Archive for the 'Observations' Category

Dec 23 2010

CHRISTMAS IN KILLARNEY

A toy truck, a stroller, 

                                         

and pub coasters

                                        

strung with dental floss…

__________

                                             

A Christmas-in-Ireland Memory

(Featured Christmas Post for December 23- December 26, with no commercial interruptions. Fresh new daily blog posts on business and personal development will begin again on Monday, December 27th. Please return then, and please enjoy the archive insights anytime.)

Thank you for your visit!

___________

  A few years ago, Kathy and I made a return trip to the West Coast of Ireland.  This particular visit was  inspired and romanticized by the classic Bing Crosby Christmas song, “Christmas In Killarney.”  We spent our first Christmas away from home in the Southwest (County Kerry) corner of Ireland, at Killarney Country Club. 

___________

     Up a rocky, grass-between-the-tires dirt road from downtown Killarney, jockeying “the wrong side” car controls to bounce cheerfully along between the seemingly endless stone walls that separated cows from sheep, we drove under an archway and pulled into the courtyard of a two-story brick complex that reminded me of “Gone With The Wind.” 

     There was one other car at the far end.  We parked, followed the sign to the office, and at front desk found a smiling, green-eyed, freckled face young lady with what else but a bubbling thick Irish accent . 

     We registered and unpacked into a spacious two-bedroom upstairs arrangement, with living room and kitchen downstairs.  Our windows overlooked the courtyard and pathway to the Country Club Pub.  Farmland hills peppered the distant views.

     It seems when I think back –after the first day of being sneered at by a non-English speaking tourist family of six who seemed to resent us poking our heads in to take the front desk clerk’s invitation to check out the odd, three-foot-deep, indoor pool they had commandeered– that we were actually the only guests there for the rest of the (Christmas) week. 

___________

     We made the bumpy drive into town every day, a beautiful, historic, bustling hub filled with happy holiday shopping locals who appeared to be warming up for the coming Saint Steven’s Day celebration that started the day after Christmas, and pretty much shut down the country for twelve days.

     Most of the shoppers we observed seemed to visit a shop or two, then stop in a pub, then visit a shop or two, then stop in a pub . . . you get the idea. So, “When in Rome…” or Killarney, as the case may be, we simply followed the crowd.

     I’ll always remember clusters of rowdy-looking teenagers huddled together on sidewalks, laughing and smoking and being teenagers, suddenly backing up out of the way as we approached (smiling, gesturing us past, saying “Good Marnin’ ta’ya!” and the boys actually tipping their caps) to let us walk through. Who knew?

     Of course we didn’t spend all of our time in town. We drove hundreds of miles of picturesque unspoiled (and un-littered) countryside during the week, meeting only pleasant, accommodating-to-a-fault natives all along the way. 

     Night driving seemed a bit perilous, so we opted for evening visits to the Country Club Pub.  The alternative was staying in our unit with three tv stations (two of which were broadcast in German from Germany! Go figure). 

___________

     The only Christmas tree we could find to buy (for $45 American) made Charlie Brown’s famously forlorn little scrub pine look like Rockefeller Plaza.  I think the one we got was about thirty (“turtee”) inches tall and had about 16 (or maybe it was 14?) scrawny branches. 

     Back with the tree, but (Oh, yikes!) no ornaments!  We had managed to confiscate a wide range of cardboard pub coasters in our travels, and strung them up with pieces of dental floss. 

     We fashioned a homemade treetop star from a piece of aluminum foil the bartender scrounged up, and stuffed two ”Season’s Greetings”scrawl-imprinted plastic shopping bags with small sofa pillows, and hung them in our windows. 

     We grocery-shopped for the all-time elaborate Christmas morning brunch of Irish rasher (bacon), eggs, cheese, jam, butter, toast, fruit, crackers, caviar (no, I was not leaving caviar for Santa; this was, after all, vacation!), coffee, tea . . . and –being deeply entrenched in beer and ale country– a bottle of asti that at the price of about 67 trillion dollars American, tasted a lot better than it was. 

___________

     We ended up exchanging gifts that we bought “secretly” as we walked down opposite sides of the downtown, waving across the road at one another between store visits while hiding shopping bags behind our backs — a book for me, a piece of Irish crystal and a little stuffed Irish Christmas Bear for her, plus some other goodies.  It was great! 

     Every minute there was great, even when fifteen native Killarney guys –the town butcher, a gooseneck twister (yucht!), dairy farmer, mailman, horseshoe maker, “tyre” changer, carpenter, and on and on– had us singing with them until 3am at the Country Club Pub (where most had hiked by flashlight from their nearby stone and clapboard farmhouses).  

     With the rows of “y’got tafinish ’em” topped-off pints of beer and ale lined up from one end of the bar to the other (planted there when 11:15pm closing time came and the lights were flickered, the doors locked, the lights turned back on and the singing began), we joined in the raising of glasses and voices. 

___________

     It was this experience –as we worked our way through “I’ll take you home again, Kathleen” and “Danny Boy” to an endless string of Christmas songs– that led us to the astonishing discovery that no one in Killarney had ever even heard of the traditional classic Crosby song, “Christmas In Killarney” that brought us there in the first place!

     But it didn’t matter that no one knew Bing had celebrated their town, as long as we sang with them, and with some measure of gusto.  Well, sing we did!  Kathy (besides being only one of very few females who ever stepped up mto the bar there, even led a chorus of “Zippity Do-dah!” 

     Laughter rocked the pub all night. 

     Walking uphill between farms the next morning, a man about a hundred yards behind a crumbling rock wall, dropped his handheld plow, patted his horse and jogged across the field just to tip his hat, reach over the rocks to shake hands, and wish us Merry Christmas!

     So much for all that pleasant surprise stuff; we really did have a wonderful experience there. 

___________

     Just one thing was missing.  Family.  We spent half of Christmas afternoon trying to phone home, with circuit connections going from where we were, to Northern Ireland, to Boston, to Florida, to New York, to the clan in New Jersey who sounded like they were in a tunnel. 

     It made us realize that all the happiness of the week we spent there was momentarily lost to being lonesome for family. 

     We managed to bounce back when the resort manager and his wife (who we suspect might have been listening in to our phone connection efforts) invited us to their home to see the doll baby stroller Santa brought for their daughter.  (Last Christmas, Santa brought the doll!). 

      Their son got a toy truck. 

     One single present each.  The two children were so thrilled, they thought they were in heaven! 

     T h a t   certainly gave us cause for pause. 

 _______________________

    

 We in America are so blessed with so much . . . and family is, well, what Christmas is all about now, isn’t it? 

     Kathy and I truly hope that you and yours

     enjoy what you have today, and every day,

and not take any of it for granted. 

     Oh, one last thing: Please remember to God Bless Our Troops for their eternal vigilance that grants us the freedom we have to celebrate this joyous Christmas day and holiday season! 

                                          

Enjoy, and Peace Be With You!

[The original of this Christmas story appeared on 12/25/08 on this blog site.]

 

 # # # 

www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

No responses yet

Dec 22 2010

MERRY CHRISTMAS, ONE AND ALL!

 

Not A Cursor Is Stirring . . .

                                                          

A couple of nights ago, I started to write a post of some emotional recollections of Christmas’s past. I unconsciously chose to make it hard for myself to not be thinking too unhealthily-much about those people and pets who can only be here in spirit this year:

(God Bless You All Jimmy, Butch, Ernst and Paul, and especially missed in our lives and our Christmas household: our cherished dogs, “Tuckerton Boy” and “Barnegat Girl” —– all six of you left us this year, just weeks apart!)

                                                   

But then, as I felt the tears coming, I shook myself into some here-and-now reality and got my mind caught into a second-wind rush of business thinking again for the last two nights’ posts. 

Is that kind of like going on a hard-earned vacation and then taking half a week to unwind and realize you’re on vacation? Hmmm. There’s a question that’s certainly no less troubling than the mixed emotions that come for many of us with the holiday-slow-down territory.

Anyway, I hope you will take a look at this and some of the other posts in this column (and of course the word links!) in addition to tomorrow’s special: CHRISTMAS IN IRELAND.  They certainly touch on some of my writing extremes.  You may like all or none, but if you prefer one direction over the other, please call or write me and let me know. 

You who are regular visitors (Thank You!) know that I continue to straddle the line between literary interests and hard-nosed, but light-hearted (if one could possibly have both a hard nose and a light heart?) business teachings. 

                                                                       

Having been a businessperson, business professor, business consultant, and business author makes it hard to get business out of my system, but I love writing fiction too, and often find myself writing blog posts on a coin toss!. 

As for this blog site, I have all kinds of analytical stuff to digest, but it rarely helps me know how to most effectively divide my writing pursuits because YOU –you who actually return here without threat of punishment– are really the only ones who can help me do that. 

So please do pass along your thoughts on what you’re more or less interested in.  You can be sure I will pay close attention to anything you say, and I’ll love you for it!  Seriously, I will greatly value your input. 

I figure if you’ve read all this, and gotten this far, you either relate to something I’ve written, or you wish me off the planet, or you’re stealing my ideas to start up a new government in Bongo-Bongo (I DO get a lot of regular visits from many foreign countries!).

Or . . . perhaps your tv is broken and you’re ready to join Matchmakers, or you’ve got 16 kids with stockings to fill and toys to assemble and you’re doing tasks of avoidance right now by pretending to be engaged in important research as you hover over your screen . . . or maybe you’re just a really sick puppy?! (It’s okay; I love all puppies!)  

SO:  ‘Tis the night before Christmas, and all through your mouse, not a cursor is stirring, not even the souse who lives next door and pounds on your door when you stomp on the floor and call him a louse

. . . whew!  Can you tell I had a glass of Christmas wine? 

                                                                             

Really, all you dear visitors, I wish for each of you the happiest, healthiest, and Merriest Christmas of all time. 

Stay close. 

Stay Safe. 

Stay warm. 

Love Those You’re With and Miss Those You’re Not With. 

Relax. 

Smile. 

Laugh. 

______________

See you sometime tomorrow (with some special nostalgic comments about one very memorable CHRISTMAS IN IRELAND!). In the meantime, have a great sleep (unless you’re in Bongo-Bongo and just woke up!) and have a great day tomorrow!  

 # # # 

www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

No responses yet

Dec 21 2010

DEFRAGMENT YOURSELF!

When you finally slow down for

                                          

(or from) the weekend,

                                      

DEFRAGMENT!

 

 

No need to explain why. You already know all the economy, industry or profession, marketplace and competition reasons.

So let’s get to the heart of it. Use this slow-down-time period to step back, adjust your glasses, put your hands on your hips, stretch, yawn, take some deep breaths, and defragment — put all the pieces out on the table.

                                          

Start with your business . . .

What’s been going on these past few months? Weeks? Where’s your business now, and where’s it headed?

~~FINANCES?

Management? Strategies?  Communications? Budgets? Investors? A/R? A/P? Cash flow? Payroll? Other overhead? Reimbursements? Taxes? Revenues? Charitable donations? Profits? Accounting systems? Bookkeeping services? Add your own here: _____________________  

~~OPERATIONS?

Management? Strategies? Communications? Equipment? Supplies? Storage? Shipping? Inventory? Warehousing? Operating systems? Work flow? Scheduling? Purchasing? Leases? Legal actions? IT? Add your own here: _______  _________________________________   

~~MARKETING?

Management? Strategies? Communications? Branding? Sales? (Yes, sales is a function of marketing.) Public and community and investor and industry relations (Also all marketing functions, including news releases, special events, blogs, BUZZ)? Advertising (another function of marketing, including online, traditional and direct media . . . as well as the creation and production of all of it) Pricing? Packaging? Promotion? Merchandising? Social media? Add your own here: _____________________________  

~~HUMAN RESOURCES?

Management? Strategies? Communications? Benefit programs? Customer Service? Referral values? Recruitment? Hiring and firing? leadership, teamwork and skills development training? Performance incentives? Motivational programs? Add your own here: _____________________________

                                                  

[So you noticed those 3 primary targets for each category, huh? Well, in my experience, poor management, poor (or no) strategies, and poor communications have consistently been the primary reasons for business failure!]

                           

That should give you a place to start. When you’ve exhausted your business thinking, switch gears to your SELF.

 

What’s been going on these past few months/weeks  with YOU? Where are you now, and where are you headed?

                                                       

~~HEALTH & FITNESS?

Are you squeezing in enough exercise every week to keep yourself in decent shape? You need not lift or jog for three hours a day and eat powered protein shakes with 37 raw eggs for breakfast in order to stay physically fit.

Many experts say 3 hours a week of brisk walking and avoiding overdoses of red meat and fatty foods will suffice for most people with busy schedules. Are you getting routine medical and dental health checkups as recommended? What do you need to do to motivate yourself in these directions?  

~~FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS

Are you spending enough quality time with children, parents, spouse or significant other and (get your finger out of your throat!) your in-laws? How can you combine some time-consumers more productively? Walk with family members or friends. Partner up for health tests (easier to deal with when you have company).

Get serious about sharing healthy food preparation ideas, recipes, and meals. Small specialty of handmade gifts and handwritten thank you notes work wonders as relationship cement. Add your own ideas here: ____________________

~~SELF-EXPRESSION, SELF-AWARENESS & SELF-DEVELOPMENT

Surely you know what you need to do in these categories to defragment yourselfand move forward with the adventures in creative expression and self and academic learning that you’ve always wanted to fit into your life, but never chose to make the room for. Now’s your chance to choose, and blame it on me!

The more you can learn about yourself, the better you’ll be as a leader and coach and role model . . . the better prepared you’ll be to inspire and motivate others to productivity and peak performances. Choose to make yourself make room for this. 

                                            

Weekend time slow-down periods are the perfect times to reevaluate and make commitments to yourself.

No, not token promises that never happen. Get serious here for a minute.

You have only one life, and the rest of it starts the minute you leave this blog post, so how about making the rest of your life make the kind of difference you’ve only ever dreamed of?

Hey, what’s to lose by trying?

 

 # # # 

www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

No responses yet

Dec 20 2010

Business as usual? Not tomorrow!

Tomorrow

                        

is the 2nd day

                      

 of the rest

                            

   of your life!  

                                                           

So, “business as usual” is an expression left over from the days of yore. Get rid of it! Click on Delete! There is no such thing anymore. No business that’s managed to survive this long into this dying quail economy has a “usual” anywhere on its plate.

This is especially true given The Great Global Warming reports whose noteriety earned an infamous Nobel Prize on the cusp of all the extreme cold temperature onsets. 

I mean, consider that business climate (as we used to know it) has been under crippling storm interferences from the Nation’s capitol, and from deadly mass media manipulations blowing out of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore.

If we look over here, at this gathering high pressure system in the Midwest we can probably trace back its origins to corruption in the Chicago area which was stirred up by former community organizers and regularly energized by “Hollywood’s finest” over on the left coast.

Ah, but you only (and rightfully, I might add) want the bottom line: Will it rain or snow?  

Yes. Depending on where you are, at least one and maybe both!

                                                                                  

Whatever you’ve suffered to date in trying to keep arms distance from the incompetent government’s meddling hands and from the pathetic examples set by America’s corporate giants, is bound to get worse before it gets better. But it need not get worse for YOU! That’s your choice. You have the ability to stay in control of your ship and steer it through the coming storms. 

It will take some preparation and a vigilant sense of readiness, but you know what? You’re a pro at that! You’ve proven it by getting this far. Take time this week and next to enjoy your family and rest your business brain. But don’t hang up the phone. This is the most ideal period of the year to think about direction instead of survival.

Map out where you’re headed. Check the long-range weather reports and plan course corrections accordingly. Start to look at the prospects for added revenue streams that do not stray too far from your basic business. Begin piecing together a branding strategy and approach that can take you one step up on the competition.

Look a little harder for the opportunities that are there in the corners, the ones you might have passed over before you restructured or streamlined operations. You may have to “knuckle under”! That’s an expression that does still apply. Here’s another:

Open minds open doors.

                                                               

Pay attention to proper, productive goal-setting. Pay attention to your SELF and your stress levels and your health (because the best open minds and open doors in business mean nothing if your body locked up and shuts down!) Stress, today, may not be greater than in other generations, but it’s certainly quicker, so you need keep pace –and set the pace– are you ready? Set? Go!

  # # # 

302.933.0116   Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

2 responses so far

Dec 19 2010

GOT GUTS?

Headed to 2012–and

                               

your business

                             

is still breathing?

                       

You got guts!

        

It takes more, much more, than an MBA, family inheritence, or good luck to have a living, breathing business survive this still-spiraling economy. It takes guts.

Guts? Right. You must have ’em, or you wouldn’t be reading this. Okay, enough with the backpats, where do you go from here? Yeah, into January, right. I know. But beyond that, what?

Since you’re an entrepreneur preoccupied with making your idea work, you’ll probably be doing all your gift shopping online, or running around at the 11th hour grabbing stuff off what’s left on nearby retail shelves.

If that’s not the case, and you’re a true romantic who has planned every inch, and had a thousand hours to plan and organize and wrap, you’re probably a corporate type who did all your Christmas shopping in July, and not reading this anyway.

So, here’s a thought: What about taking yourself through a group brainstorming experience —  by yourself?

                                                                                  

Is that like suggesting that you do a multiple-personalities thing? Yes, but not so close to the edge that you’ll need a shrink by New Year’s.

I’m suggesting you start with a pad and pen or pencil (if any of those tools are still within your reach). Laptops and all those other hand-heold devices just don’t cut it! They don’t give you enough time to think.

Besides a little practice with that lost art called handwriting, the experience alone could be a good stimulous (speaking of which, Red Bull isn’t a necessary accompaniment, but you may want a cup of coffee?). 

Next, turn off your cell phone; I promise the world won’t end. Then find a place where you won’t be interrupted. (HA! Talk about challenge!) Maybe it has to be a locked car in your driveway?

At the top of your page, write the one business issue that is most important for you to address in 2012.

Be realistic.

Draw a vertical line down the middle of the page.

                                                                

Put a + (plus) sign on the left and a – (minus) sign on the right. Start to write down everything you can think of (in the left-hand column) that could be a positive outcome of resolving this issue. Everything you imagine as negative on the right. Think freely.

Don’t criticize or second-guess yourself. Instead, go back over your list from the perspective of what you imagine to be your most trusted advisor or most valuable employee. How would it change?

When you’ve given these two columns about 10-12 minutes for each of your split personalities, STOP! Take a swig of coffee. Take some deep breaths. Rub your hands together briskly.

Next page: Write down the three steps you can take on Tuesday, January 3rd, to make some of that left-hand column stuff on your first page start to happen. Rank order the priority of steps.

Make some specific notes about the who, what, when, where, and how each of those three steps can/should/will occur.

Give them a timeline.

Be realistic.

                                                                           

Keep it all flexible: your rankings, your steps, your timeline, and what you expect for results (yes, without this, it’s hard to know why you’re pursuing anything) . . . flexible.

If you get close to the date and it’s not going to happen, don’t whip yourself (that’s hard to do anyway), just move the date. If the steps involve money or other people, leave them flexible enough to adjust in case things don’t go swimmingly (which as you know, they rarely do!)  

Fold up the pages. Put them in your pocket. Type them into your computer tomorrow (not today) and edit them in the process. Share the information as appropriate.

Congratulate yourself for doing goal-setting the right (most productive) way. Now make it happen! And stop worrying. Remember, you got guts!

 # # # 

302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

No responses yet

Dec 18 2010

False Promises

“But I have

                      

promises to keep

                                      

     and miles to go

                       

      before I sleep . . .”

— ROBERT FROST

 

NOTHING is more aggravating to a business professional than assurances from others that prove empty, guarantees that don’t deliver, and boxes full of promises with false bottoms.

These games waste time and money, drain energy, and create havoc for the person or organization on the receiving end.

I recently witnessed a guaranteed $1 million sale that ended up costing a great deal of anxiety and money to discover that the “sale” was a hoax.

Maybe a million dollar sale is hard to relate to, so here’s one I’m sure you’ve experienced:

An on-again, off-again client (Sam) once assured me my proposal to manage a very major (big fee) project was acceptable and that we should meet to wrap it up early the following week.

He asked me to call on Friday morning to set a time and date when we could meet and I could pick up a check.

                                                                       

With some overdue bills on the desk, that was a welcome thought. The accompanying feelings of relief were quickly muffled. On Friday morning, Sam was unavailable so I left a voicemail and doubled up with an email that I could be available to get together on Monday or Tuesday. Sam never responded. It was a long weekend.

I called again on Monday and had to leave another voicemail. I sent another email. Still no response.

In the meantime, the two teleconferences originally set for Monday that I had moved to Wednesday so I could be available for Monday or Tuesday were suddenly on the firing line. I tried Sam’s number to no avail three more times that day. At the end of the day Tuesday, Sam called to apologize for being very busy and wanted to meet on Wednesday.

I explained I had conference calls set up, and Sam then suggested connecting on Thursday. He had my check ready. I asked if he could put it in the mail so I could get started, and he said he needed to meet personally with me first to “go over a couple of minor points and sign off on the project.” 

One of the Tuesday conference calls (involving a dozen people) was last-minute rescheduled –you guessed it– to Thursday.

                                                  

Sam, as it turns out, was “called out of town at the eleventh hour” on Thursday and didn’t bother to let me know until his email arrived two minutes after the rescheduled conference call that I was supposed to be in, was completed.

He sent me an email on Friday saying he promised he would be at my office first thing Monday. I took a deep exhale and shuffled my Monday schedule around so the morning would be clear.

Sam called at noon Monday to say he was sorry for not getting to me earlier, but assured me he would be stopping in later that afternoon, at 2pm. At 2:15pm, an email arrived announcing that the week had just become “too crazy” and would the following Monday afternoon be okay to meet. You know when you can feel the meltdown is on the way?

I politely told Sam to take a hike. I had to run double-speed to make up the lost time and attention to other clients and pay the overdue bills. This is of course all in addition to my churning stomach and missed sleep.

I know, I know, I did a lot of stupid things , but only because I start with trust, and expect people to keep their word. 

It’s happened before. It will no doubt happen again. I would never dream of being what I consider to be so “insolent,” so I have a hard time accepting that some people out there really don’t care about honoring their commitments.

“Promises are made to be broken” they might say. Well, I’ve learned the hard way to be more suspect of people who assure me of anything. It’s really not hard–especially these days– to communicate, unless a conscious choice is being made to confuse, confound, annoy, not deliver, take the high road, or pretend to be too busy to be concerned about other’s commitments. 

Show me. Don’t talk about it.

                                                                           

And when you miss the first shot and don’t call . . . don’t call! I’m not interested. Sam ruined it for both of us! Here it is: Demonstrate respect and follow through with what you assure others of, and you’ll never lose credibility, or business. And you stand to gain: a high-trust reputation. 

                                                              

 # # # 

302.933.0116    Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

3 responses so far

Dec 16 2010

SKIMPING ON CHRISTMAS

Businesspeople down in

                                

Onunderoverup

                           

are too busy blaming

                         

instead of solving.

                                                  

“Down in Onunderoverup”? Huh? Oh: Down and in . . . Revenues and profits are down. It’s the worst holiday shopping season in memory. In and on . . . Brick and mortar businesses are getting killed by the invasion of online businesses. On, under, and over . . . Online businesses are being undercut by overkill retail sales events. Up . . .C’mon folks, let’s own up to the reality that this is a bite-the-bullet Christmas for probably two-thirds of all Americans.

 

IF — like many others this year who don’t work for do-nothing, free-spending government agencies or bailed-out corporate giants — IF you happen to be having a tighter Christmas ahead than those you’ve left behind, you may want to consider three points:

  • Unless you choose for it to be (behavior IS a choice), you need not think that it’s corny, hokey, old-fashioned, ancient, not P.C., or “yeah, so?” (Thoughts are things!), to consider this first point.

1)  Here’s how it goes: choose for a minute or two to think that Christmas is not all about you, except as a a joyful celebrant.

While you’re staring at your screen right now, dismantle the whole holiday stress clog-up in your brain (take some deep breaths) so you can step back with a fresh perspective and see Christmas more realistically, for what it is: the celebration of the birth of Christ.

                                                                  
  • Okay, now, flying on the shirttails of the first point, comes this second point to think on.

2)  How have you chosen to let others (and your self) set you up over your lifetime to choose over-the-top artificial representations of this joyful event to bump the real thing off into the wings from stage center?

How have you become victimized by decades of deep and hard-hitting commercialism?

                                                                                   
  • Have all those sales, ads, commercials, emails, txtmsgs, endorsements, and “perfect family with perfect dog in their perfect home setting” images left you with the guilties because you can’t afford that surprise diamond or vacation gift for your spouse this year? Because the kids will have to settle for the cheap iPod and a slightly used Wii? Just one chew-bone and a single squeaky toy for Rufus?

3)  Welcome to reality. It’s the same place that many (probably the majority) of your customers have been quietly and more steadily inhabiting over the last couple of years.

It’s not just you. It’s not just them. It’s the vast majority of the world that’s actively downsizing 2010 Christmas gift-giving and expenses.  

                                                                                             

Well, realizing that you’re not alone sometimes serves to soften the edge. You should, by the way, also know that I am not a minister of any kind, nor have I any religious drums to beat . . . what then?

It’s Christmas!

Skimpy perhaps by past life standards, but this is this life, here and now.

We only go around in it once, and we’re in it together:

business owners, partners, managers, employees, suppliers, investors, service and sales professionals, referrers, AND customers! 

                                                               

In a time of year that accents good will, “blame” is a nonproductive misfit. In a time of life that businesses struggle with the economy, fixing the economy becomes Job One for businesses.

What can yours do? What can you do? What can you do now, tonight, tomorrow, to take a major step toward righting your ship?

# # # 

www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

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Dec 15 2010

MOTIVATION

 “I read a blog today,

                         

Oh Boy!”

                                                    

[With thanks for the unconscious melody, to The Beatles]

 

Contrary to a blog post I just read, MOTIVATION does NOT come from inside you!

It is DESIRE that lodges itself deep within each human being (and of course most animals).

Motivation is an influence that’s exercised and exerted from the OUTSIDE.

It is what activates or triggers desire.

To say someone is “self-motivated” simply means that person is in touch with her or his desires, and that some external things or events (or other person or people has) have activated, stimulated, or triggered those desires, increased awareness of them, and brought them to the surface.

                                                             

This little bit of wisdom is as important to marketing strategists, sales professionals, and online content writers and designers seeking to trigger emotional buying motives, as it is to business owners and managers.

  • We’ve chatted here often about the practical motivational applications of Maslow’s Theory of Needs Hierarchy.

Decades later, it is still a constant and still the most valuable motivational tool for business and organization leaders.

It requires leaders to pay ongoing attention to what things most make themselves and those around them “tick,” and recognize that needs can change instantly. 

  • Herzberg’s research adds yet another dimension of reality that we often assume that we know what other’s needs are, but are frequently wrong . . . and that financial and job enrichment rewards are important, but in motivating for true job satisfaction, gaining some sense of achievement is what really matters most.

                                                                      

Okay, now that we’re past all that textbook stuff, let’s take a closer look at leadership. Motivating and inspiring others to perform optimally is a primary challenge and responsibility.

Whether the prompts to action are directed toward problem solving or innovating (or producing innovative solutions), or selling (which may of course combine all of the above), there is an over-riding need to turn on the reality spotlight!

The point is if you are out there on the front lines of sales and/or management–and aim to be successful–you’re not likely to have the time or patience to mollycoddle (cool word, huh?) a bunch of theoretical approaches about how to do your job.

Theory talks. Reality walks.

                                                                                      

Now, here’s the killer: if you don’t do the reality booster-shots hourly or daily, your leadership effectiveness stands to suffer big-time.

Remember those on-the-job moments when a boss expected you to be internally-motivated and told you to do something “by the book” that turned out to be dumb, wasteful, irrelevant, insensitive, or ineffective (maybe all?)? Just a small example.

What about the boss who got you excited about doing something that you always wanted to try or to learn, but thought you’d never get the chance? THAT is external motivation of your internal desire! Also just a small example.   

How can you reach inside those you are responsible for leading, to locate and push those magic buttons that ignite their rocket launchers?

One good answer: 

Igniting people’s individual rocket launchers requires full understanding that the strength of your role performance as a leader is determined by how well you can get to know your SELF and others’ individual selves.

                                                                                                                      

Your ability to make great things happen depends on how effectively you size up other people’s qualifications, energy drives, interests, instincts, capabilities . . . and desires!

The more you can know yourself, the more easily you can know others. When you know what others want and need, you’ll know how, when and where to reward and challenge them most productively.

But keep it on your back burner that a personal crisis or even minor oversight on your part or on the part of any of those you lead, can change the dynamics of the relationship and the tasks at hand overnight or within the hour, even within the minute! And that can change what you need to do to help others make a difference. 

# # # 

www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116  Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

 

 

No responses yet

Dec 14 2010

Make Something Happen NOW!

The quickest fix for

                                         

“Nuttin’s Happenin'”

                                   

. . . is to ACT NOW!

                                                               

NOW, while we’re on the cusp of

The Great American Work Slowdown. 

                                                                                                    

Christmas is just a week from Saturday. Everyone (except for rambunctious entrepreneurs–there’s some other kind?) is moving more slowly at work. The rank and file are increasingly preoccupied with office and neighborhood parties.

Could this be true? Is it just my imagination? Are you grinning nervously at that thought or at what I might be tossing your way in the next couple of paragraphs? 

                                                                                                 

Well, if you’re in that “rambunctious” crowd I mentioned, you probably wait ’til the last minute to shop, hate to waste time making the festive rounds but find that a couple of stiff drinks help make those swashbuckling business status-climbers and oozy neighbors a little more tolerable . . . and it’s all good practice leading up to that big week of dysfunctional family gift-giving gatherings! 

                                                    

Put your mouse down for a nap.

                                                                

Get up from your desk or work station or laptop, and stop reading this blog (I trust you that you’ll come back). Now, DO SOME thing. ANY thing! It doesn’t matter what you do. What matters is that you do SOMEthing.

Take a walk around the block. Eat a cookie. Take a bathroom break. Turn the music on or up. Draw a picture. Get away from the monitor and keyboard and take some deep breaths. Shake your head like a wet dog. Clap or briskly rub your hands together. Take a slug of cold water.

Appreciate that by breaking your concentration, you are also breaking some element or accumulation of stress.

Don’t quit yet. Don’t rush back to the screen. Gently close your eyes and take ten seconds to massage your temples or the back of your neck (counter-clockwise stimulates more blood flow).

Pick up a pen or pencil (you DO still have one?) and a piece of scrap paper. Write or draw or diagram the first thing that comes into your mind . . . like a creative branding theme exercise

It absolutely doesn’t matter what you record (and no one but you will ever see it anyway).

Go ahead. I’ll wait. ………. Good!

                                                        

Next, draw or write or diagram the first thought you have about something you can do at 9 o’clock tomorrow morning to pump up or booster-shot some part of your business into action right away.

Maybe it’s a new direction. Maybe it’s solving a nagging problem. Or it’s reviewing reports or articles you’ve been shoveling around, or checking websites you’ve been intending to visit, or having coffee with the new (or oldest) employee (or supplier/vendor/sales rep) and listening?

Perhaps you haven’t made enough time lately to initiate collection of customer feedback? 

No matter how small a step, just make it an ACTION step. SOME action always beats NO action! I hear from blog visitors all the time that success comes from having a bias to action. Do you? 

# # #

 

www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

No responses yet

Dec 13 2010

You Should Write A Book!

You own or run a business

                            

or professional practice,

                                                       

so you’re filled with stories

 

 . . . and people have been telling you for years that you should write a book, right? And, HA!, you laugh it off, right?

                                                                              

But somewhere deep inside, you think you really DO have a story worth telling and that you, well, who knows, you could maybe even be the next John Grisham or Annie Proulx. After all, with 37 trillion boring text books already out there, this would have to be a novel. So, fiction it is.

Maybe at some point in your life, you even got up the nerve to get started?

                                                                               

Somewhere, buried in the back of a drawer, or deeply embedded in some tech thing-a-ma-jig (let’s hope something more recent than a, er, showing my age here, a floppy disk?) you have knowingly and hopefully saved your original scribble, no doubt based on some dialogue with one of your prior six or seven spouses, or long-(almost)forgotten soul mate…or a much hated boss!

And now that you think about it, if you can dig the whole mess out, it probably wouldn’t take much to finish it off, true? Even if you were starting from scratch, you could probably zoom through the first bunch of chapters before your spit even hits the ground!

Oh, just imagine–your name in lights, TV interviews with Charlie Rose and Oprah, book signings where you toss each signature pen over your shoulder.

Have I got news for you, Brothers and Sisters!

                                                                        

First, if you can pull an engaging story together in less than 40-80-hours a week for a year or two, and whip it into presentable format for soliciting agents and publishing house editors, your first name must be Miraculous.

Second, as hard as the plot, character development, storytelling, dialogue, writing, editing and proofreading is…expressing the right words in the right ways…finding a good agent who will find you a publisher is harder still.

You should know that whatever you write will never be good enough for 95% of those you seek to cornerstone your career. EVERY time you send out a query letter or first five or ten pages, you will find errors and weak stuff in your work that sucks AFTER you send it out. GUARANTEED!

“Well, just bypass all that garbage,” you say. “Just self-publish it. Then who needs agents and publishing house editors?” Uh, YOU DO, unless you’re also a marketing whiz with deep pockets, and prepared to be your own full time publicist and promoter as well.

Writing a “hot” news release is a skill all by itself.

Then after it’s written, you need to know when, where and how–and have, yes, the tenacity–to get the right person receptive enough to give it coverage. 

Ahh, and then there’s the next release or two or three or four, plus a media kit.

But could be you just want 26 copies printed (to perhaps impress the former spouses and all those stray children…and of course your mother!)   

                                                                         

So back to the agents and publishing house editors (assuming you have a day job and would have a hard time adding another full time one to your schedule). These are categories of people who tend to exude creepy-crawly and sometimes pompous attitudes.

They must spend most of their lives locked in closets from the best I’ve been able to determine.

Most avoid having any online presence. Most are so swamped with so much drivel submitted by so many drivelers, that they start to think of themselves as saintly and will only consider work that is 110% (that extra 10% always a brain-tickler) letter perfect in both content and presentation. Exaggerating? I wish! 

They use one of about four variations on the same theme for rejection explanations, almost always accompanied by a set of pat-you-on-the-back-of-the-hand encouragement and oh, such humility, that they of course can’t possibly know what other agents might “really relate” to your work so, pat-pat, send your review requests elsewhere (and keep the drivel clutter going!).

                                                              

Here’s the bottom line:

You want to write a book? Write! Then rewrite, rewrite, rewrite, rewrite. OR just call me and I’ll rewrite what you’ve written to make it better OR I’ll write your story for you – your novel, or your memoir, or your company’s story, or your marketing or branding program, or your news release (which I will get coverage for!).

Click here for some of my latest work.

 

# # #

 

www.TheWriterWorks.com

302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US

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!

No responses yet

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