~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ LEADERSHIP WIRED John C. Maxwell's FREE Semimonthly Newsletter Designed To Maximize Your Leadership Potential. February 2005 - Volume 8, Issue 3 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In This Issue: * Maxwell Moment – Pay the Price * Leadership@Large – Surveying the Leadership Landscape * Book Review – Journey to Accountability * Quick Quotes – Control Yourself ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Maxwell Moment ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ PAY THE PRICE By Dr. John C. Maxwell Every Sunday when I was growing up, my dad would give me a list of the chores I had to do that week. Some, like taking out the garbage, were daily tasks. Others, such as my regular assignment of cleaning out the basement, could be completed anytime—as long as they were done by noon on Saturday. I knew I could do the basement on Monday, Wednesday or even Saturday morning. But I quickly figured out that the sooner I got it done, the more I could enjoy the rest of the week. Without even realizing it, I was learning an important life lesson: pay now, play later. I could have waited until the last minute to do my chores. But if I had, I would have risked missing out on some fun activity my dad had planned for Saturday afternoon—an activity I knew I'd have to skip if I didn't get my work done. So I chose to make the effort on the front end. Whether you're doing household chores or building a company, practicing the "pay now, play later" principle requires one key element: discipline. What exactly is discipline? It's the means to getting what you really want even when you don't want to do the thing necessary to get it. In the last issue of Leadership Wired, I wrote about how the ability to make right decisions is critical to success in life. That's true, but good decisions have no value without discipline. Decision-making takes care of goal-setting, but only discipline results in goal-getting. As I wrote in my book, Today Matters, "Everyone wants to be thin, but nobody wants to diet. Everybody wants to live long, but not many want to exercise. Everybody wants money, yet few want to work hard. Successful people conquer their feelings and form the habit of doing things that unsuccessful people do not like to do. The bookends of success are starting and finishing. Decisions help us start; discipline helps us finish." In other words, when it comes to success, good decisions and discipline go hand in hand. Good decisions minus discipline equals a plan without a payoff. And discipline minus good decisions equals regimentation without reward. Only when we have good decisions plus discipline do we have a masterpiece of potential. Now, it's not easy to practice discipline. In fact, it can be downright painful at times. We all know what it's like to do something that we don't want to do but know we should do. That's the pain of discipline. But if you don't engage in that kind of pain, you open yourself up to the pain of regret, which is far more excruciating. This leads me to an obvious question: How do you develop discipline? Here are four steps. 1. Set deadlines and priorities. Don't make a list of everything you have to do and start working from the top. Prioritize your to-do list. Determine which projects you need to accomplish first and how much time you need to get them done. Then give yourself a deadline and get busy. 2. Challenge your excuses. I get so tired of whiny people telling me why they couldn't, shouldn't, didn't and wouldn't. Put the violin away and start taking a hard look at the so-called reasons you cite for not being able to get things done. As I like to say, it's easier to go from failure to success than from excuses to success. As long as you're making excuses, you're never going to make it. 3. Remove rewards until the job's done. Marathon runners don't stop for a break after each mile, and neither should you. I'm not saying you shouldn't divide your work into manageable chunks or celebrate the achievement of intermediate goals. Just don't have that Krispy Kreme doughnut too quickly. 4. Stay focused on results. Jackson Browne once said, "Talent without discipline is like an octopus on roller skates. There's plenty of movement, but you never know if it's going to be forward, backwards, or sideways." Staying focused on achieving results—with the priority items on your to-do list, I might add— will keep you from acting like an octopus on roller skates. If you want to be successful—as a leader, as a parent, as a member of society—you have to pay the price. You can be disciplined and pay on the front end, or you can take the seemingly easier path and pay on the back end. Unfortunately, if you play now and pay later, the payment's much heavier. As I often say, hard work is the accumulation of the easy things you didn't do when you should have. So, learn from my boyhood basement-cleaning strategy. Pay now, and play later. Because if you pay now, you'll get to play a lot longer. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Leadership@Large ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TIME MANAGEMENT 101 It's difficult to lead effectively if you're not managing your time well. Interestingly, our inability to be as efficient as possible often has more to do with what we're not doing than what we are doing, according to time management expert Donald E. Wetmore, author of Beat the Clock and Organizing Your Life. In a recent article on darwinmag.com (a companion site of CIO.com), Whetmore outlines several mistakes that can keep you from achieving peak productivity each day. Here are a few: • Neglecting to clean up your work area. "Studies have shown that the person who works with a messy desk spends, on average, one- and-a-half hours per day looking for things or being distracted by things," Whetmore says. "That's seven-and-a-half hours per week." • Starting the day without a plan. This causes you to "begin your day by responding to the loudest voice … and spend it in a defensive mode, responding to other people's and events' demands," he writes. "You will have worked hard but may not have done enough of the right things. Time management is not doing the wrong things quicker. That just gets us nowhere faster. Time management is doing the right things." • Skipping lunch breaks. Contrary to popular belief, habitually working through lunch will not give you more time to accomplish your work. "After doing what we do for several hours, we start to dull out," Whetmore explains. "A lunch break, even a short 15-minute break, gives us a chance to get our batteries all charged up again to more effectively handle the afternoon's challenges." To read more, see http://www2.darwinmag.com/read/feature/time_dec04.cfm OVERCOMING MEETING MALAISE Many people hate meetings, and for good reason. They're boring and unproductive. So says well-known business fiction writer Patrick Lencioni, author of such fables as The Five Temptations of a CEO, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team and—his latest—Death by Meeting. One way to overcome meeting hatred is to understand the correlation between meetings and movies, Lencioni told Leadership Guide magazine in a recent interview. Most movies are two hours long, as are many staff meetings. However, according to Lencioni, meetings have two advantages over movies—they're interactive and relevant to our lives. That said, they're often boring because they lack a key element of a good movie: conflict. Therein lies the solution to meeting malaise. "When we lead meetings, we need to think more like directors and screenwriters," Lencioni said. "We need to give our people something to care about, something worth engaging in conflict over. We need to raise their level of anxiety about what could go wrong if we don't engage. And we need to raise these issues at the beginning of our meetings, before our audience checks out and starts thinking about what movie they're going to see that night." To read more, see http://www.leadershipdevelopment.com/main/html/magazine_results.html?article_id=153 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Book Review ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ JOURNEY TO ACCOUNTABILITY The Oz Principle: Getting Results through Individual and Organizational Accountability By Roger Conners, Tom Smith and Craig Hickman (Portfolio, 2004) When you watch NBC's hit series, The Apprentice, it's hard not to notice how so few of the people vying to be Donald Trump's next protégé ever really take responsibility for their actions. This is readily apparent in the famous boardroom scenes at the end of each episode, where Trump interrogates the worst performers of the week about why he should not fire them from the show. But it's also evident at other times, as the ambitious participants try to explain their team's struggles by pointing accusatory fingers at their teammates. Unfortunately, the lack of personal accountability that Trump's would-be apprentices often demonstrate is one aspect of this so-called "reality" show that is actually quite representative of the real world. From large corporations to small family businesses, employees at every level are so busy pretending problems don't exist—claiming it's not their job to fix them, blaming others, citing confusion as an excuse for doing nothing, asking someone else tell them what to do, covering their tails or simply waiting to see if things will get better—that they never attain the outcomes they want. According to the authors of The Oz Principle, accountability is the key to getting unstuck from this unending cycle of victimization. But, unlike the commonly held view that tends to emphasize past actions, their version of accountability involves "a personal choice to rise above one's circumstances and demonstrate the ownership necessary for achieving desired results." This is exactly what Dorothy, the Tin Woodsman, the Lion and the Scarecrow had to do in L. Frank Baum's classic, The Wizard of Oz, which makes their journey a fitting springboard to a serious discussion about accepting responsibility. In The Oz Principle, Rogers Conners, Tom Smith and Craig Hickman first help readers to recognize when they are stuck in the victim cycle. Then, using ample illustrations and multiple self-assessments, they outline what they call the "steps to accountability"—acknowledging reality, owning your circumstances, obtaining the wisdom to solve your problems, and exercising the means to make things happen— that lead to improved individual and organizational performance. First published in 1994, the 2004 edition of The Oz Principle has been updated with relevant statistics, ideas and anecdotes based on Conners' and Smith's work over the last decade (they are cofounders of Partners in Leadership, a management consulting firm that trains people to apply the concepts in the book). Although the authors' habit of italicizing trademarked terms borders on annoying at times, by the last page, readers will be well equipped to spot Below the Line victim attitudes, rise Above the Line and start climbing the Steps to Accountability (See It, Own It, Solve It, Do It). It would be interesting to see what might happen if the producers of The Apprentice made The Oz Principle mandatory reading for everyone who appears on the show. That's not likely to happen anytime soon (finger-pointing and tail-covering produce higher ratings than joint accountability), but the book is still a must-read for anyone who works and leads in the real world. -- Review by Lois Flowers, INJOY consulting editor ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Quick Quotes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ CONTROL YOURSELF "Self-respect is the root of discipline: The sense of dignity grows with the ability to say no to oneself." —Abraham Joshua Heschel "I am, indeed, a king, because I know how to rule myself." —Pietro Aretino "Not being able to govern events, I govern myself, and apply myself to them, if they will not apply themselves to me." —Michel de Montaigne _________________________________________________________________ Leadership Wired is written by Dr. John C. Maxwell and is available via e-mail on a free subscription basis. 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