There is no excuse

                                                                           

for employee excuses. 

     Let’s face it, Boss.  The more you run around trying to be a first aid squad patching up the business cuts and bruises and blackeyes, the more you function as a fire department blanketing flames and hosing down everything in sight, the more you lose control.

     When employees appear to be invested in offering excuses, and in maintaining the status quo so they don’t make waves, the less they are living up to their potential and the more your business will suffer on the bottom line.

     So what’s a Boss to do?  Step back from it all.  Take a couple of deep breaths.  Recognize that you have been taking the monkey off employee backs for too long and that it’s time to put the monkey back where it belongs . . . return it to those you are paying to take and manage responsibility.  

     There is no excuse for excuses.  And when employees can duck responsibility and not miss a step, they will.  Why not?  They’ll get paid as much for making the minimal 9-5 effort as they will for acting more responsible and putting in extra effort and extra hours.  (Does this sound something like being a parent?) 

     If you’re expecting employees to step up and act like owners, you’d better figure out some way to make them feel like owners . . . whether it’s a matter of stock options, or junior partnerships, or simply extending some vacation times, or awarding some bonuses, people are people are people.  Incentives motivate. 

     Ah, you say, but you’ve tried giving salary raises and it hasn’t changed things.  How can you fault someone for not wanting to do more work once she or he is making more pay when it’s just as easy to go into cruise control?  On top of that, remember that pay raises are permanent increases.  By comparison, bonuses and non-cash rewards are blips on your bottom line.

     If you’re determined to get results from incentives, you have to be determined to figure out what makes each individual incentive recipient tick! 

     Someone with a teenager who needs braces will be more motivated by your incentive offer to pay the periodontist than a cruise vacation.  Someone who comes from a wealthy family will not be as motivated by cash as by a limo-transported theatre show and dinner for two (or four) at his or her favorite restaurant. 

     An employee who’s nervous and worried about neighborhood burglaries will be motivated by a one-time expense security system installation and service contract or a new, bolt-to-the-floor fire-proof safe. 

     It’s all about Maslow’s Hierarchy and understanding as much as you can about what’s important in the life of each person, and rewarding that individual at the level that counts most for that person.           halalpiar         

For experienced bottom-line management consulting and coaching that gets results –guaranteed– contact award-winning author/educator/consultant Hal Alpiar now at 302.933.0116 or email Hal@TheWriterWorks.com

 Avoid the temptation

                                                                   

to try to do everything!

     With the good fortune of my having talented, creative children —a major Washington DC award-winning theater director daughter, and a major LA/Dayton OH award-winning musician/composer son— comes the awareness that business trade shows are theatre!

     If you’re participating in one trade show, or hundreds, and don’t treat each as if you were hosting a world premier theatre opening, you’re wasting your time, money, and energy. 

     Opening a play requires precise planning . . . from tickets, ushers, programs, music, costumes, advertising, promotion, sound, lighting, props, backdrops, script development, auditions, rehearsals, and how the actors and actresses “come across” to their audience.

     How do your company representatives “come across” to trade show visitors?  Do they have rehearsals? 

     To be truly productive in a trade show setting, avoid the temptation to try to do everything.  It can be no more effective than actors and actresses trying to double up as ushers, ticket-takers, advertisers, lighting and sound technicians.

     Trade show participation can sell products and services OR gain industry exposure and build goodwill OR inform and educate OR recruit employees OR establish contacts and build a mailing list . . . but never (really, never!) target more than one purpose.  It simply won’t work! 

     Remember that theatre audiences and trade show audiences are both filled with critics who can make or break your presentation in just a matter of hours.  It’s also important to keep in mind that the vast majority of trade show attendees are “tire-kickers” and “window shoppers” who are there to gather information (and goodies) and compare the offerings.  Depending on your single purpose, being able to sort out prospects from suspects can be critical to your success. 

     What’s the best way to prepare?  Go to other trade shows — any trade shows!  And be a detective.  Figure out which booths and exhibits are doing best and why, and which are not.  Take notes.  Then go home and rehearse your presenters to stay with the game plan and focus on the single goal of collecting business cards, OR making sales, OR making impressions, OR . . .                halalpiar

For creative consulting help with trade show presentations, call Hal direct at 302.933.0116 or email Hal@TheWriterWorks.com 

What’s free, feels good when

you get it, feels good when

you give it, and is worth more

than a bathtubful of cash? 

Being a good neighbor isn’t just a behavior promoted by children’s TV icon, “Mr. Rogers” (God bless his talented, caring, sweet, perceptive soul!). Being a good neighbor means helping and sharing and sometimes, being self-sacrificing. 

It’s an attitude. It’s a behavior pattern driven by your willingness to accept responsibility for more than yourself, and to be willing to act responsibly toward those around you, even when you may least want to . . . at home AND on-the-job! 

It doesn’t mean giving up your SELF for others (those are “Heroes” and Heroines” and we need only glance quickly to our young service men and women for glowing examples!). 

It doesn’t mean (necessarily) making a career of it, like so many of the wonderful helping professionals (nurses, charity and social workers, missionaries, therapists, et al) among society’s ranks. Oh, and it also doesn’t mean doing favors for others who really don’t want your favors!  

It DOES mean being conscious of others’ needs and helping to fill those needs whenever you can when called upon, and whenever you see the needs and are able to help, whether called upon or not. 

It’s called “pitching in.”  It’s called “stepping up to the plate.” 

     I call it “Neighborship”! 

And you know what’s really remarkable? It seldom takes more than the simple offer of a helping hand to revitalize the home or on-the-job attitude of the person or persons on the receiving end. Of course, you may have to be willing to accept a “thank you,” or handshake, or smile, as your reward. 

But, oh, isn’t that what a truly blessed event is all about anyway?

I am truly blessed to have YOU be reading this right now, and I am not even a minister!  Thank you, and please do return. Have a great day and a great night!    

If you have a good, inspiring Neighborship example to share, please post it as a comment!  or email it to me Hal@ Businessworks.com    

Are you always 

  

anticipating

                               

the next pitch?

     Does your on-the-job behavior match the thinking of a baseball player?  Are you always anticipating the next pitch, and what you’ll do if the ball goes here, and what you’ll do if the ball goes there, and what you’ll do if the signals change . . . or the winds change . . . or your superstitous teammates don’t change the shirts they’ve worn for the last three games? 

     Nothing wrong with thinking like a baseball player unless the company or industry you’re in is Armenian or Finnish, or simply doesn’t leave you time to think.  Maybe the company or industry you’re trying to represent as the star left fielder is busy playing hockey or fast-break basketball?  Circumstances like these make for tough going, trying to get your glove to get in the game!  

     Worse, I suppose, you could be a serious golfer in the middle of a football game (keep the first aid squad phone numbers handy!).  Let’s face it, you can’t play soccer on a tennis court or water polo on a ski slope (Yikes!  Now that would be cold, and you’d never want to miss the ball and have to chase after it!). 

     So, what’s the message?  If your work situation is unhappy, or giving you headaches, knots in your stomach, or other stress-provoked ailments like lower back pain (or, really, just about anything you can think of . . . uhuh, including those two merciless extremes: diarrhea and constipation), step back from the action (no pun intended), and take some deep breaths [Really!  See “ARE YOU BREATHING?” under the Articles tab on this site].

     Then, ask yourself if you’re “playing the same game” as everyone else, and especially of course, the boss!  Entrepreneurs (and male, female, black, white, purple, orange, MBA or otherwise, makes no difference) rarely survive corporate life because they march to a different drummer.  Regardless of money earned, most would prefer to be an individual Tiger Woods-type performer than to be any superstar team player. 

     Conversely, not many corporate types succeed with business startups.  Often, because they fail to realize that they must now pay the expense account submissions, turn out the lights, take out the trash, skip lunch and work far past the luxurous 9-5 weekdays they’re used to.  [See June Archives blog post: “TO ENTREPRENEUR OR NOT TO ENTREPRENEUR?”]

     Maybe you need to examine the environment you work in more carefully and consider if it’s really the match for your skills and interests and personality that it once appeared to be.  We do change, you know.  And, yes indeed, old dogs can learn new tricks. 

     But before you decide to toss your corporate cookies out the window to become a deep sea fisherman or fisherwoman (thought I’d throw that in just in case you’re a compulsive HR executive; I wouldn’t want demerits, even though I never heard of a fisherwoman), think again! 

     The grass . . . yes, it does look greener over there, but remember that these days, EVERYthing is greener!  It’s getting hard to tell which came first —

                                  environmentalists or St. Patrick?!             halalpiar

Perhaps, Dear CBS, whatever credibility

you ever once had, when many of us were

growing up, has long since gone out the

window –even before Dan Rather. 

     Perhaps, Dear CBS,  you’ve turned your heads away from the positive signals that the housing market is starting to look healthier because your necks got stuck when you decided to fixate on the negatives?  And perhaps you overlooked the Manager of Tanger’s —Rehoboth Beach, Delaware’s massive outlet malls that stretch for miles along Coastal Highway Rt.1— who reports that “while people are being more selective and spending longer periods shopping to economize on fuel, merchandise sales are at an all-time high!”?

     Doesn’t sound to me like your on-screen statement “Economy Crumbling!” 

     Isn’t this turning of the head scam sort of like the Iraq news reports, and your insistence on trying to make our heroic troops look bad?  [How interesting, now that we’re actually winning there, by the way, that your doom-and-gloom reports have been being quietly phased out.]  Where are your reports of U.S. Troop successes?    

     Whatever credibility you ever once had, when many of us were growing up, has long since gone out the window –even before Dan Rather– because of your own policies that appear to cultivate indiscriminate, biased word choices and conclusions at every turn.

     Do you really believe your viewers are as stupid as your so-called “news reports”?  Do you think viewer annoyance was neatly dispensed with, and swept away under Rather’s demotion rug?  Perhaps you should revisit this thinking, assuming that the short-sighted policy-making practices of your management team allows for such an excursion.   

     Do you imagine your viewers to be successfully hoodwinked by the babble of your third-rate talking heads?  Do you think the public is so blind to your crazed pursuit of money and political favor lobbying that it buys into the position of weakness you’ve carved out for yourself? 

   It’s transparently clear that –if you ever had it to begin with– you have lost all sense of responsibility and interest in preserving the platforms of objective reporting that were once the very fabric and foundation of your company’s existence. 

     No wonder the Internet is blowing you out of the water!  Shame on you for continuing to persevere in the manipulative spreading of opinions that you so maliciously and arrogantly label as “reporting.” 

     No, Dear CBS, it is YOU who is  c r u m b l i n g !

     But, ah, you do, you know, have a choice.  Every passing hour is a new opportunity for you to come alive, and present news without bias, and challenge viewers to think for themselves by putting facts on the table.  Just imagine the possibilities.  Or is that asking too much?     halalpiar

 See 7/13 Post below for Part I of II

Network TV news coverage

allows us no room

to breathe the truth!

     No matter what side or edge of the U.S. political fence you may be standing on, or straddling (or simply ignoring), you would have to be brain-dead to not be aware of CBS’s track-record for consistently delivering manipulative, exaggerated opinionating that they unabashedly proclaim to be responsible reporting.

     I believe CBS network TV news coverage to be (at its best): incessantly amateurish, relentlessly irresponsible, socially insensitive, patently false, and insulting to the average viewer.  It leaves us no room to breathe the truth. 

     It tries to jam reactionary opinions down our throats by preventing us from having the information we need, to be able to examine issues and events objectively.  It is replete with innuendo and thinly-veiled attempts to manipulate and control viewer thinking.   

     From what appears to be intentionally lop-sided reporting of America’s war on terrorism . . . to the tossing of ill-deserved green bouquets to Al Gore’s ludicrous global warming theories, supported by not one single body of credible scientists . . . to two words held on a CBS network TV screen yesterday morning during a grossly exaggerated news report of U.S. housing and gas price problems.  The two words:  “Economy Crumbling.” 

     Sorry, CBS, but it is YOU who are crumbling! 

     Everyone knows we’re in tight housing and oil/gas price situations right now.  Everyone also knows the leadership roles you played by adding fuel to these fires.  Only a fool would buy into your incredulous stretch to the next step, however — that the entire economy is now “crumbling.”!   Really!  

     Your ivory towers have blocked your views of reality.  Have you tried getting into a middle America restaurant during this period of “crumbling” economy . . . or noticed the lines at the pumps, even with $4+ per gallon pricetags?           halalpiar   

See 7/14 Post above for Part II of II

First, keep in mind that

all of the above choices

inflict pain! 

     It’s difficult to engage the services of a literary agent, doctor, dentist, lawyer, plumber, vet, auto mechanic, or computer geek without broadside exposure to physical and/or emotional and/or financial pain. 

     It is also often difficult to hire one of these vendors (or “professionals” as they like to call themselves) without running the risk of annihilation of your body, your feelings, and your wallet (and if those, then probably your brain as well). 

     Thus the Boy Scouts of America Motto: “Be Prepared” echoed by none other than Henry David Thoreau who proclaimed the need to “Be forever on the alert!”

     The point arrives in everyones’ lives where a “prepared” and “alert” choice must be made between perceived characteristics of services that are “older, more experienced, physically weaker, and more conservative” vs. “younger, less experienced, physically stronger, and more liberal.” 

     Do you go for the stronger, quicker, 20-something, messier, higher-priced plumber (or doctor or lawyer or literary agent) who shows up with an attitude, when he or she feels like it, with her or his backward baseball cap (to prevent neck sunburn?) and some form of stereotypical “crack” exposed . . . or the the weaker, slower, 50-something, neater, lower-priced plumber (or vet or auto mechanic or computer geek) who shows up humble and accommodating, exactly on time, with his bald head uncovered or her hair neatly out of her face and, oh yes, a longer shirttail?       

     So have you done your homework, or just thumbed through your phonebook yellow pages or newspaper classifieds?  Did you know it’s been proven that we spend more time and energy evaluating the purchase of a can of beans than we do choosing a doctor?  (That is weird!) 

     I always liked the old ad for a $200 motorcycle helmet that said something like,

If you think your head

is worth $24.95,

buy a $24.95 helmet!” 

     If you think your reputation, material possessions, your body, teeth, pipes, pet, car, or computer isn’t worth more than a can of beans, then go ahead and pick a doctor (lawyer, dentist, plumber, vet, mechanic, or computer guru) from advertising!  Then be “prepared” and “alert” for pain.  Your choice.  Enjoy!       halalpiar

Note:  Hal Alpiar is the author of DOCTOR SHOPPING . . . How To Choose The Right Doctor For You And Your Family, which won a national book award for consumer health information.  See www.TheWriterWorks.com for additional details on Hal’s professional practice consulting, training and marketing programs or call 302.933.0116

     Is it just me, or what?  Counting six of the last ten, it seems every book I read these days (and I average about two a week) is wrapped around a wussy character . . . the kind of protagonist who makes me want to throw lamps and TV clickers!  

     Instead I punch the cover and yell into the binding:

Will you P U L L E S E speak up, stand up, be assertive, cock your hat, make a fist, stick out your tongue, puff out your chest, pull your shoulders back, put something of substance out on the table for all of us tortured readers to see and hear and imagine and think about! 

     You’re the lead character, for crying out loud!  Stop leaving us frustrated and anxious and angry at you.  Why can’t you speak your mind and tell it like it is?  Stop with the dumb, mamby-pamby, mealy-mouthed excuses.  Stop crawling away from confrontations.  How can you expect us readers to support your wimpy approach to other less-capable characters who run roughshod over you?  We’re not all social workers out here. 

     It’s not true—dear author-creators of leading-role, candy-ass characters—that everybody loves an underdog.  Well, maybe in sports, but you know what?  When you act like an underdog in real life or as a main character in some author’s story, people won’t side with you; they won’t like you; they will stop reading! 

     And this happens because?  Because there’s enough anger, anxiety, negativity and frustration in real life.   We read books to learn, be informed and entertained, to escape . . . not to see more of the same that we deal with every day. 

     I just finished an absolutely wonderful story about a racecar driver who took it on the chin so many times from his evil, mean-spirited in-laws that when he lowered his head, there was probably nothing left between his bottom teeth and his chest!  The only reason I took it to the end was that this magnificant story was told by a classy, assertive part-Laborador retriever (but of course who could only bark!).  The hero car driver was such a wuss, he made me want to throw myself off a bridge! 

     Okay, you say, but you did read it, and so what else is new?  Well, I also just gave up on a book that revolves entirely around the weakest personality to ever grace the human race.  This cross-country trekker who only God knows how this fragile, feeble character managed to survive by bicycle from Rhode Island to Colorado before I threw it down.  This guy would have made Ghandi and Saint Theresa look like terrorists! 

     Character flaws are important attributes; they make the person credible.  But give me a heroine or hero with clout, chutzpah, hubris, nerve, balls, whatever you want to call it! 

     I want to read about winners who stand up for themselves, and who get back up when they’re knocked down . . . because nothing compares to meeting and getting to know someone who inspires!      halalpiar  

CHANGE is hardly ever a good thing 

when somebody else does it TO you.  

     In business, industry, education, government, real estate, food and gas pricing, or otherwise, “CHANGE” is hardly ever a good thing when somebody else does it TO you.  Change is only meaningful and rewarding when YOU can make it happen for yourSELF. 

     When change is done TO you, it prompts inaction, resistance and excuses.  When you create and deliver change for your SELF, you are more likely to take ownership of the steps involved, and follow the process through more determinedly to make it happen.  

     “Okay, Joe, from now on, you’re going to have to print out, copy, and collate three copies of the daily 75 pages of inventory activity that you were just submitting by email before.  The two new bosses want hard copies, and of course I’ll need one too.  Oh, and you may want to run a fourth as a sort of cover-your-butt set that you can check with if questions arise.”    

     How does that feel compared with: “Joe, the new bosses are interested in seeing your inventory spreadsheets without having to jump around on their computer screens; could you come up with a method that you think might work better for them, something that doesn’t require a lot of your time?” 

     Do you think one of these approaches might serve to motivate more than the other?

     “Gwyneth, I want you to clean up your room right this minute, or you’ll not get dessert after dinner!” OR “Gwyneth, I’m getting concerned about the condition of your room; would you please take some time right now to come up with a way to get it shaped up by dinnertime every night, starting tonight, and let me know your plan when I stop back in ten minutes?”

     Notice the focus is on HOW can a task get done.  NONproductive emphasis is on WHY did you screw up, or on what threats might prompt action, or on implying some level of personal incompetence. 

     When you ask someone WHY? you will only ever get a reason or excuse for an answer.  When you ask HOW? you’re prompting the other person to evaluate, assess, and recommend process steps, without suggesting any personal shortcomings.

     HOW to get others to make changes happen for themselves?  Remember that behavior is always a choice.  You can choose to not react.  If you don’t react, you will never overreact!  You will be more effective in controlling and helping yourself and others to more effectively control behavior and accomplish tasks.  Remember if you need to criticise, criticise behavior, not the person.  And do it in private.  Save audiences for giving praise!        halalpiar

What do ABC, CBS, NBC, TNT, CNN, MSNBC, and newspapers (if you can call them that) like The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, and USA Today have in common?  

     If your business is running local, regional, or mass media advertising without the support of a major public relations program, odds are you’re wasting your money, and whatever results you may be getting are just a fraction of what you could be generating. 

     Businesses get stuck running “maximum impact” schedules of TV and radio commercials, and newspaper ads because they’ve been sold a bill of goods, or because the competitors are doing it, or because that’s just the way it’s always been, or because they enjoy the ego-gratification that accompanies flashy, “big-time” exposure of their business, and perhaps themselves, or because of friendships, or whatever feeble excuse comes to the surface.

     Reality, though, is that the only thing these businesses are accomplishing–at their own expense–is that they’re making the media moguls rich.  Yup, probability is that the media people we’re talking about are the very same ones who consistently deliver insane, insulting, opinionated, negative garbage to our living rooms: Flagship and affiliate radio and TV stations of networks like ABC, CBS, NBC, TNT, CNN, MSNBC, and newspapers (if you can call them that) like The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, USA Today, and the smutty scores of other trash opinion messengers (a much truer categorization than their self-appointed “news” misnomer) . . . and your time or space advertising purchase puts your business smack in the middle of all this crap!  You think your customers don’t care or notice the environment you present your messages in?   

     So you run a small or medium sized business that is presently stuffing these destestable fantasyland coffers with your hard-earned dollars?  What can you do?  STOP!  Stop accepting the rape cards (pun intended!) that their salespeople thrust in your face!  Stop accepting the packaged program scheduling that’s pushed in front of your checkbook!  Go back to those media you consider truly essential to getting your message out, and bring your own package with you . . . to sell them!  If they truly honor and respect you as a customer, they’ll be thrilled at the innovative prompting.

     Surely you are more of an expert at your business than any of the media, so (on your own, or with professional help) develop your own content (e.g., a radio or TV feature show, a daily or weekly news column, a blog site, a series of feature magazine articles), package it, and sell it to receptive media programmers or editors (they’re not all bad!) along with your company’s sponsorship.

     Start a PR program to support, back up or even replace your advertising program.  BUT make it good; make it consistent; make it benefit others; make it NEWSWORTHY!  And be tenacious in your follow-up to give the program teeth!                    halalpiar

If you’re interested in how to make what’s suggested here actually work for your firm, or you have questions about any of the comments in this post, contact Hal Alpiar at 302.933.0116 or visit www.TheWriterWorks.com