for another minute, what’s something new you’ve learned about your business today? What’s something new you’ve learned about your SELF today? (Yes, both events did in fact occur; you just blocked them out or didn’t give yourself enough credit for the discoveries.)

     How will any of that new information help you tomorrow? When was the last time you and your family depended on someone else’s decision making? When was the last time you put yourself in your employees’ shoes and thought about their perspective of your business and your decision making? How do you think dependency feels?

     When was the last time you stopped long enough to teach an employee something important that she or he can use to do a better job, or be able to take home to share with family? Do you take active interest in your people every day? Why not? They may never admit it and you may never believe it, but all studies ever done would reinforce that you can be sure they take active interest in you every day, probably every hour! 

     So, that means you’re obliged to return the interest? No. You’re obliged to do everything you can possibly do to cultivate employee enthusiasm for the work they are doing. When financial reward is not possible, emotional support and psychological reward and teaching by example have to suffice. And if you’re consistent about making those money-substitutes work, they will. All human beings need reinforcement and reassurance. Employees need it from their bosses. Are you on it?                                                                              

Comment below or Hal@BusinessWorks.US Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You! Make it a GREAT Day! Blog via RSS feed or $1/mo Kindle. GRANDPARENT Gift? http://bit.ly/3nDlGF

Faster Than A Speeding

Twitter Tweet . . .

First and foremost,  I hope that the “Twitter Tweeter” who is  responsible for the 9 words I plucked off of Twitter (to feature in my blog post tonight) steps forward. I’d like to put a gold-medal ribbon around her/his neck.

Staring blankly at the rampaging scroll  of recent Twitter trash, I was reading:

“Gosh” and “Golly” and Obama this and Rush that; how to get 14 zillion followers in 24 hours; who’s listening to Jeremiah Was A Bullfrog;what stale peanut butter tastes like; when did Jesus last appear in midtown Manhattan; what the weather is in Southwest Padula; the now infamous “I did not…” quote by Clinton; and how cool Ban-Ray sunglasses are; THEN 9 words rolled by that caught my eye . . .

WHY?

WHY NOT?

WHY NOT ME?

WHY NOT NOW? 

     Whoa!  I said to myself, “Self, these four questions, these nine words, could turn the business world around.” Then I scribbled them down quick before they fell off my screen into Twitter oblivion (Yes, some people do still write things on paper! And, yes, Virginia, there IS a Twitter Oblivion!).

     When I looked up,  sure enough; they were gone. Was it a mirage? NO, I had them on this little scrap that I stuck in my pocket. For days, I kept pulling it out to think about. Guess what I figured out? These 9 words could be the official Mantra for Entrepreneurs.

     These 9 words  are the reason that upstart business startups get started! I mean you’re not likely to see this grafittied on nursing home walls, or in the men’s room at your local bar. This is heady stuff here.

     WHY? WHY NOT? WHY NOT ME? WHY NOT NOW?  works big-time as a thought-provoking motivator for salespeople. And aren’t we ALL salespeople? Well? Aren’t we? When did the last day ever pass in your life that you were not trying to “sell” something to somebody?

     If you’re honest,  the answer may be “never.” Even babies and puppies try to get attention. The blessed difference is they don’t have hidden agendas! So, back to the question, and back to the four questions, and 9 words:

WHY?

WHY NOT?

WHY NOT ME?

WHY NOT NOW? 

     My humble suggestion:  Write them down, paste them up, and think about them everyday for 3 weeks. I’m betting that you will astound even your skeptical self!     

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 “We make a living

by what we get,

but we make a life

by what we give.”

–Winston Churchill

Dedicated to one of my softball league buddies, Jimmy Travers, whose great sense of fun and spirit left us this weekend for his next life…… Thanks for the laughs and the hustle…Hit ’em where they ain’t, Jimmy!

     How you make a living may determine how you live your life, but how you live your life will determine how the rest of the world sees and experiences you and your business.

     What’s unique and exciting about this is that you can change either or both at the drop of a hat!

     Making the change, any change, is a choice…your choice, a decision made on a dime, in a blink, in two shakes of a lamb’s tail, or lickity-split. Reaping the rewards may take a little longer. 

     It might, for example, take a little while to gain acceptance and appreciation and trust and credibility, but the end result is as permanent as your diligence.

     Have you ever quit smoking or started exercise? Neither produces results overnight, but the more you stick to it, the more you see that the change works. And the easier it gets to make that choice every day.

     Not only that, one positive change fosters others…a chain reaction that breeds success and satisfaction. Being in better health attracts others who share your pursuits. It attracts happiness too. Health and happiness attract financial success, business success, family success.

     And that’s when you can really “make” your life by giving back to others what you gained in wisdom from those who came before you, who also came and conquered.

     No, I’m not talking about some of the more popularly-publicized (and extremely naive) notions of socialistic wealth-sharing. That kind of destructive thinking never works.

(Dictating healthcare choices for everyone unfortunately appears headed to be the next proving ground for this point.)

     Donating money is a wonderful thing when it’s affordable and a free choice! I’m speaking here though—beyond money— of treating family, friends, neighbors, customers, clients and patients, employees and suppliers–all–with increased respect. Every day. Persistently. It comes back to you AND your business!

     There’s a small sign hangs over my desk for it seems a hundred years that says  “Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.” Or, as Churchill said, “…make a life by what you give.” That choice made again and again will make your business grow.

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Input welcome anytime: Hal@TheWriterWorks.com  (”Businessworks” in the subject line) or comment below. Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals, good night and God bless you! halalpiar # # #   

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Action In Pursuit Of

Meaningful Goals

Delivers Success

     Much has been made in motivational literature about the wisdom of rewarding those employees who have tried and failed—solving, launching, selling, creating, producing, developing, inventing—cited often as a best practices reverse-psychology hallmark of many of the human resource management approaches used by the same big business catastrophes that have dragged down the entire global economy 

     The point of this thinking is that by mollycoddling people who can’t cut the mustard, these non-performers will inevitably produce more positive results when you continually reward them with an “A” for effort. After all, shouldn’t business be like T-Ball or Cub Scouts where everybody who does a good job of trying gets rewarded? After all, rewarding employees for failed efforts that are born of sincerity may produce failures, but will also produce more sincere efforts, which will presumably and eventually pay off in success. Right? 

     Well, I don’t buy it. It’s non-productive circular reasoning. We’re not talking about sensitivity here. Insensitive bosses don’t survive long term. We’re talking about making businesses work. Period. I believe when you reward people for failing, you are simply prompting them to produce more failure. Don’t you think? I mean, it seems to me it makes more sense to instead reassess the goals attached to the challenges at hand.

     Are goals clearly defined? Specific? Flexible? Realistic? Due-dated? If they’re not ALL of these things, they’re not goals; they’re wishes. Wishes don’t get things done. Action gets things done. Real, meaningful goals that are specific, flexible, realistic and due-dated are the ones that trigger action. Action in pursuit of meaningful goals delivers success. 

     Huh? Well, consider that if perhaps the carrot is closer, the rabbit will actually reach it and then get a commensurate reward (a bite of carrot) vs. having to try getting to a far-away, out-of-reach carrot, the pursuit of which serves only to exhaust and stress out the rabbit, nes pas?

     It is a far more productive practice to reward steady small steps to achieving success with incremental (small, frequent) rewards along the way. It’s easy to say the sky’s the limit, and set off for the sky, but whatever is “easy to say” is rarely productive, and almost never is “reaching the sky” realistic.

     Except for those few wondrous gifts to humankind—like the Wright Brothers, Mother Theresa, Thomas Edison, Helen Keller, Einstein—most of us will not achieve their levels of the impossible dream in our lifetimes.

     We can, though, most assuredly achieve our own levels of the impossible dream by scaling ourselves and our employees back to manageable steps and by chunking up tasks to within the range of reason. And to then appreciate and reward accordingly. “One small step…” proclaimed the first moon-landing Astronaut.

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Input welcome anytime: Hal@TheWriterWorks.com (”Businessworks” in the subject line) or comment below. Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals, good night and God bless you! halalpiar  # # # 

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You’re boss for the day,

in charge of the zoo.

Whaddaya say?

Whaddaya do?

     Even when you think no one’s around or paying attention, everyone IS. It’s hard to run your own business on stage in the spotlights (especially in some of the larger more public theatres), but “on stage” is where you and every other boss perform every day.

     You may even need to drop the curtain (or close your door) every once in awhile for a few minutes privacy just to sniffle, pick, scratch or gargle without an audience. But–even then–remember you are still the chief muckity-muck and (like it or not) you’re a parental figure to those who work for you.

     You probably don’t think that your employees are anywhere near being neurotic. You may be astounded to learn that many of them (if not all) measure your every move. They all watch TV. So they all know how to observe, scope things out, size things up, and “case the joint.” It’s rare that anything you say isn’t repeated over and again both on the job, and at home, as well as to neighbors, friends, teammates and bar buddies. Your community and industry exposure is as public as a professional athlete’s is to her or his sport.

     Odds are pretty good that your people want to butter you up, or do you in, or simply not make waves. An exclusive small handful are self-actualized enough in the work they do to enjoy doing the work they do with no greater agenda. But this is a very small fraction of the total. None of them will do their jobs with the conviction and commitment that you have. None will do things exactly the same way that you would.

     But this is why you get the big bucks. It’s not your job to get things done. It’s your job to get others to get things done. Bottom line is that bosses who treat employees as underlings produce underlings. Underlings don’t sell. Underlings don’t innovate. Underlings don’t take initiative. Underlings hate their jobs.

     Bosses who treat employees like partners produce partnerships and employee teams that believe in what they are doing. These are the people who will strengthen the organization because they are granted the respect that renders them not afraid to step up to the plate, nor to challenge the status quo.  

     As Boss, the best, most productive and motivating thing you can do is to take the time and trouble to learn a little bit more than you presently know about what makes each employee who works with you “tick”…what kinds of dreams, desires, wants and needs does each have.

     You needn’t be a shrink to do this. Simply open your eyes and ears more. Tune in to the kinds of things people do and say. When you can reward behavior with rewards that really matter to each individual, you are cultivating long-term commitment, ongoing loyalty, and exemplary performance. 

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 Hal@Businessworks.US or comment below.

Thanks for visiting. 

Go for your goals, good night and God bless you!

Discombobulated? 

     When overwhelm strikes, like a tsunami, and you dive under the nearest pillow or cannonball into your hot tub from the second floor deck, or run screaming down the hall that little chickens are falling from the sky, you may be on the cusp of committing to some daily psychotherapy explorations, but you’re probably normal. You may simply have spent too many years locked in your office.

     We all feed ourselves to the clock and occasionally become time-stricken. Great, you say, to hear so many others share this misery, but, you say, whassup with how to get out of the clock before it chews off my feet –or head, depending on how close it was able to get to me when the hickory-dickory docked?

     The answer, my friend, is not blowin’ in the wind. It’s in chunking up your day so you’re never in any one place mentally or physically or emotionally long enough to get gobbled up by Old Man Time. In other words, start planning your daily schedule by “CHUNKS” instead of by hours.

Motivational guru Brian Tracy suggests we ask ourselves, “What is the most valuable use of my time right now?” as many times as we are able to think of it, day after day.

He says that asking ourselves this question consistently makes us more productive and guarantees success.

     If you’re finding yourself lost in your work for days on end or corkscrewing yourself into a bottleneck of problem-solving, you may want to re-visit some of what you might have forgotten about the art of delegation, and you may want to simply start taking more breaks.

     Some of the world’s most UN-productive people are those who dedicate their efforts to their work so single-mindedly that they eat lunch at their desks, cannot relax around family or friends, injure themselves anytime they try some kind of exercise that takes them away from their jobs, and have to have it be a real effort…to smile ;<})

     When you can chunk up your work schedule, your exercise, family time, your goals, decision making, even travel, you will be happier, healthier, and more productive more often. Remind yourself that your body is not a machine, that you ARE your body.

     I mean imagine that carnivorous clock noted earlier eats your body, now what? What’s left? Don’t give me “heart and soul” stuff here. Think it through. You run a business. You know how to think. Do you know how to chunk it up? Give it a shot. What have you got to lose? More valueless time?    

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Hal@Businessworks.US     302.933.0116

Open  Minds  Open  Doors

Many thanks for your visit and God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Okay, Boss…where

do you rate yourself?

     Where do you rate yourself on a scale of 1-10 (10 being highest) in motivational skills?

     You’re a business owner or manager. When’s the last time you put your brain in a blender and flipped it on “Puree”? (Er, never, I hope, but then you wouldn’t likely be reading this, right?) Well, here’s the point: what methods do you use to get people to sit up and pay attention? To jump? To dive in? To follow? 

     How aware are you of the fact that if your associates and employees have the same “take” on your business that you have from the control tower, they wouldn’t be associates and employees. They’d be running their own businesses, and maybe even competing. Sooooo, maybe it’s a good time to consider some new approaches.

     Let’s start by trying something you’re probably afraid to do (most entrepreneurs are): Tune in to other people’s sensitivities, and show them that you are aware of their feelings by directly or indirectly addressing them in the meetings you run, the directions you give, the requests you make, the emails you send, the phone discussions you have.

“I realize and appreciate that some of you may feel uncomfortable about having to share the burdens of this benefit plan reduction we’re making. I know because I am experiencing this cutback as well, but for now we all need to pull together in order to survive and grow. I fully understand the added stress this decision may put on you and your family and can assure you we will make some mid-air corrections at the first possible opportunity” is better than an announcement slip in the pay envelope!

     This is not to suggest you mollycoddle (I do love that word!) every employee sensitivity or cave in to every wimpy request. But it does mean that it’s important to the cardiovascular and musculoskeletal health of your organization to recognize and appreciate that leadership is often defined by one’s ability to relate to and mobilize others. The “relate to” part has to do with sensitivity.

     True leaders know their followers. They know their strengths and weaknesses, and they play to the strengths. They know how and when to challenge, and how to get the most productive efforts from each because they start with sensitivity…and then apply detective skills.

     You cannot motivate others for maximum effectiveness without knowing what makes them “tick” and without knowing what their current needs are. A trophy or plaque means nothing to someone struggling to afford new tires. A cash bonus is meaningless to someone who’s just inherited a big bank account.

     It doesn’t take as much effort as you might think to stay in touch with what your peoples’ lives are all about, and you need not step off the deep end of socializing to know how to reward and challenge appropriately and productively. 

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      . . . I’m open to your input anytime: Hal@TheWriterWorks.com (”Businessworks” in the subject line) or comment below. Thank you for visiting. Good night and God bless you! halalpiar  # # # 

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“I know how it feels to have 

wings on your heels, and to

fly down the street in a trance”

                                                              From the classic song, “HELLO YOUNG LOVERS”

     Sure you can stop to smell the flowers, but that just gives you a breather. What you really need to do is stop for a minute and remember how it feels to have wings on your heels and to fly down the street in a trance because THAT will give you M O T I V A T I O N.

     Think back to the last (or first) time you were so excited, you might as well have been flying. Go on. Do it! Think back. Remember what was going on? Remember how great you felt? Remember how you knew at that moment that you could conquer the world?

     Stay with it.

     Now, do it again. Whaaaaat? Yes, do it again! Feelings and behaviors are a choice! Sometimes choices are conscious and sometimes they are unconscious. Make a conscious choice to recreate the exhuberance you felt at that magically high moment and bring it all back into focus. Get your butt cranked up to fly through this coming week!

     Go to bed tonight convinced that you own the world (regardless of reality and woes and worries)! Be in 100% charge of your SELF and your feelings. Go to bed telling yourself:

I will awake at ___AM (insert whatever time you rise) feeling happy, healthy, rested, alert, physically fit, and ready to take in all the money that comes easily and frequently.

     Don’t question me. Don’t dismiss this. Don’t X off the page. Don’t give up on yourself! YOU OWE YOURSELF a huge, successful week. Make the choice and do it! Stop making excuses. Stop allowing (choosing for) your mind to drift back to negative, bah-humbug nonproductive ways of thinking!

     You know in your heart that you can do better, and that you need only to drive your energy with a positive thrust of attitude. TURN OFF THE 11 O’CLOCK NEWS and go to bed reciting the blue boldfaced sentence above. Go on! I dare you! Take up my dare and watch what happens! What have you got to lose? The 11 O’clock News? (It’ll be there tomorrow. Same old stuff. You won’t have missed a thing. I promise.) You might even get up on time!

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      . . . I’m open to your input anytime: Hal@TheWriterWorks.com (”Businessworks” in the subject line) or comment below. Thank you for visiting. Good night and God bless you! halalpiar  # # # 

FREE BLOG SUBSCRIPTION? Click on ”Posts RSS Feed” (Center Column). FEELING CREATIVE? Visit the daily growing 7-Word Story (That’s now 232 days in the making) and add your own 7 words: http://halalpiar.com/?page_id=157