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by Rick Baker
On Dec 25, 2014
[No text]
by Rick Baker
On Dec 24, 2014
Entrepreneurs have deal-doing insight.
Good salespeople have deal-doing Insight, which can be defined as:
- a natural, deep capacity to understand people and situations,
- a tuned intuition that identifies patterns & trends, and
- an ability to see gaps and know ways to fill them.
True entrepreneurs and top-notch salespeople possess a set of natural talents that work together to create insight strength.
As one example:
Consider Ideation and Intellection...the ability to imagine ideas and the ability to think about and understand ideas. These are two distinct aspects of Talent: that is, to a degree they can be viewed as distinct. Ideation and Intellection are 'intertwined'. Many people tend to be 'set' in one mode or the other. As a result - few people possess the ability to shut off Intellection in order to free up Ideation. Few people possess the ability to set aside judgment and replace it with open-mindedness or free-flowing creativity. Indeed, very few people can switch back and forth between Ideation and Intellection. Most people get stuck in thought ruts...thought habits.
Q: Can a person develop Insight Strength?
A: Absolutely - Yes!
Here's a great way to start - read some of Edward de Bono's work.
Applaud curiosity.
Spend more time with inwords.
Remember - deal-doing insight can be converted into fortunes.
New Things are the key to interesting and positive work experiences.
by Rick Baker
On Dec 23, 2014
Do you intentionally try new things, explore new group, embrace your natural curiosity and creativity?
***
"Of all the things you seek to control in life, it turns out that one of the most important ones is the introduction of new."
"Bottom line: setting your sights on enjoying new experiences regularly is one of the greatest ways to remain fully engaged, energized, and enthusiastic throughout your lifetime."
Brendon Burchard, 'The Charge', (2012)
When you really stop to think about it, people only do 3 things. People do good habits, bad habits, and new things. Everything we do can be placed into one of those 3 categories. I we use these simple categories and think about the things we do then we can quickly identify ways to improve our actions…and do a better job of aiming our actions toward success. And, as Brendon Burchard says, “new things” are the route to positive energy and positive feelings.
How do new things help you remain fully engaged, energized, and enthusiastic?
You can do New Things to displace Bad Habits. Bad Habits, by definition, feel bad. They feel bad because they are not aligned with your goals. They distract you from your goals and that reduces the likelihood of you achieving your goals. New Things provide information. You can test New Things to determine if they are taking you closer to your goals. Some New Things will take you closer to your goals. If you repeat them then they become Good Habits, which by definition feel good.
When you feel good you are engaged in thoughts and action...you are energized. When you feel really good you are enthusiastic.
New Things provide the bridges and paths from Bad Habits to Good Habits.
New Things provide the way to make adjustments so you achieve your goals.
by Rick Baker
On Dec 22, 2014
Our CFFB roundtable group has a habit of doing self-discovery exercises at our monthly meetings. Recently, we discussed “6 THINGS HAPPY PEOPLE NEVER DO”.
We found the exercise through an internet search, which we summarized as:
“Happy people do a lot of things. They spend time expressing gratitude, cultivating optimism, practicing kindness, nurturing loving relationships, committing to meaningful goals, savoring life’s little pleasures, and so on and so forth.
But they NEVER…
1: Mind other people’s business
2: Seek validation of Self-Worth from others
3: Rely on other people and external events for happiness
4: Hold onto resentment
5: Spend prolonged periods of time in negative environments
6: Resist the truth”
With that internet-inspired background, we asked ourselves:
What would you add to the list?
What’s something you should NOT do if you want to be happy?
Then, when we met as a group, we shared and discussed our self-discovery answers.
Here are some of the things we think happy people never do:
- Rely on indulgences to feel better
- Try to change other people
- Blame others
- Show up to prove, instead they show up to improve
- Consume negative media
- Watch their partners billable hours at work
- Spend too much time worrying about the future
- Allow tragedy to become part of their identity
- Live in the past
- Base self-identity on their financial status
- Try to do it all themselves
- Say "Yes" when they want to say "No"
- Stop learning
- Relax when their talents and strengths are lying dormant
- Fail to feel uncomfortable when they err and violate their personal values
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It seems to me the people in our CFFB roundtable group are life-long learners. And, we recognize self-knowledge is the starting point…
by Rick Baker
On Dec 16, 2014
Of course, good leaders want to:
- Do a good job at delegating authority for decision making
- Empower people so they are motivated to expand their decision making
Here are a couple of important considerations:
- Delegation must be consistent…people need to be told the rules and the extent of their authorities
- Delegation must be communicated…it is not enough to say “Our people are empowered to make decisions”. It is important to ensure people understand how and when their authorities should be exercised. It is important to ensure people understand your decisions can be questioned…’within bounds’.
How should we go about setting up Decision-Making authorities so people are empowered? Leaders - here is simple way to approach this: consider the people who directly report to you then have those people perform the same exercise for the people reporting to them.
According to Brian Tracy there are 3 types of decisions:
- Command Decisions: decisions made by the Leader alone
- Consultative Decisions: decisions made by the Leader after the Leader has consulted with his/her direct reports [and other folks, as required]
- Consensus Decisions: decisions where the Leader delegates the decision-making authority to his/her Leadership team…i.e., like the others, the Leader gets a single vote
As mentioned above, communication is important. The first step is informing everyone you think it makes sense to follow Brian Tracy’s advice and use 3 types of decisions. After that, start by saying, “This is a consultative decision” or “This is a consensus decision” or “This is a command decision”. This probably will not be required because people will understand the decision type by the way you introduce the decision. On the other hand, there is no harm in making sure by saying things like “I would like to consult you about this” or “Can we come to group consensus about this” or “I have made the following decision’. When in doubt – over-communicate.
About Command Decisions…
I tell people I have a 10-3-1 Rule:
- For every 10 command decisions I make I expect about 3 will be questioned
- For every 10 command decisions I make I expect about 1 to be strongly resisted, questioned, and argued against
Why? It seems to me 10-3-1 is about the right ratio. When I make command decisions I will make mistakes…hopefully, I do not err more than 3 times out of 10 decisions. If I do then I should not be the boss. Occasionally I will make a glaring mistake…hopefully; I do not do that more than 1 time out of 10 decisions.
My communication of my 10-3-1 Rule is an effort to ensure everyone is comfortable questioning my decisions…’within bounds’. It is an effort to establish boundaries for command decisions:
- command decisions should not be taken as absolute, unquestionable commands…I don’t want to be surrounded by automatons or sycophants…I do want to be surrounded by quality-thinking, curious people
- command decisions should not be subject to excessive questions or objections…a level of questioning and objection is healthy…excessive questioning and objection is a signal of a problem
- people on leadership teams do better when they know the rules
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According to Dale Carnegie...
"When Theodore Roosevelt was in the White House, he confessed that if he could be right 75 percent of the time, he would reach the highest measure of his expectation."
About Roosevelt's 75%... that supports the selection of 3 in 10-3-1...or, at least, it suggests having 3 of 10 decisions questioned is in the right ballpark.
by Rick Baker
On Dec 15, 2014
While this probably has never been the subject of a scientific study, I believe the most-successful people of all time form the same crowd as the most-successful question askers of all time.
In some disciplines, this is self-evident: teachers, trial lawyers, philosophers, scientists, inventors, sales people, and market researchers come immediately to mind.
In those disciplines, the master-players all excel at The Art of Good Questions.
How about your discipline...your chosen field of business?
Could you and your people learn the Art of Good Questions?
The answer is - Yes.
Consider buying & selling as one example and think about it this way…
- You are a sales person. You are on one side of a chasm…a wide, deep, dark, bottomless crevice…it looks like a mini-Grand Canyon, except it is pitch black and you can see nothing when you stand on the edge and look down
- Your probable client is on the other side…too far to jump to be with you
- You and probable clients have been here and there before…lots of your probable clients are in that wide, deep, dark, bottomless crevice…somewhere
- You can do one of two things:
- You can do and say the same old things you have always done and said
- You can ask a terrific question that magically launches your probable client over the wide, deep, dark, bottomless crevice…over to your side
If you picked #2, well done, you know the The Art of Good Questions.
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"You gotta ask 'why' questions. 'Why did you do this?' A 'why' question you can't answer with one word." Larry King
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