But that’s good.

As Harold Wilson said, “He who rejects change is the architect of decay.  The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery.”

Edwards Deming said it more simply, “It is not necessary to change.  Survival is not mandatory.”

Well, I plan to survive and we sure aren’t dead, so change it is.

When change hits have you noticed how much energy people expend looking for reasons not to change? John Kenneth Galbraith said it best, “Faced with the choice between changing one’s mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof.”

I don’t mind big changes, such as moving from California to Washington, but I hate changing little stuff, especially personnel changes in the companies with which I frequently deal.

When that resistance kicks in I remind myself of something I read years ago—if nothing ever changed, there’d be no butterflies. Good thought—change as metamorphosis.

Pauline R. Kezer said, “Continuity gives us roots; change gives us branches, letting us stretch and grow and reach new heights.”

Kurt Lewin opines, “If you want to truly understand something, try to change it.” Boy, is that true.

But it is John Lilly who really understands what change means, “Our only security is our ability to change.”

Change should be embraced, even when you’re not sure what it will bring.

Since b5 notified me the Leadership Turn was ending I’ve wondered what the change would mean to me. Will you migrate to MAPping Company Success and continue inspiring me to explore articles I read and share my off-the-wall ideas? Will you read a blog that doesn’t have ‘leadership’ in the name?  What will I do with the extra time?

What kind of butterflies will this change bring?

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Post from: Leadership Turn

For decades they’ve been exploring a plethora of business books, articles, seminars, coaching, consulting, discussions, etc., on the subject—some good, some not so good—and are still searching for how to lead their workers out of that dreaded box.

I hear, “How do we get the team to think differently?” “What incentives work best?” “How do we engage our people?”

What I don’t hear is “What do I need to change in me [to make it happen]?”

What annoys is the assumption that the solutions all involve changing the staff, environment, compensation and any other external item that might plausibly make a difference—except self.

If you want your people to think/do/work outside-the-box then you need to lead/manage outside-the-box and that usually means changing your MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy™) before you can expect your people to change theirs.

This is rarely what leaders/managers want to hear.

I keep saying it, as do others, but many still don’t get it or just ignore it.

Today I’m saying it again loudly and very publicly:

You (there are no exceptions, none) manage/lead based on the way you think, what you think, how you think, and what you believe—in other words your MAP. No matter what you read, hear or talk, you will always walk your own MAP—that is your authenticity and you can never get away from it.

It’s not enough for you to know, you need to accept this as truth along with the knowledge that any changes are your choice and in your control.

That said, why not adopt RampUp Solutions taglines as your own.

To change what they do, change how you think.

Leadership: outside-the-box/inside your head.

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What would you write if you were allowed just 100 words to describe a future for our world knowing that your description would become reality?

I don’t mean sci-fi technology or sweeping physical changes, but changes to people’s MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy™), universal changes that would improve life in any country and overall globally.

Here is mine.

We need to stop putting ideology ahead of success; stop avoiding accountability by citing those whose lead we follow; excusing our own unethical behavior on the basis that others do the same thing; believing that [whatever] is OK because our religion forgives us. We must take initiative and stop waiting for someone else to show us how, tell us why or lead our actions. We need to cherish our planet, all its plants and animals, and accept that there is only one race, human; everyone needs to clean up their own back yard, then help others—together we can win.

Write your hundred words in comments and you’ll be entered to win a copy of High Altitude Leadership: What the World’s Most Forbidding Peaks Teach Us About Success.

The winner will be chosen by Random.org. You can enter as many times as you want, as long as the entries are different. The contest runs to the end of November, so enter early and often.

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Post from: Leadership Turn

It is the difference between spending large amounts of time and energy arranging your life so nothing can go wrong or trying to fix the people in your world so you won’t be hurt/upset/etc. when they doing whatever as opposed to recognizing that there is nothing you can do that will protect you and spending the same time and energy building your coping skills.

I figured this out on my own when I was five years old and my father was killed. Being the people they were my family and relatives each found their own way to deal with it and I needed to do the same.

And I did.

I knew I couldn’t change what happened, there was nothing I could do that would bring him back. I had to go to school and listen to everyone say how sorry they were without falling apart and making a fool of myself. In other words, I needed to cope with what had happened and because no one could do it for me I did.

As I grew and other things happened I stayed focused on coping with them; most were the small, everyday variety that happen to all of us, while others were large.

The common element was that they were all things that made me fall apart, so I focused my energies on how fast I could put myself back together, because I had come to believe that falling apart was normal.

By the time I was in my twenties I was so good at it that most people who knew me thought nothing could dent me.

Ha! Little did they know, but by then I could fall apart on the first beat and put myself back together by the second.

I wish there was some methodology I could share that would pass the coping skills I have on, but I have found over the years that each person has to develop their own; what works for them.

What I can guarantee is that no matter what you do, you will never constrain your world to run perfectly smoothly with nary a bump or an upset.

But you can build your ability to handle whatever happens; to cope, keep going and deal with everything that life throws at you.

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Post from: Leadership Turn

I recently ran across this quote; it’s been years since I read the play, but that poignant line, with its message that what has been is and irrevocably will be has always left me feeling depressed and angry.

Depressed because it revokes hope.

Angry because it’s the antithesis of everything I believe.

It proclaims that we, whether individuals, organizations or countries, can’t change; that we are locked on our trajectory with no rudder and an endless supply of fuel.

That thought represents a type of MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy™) I’ve constantly rejected, while embracing the belief that anyone can change if they choose to make the effort.

Not that it’s simple or that it’s easy, but that it can be done.

I’ve done it and am in the process of doing it again.

You’ve done it and can choose to do it again.

Whether you choose an opportunity or pass it by, each one changes the present and alters the future, because your MAP changes with each decision.

Not necessarily large changes, but changes none the less and those changes will impact your next decision and so on throughout life.

But you can avoid changes by embracing a rigid ideology that eliminates decisions by turning a blind eye of all divergent opportunities or by allowing someone else to decide for you in the name of followership.

What are you going to do?

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Post from: Leadership Turn

As with any large group, negative attitudes and actions often get more attention and press than positive ones and I’m no exception.

Leadership’s Future is often about Millennials—their sense of entitlement, expectations, impatience, and the parental intervention that fuels it.

My Millennial friends kid me that I’m ignoring a large number of their demographic, although even they don’t claim that it’s anywhere near a majority.

But they do have a point, so I’m offering up a new term to designate those who are chronologically, but not psychologically, Millennials.

aMillennial, because placing an ‘a’ in front of a word nullifies its meaning (see a-6).

I ran into a great example of the positive at AARP’s u@50 contest.

It wasn’t the first place winner that blew me away, but the second.

Her words are an inspiration for us all and a good lesson to remember that people change as life changes.

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Gen Y didn’t raise themselves to feel entitled, require constant praise or expect success for trying their hardest.

Jan left a comment a few weeks ago and I think she speaks for a large number of her generation, “There is a great amount of pressure to earn good grades and gain a GREAT career, as if somehow that is the only way to gain success in our lives. … The present often does not matter, including learning the subject. Students live under this constant pressure to make good grades, with that fear of failure programmed into the back of our minds.” (Please take a moment to read her entire comment.)

Decades ago after my sister had her first child she said, “I know that I’ll do things that mess up my kids, but they damn well won’t be the same things that messed us up,” and they weren’t.

This is normal life, with the previous generation screwing up their kids in some way and the kids eventually sorting it out—or not—and then moving on to the next generation, but it’s changed now.

Greg Jayne is the Sports Editor for my local paper and he summed it up nicely in a column about the people’s attitude towards performance enhancing drugs.

“Last year, Major League Baseball drew 78.6 million spectators to the ballpark… The sport generated about $6 billion in revenue, nearly twice what it generated in 2000 and roughly $20 for every man, woman and child in the United States. … The baseball-watching public simply doesn’t care that much about players who cheat the game. … We live in an era in which style trumps substance, and the superficial is held in such high regard that we all are diminished. Is there any reason to think that baseball should be different? Is there any reason to express moral outrage when somebody is trying to improve his performance and help his team win? That is, after all, the ethos of the time.”

Yet there are still supposed to be areas that are sacrosanct, people we assume will work for the good of our kids; people to whom we don’t give a second thought—until their actions blow up in our faces.

Priests/ministers/rabbis. Teachers. Family. Judges.

It’s terrible when people are driven by their own inner demons, but somehow it’s even worse when they ruin kids’ lives out of plain old fashioned greed.

“…two judges pleaded guilty to tax evasion and wire fraud in a scheme that involved sending thousands of juveniles to two private detention centers in exchange for $2.6 million in kickbacks. … Virtually all former colleagues and courthouse workers would not allow themselves to be identified because the federal investigation into the kickback scheme was continuing and they feared for their jobs if they alienated former allies of the judges.”

Obviously, it’s not just individuals, but the laissez faire attitude prevalent in a large percentage of all generations that’s driving the problems to levels not seen previously.

Enough is enough. We need change—but where to start?

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Post from: Leadership Turn

Short version. “Chris” is one of his top producing marketing people and extremely valuable to the team and the company. Recently, the team had a vehement disagreement on a marketing plan, but finally decided to go with an approach different from the one that Chris had championed.

Since then, Chris has made a number of comments and suggestions that undermine the current effort and has privately said that she hopes it fails because the other approach was better.

The team was starting to notice and some were losing confidence—a sure way to guarantee failure.

Rick said he had talked a bit with Chris; she denied that she was sabotaging the campaign and if it failed it would be because the wrong choice was made.

When I asked if Chris was always such an ideologue Rick was startled. He hadn’t thought of her actions in those terms, but after thinking it over he decided that she was a bit, although normally not to this extent.

Rick went on to say that it was ironic, because during the election Chris had been adamant that the “hide-bound ideology on both sides was creating problems for the country” and that she thought Obama was less locked into a specific, narrow ideology than most politicians.

More recently, she had been furious with Rush Limbaugh’s comment “I hope Obama fails,” seeing it as destructive and unpatriotic.

And therein, as I told Rick, lay his solution. Here is what I suggested.

• Arrange a conversation without interruptions, such as an off-site lunch.
• Make a production of turning off your cell phone (if Rick isn’t answering his, Chris is unlikely to interrupt to answer hers).
• Keep the tone conversational; avoid anything that sounds like an accusation or makes the lunch feel like a confrontation.
• Remind Chris’ about her previous thoughts regarding ideologues.
• Once she confirms her thoughts gently draw the parallel between her attitudes and an ideologue.
• Use her own words and feelings to refute whatever defense she raises (again, without attacking her).
• Keep it conversational and take your time leading her to the recognition that her actions are the same as those she dislikes, just in a different arena.

Rick called today to say they’d had lunch that day and the conversation went exactly as predicted. It wasn’t perfectly smooth and there were some dicey moments, but when that happened he backed away and tried another route. He said that it would have been impossible to do in the office with interruptions and turning off their cells created a whole different mood.

He said that when Chris realized that she was doing a highly watered down version of Limbaugh she was openly shocked and very apologetic.

Instead of leaving it there, Rick took extra time to walk through the competing plans and why the team had chosen the one and not the other. He explained that it wasn’t that Chris was wrong, she just held a different opinion and that was OK, but it wasn’t OK do anything to undermine the program—even unconsciously.

With a more open mind Chris grudgingly agreed to the reasoning. She said that in spite of still feeling the other plan was better she would do everything in her power to make the project work. She said that the success of the project was more important than being “right.”

Rick was lucky because a critical member of his team was also a rational thinking person who could see a parallel when it was pointed out and not enough of a hypocrite to claim “that’s different…”

Chris was lucky because she worked for a manager who valued her and was willing to take the time to help her change and grow.

How do you control your inner ideologue?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Last week I wrote Time To Get Off Your Ass And Lead (Yourself) and Ravi Tangri added some very intelligent thoughts in his comment. I hope you’ll take a moment to click over, read it and add your own thoughts to the conversation. It’s an important one for all of us.

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First up is Anne Mulcahy, chairwoman and chief executive of Xerox Corporation, a company that she took over on the brink of extinction and turned around. “In 2002 this company lost almost $300 million, and by 2006 we were making over $1 billion.” Now that’s a turn around!

When asked what the secret was, Mulcahy said, “It isn’t a secret sauce. It’s actually fundamental communications, in terms of your ability to really get out there and be with your people, tell a story. People really have to begin to believe in a story to get passionate about the direction the company is going in, which hopefully you’ve been able to do through the way you articulate it, simplifying the complex so that people can get their arms around it and see how they can make a difference. There’s nothing quite as powerful as people feeling they can have impact and make a difference. When you’ve got that going for you, I think it’s a very powerful way to implement change.”

Next is a video interview with John Chambers of Cisco Systems. The dot com bomb blasted Cisco and Chambers brought it back. In the interview Chambers talks about managing in this downturn, how collaboration is the next phase of management style, change, and identifying market transitions. He also discusses how business leaders need to “earn back” public trust, how he is adapting the company and why he’s “far from a perfect leader.”

Finally is a great McKinsey print and video interview with venture philanthropist Jacqueline Novogratz.

“As a venture philanthropist, Acumen Fund’s Jacqueline Novogratz leads entrepreneurial projects across the globe—many of which put women at the helm of emerging local businesses. In this video interview, she discusses her experience developing other women leaders, the way they have shaped her own approach to leadership, and the different leadership cultures she sees at play in the public and private sectors.”

Fabulous. Do click over to see the video and read the print part, also.

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Post from: Leadership Turn

That’s what Apple did with the iPod and that’s what every CEO recognizes as being of paramount importance.

In a post last summer I said, “You must constantly change MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy™)—your own, your people’s and your culture’s.

But it’s not just about managing change; it’s about creating a desire for it. It’s about creating an environment where changes are being driven by your workers, not just by you and your execs.”

That’s what Obama and his team did brilliantly and that’s why you should read the book.

Forget politics, think about the challenges your company faces. Survival isn’t enough.

The business world and consumer landscapes are changing—industries that downplay or ignore innovation to focus on survival and the status quo out of fear of upsetting their current business model are likely to be swept away by the transformation rocking the global economy.

To thrive, you need to engage your current stakeholders (investors, employees, vendors, current customers)—just as Obama did.

His success turned on three main points, he

1. kept his cool under all provocations,
2. applied social technologies, including blogs, texting, and viral videos, and
3. made himself synonymous with what he was selling—change.

Obama allowed nothing to be set in stone and moved swiftly when the landscape changed.

One of my favorite examples was his choice to reject funding limitations, although he had previously said he would accept them. Why?

Because he realized that the amount of money he would raise via the Net more than compensated for McCain’s bashing him for the switch.

Now substitute ‘innovation’ for money and ‘quarterly results’ for bashing and give it some hard thought.

Read the book; adopt/tweak/adjust its lessons and tools for your company’s situation and then execute, because all the theory and examples won’t help unless you have the courage to use them.

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Post from: Leadership Turn