It's true: some things in life are free. On this page, you'll find my free gift to you — a constantly changing selection of articles by some of the top individuals in business and coaching. I've chosen these resources to cover a broad range of topics, so there's sure to be something for everyone. Be sure to check back often, as you never know what answers you're going to find here both for the questions you know you have and the ones you never imagined.

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1. Turnover Is Bad by Patrick Lencioni
2. Building Your Business by RAN ONE Inc.
3. Awaken the Leader Within by Kevin Cashman
4. Four Magic Words by John Parker Stewart
5. Is Procrastination Holding You Back? by C.J. Hayden, Mcc
6. Want to be a Star Performer? by Clare Marshall Wood (PDF, 68 KB)

Turnover Is Bad
by Patrick Lencioni

There is no better way to raise the collective blood pressure of an exective team than to tell them, "You have a turnover problem." Letting people walk out the company foor is like watching revenue evaporate. Recruiting and training costs make replacing a person so painful that companies are doing more to keep their people. Who dares question the wisdom of a cause so worthy as retention?

Unfortunately, instead of improving their turnover, many executives are making it worse. Turnover serves an important purpose, even in today's skin-tight job market. It allows organizations, like organisms, to rid themselves of elements that do not serve the greater good.

Weeding Out Misfits

One indication of a strong culture is the rapid departure of people who don't fit. Ultimately, those people are best served by finding a company where they can fit and thrive.

When a company artificially keeps people who don't belong, it creates a culture of blandness and mediocrity. Blandness occurs when a company decides that it must retain virtually all of its people by trying to please everyone. Flex hours? Sure. Free sodas? Why not? Someone might leave. Self-managed teams? If that's what employees want, then we've got to do it. Might as well throw in a sabbatical program and extra vacation to retain employees.

When you employ a "please everyone" strategy, even below-average employees try their hardest to stay to continue riding the amenity train. And when below-average employees stay, above-average employees leave.

Mediocrity Follows

Before you know it, your turnover numbers are looking okay, but you've lost a few key people who would rather work at a company that measures success in terms of market share and where employees stay because they are passionate about the company and its culture, not its benefits plan. When key people leave, mediocrity follows.

This situation can be avoided if a company has a clear performance ethic, one that calls for the swift but kind dismissal of employees who don't measure up to behavioral or performance criteria.

Many well-intentioned companies that try to establish rigorous performance-management programs find themselves assuaging the needs of marginal employees because "the cost, time and energy required to replace them just isn't worth it." So they justify their performance and invest in their reformation, sending them to special training or even reducing their workload.

Sadly, that training money should be spent on high performers, as the extra workload falls on the people who are getting their work done. As corporate socialism creeps in, poor performers are coddled - and high performers bail.

One day the executives who are applauding the VP of HR who reports a decrease in turnover, but they're also wondering why the company's stars are leaving. And before they know it, the performance begins showing the delayed effects of the brain drain. Unfortunately, by then it is often too late.

The challenge for leaders is to place the emphasis on retaining high performers - not the top half, but the top 10 percent - and run the company in a way that keeps them motivated. Ultimately, this will inspire most employees and encourage poor performers to leave, hopefully to join a competitor.

Here's the clincher: Not only will the company perform better, but it will also be a better place to work for people who have high standards and share the company's values. That's a better strategy for retention than a fridge full of sodas.

Copyright 2003, Patrick Lencioni. All rights reserved. From Executive Excellence Magazine

Building Your Business
by RAN ONE Inc.

To build a business you have to be good at marketing yourself, your experience, and your skills. This requires a mix of strategies – some traditional, some innovative. Here are some suggestions that can help.

Define your vision

To know what you have to offer, determine the unique qualities you can attribute to your business and yourself. Look at the type of business you have, your experience in the industry, your position in the market, the special knowledge of your team members, and the business location. These are the elements of what you have to "sell" to customers – existing and new.

Clearly articulate the long-term view that you hold for your business. Don’t allow yourself to be focused on short-term needs or personal ambition.

Involve others in your planning and be open to their ideas. Talk to your team members and your customers for some fresh insights and ideas.

Establish your brand

Now that you know what you have to offer customers and where you want to be in the long-term, you can begin to market your business and make it grow in a structured way.

Develop your "brand" – a logo, a corporate look, perhaps even a slogan. Be visually unique and have a style that represents what you are and where you’re going. Carry this through into a corporate brochure and a website.

Get more business from your existing customers

It’s always easier to sell more to an existing customer than to create a new customer. Ensure all your team members know the complete range of products and value-adds you offer so that nobody misses an onselling opportunity with a customer.

Take some time in your team meetings to develop and introduce new products and services you would like to promote to your customers. Tell your team how to spot potential opportunities and create awareness with customers.

Ensure that you regularly raise awareness of your products and services among your existing clients through direct mailouts and email newsletters. Keep in regular touch with customers and don’t give them a reason to look elsewhere.

Go after new customers

Look for opportunities to promote yourself and your business to potential customers. Get involved in local business and social groups. Offer your services as a speaker, or organizer. Spend time, not money, and become a part of your community. (This also helps with your existing customers, of course.)

Approach local newspapers about providing an advisory column in your areas of expertise. Offer to answer readers’ questions on your industry. Become recognized as a source of information.

People like to buy from someone they know. For most small to medium-sized enterprises there’s no better way to build a business than by marketing yourself. Define your vision, establish your brand, then go out there and get the customers!

About the Author
Provided by RAN ONE Inc. For Information contact Randy Hay from JR Hay & Company via email jrh@JRHay.com or by phone at 604.263.3233.

Awaken the Leader Within
by Kevin Cashman

Over the past decade, I have closely examined how the principles of authenticity and purpose are manifest in personal growth and leadership development.

I view leadership as a sacred calling to make a life-enriching difference. In my book, Awakening the Leader Within, I tell the story of a CEO named Bensen Quinn (a character based on hundreds of real-life CEOs), who faces a deluge of personal, professional, and ethical crises. As Quinn confronts these defining moments, we learn lessons about authentic and purposeful leadership.

Like many people today, Quinn is shocked to find that he can't answer some of life's biggest questions: Does my life have meaning? Am I making a difference? Is this the life I want to live? Growing as a person, he grows as a leader, becoming more authentic, more purposeful, more determined to add value to his company and community and to create a meaningful legacy.

His story illustrates the great potential that "ordinary" men and women have, to go beyond what is, beyond "this is how we always do things," to create entirely new possibilities.

Six Seeds for Growth

I engage in an interactive coaching process that centers on six generative principles – six seeds to grow and lead as a whole person:

Seed 1: Authenticity. From the coaching I have done, authenticity appears to be, more than anything, an alignment, a congruence of the inner and outer person. More often than not, the authentic person's beliefs, values, principles and behavior tend to line up. Commonly referred to as "walking your talk," it is also "being your talk" at a very deep level. I invite you to embrace the life-long process of unfolding your strengths and acknowledging your vulnerabilities as a leader.

Seed 2: Purpose. Purpose is the voice of authentic leadership. When a leader's voice lacks its intended power and impact, it's often a symptom of disconnection from personal purpose. When a leader's voice is strong, it often represents a personal connection to the leader's unique life experience and can be tangibly felt by all. For our voice to be strong, the melody of the music in our heart must be clearly heard. To know what you stand for as a leader, remind yourself of what is important to you, based on the lessons your life experiences have taught you.

Seed 3: Essence. Essence is the soul of leadership; it is spirit expressing itself through the leader. Essence is the trans-formative force in our lives, whereas ego is the coping force. Because essence is within us, we can attune our lives to its silent power and gain its support for all that we do. Ego, on the other hand, is the sense of limited individuality. It is the coping mechanism that seeks security and tries to grab what it can of life's fleeting pleasures and treasures.
While all of us operate from both ego and essence, often we are overdeveloped in our identification with ego and under- developed in our identification with essence – our connection to the whole of life. Learn to recognize which mode you are in at any point in time, and to shift to essence more. Notice when ego and the qualities of essence are being manifest in your life and leadership.

Seed 4: Relationship. Connection is the glue of leadership, bonding parts and revealing wholeness. Too often, when we think of the word connection, we think of being connected with something – outside of ourselves. But outer connection rests on inner connection. The seed of relationship begins with self and extends outward to others and the context in which we are operating. It rests upon the inner self-relationship work of the seeds of essence, purpose, and authenticity. All leadership is in relationship; leverage the power of connection to enhance your value creation.

Seed 5: Value Creation. This seed is germinated through enlightened, sustainable leadership. Value creation goes beyond getting financial results. From the vantage point of value creation, get- ting financial results is not enough; this is not what the magic of leadership is all about. Financial results are the fuel of organizations. But to be sustainable, financial results must serve not only the shareholders, but also the employees, customers, and environmental needs.

New leader need to create more balanced measures to achieve financial results while serving the needs of self, others, and the whole. Finding the creative, life-enriching ways to serve these constituencies is the challenge for authentic leaders today. Good leaders get results; great leaders get sustainable results by serving the interests of multiple constituencies.

Seed 6: Coaching. Helping to foster the growth of those around us gives sustainability to our leadership and perpetuates optimal, ongoing value creation. Coaching is the art of drawing forth potential onto the canvas of high performance. It' s the gentle yet firm hand of leadership guiding the way like a caring friend, helping the person set a more positive course.

The coach's task is not to pontificate, not to take a stand, not even to teach. The real task of the coach is to help people open up to their own gifts, and their own inner guidance, so they can determine for themselves their best possible direction, bring forth their greatest abilities, and make their best contribution.

About the Author
Kevin Cashman is CEO of LeaderSource. This article is adapted from his new book, Awakening the Leader Within (WiIey) www.leadersource.com, 612.375.927l

Four Magic Words
by John Parker Stewart

People support or defend what they help create or decide.

Over the years I have developed a strong belief in the need to include people in decision making at every level. The decision-making process needs to involve others, because people tend to support or defend that which they help create or decide.

People are powerful supporters of their own work. Why not use that natural inclination to your advantage? Wherever I go, I hear CEOs, directors, managers, and supervisors asking me to get their people to buy-in and to agree with what they have decided.

They tell me their people need to better see management's perspective and to follow their way of doing business.

I listen to this plea and then ask the manager if he or she has taken the time to understand the employee's perspective. Typically in response, the manager's eyes begin to roll and a hopeless sigh accompanies shrugging shoulders. "Yes," he says, "1 have made an effort, but I get no response. I have an open door policy. I try to make myself available so people can express their opinions. However, rarely do people come by. I assume if they wanted to say something they would." Thus, he continues to tell them what he thinks they need to do. Yet, he is surprised and irritated when many employees don't show enthusiasm about what he wants them to do. He is taken back when policies are not followed.

There should be no surprise in this situation. One big reason why people don't follow policies, procedures, or practices is because they were never consulted on the issue. They never gave any input, nor was their input considered valuable. Former Senator Patrick Moynihan put it best, "Stubborn oppositions to proposals often have no other basis than the complaint of, 'Why wasn't I consulted?"' When we aren't consulted, we tend to resist.

So, how do you consult others? Four words constitute one of the most magical phrases that you can ask. They are: What Do You Think? This simple phrase reveals mountains of information and insight. It solicits the other's opinion, but it also paints you as one who is interested in the other's input. It conveys the perception that you don't know everything and you wish to collaborate and be a team player. It pushes the decision making process down to where the decision will have the greatest impact. And, it creates an atmosphere of expression and open communication. Managers need to take a proactive approach in asking what their people think

Another benefit to this magical phrase is shifting the rentership attitude into an ownership one. When you rented an apartment or house, did you really care what happened? Did you ever try to improve the place? Did you go above and beyond the expected level of maintenance? I doubt it. Rentership is temporary. Your perspective is based on a 30-day interval. Moving is quick and fairly simple. So, you are not involved in the place you live.
Compare this attitude with the one you have when you own a house. The place is yours. Your name is on the deed. You desire to take care of the place. It is your house, and you can provide all the input into how to take care of it.

Now, translate these two attitudes into your workplace. A "renter" employee gets the job done, but never goes beyond what is needed. Punctuality is probably not a high priority. The focus is not on work. Work is a temporary activity – something to muddle through until the day is over.

Owner employees are anxious about offering new ways to help the client. They offer ideas and volunteer for assignments. Mentoring other employees is second nature, and they frequently are one step ahead of the rest of the pack. How do you convert a renter- ship attitude to an ownership one? Asking people for their input is critical in this attitude transformation. If we allow people to set their own direction and to be a part of the decision-making process, then an ownership perspective can grow.

Increased Commitment

I am always amazed to see the reaction when an employee learns that senior management wants his or her opinion. I have seen folks stay late at work, change their shift time, wait in the parking lot, or hangout in the lobby just to have senior management ask them their opinion. It is a magical thing to ask someone his or her thoughts.

Not only will the employee support or defend that which they helped create or decide, but also they can provide you with information you couldn't get any- where else. Your people are the ones in the trenches and see what really goes on; you couldn't get more accurate information from any other source. As a result, they often have the good ideas and insights that management needs.

Using the phrase, "what do you think," instead of "you will follow me," offers a magical consequence: people's commitment. It can transform an attitude of rentership to one of ownership. The quality of decisions will most likely improve as those who do the work can provide their input. Remember Eric Butterworth's insightful quote, 'I tell you and you forget. I show you and you remember. I involve you and you under stand." Not only will your people understand, but they will feel valued and champion the direction of the company.

About the Author:
John Parker Stewart is President of Stewart Systems, Inc. and can be reached at 503.638.1106 www.johnparkestewart.com

Is Procrastination Holding You Back?
by C.J. Hayden, MCC

When you look at your marketing to-do list, do many of the items on it look all too familiar? Have entries like “call Donna Sanchez” and “follow up with Floyd Corp.” been copied from a previous week? Putting off unappealing tasks may be human nature, but for an entrepreneur, procrastination can be deadly.

Delays in contacting a prospect can lose the business to the competition. Failing to get the word out about an upcoming event may forfeit dozens of opportunities. Wasted marketing time can never be recovered. By the time you realize you might not make your goal for the month, quarter, or year, it may already be
too late.

Finding tasks on your to-do list week after week is a clear sign you are procrastinating, but it's not always this obvious. Can you identify with any of these situations?

1. Feelings of overwhelm. You have a backlog of work that seems insurmountable. You wake up in the morning already thinking about everything you must accomplish that day. It seems impossible to get it all done. If you are routinely unable to complete what's on your list in the time available, you may be creating the problem yourself by putting tasks off week after week.

2. Making excuses. You find yourself constantly having to make excuses to your business buddies, referral partners, potential clients, or even your coach about why you never followed up on that great referral, that important sales call wasn't made, the marketing package wasn't sent, or the proposal wasn't written. After a while, the excuses begin to sound flimsy, even to you.

3. Trivial pursuits. You notice that you are doing unimportant chores — rearranging your desk drawers, filing old business cards, shopping for just the right desk, surfing the Net — while neglecting crucial marketing activities.

4. Overflowing pipeline. A form of procrastination unique to entrepreneurs and salespeople is continuing to develop new leads instead of contacting the prospects you already have. If you are spending more time attending networking events or reviewing lists of names than getting on the phone, putting your fingers to the keyboard, or driving to appointments, this problem may be yours.

If you ARE procrastinating, what then? Begin to change this habit by getting in touch with your motivation to do better. What rewards, tangible and intangible,
do you get from your work? Remind yourself of that payoff on a daily basis. Post a picture or note that represents those rewards to you on your calendar, phone, or dashboard.

Break down each of the activities you are having trouble with into small steps. Pick what seems like the easiest place to start, and block out time on your calendar to make a beginning. You may find that once you are taking action, the rest seems much less difficult than you had feared.

If you find that you really do have too much on your plate to have enough time for marketing, it's essential that you cut back on some of your other activities immediately. A business without marketing isn't a business; it's a hobby.

Create more accountability for yourself by telling a buddy, support group, or coach exactly what you plan to get done each week. Ask them not to accept any excuses from you, and to remind you why you said you were doing all this in the first place. You can partner in this way with a colleague by setting up a weekly check-in where each of you reports to the other.

It may take time to break the procrastination habit, so give yourself permission to fail a few times. Remember that even a small amount of progress may be allowing you to achieve more than you ever have before.

Here's to getting it done, C.J. Hayden, MCC

About the Author:
Copyright 2002, C.J. Hayden. All rights reserved. Visit http://www.getclientsnow.com
or mailto:info@getclientsnow.com Wings Business Coaching, LLC * www.getclientsnow.com
P.O. Box 225008 * San Francisco, CA 94122 Phone/Fax (415) 981-8845 * Toll Free (877) 946-4722

Principled Communication
by Stephen R. Covey

Since the publication of my book, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People,
I have worked with many wonderful individuals who are seeking to improve the quality of their communications, relationships, products, services, organizations, and lives.

But sadly, I see many people using a variety of ill-advised approaches. In effect, they try to apply short-cut, manipulative practices learned in academic and social systems to natural systems, the “farms” of their lives.

The Problem: Alternate Centers

Let me share with you some examples of the problem. Then I will suggest the principle-centered solution.

Some executives justify heavy-handed means in the name of virtuous ends. They say that “business is business” and that “ethics” and “principles” sometimes have to take a back seat to profits. Many see no correlation between the quality of their personal lives at home and the quality of their communications at work. Because of the social and political environment inside their organizations and the fragmented markets outside, they think they can abuse relationships at will and still get results.

The head coach of a professional football team once told me that some players don't pay the price in the off-season. “They come to camp out of shape,” he said. “ Somehow they think they can fool me, make the team, and play great in the games.”

When I ask in my seminars, “How many of you would agree that the vast majority of the work force possess far more capability, creativity, talent, initiative, and resourcefulness than their present jobs allow or require them to use?” The affirmative response is about 99 percent. We all admit that our greatest resources are being wasted.

Our heroes are often people who make a lot of money. And when some hero
an actor, entertainer, athlete, or other professional suggests that we can get what we want by practicing hardball negotiation, closing win-lose deals, and playing by our own rules, we believe them, especially if social norms reinforce what they say.

Some parents don't pay the price with their kids, thinking they can fake it for the public image and then shout and slam the door. They are then shocked to see that their teenage kids experiment with drugs, alcohol, and sex to fill the void in their lives.

When I invited one executive to involve all his people and take six months to write a corporate mission statement, he said, “You don't understand, Stephen. We will whip this baby out this weekend.” I see people trying to do it all over a weekend trying to rebuild their marriage on a weekend, trying to change a company culture on a weekend, trying to pump out a major new business proposal. Some things just can't be done over a weekend.

Many executives take criticism personally because they are emotionally dependent on their employees' acceptance of them. A state of collusion is established where executives and employees need each other's weaknesses to validate their perceptions of each other and to justify their own lack of production.

In management, everything goes to measurement. July belongs to the operators, but December belongs to the controllers. And the figures are manipulated at the end of the year to make them look good. The numbers are supposed to be precise and objective, but everyone knows they are based on subjective assumptions.

I once spoke to a group of executives at a training conference and discovered that they were bitter because the CEO had “forced” them to “come and sit for four days to listen to a bunch of abstract thoughts.” They were part of a paternalistic culture that saw training as an expense, not an investment. Their organization managed people as things.

In school, we ask students to tell us what we told them; we test them on our lectures. They figure out the system, and then they party, procrastinate, and cram to get the grades. They think all of life operates on the same short-cut system.

The Solution: Center on Principles

These are problems that common approaches can't solve. Quick, easy, free,
and fun approaches won't work on the “farms” of our lives because there we're subject to natural laws and governing principles. Natural laws, based upon principles, operate regardless of our awareness of them or our obedience
to them.

Often habits of ineffectiveness are rooted in our social conditioning toward
quick-fix, short-term thinking. In school, many of us procrastinate and then successfully cram for tests. But does cramming work on a farm? Can you go two weeks without milking the cow, and then get out there and milk like crazy? Can you “forget” to plant in the spring, goof off all summer, and then hit the ground real hard in the fall to bring in the harvest? We might laugh at such ludicrous approaches in agriculture, but then in academic environments, we might cram to get grades and degrees.

The only thing that endures over time is the law of the farm: I must prepare the ground, put in the seed, cultivate, weed, water, and nurture growth. So also in a business or a marriage there is no quick fix where you can just move in and magically make everything right with a positive mental attitude and a package of success formulas.

Correct principles are like compasses: they are always pointing the way. And if we know how to read them, we won't get lost, confused, or fooled by conflicting voices and values. Principles such as fairness, equity, justice, integrity, honesty, and trust are not invented by us: they are the laws of the universe that pertain to human relationships and organizations. They are part of the human condition, consciousness, and conscience.

People instinctively trust those whose personalities are founded upon correct
principles. We have evidence of this in our long-term relationships. We learn that technique is relatively unimportant compared to trust, which is the result of our trustworthiness over time. When trust is high, we communicate easily, effortlessly, instantaneously. We can make mistakes, and others will still capture our meaning. But when trust is low, communication is exhausting, time-consuming, ineffective, and inordinately difficult.

Most people would rather work on their personality than on their character. The former may involve learning a new skill, style, or image, but the latter involves changing habits, developing virtues, disciplining appetites and passions, keeping promises, and being considerate of the feelings and convictions of others. Character development is the best manifestation of our maturity. To value oneself and, at the same time, subordinate oneself to higher purposes and principles is the paradoxical essence of highest humanity and the foundation of effective leadership.

Principle-centered leaders are men and women of character who work with competence “on farms” with “seed and soil” and who work in harmony with natural, “true north” principles and with the law of the harvest. They build those principles into the center of their lives, into the center of their relationships, into the center of their communications and contracts, into their management processes, and into their mission statements.

About the Author:
Dr. Stephen R. Covey is an internationally respected leadership authority, family expert, teacher,
organizational consultant, and co-chairman of Franklin Covey Co. He is also the author of several acclaimed books, including The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
From Executive Excellence Magazine
Copyright © 1992, 2001 by Franklin Covey All rights reserved

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