Aaron McHugh Work Life Play Archives - Page 13 of 14

Non-Essential Personnel

On snowy weather days here on the Front Range of Colorado, it is not uncommon for our schools and offices to have a two hour delay added to the normal morning start schedule. When you turn on the TV/Radio you will hear the announcer say “The following schools and businesses are closed or on a two-hour delay……”

My favorite part is when she says “All Non-Essential Military Personnel, need not report“.

What?

Does that mean all of the people that don’t really do anything all day, we can live without you today, so go ahead and stay home?

I have three questions for you.

What did you do today that is entirely replaceable, outsource-able, non-creative, unimportant, and non-essential?

What percentage of your day did that occupy?

Should you come back tomorrow or just stay home with the other non-essential personnel?

Dare to be essential.

The Lost Art of Being an Apprentice

There are a few remaining trades that still require a season of designated apprenticeship. When I think of those industries Electricians, Architects, and Engineers come to mind.

Side-by-side

There was a time in our history where it was expected that the Apprentice would work side-by-side the Craftsman.

Today, it seems that everyone knows everything there is to know about everything.

Or so they say. Really?

What happened to the humility required to accept the position of Apprentice?

I believe as the Industrial Age shifted away from craftsmanship to factory production, we lost the vital role of the apprenticeship.

Today, I rarely meet anyone, young or old, male or female that takes on the posture of an Apprentice. Although there may not be a formal program like those in the Trades it should not prohibit you from considering enrolling yourself in an apprenticeship role.

Humility is the first ingredient required.

Second is a watchful eye and desire to find a Craftsman to shadow. Have you encountered the saying “When the student is ready the teacher will appear“?

The lost art of being an Apprentice should be reclaimed. Not through our school systems, not by the Trade industries, but by you and I.

One of my favorite apprenticeships is under Vance Brown. Today, he is CEO of Cherwell Software. I had the privilege of formerly working under him for a few years in a software start-up. I took the job because he was the teacher, the Craftsman, the guy who had more miles on the odometer than me.

Takes the pressure off

As the Apprentice, it takes the pressure off from having to have the right answer all of the time. Your job shifts to being responsible for asking questions. Instead of mastery you learn and absorb what you will need for the future day when it is your responsibility to know the answer.

Start with a willingness and humility to become the Apprentice. Then open your eyes and watch the Craftsman appear.

Are We Any Good at What We do?

When I attended the Seth Godin Medicine Ball session last month, he asked a key question.

As part of a three part triangular diagram, the questions were:

Do you understand how things work? (Strategy)
Are you willing to invest Emotional Energy? Are you willing to fail?
Are you any good at it? (Skill Set)

This last one has recently been sparring with me like a boxer in a ring.

I love it.

I was recently asked some challenging and appropriate questions related to business.

What’s the future hold? Where are we headed? How are we going to get there?

And the question of “Am I any good at it?” keeps coming back to me.

Am I any good at:

-Seeing the future?
-Articulating the path we should take?
-Forecasting Sales & Revenue?
-Presenting the business review?
-Delivering under pressure and with the clock ticking?

I am applying those questions to the approach I will take in responding to the business questions above.

It’s one thing to talk about how good you are at X or Y or Z. It is another thing to actually pony up and do the work.

Wish me luck!

How to Dollar Cost Average for Life

Dollar Cost Averaging For Life — photo by itamar

I find that one of my greatest challenges to producing or yielding more in life is due to a lack of consistency.

Consistency is a challenge.

Pick any one of these: your diet, your marriage, your yard, your finances, your career, your hobby, your fitness, your relationships.

How challenging do you find it for each of these to be yielding the fruit you dream about?

Maybe we need a “You pick two” type approach like a Panera Bread meal deal?

Do you want a soup and a sandwich combo?

Today, I balanced the checkbook (finances), worked with a new hire (career) and squeezed in a 42 min lunch time run (fitness).

Diet, sleep and marriage are all out of balance today.

Dollar Cost Averaging

Maybe we need to approach Life like we do our financial portfolio, dollar cost averaging.

Over time, consistent, small deposits invested regularly will yield a better harvest than small sporadic investments.

But if you measure any one day by itself, or only make irregular occasional deposits, your overall return will be lower.

If this does not work, then I’m in trouble.

How about you?

What does your trend line look like?

Start Doing the Job You Wish You Had

There is only one you.

I spoke with a friend this week that was recently hired as an Estate Manager in Beverly Hills, CA.

He was responsible for hosting Hollywood’s upper echelon on Christmas Eve.

Four years ago he was driving golf carts.

Trust me he did not think he would be managing an executive’s estate when he was running at 5 am with the wife of Mr. Mergers and Acquisitions from one of the largest banks in the world.

He was simply being himself: honest, reliable, brilliant, and personable.

He always added that polish of perfection.

But guess what happen when she went home after the best run of her year.
“Honey you know how hard you say it is to find good people? Have you considered (insert your name)? He/She is so (insert your talent, skill, Art)”

It turns out if you do the (job/Art) long enough then people cannot help themselves from hiring/paying you.

Guess what?

There was no job posting, no interview process, “I am only offering this to you because no one else can do this like you”.

His dad told him “It’s funny the harder I work, the luckier I get“.

Great advice Dad.

Twenty seconds of insane courage

In the movie We bought a Zoo-Matt Damon, there is a great scene where Matt Damon’s character is coaching his son on being insanely brave for 20 seconds.

When considering doing something that you are fearful of, twenty seconds is a long time.

I tried it this week literally coaching myself through doing the thing I was afraid of.

It worked. Insane courage for twenty seconds.

I think I’ll try it again today.
youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmMFIganRQY

My boss does not inspire me

Here is what you tell yourself….

My boss does not inspire me.
(In your mind this is the root problem).

He/she does not motivate me or get me excited.
(In your mind you believe this is holding you back).

I would work harder, smarter, faster, with more passion if he or she did (fill in the blank).
(You believe you would do things differently if only your boss would…..)

I lived this way for a lot of years. And then one day, I fired my boss from the responsibility of motivating, inspiring or inviting me to do great things.

Stop waiting.

Quit hoping.

Hire yourself for the role of inspiration, vision, passion, creativity and gratitude.

Ten Thousand hours

Have you read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell?

Here is a quick rule that he talks about. In short, the key to success is to spend ten thousand hours in your craft, art, sport, profession, or skill.

Translated that is equivalent to five years of a full-time forty hour work week.

We tend to say an Athlete or Artist or professional person makes it look easy. Easy is very relative. Most people are never willing to invest the time it takes to arrive at that “it looks easy” point.

Showing up is not the same. Doing the hard work is where the differentiation exists.

Am I willing, are you willing to invest the hours and do the work to become the (fill in the blank)?

We tend to start with desires like “I want to be a writer,” or “I want to be wealthy,” or I want to be in a good shape.”

The desire of the dream is all too often far from the daily behavior.

Start today. Put in the ten thousand hours. Become your desires.

Straight lines and failed business plans

A+B=C… right?

The shortest distance from Point A to Point B is a straight line. In mathematics this is true, but is it true in life?

What if life doesn’t work this way?

Let me tell you a story.

A buddy and I had an idea for a company in 1999, cubicleplanet.com. It was going to be brilliant. Long before social media, before Facebook, Ning, Twitter, Flicker, LinkedIn, we had this idea that people in cubicles wanted to be socially connected. We envisioned each cubicleplanet member being united in the Global connection by plotting their cubicle with GPS coordinates on the Global CubiclePlanet map.

Every college kid in his dorm was getting $2.xM in funding, or so we thought. So, we entered contests, wrote a business plan (which was pathetic), printed t-shirts, cut a radio commercial, and waited for our millions to roll in.

Nothing happen.

We did not win any of the “Eat dinner with a VC” contests. No rich uncle stepped up to offer us seed money.

But…

I was doing some guiding in the mountains on the weekends. And one of my clients left his shovel in my car after our winter survival outing.

He was a CFO at a local software startup. I had to drop off his snow shovel on Monday. I asked, “Would you read my business plan?” He said “Great idea, but you’ll never get money for it. Come work for us instead.”

The straight line theory is idea>business plan>funding=millionaire.

Or, is there another theory? What about having the courage to dream the outlandish, ridiculous, bad idea (too early for the market) that leads the way for the next opportunity.

idea>business plan>forgotten shovel>want a job>launches a career in software sales=priceless

So, is it failure? Or, is it courage? Failure is a perspective.

Which will it be for you?

A Prize Fighter, a Scrapper, and a Sales Strategy

I heard a great Sales person depiction this week that seems worth sharing:

Picture two Sales people, like two boxers.

The lights go down. The announcer shouts with beat thumping music accompaniment, “Let’s get ready to RUMBLEEEEE…..”

The Prize Fighter

He shuffles down the aisle toward the ring. A gaggle of his support crew all wearing matching outfits follow in tow. Out in the parking lot, back at the gym, this guy leaves a wake of tired people. Always needing more, always wanting more, always requiring more from his ever-growing team.

He fights to get paid.

He wins big fights. He doesn’t even show up for the little ones. “Go Big or Go Home” is his mantra.

I’ve worked with guys like this. Always going for the proverbial sales “Whale”-size customer. Always requiring tons of internal resources, more marketing, more features from development, more (fill in the blank)…..

And, they close a big deal once a year or every two years, so they silence the naysayers.

The Scrapper

He has his trainer and brother-in-law. No entourage or girls in bikinis. (Sounds like the first Rocky movie, huh?)

Man, this guy can fight. He fights with heart and guts and gumption. He doesn’t turn down any fight.

He can jump in the ring with the Prize Fighter or he can trade blows down at the YMCA with the local neighborhood hero. And he wins. His team trusts him, and he trusts them. There is substance and meaning to his training.

I’ve worked with sales people like this. And I love their style. They wake up early, swallow their blended shake of raw eggs, and do the work. They make the calls, learn the product, and develop a conviction for their solution.

They require so much less energy on their surrounding team.

And they also win.

Everyone has a style of winning.

I’d rather carry the stool of a Scrapper than be on the payroll of the Prize Fighter.

Which are you? How do you fight?