Eric Jacobson

Archive for the ‘Company Culture’ Category


Leaders: How Will The Value Of Your Days Be Measured?

In Company Culture, General Leadership Skills, Leadership, Leadership Education, Leadership Skills, Leading By Example, Management on February 15, 2012 at 9:04 pm

I recommend that all leaders every so often read the What Will Matter poem by Michael Josephson.

It serves as a powerful reminder of the importance of unselfishly serving and leading with character.

I’ve highlighted in bold and in color my favorite parts of the poem:

 

Ready or not, some day it will all come to an end.

There will be no more sunrises, no minutes, hours or days.

All the things you collected, whether treasured or forgotten, will pass to someone else.

 

Your wealth, fame and temporal power will shrivel to irrelevance.

It will not matter what you owned or what you were owed.

 

Your grudges, resentments, frustrations and jealousies will finally disappear.

So too, your hopes, ambitions, plans and to-do lists will expire.

The wins and losses that once seemed so important will fade away.

It won’t matter where you came from or what side of the tracks you lived on at the end.

 

It won’t matter whether you were beautiful or brilliant.

Even your gender and skin color will be irrelevant.

 

So what will matter? How will the value of your days be measured?

but what you built; not what you got, but what you gave.

What will matter is not your success, but your significance.

What will matter is not what you learned, but what you taught.

 

What will matter is every act of integrity, compassion, courage or sacrifice that enriched, empowered or encouraged others to emulate your example.

 

What will matter is not your competence, but your character.

What will matter is not how many people you knew, but how many will feel a lasting loss when you’re gone.

 

What will matter is not your memories, but the memories that live in those who loved you.

What will matter is how long you will be remembered, by whom and for what.

Living a life that matters doesn’t happen by accident.

It’s not a matter of circumstance but of choice.

Choose to live a life that matters.


Are Your Supervisors Driving Away Your Employees?

In Company Culture, Effective Communications, Employee Engagement, Employee Retention, Employee Satisfaction, Engaging Employees, General Leadership Skills, Leadership, Leadership Books, Leadership Education, Leadership Skills, Leadership Training, Management, Motivating Employees on February 15, 2012 at 8:08 pm

One section in Richard Finnegan’s book called, Rethinking Retention in Good Times and Bad, compares traditional thinking versus new ways to think about retention and the vital role supervisors play in retaining employees.  For example:

Traditional Thinking:  Human Resources-driven programs like pay and recognition are essential for retention.

Rethinking Retention:  Ineffective supervisors trump programs and drive turnover.

Traditional Thinking:  All aspects of company culture contribute equally to retention.

Rethinking Retention:  Supervisor-employee relationships have a disproportionate impact on retention; the supervisor is the company.

Traditional Thinking:  Centralized communication and career programs impact all employees equally.

Rethinking Retention:  Supervisors drive what employees know and learn and help them prepare for careers.

Are your supervisors helping to retain employees or driving them away?


Great Leaders Grow

In Company Culture, General Leadership Skills, Leadership Books, Leadership Education, Leadership Skills, Leadership Training, Leading By Example, Management on February 9, 2012 at 9:08 pm

This week, Ken Blanchard’s and Mark Miller’s book, Great Leaders Grow, hit the brick and mortar and online bookstores.

In honor of the book release I welcome guest blogger Ken Blanchard.

How to Evaluate Your Leadership Style

By Ken Blanchard, Co-author of Great Leaders Grow: Becoming a Leader for Life

Today, I’m going to give a short, one-question quiz. Here’s the question: How do you rate as a leader?

I don’t ask this question flippantly. It is a question I’ve asked countless people at the leadership seminars we conduct.

As leaders, most people rank themselves as being very close to a minor deity or at least Mr. or Ms. Human Relations. Seldom do leaders give themselves low marks. Strangely enough, when the tables are turned and people are asked to rank their boss’s leadership style, we often find many supervisors graded as being adequate, merely OK, or at worst, office autocrats who depend heavily on the often-referenced “seagull management” technique as their sole line of attack — they leave their people alone until something goes wrong, and then they fly in, make a lot of noise, dump all over everyone, and fly out.

More often than not, we find that leaders lull themselves into thinking they are top-flight leaders because they think they use a supportive or coaching style, which someone told them are “good” leadership styles. Not too surprisingly, this isn’t the way they are seen by those in their department, office or store.

To get a true and accurate answer about the question above, it is necessary for you as a supervisor to honestly determine how your employees perceive your leadership style. These are the folks who know you best. They have first-hand experience with your leadership style and operate on their own perceptions about it. They are the best judges of your managerial effectiveness. However, getting an employee or subordinate to give his or her honest feedback on your leadership style is difficult. People fear being the messenger who will get shot for bearing bad news. Hence, they are naturally reluctant to be totally candid.

Employees are sharp observers. In the past, they may have gone to their leader and made an honest suggestion such as, “Ken, I think our Thursday afternoon meetings are a waste of time.” If the supervisor answers with an outburst by saying, “What do you mean a waste of time? Are you kidding? Those meetings are important,” it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that one thing the leader doesn’t want to hear is the truth.

It is important to remember that when people you supervise tell you what they honestly think about your style of leadership, they’re really giving you a gift. When someone gives you a gift, what is the first thing you should say? “Thank you,” of course! Then it’s a very good idea to follow up by saying, “Is there anything else you think I should know?” When a person learns that you won’t become defensive or hostile when he or she gives you an honest evaluation about your style, you’ll find that you’ll be given many nuggets of truth which are extremely valuable. My advice would be to encourage people to give (feedback) at the office, and to give often!

Just remember, what you think about your own leadership style really doesn’t matter. In addition, there is no one correct style, nor is there a “good” or a “bad” style. Rather, style is judged by those immediately influenced by it. It’s your people’s response to your style that matters. If you are getting the right response consistently — high productivity and morale — then you’re doing just fine. If not, then perhaps it’s your style that needs changing, not your employees.

Ken Blanchard, co-author of Great Leaders Grow: Becoming a Leader for Life, is cofounder and chief spiritual officer of the Ken Blanchard Companies. He is the author or coauthor of 50 books that have sold more than 20 million copies, including the iconic One Minute Manager®.

As originally published on “How We Lead.”  © 2012 Ken Blanchard, co-author of Great Leaders Grow: Becoming a Leader for Life


How To Make E-mail Communication More Effective In The Workplace

In Company Culture, E-mail Communication, Effective Communications, Leadership, Leadership Books, Leadership Skills, Management on February 9, 2012 at 9:02 pm

Are you leading an organization where e-mail communication is ineffective?

Here are some wise guidelines that Verizon Wireless has used to promote effective, efficient and responsible e-mail use within its company.

You can find these guidelines in the book, Managers, Can You Hear Me Now?, written by Denny F. Strigl, former CEO and President of Verizon Wireless.

  • E-mail should bring closure to work, not create more work.
  • Before you write an e-mail, ask yourself if calling or visiting the recipient will bring better communication.
  • Keep e-mails short.  Make your point in just the subject line or the space in the preview pane.
  • Don’t assume other people are staring at their screens, waiting for your e-mail.
  • If just one person needs information or clarification, don’t send your e-mail to a group.
  • Never send e-mail when you’re angry.
  • Assume anything you put in writing will be leaked to the press or to your competitors.
  • Stay accountable.  Sending an e-mail doesn’t transfer responsibility.
  • E-mail is never an acceptable excuse for not getting something done.  If you need a reply to an e-mail before you can do your job, get the information another way.
  • Don’t spend more than five minutes dealing with an e-mail.  When you go over this limit, stop and make a phone call.
  • Don’t judge how much you’ve accomplished by how many e-mails you’ve sent.


Be A Manager Who Makes Decisions

In Company Culture, Effective Communications, General Leadership Skills, Leadership, Leadership Books, Leadership Education, Leadership Skills, Leadership Training, Making Decisions, Management on January 27, 2012 at 7:59 pm

A manager who can’t make a decision or who can’t make a timely decision will frustrate his/her employees. Equally bad, a lack of decision will impede the progress of the manager’s team.

Some managers make endless requests for data as a way to postpone their having to make a decision. Employees end up spinning in circles, slicing and dicing the information far beyond what is truly needed for the manager to make a decision.

Some managers are simply afraid to make a decision in fear of making a “wrong” decision. These managers don’t necessarily request needless data, but simply just never decide.

Successful managers gather the data from their employees, make any truly necessary follow-up requests (probing beyond what their employee may have researched/gathered on their own), and then make their decision…knowing that in virtually all cases most decisions are not black and white “right or “wrong,” but are the best decisions made at that time for the current circumstances.

Good managers know that most decisions can be tweaked along the way as their teams carry out their tasks impacted by the decision.


Honor MLK By Volunteering Or Leading A Team To Volunteer

In Company Culture, Employee Engagement, General Leadership Skills, Leadership, Leading By Example, Management, Volunteering on January 14, 2012 at 7:48 am

As the nation honors Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on Monday, January 16, volunteer or make the decision to volunteer in your community. King routinely asked “What are you doing for others,” and January 16th is the ideal day to ask yourself that question.

The federal holiday was first observed 25 years ago and in 1994 Congress designated it as a National Day of Service, inspired by King’s words, “everybody can be great because anybody can serve.”

You can turn to Volunteer Match to find volunteer opportunities right in your neighborhood or nearby surrounding area. Visit the web site, type in your zip code, and you will be presented with a variety of organizations seeking volunteers.

And, if you are a leader in the workplace, encourage your team members to volunteer in the community as individuals.  Or, organize team volunteer afternoons or evenings for your employees.


What Southwest Airlines Taught Us In 2011

In Company Culture, Customer Service, Employee Satisfaction, General Leadership Skills, Leadership Books, Leadership Quotes, Leadership Skills, Leadership Training, Leading By Example, Listening Skills, Management, Motivating Employees on December 31, 2011 at 6:31 am

Southwest Airlines celebrated its 40th this year and was kind enough to share in its in-flight magazine 40 lessons it learned since 1971.  The lessons provide good tips for business leaders.

If you missed the full list, here are some of the highlights:

  • Invent your own culture and put a top person in charge of it.
  • A crisis can contain the germ of a big idea.
  • Simplicity has value.  For Southwest, simplicity means using 737s for most of its fleet, which makes maintenance more cost-effective and allows more efficient training for flight crews and ground crews.
  • Remember your chief mission.
  • Take your business, not yourself, seriously.
  • Put the worker first. For Southwest, that meant being the first U.S. airline to offer a profit-sharing plan, in 1974. Employees now own 13 percent of the airline.
  • The web ain’t cool, it’s a tool. Southwest was the first U.S. airline to establish a home page. By 2010, Southwest.com boasted more unique visitors  than any other airline, and ranked as the second largest travel site.
  • Get Green.  That means for Southwest embracing conservation.
  • Manage permanence.  Southwest knows what not to change, even when it’s managing change.
  • Keep the idea simple enough to draw on a napkin.
  • Never rest on your laurels.
  • It’s about customer service, not scalability.
  • Promote from within.
  • Recognize your luck.

One can learn a lot of Southwest! Thank You!

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The Five Most Important Questions You Will Ask About Your Nonprofit

In Company Culture, Leadership, Leadership Books, Leadership Skills, Leadership Training, Management, Nonprofit Leadership on December 15, 2011 at 10:26 pm

If you lead a nonprofit organization, the one hour it will take you to read Peter F. Drucker’s book, The Five Most Important Questions You Will Ever Ask About Your Organization, will be well worth it.

  • This book may fundamentally change the way you work and lead your organization.

Perhaps one of most challenging questions Drucker asks the reader is:

“Do we produce results that are sufficiently outstanding for us to justify putting our resources in this area?“

Because, Drucker argues that need alone does not justify continuing. Nor does tradition, if your results are not sufficiently outstanding.

If you volunteer for a nonprofit or are seeking employment at a nonprofit, this book is also an insightful and inspiring read.


Leadership Skills: Be Decisive; Find The Truth; Send A Thank You Note

In Company Culture, Effective Communications, General Leadership Skills, Leadership Education, Leadership Skills, Leadership Training, Leading By Example, Making Decisions, Management, Motivating Employees on December 11, 2011 at 10:59 am

Be decisive

A manager who can’t make a decision or who can’t make a timely decision will frustrate his/her employees. Equally bad, a lack of decision will impede the progress of the manager’s team.

Some managers make endless requests for data as a way to postpone their having to make a decision. Employees end up spinning in circles, slicing and dicing the information far beyond what is truly needed for the manager to make a decision.

Some managers are simply afraid to make a decision in fear of making a “wrong” decision. These managers don’t necessarily request needless data, but simply just never made a decision.

Successful managers (true leaders) gather the data from their employees, make any necessary follow-up requests (probing beyond what their employee may have researched/gathered on their own), and then make their decision…knowing that in virtually all cases most decisions are not black and white “right or “wrong,” but are the best decisions made at that time for the current circumstances.

Good managers also know that most decisions can be tweaked along the way as their teams carry out their tasks impacted by the decision.

Find The Truth

If you’re a parent of two children you already know that when the two are fighting and child #1 tells you what happened, you then ask child #2 what happened, and most often the truth is somewhere in the middle of what the two children have told you.

Surprisingly, many managers, even when they are parents, don’t use this parenting “discovery” skill in the workplace. Instead, they often listen to only one side of a situation. Whether it is because of lack of interest or lack of time, they don’t proactively seek out the other side of the story.

The unfortunate result is those managers form incorrect perceptions that can often lead to poor decisions and/or directives.

So, the next time two employees are at odds, or when one department complains about another department within your organization, take the time to listen to all sides of the situation to discover the truth that’s in the middle.

Send A Written Thank You Note

Nearly all employees want to do both a good job and please their supervisor. When they succeed, send them a thank you for a job well done.

A short note (handwritten is particularly good) thanking them for a good job is extremely powerful. Particularly for new employees on your team. Or, for employees new to the workforce and early in their careers.

Include in your note a sentence regarding what they did especially well and how their specific action made a positive impact. Remember, be as specific as possible in what you write.

Be sure to send your note soon after the job was completed. If you wait too long (more than a week), the note will lose its impact.

Send your note in a way it can be easily saved by your employee. Even employees who have been on your team for a long time will likely save your note.

Finally, reserve your sending thank you notes for the big jobs, large projects, extra special work. If you send thank you notes too often they’ll lose their effect.


9 Tips For Delivering Excellent Customer Service This Holiday Season

In Company Culture, Customer Service, Effective Communications, General Leadership Skills, Leadership, Leadership Books, Leadership Education, Leadership Skills, Leading By Example, Management, Sales Management on November 19, 2011 at 12:02 pm

Leading a customer service team?  Have the team members use these 9 tips for delivering excellent customer service this holiday shopping season:

  1. Rely on winning words and soothing phrases.  A simple but sincere “Thanks for your patience” or “I’m listening” can go a long way toward defusing a holiday shopper’s frustration, anxiety, or panic. Develop a repertoire of short, easy to remember phrases around issues that are important to customers. Practice until the words come naturally.
  2. Communicate with silence. Remaining silent while your customers are talking is a basic courtesy, and nodding tells them you’re listening and understanding what you hear. An occasional “uh huh” or “I see” tells them you’re still listening without interrupting.
  3. Make customers feel seen. Making eye contact acknowledges that you see your customers as individuals. But there’s a balance to be struck here: staring can make your customers uncomfortable, too. Also keep in mind that eye contact is governed by specific cultural rules. A good rule to follow is to give as much as you get.
  4. Never underestimate the value of a sincere thank you. Thanking customers when they offer comments or suggestions says that you value their opinion. Thanking customers for complaining says that you value their loyalty. Customers who tell you they are unhappy are giving you a second chance. And that’s quite a gift.
  5. Use the well-placed “I’m Sorry.” Don’t assume that you’re not allowed to say “I’m sorry” when a snafu occurs. Actually, a sincere apology delivered in a timely and professional manner often heads off potential further problems. When you show your willingness to make sure your customers receive what they expect to receive, you relieve them of the need to even think about starting an argument.
  6. Never deny a customer’s problem. Problems are an undeniable part of the hectic, stressful holiday shopping season. And problems exist when the customer says they do. You can’t wish a problem away because it is something no reasonable person would be upset about, because it’s not your fault, or even because the customer made a mistake.
  7. Fix the person first. Real problem solving cannot happen until the issues are out on the table. And that requires getting past a customer’s emotional reaction. Breaking through the icy calm defenses of an upset customer is just as important as coaxing a “raging red” customer out of a temper tantrum.
  8. Listen and then probe for information. Customers, particularly upset customers, don’t always explain everything clearly or completely. Ask questions about anything you may not understand or need clarified. Then, when you feel you have identified and clearly grasped the problem, repeat it back to the customer for confirmation.
  9. Ask the customer for problem-solving help. Involving customers in generating solutions not only starts to rebuild the relationship, it gives them the feeling that your business really is interested in satisfying their needs. You’ll find that most customers bring a sense of fair play with them and will often expect far less than you’d think.

These tips are adapted from the book, Delivering Knock Your Socks Off Service, Fifth Edition by Performance Research Associates, Inc., Edited by Ann Thomas and Jill Applegate.

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