Impact Today™

Leadership is not a person, it is a culture – a set of ways people act, react, work, relax, and think based on their life’s experiences. People that have been placed in roles of leadership do not always fit the culture of leadership. Likewise people that are not in traditional leadership roles may very well display the characteristics of the culture of leaders.

Carly Fleishmann is a 13-year-old autistic girl in Toronto. Even though she cannot verbalize her words she has learned to spell and type. Her writings are among the most inspirational you will ever read.

Carly’s wisdom is far beyond her years. She understands the leadership quality of empathy. She knows the importance of empathy over sympathy. That is, she knows to help someone you need to know how they feel as opposed to feeling sorry for them. “You say you to want to help me,” she says, “but how can you when you don’t know what its like to be me.”

Carly, like all great leaders, also understands human potential. “I recently learned that dreams can come true,” she writes, “and that if a child like me or their parents dream is for them to communicate one day.” Of course her dream has been fulfilled.

Carly is also humble. “I am a girl with autism that learned how to spell and is now able to tell people what I think. It’s not like I built a thousand houses in New Orleans or found a way for people who don't have food get food. I think the only thing I can say is don't give up your inner voice. It will find its way out. Mine did.”

Labels: Leadership

This year we get an extra day. How are you going to spend it?

For “S” Corps, LLCs, and sole proprietorships, in fact everyone except “C” Corps, February 29 is an extra day to build sales, profits, for a new strategy. For many it will be a day of extra accomplishments for the year. Unfortunately for others it will be a day that will be whittled away with lost opportunity.

Here are some recommendations for spending your Leap Day:

1. Catch up on customer and prospect calls. Devote the day to calling customers and networking partners that you have not talked to in a long time. It is also a good day to stop procrastinating and finally make those phone calls to your prospects.


2. Rejuvenate yourself. Forget about sales, balance sheets, websites, and other aspects of your work and spend the day at a spa, indoor swim club, or some other relaxing venue. Face it, you don't normally take time for yourself and you have no sales comparison to February 29 of last year so what if you got to lose.


3. Donate some time for charity. Spend the day volunteering at a hospital, soup kitchen, or some other program. Imagine the excitement they will have for you when you walk in the front door and say, “I’m here to help in any way I can.” This may sound like a waste of time when it comes to your business, you'll be surprised how invigorated you will be next Monday morning.


4. Seclude yourself for strategy. Head to the library or some other peaceful location for you can spend some time examining your business strategy. What is working and what isn't? Ditch those things that are not providing a return on your financial or time investment and set some measurable and attainable goals for the balance of 2008.

Labels: Coaching, Strategy, Time_management

When Bill Clinton ran for his first term as president he hung a sign in his Little Rock office. “It’s the economy, stupid!” This was his visual reminder to keep his campaign focused on the economy. Of course history proved it was a successful approach to gaining the presidency.

However it is not always the economy. Last week Sharper Image and Lillian Vernon filed for bankruptcy. Wilsons Leather announced the closing of 160 stores while JCPenney saw an almost 10% profit drop. Profit woes also affected Whole Foods Market, Old Navy, and Zale.

All of them blamed the economy.

But they were wrong!

Abercrombie & Fitch, which stores under the Abercrombie, Hollister, and Abercrombie & Fitch manners, saw a 9% increase in profits from their stores in North America and Great Britain.

They produced these great results in the same economy with high-end merchandise. Last Saturday my wife, daughter, and I went into Hollister to see what the buzz is about. To our surprise the store was shoulder to shoulder with shoppers. A long line was at the checkout where everyone was paying full price – not a sale in the store!

Not only were arms full of expensive private label goods (they sell no brands other than their own), the customers were already wearing clothes with their distinctive logo.

Labels: Customer_loyalty, Strategy

Success is only possible when employees are connected to a common vision of the future of theorganization. Management typically develops incentive programs they feel will drive employeebehaviors to achieve their organizational goals. Typically these incentive programs are based onmanagement's perception of their employee's desires. However, research shows that managementhas historically been out-of-touch with employee desires.Managers mistakenly believe their employees have monetary motives and designed their incentive programs for attaining goals and hitting company benchmarks to raises and bonuses. However, surveys dating back to 1946 have consistently shown employees to be most motivated by shows of appreciation for their work (see chart).

Labels: Assessments, Job_satisfaction, Motivation, Rewards, Survey

Thirty people lost their jobs on Turkmenistan's state run television channel after a cockroach crossed the news desk during a live broadcast. Soon after taking office President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov ordered the central Asian broadcaster to transform its culture from the soviet era image. The cockroach was apparently a vivid reminder of the older style so the president ordered the firings.

If your company is trying to break with a past culture, how far will you go?

If you want to change your image how serious about it are you?

No one can doubt the seriousness of President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov.

Labels: Change, Commitment

It is estimated that in most organizations, 15 to 20 percent of employees are considered top performers. At any given time, 80 to 85 percent of an organization’s employees are not fully engaged and motivated. Many have the skills, experience and education to suggest they should be top performers, but the engagement simply is not there. Often, the disconnect is in management and leadership ability.

When you think about it, you need your employees more than they need you. Your success relies on your employees working effectively under your management. The more you are aware of their issues, the better you can address them. Listening and responding is a core leadership skill. Sometimes leaders talk too much and fail to listen. To get feedback, you must ask for it, be open to it and respond effectively.

To learn how your people can teach you which kind of leader you are, click here.

Labels: Leadership, Traits

One of the most popular books in the business world today is “Who Moved My Cheese?” by Dr. Spencer Johnson. Using trained mice, the book takes ahard look at how we face the inevitable changes in our lives. We read as Sniff, Scurry, Hem, and Haw had their very happy lifestyle changed whenthey went to Station C, where the cheese had always been located, only tofind out it had been moved.

Labels: Change

Have you heard the great news? Economists are predicting a recession!

Labels: Economy, Strategy

Age isn't always a factor in your success or failure. Consider these famous examples:

• Actor George Bums won his first Oscar at age 80.


• Golda Meir was 71 when she became prime minister of Israel.
  At age 96, playwright George Bernard Shaw broke his leg when he fell out of a tree he was trimming in his backyard.


• Painter Grandma Moses didn't start painting until she was 80 years old. She completed more than 1.500 paintings after that: 25 percent of those were produced when she was past 100.


• Michelangelo was 71 when he painted the Sistine Chapel.
  Physician and humanitarian Albert Schweitzer was still performing operations in his African hospital at 89.


• Doe Counsilman, at 58, became the oldest person ever to swim the English Channel.
  S. I. Hayakawa retired as president of San Francisco State University at 70. He was then was elected to the U.S. Senate.


• Casey Stengel didn't retire from managing the New York Mets until he was 75.

Excerpt: Glenn Van Ekeren. The Speaker's Sourcebook. Prentice Hall. New York, NY

Labels: Attitude, Coaching, Motivation