RE-energizing = Cruise control

     Running your career, business, or professional practice in cruise control requires re-energizing. 

     Groups require re-grouping.  Thinking requires re-thinking.  I know these things because I’m a writer, and every writer knows that respectable writing requires re-writing — always, all the time, no exceptions. 

     It’s RE-writing that marketing, advertising, promotion and public relations clients pay for, by the way.  Because ONLY re-writing can produce writing that’s worthy of reading . . . and responding to!  RE-writing is also what sells book manuscripts, and of course, books.  But how can you re-write something that’s not finished to start with? 

     And how can you get yourself started when you have so little time to do so much that—even as you read this, you’re worried about the time it’s taking to read this—you don’t make enough tiome to rejuvenate yourself?  Yes, that was a question.  It reminds me of the student I once tried to enroll in one of my time and stress management courses who said, “Listen, I don’t have any stress, and I certainly don’t have the time to take a course on time management!”  Uhuh.  

     Now, just to be clear, I’m not talking about that “time to smell the roses” stuff you see on Auntie Madeline’s garden plaques, or taking a 3-day weekend warrior trip to the mountains or the shore and return exhausted or hungover, or both. 

     Though if you’re still reading this, you probably don’t think that even little ventures like these, away from your work, your business or your professional practice, are affordable to your brain or your organization (especially given the one-of-a-kind customers, associates, patients, clients you have; and especially given that sales/claims/cases are so far ahead or so far behind) and you’re just being polite right now, patiently waiting for my lecture to end so you can throw a wet dishrag at your computer screen, and stomp off to your waiting piles of paperwork, snorting “bah, humbug!” (an expression you might ordinarily reserve for Christmastime?).

     “No, it’s the quality thing,” you keep saying; “it’s the quality of the time away from work; that’s all I need, just some quality time . . .” 

     Brrrrrrraaaaaatt!  Wrong again.  No, I’m talking about taking a bunch of days—more than a Monday or Friday tacked onto a “quality” weekend—and taking yourself someplace that, to you, might as well be outer space!  Go hide!  Blend into someone else’s scenery. 

     Take the risk of leaving your merry-go-round in someone else’s hands for a week or two.  When you come back, you’ll be able to make the carousel run more efficiently and more comfortably . . . maybe even get it out of running in nonproductive circles!  Imagine how far you can go on a merry-go-straight?  Stop.  Look.  Listen.  And get the hell out of Dodge!         halalpiar

 There is no excuse

                                                                           

for employee excuses. 

     Let’s face it, Boss.  The more you run around trying to be a first aid squad patching up the business cuts and bruises and blackeyes, the more you function as a fire department blanketing flames and hosing down everything in sight, the more you lose control.

     When employees appear to be invested in offering excuses, and in maintaining the status quo so they don’t make waves, the less they are living up to their potential and the more your business will suffer on the bottom line.

     So what’s a Boss to do?  Step back from it all.  Take a couple of deep breaths.  Recognize that you have been taking the monkey off employee backs for too long and that it’s time to put the monkey back where it belongs . . . return it to those you are paying to take and manage responsibility.  

     There is no excuse for excuses.  And when employees can duck responsibility and not miss a step, they will.  Why not?  They’ll get paid as much for making the minimal 9-5 effort as they will for acting more responsible and putting in extra effort and extra hours.  (Does this sound something like being a parent?) 

     If you’re expecting employees to step up and act like owners, you’d better figure out some way to make them feel like owners . . . whether it’s a matter of stock options, or junior partnerships, or simply extending some vacation times, or awarding some bonuses, people are people are people.  Incentives motivate. 

     Ah, you say, but you’ve tried giving salary raises and it hasn’t changed things.  How can you fault someone for not wanting to do more work once she or he is making more pay when it’s just as easy to go into cruise control?  On top of that, remember that pay raises are permanent increases.  By comparison, bonuses and non-cash rewards are blips on your bottom line.

     If you’re determined to get results from incentives, you have to be determined to figure out what makes each individual incentive recipient tick! 

     Someone with a teenager who needs braces will be more motivated by your incentive offer to pay the periodontist than a cruise vacation.  Someone who comes from a wealthy family will not be as motivated by cash as by a limo-transported theatre show and dinner for two (or four) at his or her favorite restaurant. 

     An employee who’s nervous and worried about neighborhood burglaries will be motivated by a one-time expense security system installation and service contract or a new, bolt-to-the-floor fire-proof safe. 

     It’s all about Maslow’s Hierarchy and understanding as much as you can about what’s important in the life of each person, and rewarding that individual at the level that counts most for that person.           halalpiar         

For experienced bottom-line management consulting and coaching that gets results –guaranteed– contact award-winning author/educator/consultant Hal Alpiar now at 302.933.0116 or email Hal@TheWriterWorks.com

Events in time

whirling frantically around 

within the confines

of limitless constraints

outside the realm

of measurements

. . . the pounding pace of life

and events in time

whirling frantically around,

and around,

and around,

and . . . 

halalpiar

 Avoid the temptation

                                                                   

to try to do everything!

     With the good fortune of my having talented, creative children —a major Washington DC award-winning theater director daughter, and a major LA/Dayton OH award-winning musician/composer son— comes the awareness that business trade shows are theatre!

     If you’re participating in one trade show, or hundreds, and don’t treat each as if you were hosting a world premier theatre opening, you’re wasting your time, money, and energy. 

     Opening a play requires precise planning . . . from tickets, ushers, programs, music, costumes, advertising, promotion, sound, lighting, props, backdrops, script development, auditions, rehearsals, and how the actors and actresses “come across” to their audience.

     How do your company representatives “come across” to trade show visitors?  Do they have rehearsals? 

     To be truly productive in a trade show setting, avoid the temptation to try to do everything.  It can be no more effective than actors and actresses trying to double up as ushers, ticket-takers, advertisers, lighting and sound technicians.

     Trade show participation can sell products and services OR gain industry exposure and build goodwill OR inform and educate OR recruit employees OR establish contacts and build a mailing list . . . but never (really, never!) target more than one purpose.  It simply won’t work! 

     Remember that theatre audiences and trade show audiences are both filled with critics who can make or break your presentation in just a matter of hours.  It’s also important to keep in mind that the vast majority of trade show attendees are “tire-kickers” and “window shoppers” who are there to gather information (and goodies) and compare the offerings.  Depending on your single purpose, being able to sort out prospects from suspects can be critical to your success. 

     What’s the best way to prepare?  Go to other trade shows — any trade shows!  And be a detective.  Figure out which booths and exhibits are doing best and why, and which are not.  Take notes.  Then go home and rehearse your presenters to stay with the game plan and focus on the single goal of collecting business cards, OR making sales, OR making impressions, OR . . .                halalpiar

For creative consulting help with trade show presentations, call Hal direct at 302.933.0116 or email Hal@TheWriterWorks.com 

What’s free, feels good when

you get it, feels good when

you give it, and is worth more

than a bathtubful of cash? 

Being a good neighbor isn’t just a behavior promoted by children’s TV icon, “Mr. Rogers” (God bless his talented, caring, sweet, perceptive soul!). Being a good neighbor means helping and sharing and sometimes, being self-sacrificing. 

It’s an attitude. It’s a behavior pattern driven by your willingness to accept responsibility for more than yourself, and to be willing to act responsibly toward those around you, even when you may least want to . . . at home AND on-the-job! 

It doesn’t mean giving up your SELF for others (those are “Heroes” and Heroines” and we need only glance quickly to our young service men and women for glowing examples!). 

It doesn’t mean (necessarily) making a career of it, like so many of the wonderful helping professionals (nurses, charity and social workers, missionaries, therapists, et al) among society’s ranks. Oh, and it also doesn’t mean doing favors for others who really don’t want your favors!  

It DOES mean being conscious of others’ needs and helping to fill those needs whenever you can when called upon, and whenever you see the needs and are able to help, whether called upon or not. 

It’s called “pitching in.”  It’s called “stepping up to the plate.” 

     I call it “Neighborship”! 

And you know what’s really remarkable? It seldom takes more than the simple offer of a helping hand to revitalize the home or on-the-job attitude of the person or persons on the receiving end. Of course, you may have to be willing to accept a “thank you,” or handshake, or smile, as your reward. 

But, oh, isn’t that what a truly blessed event is all about anyway?

I am truly blessed to have YOU be reading this right now, and I am not even a minister!  Thank you, and please do return. Have a great day and a great night!    

If you have a good, inspiring Neighborship example to share, please post it as a comment!  or email it to me Hal@ Businessworks.com    

Are you always 

  

anticipating

                               

the next pitch?

     Does your on-the-job behavior match the thinking of a baseball player?  Are you always anticipating the next pitch, and what you’ll do if the ball goes here, and what you’ll do if the ball goes there, and what you’ll do if the signals change . . . or the winds change . . . or your superstitous teammates don’t change the shirts they’ve worn for the last three games? 

     Nothing wrong with thinking like a baseball player unless the company or industry you’re in is Armenian or Finnish, or simply doesn’t leave you time to think.  Maybe the company or industry you’re trying to represent as the star left fielder is busy playing hockey or fast-break basketball?  Circumstances like these make for tough going, trying to get your glove to get in the game!  

     Worse, I suppose, you could be a serious golfer in the middle of a football game (keep the first aid squad phone numbers handy!).  Let’s face it, you can’t play soccer on a tennis court or water polo on a ski slope (Yikes!  Now that would be cold, and you’d never want to miss the ball and have to chase after it!). 

     So, what’s the message?  If your work situation is unhappy, or giving you headaches, knots in your stomach, or other stress-provoked ailments like lower back pain (or, really, just about anything you can think of . . . uhuh, including those two merciless extremes: diarrhea and constipation), step back from the action (no pun intended), and take some deep breaths [Really!  See “ARE YOU BREATHING?” under the Articles tab on this site].

     Then, ask yourself if you’re “playing the same game” as everyone else, and especially of course, the boss!  Entrepreneurs (and male, female, black, white, purple, orange, MBA or otherwise, makes no difference) rarely survive corporate life because they march to a different drummer.  Regardless of money earned, most would prefer to be an individual Tiger Woods-type performer than to be any superstar team player. 

     Conversely, not many corporate types succeed with business startups.  Often, because they fail to realize that they must now pay the expense account submissions, turn out the lights, take out the trash, skip lunch and work far past the luxurous 9-5 weekdays they’re used to.  [See June Archives blog post: “TO ENTREPRENEUR OR NOT TO ENTREPRENEUR?”]

     Maybe you need to examine the environment you work in more carefully and consider if it’s really the match for your skills and interests and personality that it once appeared to be.  We do change, you know.  And, yes indeed, old dogs can learn new tricks. 

     But before you decide to toss your corporate cookies out the window to become a deep sea fisherman or fisherwoman (thought I’d throw that in just in case you’re a compulsive HR executive; I wouldn’t want demerits, even though I never heard of a fisherwoman), think again! 

     The grass . . . yes, it does look greener over there, but remember that these days, EVERYthing is greener!  It’s getting hard to tell which came first —

                                  environmentalists or St. Patrick?!             halalpiar

Perhaps, Dear CBS, whatever credibility

you ever once had, when many of us were

growing up, has long since gone out the

window –even before Dan Rather. 

     Perhaps, Dear CBS,  you’ve turned your heads away from the positive signals that the housing market is starting to look healthier because your necks got stuck when you decided to fixate on the negatives?  And perhaps you overlooked the Manager of Tanger’s —Rehoboth Beach, Delaware’s massive outlet malls that stretch for miles along Coastal Highway Rt.1— who reports that “while people are being more selective and spending longer periods shopping to economize on fuel, merchandise sales are at an all-time high!”?

     Doesn’t sound to me like your on-screen statement “Economy Crumbling!” 

     Isn’t this turning of the head scam sort of like the Iraq news reports, and your insistence on trying to make our heroic troops look bad?  [How interesting, now that we’re actually winning there, by the way, that your doom-and-gloom reports have been being quietly phased out.]  Where are your reports of U.S. Troop successes?    

     Whatever credibility you ever once had, when many of us were growing up, has long since gone out the window –even before Dan Rather– because of your own policies that appear to cultivate indiscriminate, biased word choices and conclusions at every turn.

     Do you really believe your viewers are as stupid as your so-called “news reports”?  Do you think viewer annoyance was neatly dispensed with, and swept away under Rather’s demotion rug?  Perhaps you should revisit this thinking, assuming that the short-sighted policy-making practices of your management team allows for such an excursion.   

     Do you imagine your viewers to be successfully hoodwinked by the babble of your third-rate talking heads?  Do you think the public is so blind to your crazed pursuit of money and political favor lobbying that it buys into the position of weakness you’ve carved out for yourself? 

   It’s transparently clear that –if you ever had it to begin with– you have lost all sense of responsibility and interest in preserving the platforms of objective reporting that were once the very fabric and foundation of your company’s existence. 

     No wonder the Internet is blowing you out of the water!  Shame on you for continuing to persevere in the manipulative spreading of opinions that you so maliciously and arrogantly label as “reporting.” 

     No, Dear CBS, it is YOU who is  c r u m b l i n g !

     But, ah, you do, you know, have a choice.  Every passing hour is a new opportunity for you to come alive, and present news without bias, and challenge viewers to think for themselves by putting facts on the table.  Just imagine the possibilities.  Or is that asking too much?     halalpiar

 See 7/13 Post below for Part I of II

Network TV news coverage

allows us no room

to breathe the truth!

     No matter what side or edge of the U.S. political fence you may be standing on, or straddling (or simply ignoring), you would have to be brain-dead to not be aware of CBS’s track-record for consistently delivering manipulative, exaggerated opinionating that they unabashedly proclaim to be responsible reporting.

     I believe CBS network TV news coverage to be (at its best): incessantly amateurish, relentlessly irresponsible, socially insensitive, patently false, and insulting to the average viewer.  It leaves us no room to breathe the truth. 

     It tries to jam reactionary opinions down our throats by preventing us from having the information we need, to be able to examine issues and events objectively.  It is replete with innuendo and thinly-veiled attempts to manipulate and control viewer thinking.   

     From what appears to be intentionally lop-sided reporting of America’s war on terrorism . . . to the tossing of ill-deserved green bouquets to Al Gore’s ludicrous global warming theories, supported by not one single body of credible scientists . . . to two words held on a CBS network TV screen yesterday morning during a grossly exaggerated news report of U.S. housing and gas price problems.  The two words:  “Economy Crumbling.” 

     Sorry, CBS, but it is YOU who are crumbling! 

     Everyone knows we’re in tight housing and oil/gas price situations right now.  Everyone also knows the leadership roles you played by adding fuel to these fires.  Only a fool would buy into your incredulous stretch to the next step, however — that the entire economy is now “crumbling.”!   Really!  

     Your ivory towers have blocked your views of reality.  Have you tried getting into a middle America restaurant during this period of “crumbling” economy . . . or noticed the lines at the pumps, even with $4+ per gallon pricetags?           halalpiar   

See 7/14 Post above for Part II of II

 Life is more like baseball

 than any other sport. 

     With every inning a decade long, where only a few of us actually get into extra innings, life is more like baseball than any other sport. 

     We walk, strike out, we get some foul tips, and sometimes manage to get big hits in the clutch.  We make errors.  We tag others whenever we can, and avoid those who come barreling home. 

     We get cheered when we perform.  We get booed when we don’t.  There are times when we need to get a glove and get in the game, and other times when we need to step up to the plate.  All of us have to sacrifice from time to time, and a few of us steal when no one is looking. 

     Those who are exceptional travel inside the park and make round-trippers.  And have you ever balked?  When did you last set the table, or be in a clean up position?  We relax on deck, and work when we’re in the hole, and we work even harder to stay away from arbitration, appeals, getting thrown out, and avoiding the bullpen or —heaven forbid— being shut out! 

     We go through different coaches, and we fire managers, but no matter how much money we make, we still always do what the owner and general manager order us to do. 

     Usually in our later decades, we bring in short and long relievers, and of course the eventual closer.  But reality is that we only live life in the National League . . . because we never get to have a designated hitter! 

     If Shakespeare was right that “All the world’s a stage . . .” he had to be talking about our love affair with the diamond.  Diamonds are, after all, forever! 

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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!

First, keep in mind that

all of the above choices

inflict pain! 

     It’s difficult to engage the services of a literary agent, doctor, dentist, lawyer, plumber, vet, auto mechanic, or computer geek without broadside exposure to physical and/or emotional and/or financial pain. 

     It is also often difficult to hire one of these vendors (or “professionals” as they like to call themselves) without running the risk of annihilation of your body, your feelings, and your wallet (and if those, then probably your brain as well). 

     Thus the Boy Scouts of America Motto: “Be Prepared” echoed by none other than Henry David Thoreau who proclaimed the need to “Be forever on the alert!”

     The point arrives in everyones’ lives where a “prepared” and “alert” choice must be made between perceived characteristics of services that are “older, more experienced, physically weaker, and more conservative” vs. “younger, less experienced, physically stronger, and more liberal.” 

     Do you go for the stronger, quicker, 20-something, messier, higher-priced plumber (or doctor or lawyer or literary agent) who shows up with an attitude, when he or she feels like it, with her or his backward baseball cap (to prevent neck sunburn?) and some form of stereotypical “crack” exposed . . . or the the weaker, slower, 50-something, neater, lower-priced plumber (or vet or auto mechanic or computer geek) who shows up humble and accommodating, exactly on time, with his bald head uncovered or her hair neatly out of her face and, oh yes, a longer shirttail?       

     So have you done your homework, or just thumbed through your phonebook yellow pages or newspaper classifieds?  Did you know it’s been proven that we spend more time and energy evaluating the purchase of a can of beans than we do choosing a doctor?  (That is weird!) 

     I always liked the old ad for a $200 motorcycle helmet that said something like,

If you think your head

is worth $24.95,

buy a $24.95 helmet!” 

     If you think your reputation, material possessions, your body, teeth, pipes, pet, car, or computer isn’t worth more than a can of beans, then go ahead and pick a doctor (lawyer, dentist, plumber, vet, mechanic, or computer guru) from advertising!  Then be “prepared” and “alert” for pain.  Your choice.  Enjoy!       halalpiar

Note:  Hal Alpiar is the author of DOCTOR SHOPPING . . . How To Choose The Right Doctor For You And Your Family, which won a national book award for consumer health information.  See www.TheWriterWorks.com for additional details on Hal’s professional practice consulting, training and marketing programs or call 302.933.0116