Friday, May 20, 2011

An Important Letter to Leaders


If you lead, you probably have a picture of the future you want and how to get there.  It is usually what's in our head and our heart, and shows up in continual conversations with our team.  Planning is the key.  While necessary, budgeting is the least important in building the future.  Those who don't have belief or are not excited about the future depend too much on budgets.  This explains why these people always need everything proven before they act. They have concluded that they can't have what they want and have a logical story to back up their opinion. 

05_when_client_is_wrongIn our world, there is evidence that can convince us in the present to follow a lackadaisical approach and require proof before we act.  You create future business and your team’s success by getting your team to do things that seem impossible, only because they haven’t yet been done. How do you do that?  It’s easy.  When it occurs to you "we should do that”, get into action immediately.  One action will lead to the next and, before you know it, you will be telling everyone involved of your successes. Before too long your belief and expectations of what is possible changes and leads to more and bigger action and results people didn't believe could happen.

You’ll find that what seemed impossible is now normal and your team searches for “what else could we do"?   They keys are the action and celebrating all minor victories. This doesn’t sound like monotonous work, does it?

When we began our business, our new team used to get together Fridays in a Burlington restaurant for a beer and a special meal the owner made for us each week. We would laugh about all the things we tried and I remember constantly hearing “that’s another thing we did that we couldn’t do…. But we did it.”  It was fun.

Too often we think we are lacking in skill or knowledge when in reality nothing is missing. Depend on your common sense intuition and get started. There is nothing stopping you or your team from creating the world you envision. Start the conversation with them about the future.  Involve them in planning and tell them you want everyone to lead the action. Most people have never experienced that.

Have a great week.

No comments:

Post a Comment