98 Bloggers In Gear On The Ball

98 bloggers in gear

Take one down, pass him around...

Oops sorry... I got a little carried away... catchy tune, isn't it?

Well, there are 98 bloggers who are "in gear" and "on the ball" and they'll be at SOBCon this weekend.  I can't wait to see them in person!

• Cliff Atkinson
• Shashi Bellamkonda
• Chris Brogan
• Harry Brooks
• Anita Bruzzese
• Dave Bullock
• Mark Carter
• Brian Clark
• Tom Clifford
• Valerie Combs
• Chris Cree
• Lisa Cree
• Thomas Croghan
• Donna Cutting
• David Dalka
• Kevin Dixie
• Tim Draayer
• Andrew Dubber
• Monica Duncan
• Easton Ellsworth
• Kevin Ferrasci O'Malley
• Jonathan Fields
• Sarah Filipiak
• Mary-Lynn Foster
• Annie Galvin Teich
• Brian Gardner
• Chris Garrett
• Jon Gatrell
• Phil Gerbyshak
• Jared Goralnick
• Karen Hanrahan
• Joseph Hauckes
• Vicky Hennegan
• Scot Herrick
• John Hong
• Stephen Hopson
• Robert Hruzek
• Timothy Johnson
• Sara
• Pete Jones
• Todd Jordan
• Bob Kakoliris Christine Kane
• Adam Kayce
• Kristen King
• Jen Knoedl
• Stephen Koernig
• Bryan Kress
• George Krueger
• Amy L
• Tammy Lenski
• James G. Lindberg
• Eli Litscher
• Rick Mahn
• Sim Margolis
• Michael Martine
• Becky McCray
• Maria Meadows
• Cory Miller
• Ann Michael
• Dawud Miracle
• Debra Moorhead
• Matthew Murphy
• Paul O'Flaherty
• Tim Padar
• Jesse Petersen
• Melissa Pierce
• Wendy Piersall
• Sandra Ponce de Leon
• J. Erik Potter
• Karen Putz
• Susan R Quandt
• Levy Rivers
• Barbara Rozgonyi
• Jeff Sable
• Sheila Scarborough
• Mary Schmidt
• Derek Semmler
• Maria Sharon
• David Sherbow
• Steve Sherlock
• Brad Shorr
• Louise Silberman
• Sonia Simone-Rossney
• Julien Smith
• Stephen Smith
• Michael Snell
• Derrick Sorles
• Terry Starbucker
• Liz Strauss
• Jon Swanson
• Ruth M Sylte
• Windsor Tanner
• Michelle Vandepas
• Lorelle VanFossen
• Colleen Wainwright
• Denise Wakeman
• James D. Walton
• Randy Windsor
• Joanna Young

See you in Chicago

Carpe Factum Can Dig It

I just received a very welcomed and wonderful email from GL Hoffman.  He has awarded Carpe Factum with the Dig Your Job award, for writing about positive issues that help other people dig their jobs.  This is a guy who understands workplace issues very well, since he deals with them on a regular basis.  And he's seen his share of negative issues, which is why he is spending his time rewarding the positive.

So thanks for the award and the badge, GL.  I promise to continue to help people seize the accomplishment!

What's With Reverend Jerry?

The Republicans had Falwell.  Now the Democrats have Wright.

Both are a Don Quixote of sorts.  Falwell attacked homosexual windmills.  Wright attacks racial ones.  Many Republicans wished Falwell would just shut up, when he was still alive.  Now many Democrats wish Wright would do the same.  Each Reverend Jerry perceived himself to be on a mission from God.

Who is the "Reverend Jerry" in your office?  Who is that one person who is both passionate and dogmatic?  Who is both outspoken and myopic?  What do you do with him (or her)?  Do you do what the Republicans did and just sort of roll your eyes and ignore him?  Do you do like Obama and "distance" yourself from him?  Telling him to just shut up just adds fuel to the fire.  I mean, who really has time to have the wrath of God called down upon him from Heaven these days?

But then there's the question:  are they really doing all that much damage?  It's a question the Republicans had to answer during the 90's, and it's a question the Democrats are trying to answer now.  And it's a question you'll have to answer in your office with your own "Reverend Jerry."  Are they causing poor morale?  Lost productivity?  Missed business opportunities?  Are they accountable for their own actions, or are they blaming everybody else?  Can you fire them?  Reassign them?  Isolate them?  Demote them?  Censor them?

The bottom line is this:  if Reverend Jerry is preventing you from seizing your accomplishment, you can't ignore him in an office setting.  At least in the office, you don't have CNN and Fox News reporters salivating over the next sound byte.

Your thoughts?

A Friendly Chat In Pamplona

I'm just coming out of an 8-month-long coma known as teaching-full-time-while-maintaining-a-consulting-practice-and-writing-a-third-book-while-maintaining-a-relationship-with-my-family-and-friends-and-attempting-to-keep-up-my-personal-health.  Nothing serious, but now that equilibrium is being restored to the universe, I rewarded myself by reading a book.

Not just any book, but a book that has been sitting on my desk for about a year, taunting me, teasing me, just DARING me to read it.  "I don't have time" was my excuse.  Well, I owe Tim Irwin an apology.  His book, Run With The Bulls Without Getting Trampled, should have reached the top of my list sooner.  It was a refreshingly frank read with common sense values presented in a new light.  As a matter of fact, it didn't even feel like I was reading a book as much as it felt like I was chatting with a colleague at a sidewalk cafe.  Dr. Irwin is just that conversational with his approach

Dr. Irwin takes his lessons learned from running with the bulls in Pamplona to basic life events.  With great anecdotal synthesis, he weaves together some very proactive thoughts that should get any professional examining what makes him or her tick.  What struck me with this book is that he ties everything back to core values, something I wish more people would address.  Dr. Irwin doesn't preach; he challenges.  I've had many of these same discussions with my friends and clients, so reading his book was more affirming for me.  Even in the midst of my previously mentioned insanity, I recognized the lack of equilibrium in my life and knew that there was an end in sight.  Unfortunately, I know too many professionals who don't allow an end in sight.  They chase after the wrong things and don't do a course correction.

So... are you one of these people who is perpetually too busy to read "that values stuff"?  Make a date with yourself, carve out 2-3 hours at a coffee shop, and run with the bulls and with Dr. Irwin.  He'll give you a thing or two to think about (and many practical tools to help you take action on those thoughts) as you avoid being gored by the stampede of life events that can trample you the second you re-engage with the rest of the world.

The Birth Order of Territoriality

The other night, during a family outing to the mall, my wife took my older daughter to look for some clothes, leaving my younger daughter and me to fend for ourselves at the mall playground.  Always the people-watcher, I observed the other dads who had been banished to play-land and started noticing a really interesting trend.  It started with one other dad who was obviously a first time father.  I say this for two reasons:  1) he still was wearing designer clothes, and 2) he was hovering over his little girl, never letting his hand more than two inches away from her at any point.  On the other end of the spectrum were the dads who obviously had more than one child there; they were vaguely aware that they had offspring in the area.  As long as there was no bloodshed or loss of consciousness, they were content to sit on the sidelines.  Me?  I like playing with Abby, but I'm cool with giving her space to explore on her own a little bit, so I guess I fit somewhere in the middle.

In office politics, there seems to be the most trouble at the same two extremes as parenting.  You either deal with the overprotective professional, who is territorial about everything under his or her realm.  If you dare to give the slightest hint of invasion, it's as good as a declaration of war.  When "overprotective dad" made eye contact with me at one point, he actually scowled at me as if to say "Back off, bub."  I can't blame him; with my firstborn, I could have earned a spot as a Presidential bodyguard.  Territorial people are difficult to handle because they're doing the right things... just to an uncomfortable extreme.  In business, we want people to care, to take ownership, to seize the accomplishment.  However, when that psychological ownership comes at the expense of others, it's time to intervene.

Dealing with the overprotective and territorial professional is even more challenging because of the emotion involved.  Too often, management ignores the problem because the territorial person is getting stuff done and bringing in the results.  Or they "fix" the problem by reassigning the person to a new territory/department/division without ever explaining why this is occurring.  Then over time, the person becomes territorial again.  Fixing the problem may require having a difficult discussion with the professional, or it may require adding on more responsibilities to dillute their focus (like adding more children cures first-time fathers of overprotectiveness).  Whatever the reason, it does require some event to fix it.

How have you dealt with these kinds of people in the past?

What about the "under-protective" laissez-faire managers who don't do enough?

Saving the Environment

It's Earth Day!

With the emphasis on the environment, I thought it would be a good time to revisit the systems model.  We all know the components:  inputs are transformed into outputs, feedback tells us how good the outputs are, yada, yada, yada.  But what about the environment in which the system operates?

Recently, I was talking to a Six Sigma convert, passionately rabid about his craft.  He was, however, discouraged that he could not gain traction within his organization.  All of the Six Sigma projects seemed insignificant in the grander scheme of things going on.  Then I asked him the $64,000 question:  What are the executives doing?  His response included a lot of feet-shuffling, hemming, and hawing.  Then, I asked him about the culture of the organization, how receptive it was to a major shift in approach.  Again, more waffling.  His problem wasn't one of process; it was a problem of environment.

Many years ago, I did a project (wrote about it several months ago).  One of the large "big box" employers in town was considering putting everybody underneath VP in the same size and style of work station.  From a dollars and cents perspective, this project was a winner!  The company, who shuffled departments and individuals frequently, would have saved millions.  But they did not consider the environment.  From a company culture view, level and position (and the furniture which came with it) were similar to the caste system of eastern countries.  There was such environmental outcry because the people - the stakeholders - were so deadset against it; their identity was tied to their furniture.

So before you jump up and start to tackle the world, you might want to consider whether the world can tackle you first.  Think about the people involved, the corporate culture, your suppliers and customers, the technology available, the economy, and all of the other elements out in the environment.  You may know your inputs and outputs, but your environment can change everything on a dime.

Happy Earth Day!

Cause and Defect

Being the parent of younger children means that I am exposed to the best of children's literature at all of my kids' different stages and reading levels.  Both of my daughters have enjoyed the "If you give" books by Laura Joffe Numeroff and illustrated by Felicia Bond.  With titles like "If you give a moose a muffin" or "If you give a pig a pancake" as well as one of my favorites, "If you give a mouse a cookie," each book follows a series of events that take the reader all the way back to the beginning events of the book.  For example, if you give a moose a muffin, he'll want some jam to go with it.  The jam reminds the moose of something, which leads to another activity, directing the moose elsewhere.  Finally, the logic ends up that if you give the moose some jam, he'll want a muffin to go with it.  It's a fun reading romp which demonstrates cause-and-effect to young minds... provided those young minds don't mind going in a complete circle.

But is it really only young minds that can benefit from this?  I started thinking about what would happen if Laura Joffe Numeroff and Felicia Bond worked in the corporate world.  Perhaps the book, "If you give an executive a status report" would result:

If you give an executive a status report, he'll want some supporting data to go with it.

When you give him the supporting data, he'll probably doubt your credibility.  He'll hire a team of high-priced consultants to conduct their own study.

The consultants will spend months (and hundreds of thousands of dollars) interviewing staff and second guessing the value of your work.

They will ask you to document their findings for them and run other menial errands.

Even though it's not necessary, they will attempt to validate their value by recommending a major reorganization to the executive.

This will remind him that he needs to play golf with the other executives on his floor to sell the idea of the reorganization.

He may invite you to go along and caddy for him.

He will ask you to fish his balls out of the water and get drinks and cigars for all of his fellow-executives.

As a reward for your faithful service, the executive will put you in charge of the reorganization.  He will want to see timelines and estimates.

Seeing the timelines and estimates will prompt him to ask you for some supporting data.

And chances are, when he sees the supporting data, he'll want you to give him a status report.

Nah, I doubt they'd ever write a children's book for us big people.  It just wouldn't be believable enough.

Deflection Reflection

Oops.

Barack Obama made a bad comment, and now it's coming back to haunt him right before a couple of critical state decisions in his close race against Hillary.

After stating that the "bitter" little uninformed masses "cling to guns and religion" he's been facing the accusation that he's elitist.  I've been saying that he's elitist since the New Hampshire debate.  His "you're likeable enough" comment to Hillary as well as the number of pictures showing him looking down his nose at somebody have made me really uncomfortable with this man's core values.  The President of the United States is not a job where we put somebody in who has a volatile vocabulary.  But that's not really the point of this post.

Barack's bevy of advisors have told him he needs to back-pedal now.  People can't perceive him as elitist, they're telling him.  But rather than addressing the issue head-on and taking accountability for his words, Barack started by pulling a "shame, shame, shame" against Hillary.  Now he's doing the broken home/food stamps appeal.  I'm sorry, Barack, but the corporate suits can go toe-to-toe with you on these ploys.  In office politics, people who "get caught" try to deflect attention to somebody else's faults and/or try to change the issue to spin perceptions their own way (by the way, some of the most "elitist" people I know had very humble beginnings, which actually triggered their adult sense of entitlement and elitism).

It's important to recognize these behaviors in office politicians, too.  Deflection (as opposed to accountability) is actually pretty common in corporate America, and thanks to Mr. Obama, we have a couple more good working examples.  Rather than attempting to shame Hillary or talk about his mother's food stamps, Barack needs to shift his attention to how he words things... including his apologies (i.e., "IF I said something...").  But I suppose that's why it's called office politics.  We have the "real thing" to set such dubious examples for the cubicle dwellers.  It's also important to note that there is a difference between defending yourself and deflecting.  Defending yourself keeps the attention on the statements or issues in question rather than introducing new issues into the mix.

What do you think?

Buck Naked and Wet

The attached is one of my favorite short films from Pixar.  After you watch it, tell me this:

1. What do you generally do when you fall flat on your face in failure?
2. What lessons have you learned from your greatest failures?
3. Who's your "jackalope" to provide you with advice and encouragement during these times?

The Good, The Bad, The Creative

Some of you remember the pink bunny post of last year about this time (others of you, it seems, won't let me forget it).  Well, it's time again for my Drake creativity class to express themselves through costume.  Following Roger von Oech's framework, my students had to dress up and tell how their costume related to the creative roles of the explorer, artist, judge, or warrior (or any combination thereof).

It's always a fun social experiment.  After all, how many graduate profs could get their students to subject themselves willingly to such abject humilitation?  How many people do you know that could get the Pope to hug Satan?  (Funny story about the guy who wore the Pope costume.  It had been raining cats and dogs, coming down in torrents.  The moment he walked in the room in that costume, the sun broke through the clouds.  Whoa.  Spooky.  Also, the papal imposter promised a trip to confession this week.)

All in all, my students enjoy the experience.  It really allows them to let their hair down (with the exception of the one student who cut his hair off in order to impersonate yours truly).  For many of them, it makes creativity real.  And me?  Well, the bunny costume got a rest this year.  While you can't tell it from the picture, I'm in full SWAT gear in honor of my upcoming book.

So what about you?  If you could dress in any costume that would be express your creative spirit, what would it be?

Who's In Your Corner?

It was a bit of a pickle for this professor to handle.  I once had a student who thought her roommate was following up with me to request the exam guide for an upcoming test.  Well, the roommate didn't follow through, and the student ended up doing poorly on the test.  The question was whether it was the roommate's fault for not keeping the student abreast of the progress, or the student's fault for not taking ownership of her own communication with me.

I bet I can guess your answer.

It was equally intriguing last year when Penelope Trunk of the Brazen Careerist let Gen-Y-er Ryan Healy take the steering wheel of her blog to defend why helicopter parents should be allowed to negotiate their children's salaries.  After you read the post, make sure you scroll down and read the comments as well.  The bottom line was that poor Ryan got steamrolled by many commenters.

Lesson Learned?  Helicopter Parent and Human Resources don't mix.

So, who is in your corner?  Who is your "go to" person to stick up for you when you need assistance?  Who is your defender?  Your champion?  Your "fall back" position?

The answer is:  whomever you feel comfortable selecting for that role.

BUT

Accountability for results still resides with you.  So choose wisely or don't rely on others too heavily.  (And, by the way, outsourcing and subcontracting don't always save you in this decision either.)  My friend, Bob Prosen, always admonishes the number one rule of delegation:  "Never delegate to a moron."  At the end of the day, people ultimately will look to you as the leader.  Are you ready to face them?

A Map For Every Person

This weekend marked the end of the leadership course at Drake (grading notwithstanding, of course).  One of my students used this clip in his presentation (funny enough to share with you).  I'm just thankful that I know there are 38 graduate students who have maps... not of the US, but for their lives.  It was a powerful weekend, and all I can say is "Watch out world - these folks are going to make a difference!"