Seeing through it all

…maybe, maybe not.

There’s an awful lot of talk in top management circles trending to the favor-ability of transparent leadership, but reality often dictates the need to exercise the exact opposite, at least for certain situations. Two-facedness? Manipulative? Irresponsible? Lacking integrity? Ruling by exception? Well, even open windows do not always afford a clear view.

When every word you say and move you make is public to all around you, it can be inhibiting to decision making that might be for the good of all involved. Adhering to a policy of transparency can instead take on a neurotic life of its own which can prevent meaningful forward motion.

Consider, for example, the advisability of sharing content of investor or prospective investor discussions as they occur, with all employees. . . or, publicly airing the private meeting critique of an under-achieving employee. Actually, many if not most sensitive-type bits of information might best be kept private and only be shared on a need-to-know basis.

We badger government officials to maintain transparency because they are elected and paid by us to represent our interests, and we are entitled to know what they think and say, and how they behave. But business (thankfully, for the cause of cultivating entrepreneurial spirit and the capitalism that fuels our economy) doesn’t conduct itself that way.

Private enterprise shareholders are entitled to know how business management represents the interests of a given company, but not have a say in every issue. Shareholders are instead invested in the integrity of the management that represents the company they are invested in.

Effective transparent leadership may translate to open-door management for many, but even those who take their doors off the hinges have been known to beef up their effectiveness with periodic whispers and private notes. Because sharing everything with everyone can easily create more problems than it solves.

Another way to think of it is simply that not every organization member is capable of understanding areas of specialization beyond what she or he is directly involved with, and to expect that that’s the case is to invite confusion and delay that will block progress. It’s healthy to look at the total leadership picture before throwing all the doors and windows open.

To paraphrase Lincoln’s famous quote: “You can be transparent to all of the people some of the time, and you can be transparent to some of the people all 0f the time, but you can’t be transparent to all of the people all of the time.”

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Hal@Businessworks.US    302.933.0116

“The entrepreneur is

essentially a visualizer

and an actualizer.

He sees exactly

how to make it happen.”

 — ROBERT L. SCHWARTZ, Founder, The New School for Entrepreneurs

When I “graduated” from what was once The New School for Entrepreneurs in Tarrytown, New York, it was with my feet on the ground and my head in the clouds. I had the entrepreneurial success idea of all time percolating in my professorial brain all during the program’s intensive retreat-style weekends, but could bring only a Fortune 500 corporate background to the table.

I came away from the Entrepreneurs program experience with lots of material to weave into the college classes I was teaching. I came away with a better understanding of who I was and what I was all about, and that I was “an entrepreneur” of sorts for being so hellbent on making ideas work (and not the weirdo I was sometimes accused of being).

I ended up creating and copyrighting “Corporate Entrepreneurs” and “Doctorpreneurs.” I used what I learned to help start hundreds of successful businesses.

I learned that the Entrepreneur does not fit any definition. But being one usually means you share a number of characteristics and traits evidenced by other entrepreneurs.

• You are first and foremost a catalyst of society.
• In your own–usually underestimated–way, you are a “mover and shaker.”
• You possess the unique combination of vision and follow-through.
• You take reasonable risks.

You are the key —the secret— ingredient that’s missing in corporate think-tanks, and in every level of government.

A true entrepreneur running the U.S. Postal Service, for example, would be competing head-to-head with FedEx and UPS instead of folding up sidewalk mailboxes, cutting back offices, hours, and work schedules and raising prices. You would know that you have the world’s greatest address delivery database and network, and you’d figure out how to take over the world of email.

But what entrepreneur in her or his right mind would want to spend a lifetime untangling a 237-year-old pile of knots?

Entrepreneurship is not dead. It is lurking.

Entrepreneurs are sitting quietly in the shadows watching and waiting for the ever-dwindling opportunities that earmark today’s economic quagmire to show some signs of life. Entrepreneurship-driven activities are on hold waiting for revitalized and more encouraging government responses. Entrepreneurs are waiting for renewed trust in government representation.

• Who, after all, wants to initiate (or pay for) an innovative new business venture that gets over-taxed and over-regulated before it even gets its startup feet wet?

Entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial spirit will rise again. And when they do, they will usher in a new “Age of Enterprise” unlike any we have ever known. And besides revolutionizing the Internet and smart-phone worlds, part of the fallout will be that the U.S. Postal Service will no longer exist. Another part will be a new sense of self-enlightenment!

What are YOU doing now

to ensure that your business survives and thrives?

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Hal@Businessworks.US

There is no way

to happiness.

Happiness IS the way!

Stop looking for the finish line. Watch your feet. Happiness is not the destination. Happiness is the journey.

If you’re having trouble getting that message, it’s because you’ve consciously or unconsciously chosen to set yourself up to get brainwashed into thinking that nothing of any value exists besides the future. Well, in fact, dwelling on the past that’s over and can’t be changed is equally neurotic to being focused on the future that hasn’t yet come . . . and may never!

This futures mindset is a common occurance with salespeople who live to reach and exceed their weekly and monthly and quarterly and annual goals. Nothing wrong with goals that are specific, realistic, flexible, due-dated, and written. But the blind pursuit of any target that doesn’t measure up to all five of those criteria is simply a futile wish-list chase into fantasyland.

Talk with a car salesperson to get a better perspective on how happiness gets lost under reckless abandon to achieve a rigid inflexible goal at all costs.

If a goal is flexible, for example, and it’s clearly not going to be met, it needs simply to be changed — change the amount, the time period, the process, the methods, etc. Effective goals are not meant to be etched in concrete. Meaningful targets are always moving. Effective goal achievers move with them by glancing ahead and staying firmly anchored in the present.

What makes focusing on the future unhealthy? It quickly and easily turns away from being a positive and constructive direction when it stealthily tip-toes over the line into worry. Worrying is a complete waste of time and energy. It produces absolutely nothing except negative stress which rapidly produces illness.

Okay, you’ll grant me that worrying is worthless, so if that’s the problem, what’s the solution? It’s not a magic answer because each of us handles stress differently. So here’s a list of the most common solutions that most people tend to practice in one form or another. Try what sounds right for you, and what seems practical at the time.

Then keep trying until something works, but don’t quit on yourself!

Yoga; swimming; jogging; workouts; walking; singing; dancing; deep breathing; massage therapy; crafts; playing with a baby; playing with kids of any age; playing with pets; keeping a journal or diary; visiting another close environment (woods, beach, etc.); reading fiction; watching a cartoon; drawing/sketching/painting; fixing a meal (if this is not something you usually do); listening to music with your eyes closed . . .

The point is to know when you’re starting to feel stressed (this can be the most challenging part of the solution) and then to stop whatever you’re doing and do something different for a minute, an hour, a day . . . whatever’s appropriate for you, now.

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Thanks for visiting. Hal@Businessworks.US God Bless You!

“If you think sometimes

  that you just can’t win,

remember that life

is not a contest!”

— Kathy Alpiar

She reminded me of this shortly before her life struggles ended this past March at age 55. She had reminded me of it often over the last 25 years of our marriage . . .  almost always after my face retreated into my hands bemoaning some frustrating situation or another that I had somehow boxed myself into. I’m told everyone does this on occasion?

If you’re an American, you probably grew up with the conviction that everything you had to deal with every day –from school and Scouts to college or trade school and a career to marriage and family raising– was (is) a contest!

Admittedly, in a nation dominated by sports performance and competition at literally every level of life, it’s hard to grasp that “life is not a contest.”

But it’s NOT a contest.

(Workaholics, please re-read those last five words!)

• Life is a gift. It is a blessing. We either consciously or unconsciously choose to embrace it, or choose to waste it.

• Life is a waste when it’s obsessively dedicated to ultimately meaningless, make-believe values — making money, acquiring things, trying to impress, being self-serving and self-indulgent, putting others down, bullying, chastising differences, thinking and acting dishonestly.

How much of our precious time on Earth is wasted each day trying to get even; trying to undermine, manipulate, or represent ourselves as more than what we are; trying to pretend; trying to bait those who are weaker into our arena so we can defeat them or make them look foolish? Can any of that possibly be serving our true best interests?

If the answer to that question about how much time, by the way, is anything more than one minute, it may be worthwhile to think twice about Kathy’s quote. In other words, is our purpose here on this planet to make a difference?

How important is integrity?

Kathy wasn’t suggesting that we all abandon competition and head for some mountaintop to meditate on our navels. Of course we have to be responsible to earn a living and pay our bills. But what she was saying was that there’s a whole lot more to life than having such narrow pursuits d-i-c-t-a-t-e human existence.

Entrepreneurs get pounded over the head with these finger-waving “take time to smell the flowers” thoughts because they tend to disappear into a product/service development zone to the exclusion of friends, family, and many of life’s joyful experiences. They substitute the pursuit of “success” to the exclusion of what’s around them. I know because I’ve been there.

But I’ve come to realize that return on investment is not the sole province of business. ROI has also to do with having an ongoing sense of humor, a conscious effort to cultivate only positive stress, making room in our lives for living, keeping our promises, and being perpetually focused on service to others. Thanks Kathy.

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Hal@Businessworks.US    302.933.0116

Get it in writing . . . 

The Hardest Business Task!

Yes, test your objectives. Yes, test your strategies. Yes, test your tactics. And, yes –first and foremost– test your concepts. It’s the only sensible way (before spending money on ideas that might sound great, but that fail to produce), to make sure your pursuits are solidly grounded and integrally connected. 

~~~~~~~

What’s the hardest task in business? It’s really not hiring and firing, or funding, or maintaining operations, or making sales (though HR, finance, operations, and sales people may all want to lay claim to having the most difficult jobs). The hardest task is getting it in writing. Huh”? What’s “it”? And what’s so hard about writing? Writing what? 

I believe the most challenging of all business tasks is getting your direction and contingency plans straight. (Considering widely-published SBA findings that over 90% of business failures are attributable to “poor management,” knowing where you’re going is certainly Job One for most entrepreneurs.)

Writing your objectives clearly, simply, specifically, realistically, flexibly –and with a due date attached– has proven time and again to make the difference between revenues and profits, between success and SUCCESS!

The more principals, partners, investors, advisors, managers involved, the harder the task. It becomes exponentially difficult because –to have any value– everyone involved must agree at least somewhat with every word. In other words, agreeing on a precise target is sometimes the most trying of all challenges.

Is it (your target objective) the same as your Mission or Vision Statement?

No, but it probably needs to directly reflect both.

Whatever the objectives (or goals) are that you verbalize for yourself or your business, they need to be:

A) Missions in and of themselves, and they must fit conceptually under the umbrella of your own or your company’s overall Mission Statement.

[If your objective(s) fail to measure up to your overall Mission Statement, or don’t quite fit under its umbrella, re-examine where you’re headed with things. You may need to switch gears, or direction, or timing, or desired results.]

B) Following the path of your Vision Statement.

[If this isn’t happening, redirect your focus or re-visit your Vision Statement to consider some adjustments.]

Can you make changes and still be “on-target” with your pursuits? Absolutely! Remember that flexibility (together with realistic, specific, and due-dated) is one of the key criteria for effective goal-setting. If you’re not reaching the goal you defined, be flexible enough to redefine it, or change the tactics you’re using.

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Hal@Businessworks.US   302.933.0116

Open  Minds  Open  Doors

Make today a GREAT day for someone!