Morning Motivator – Personality Wins the Day

"A good personality overcomes many shortcomings.  Being likeable is as important as any other feature."
- Anonymous

There is something beautiful about a GREAT smile and a WARM personality.  It is INFECTIOUS on many levels and always seems to attract the best of the best out of people.  Agree?

What if you were able to make yourself more APPROACHABLE to the people that surround you?  What if they felt openly COMFORTABLE to speak to you on varying matters?  Does it matter if you are the AUTHORITY on the subject matter?  Likely not.  What IS critical is being easy to talk to, trustworthy and WILLING to listen…

Does this mean that everyone with a WINNING personality guarantees success?  Be serious… of course not, YET… it sure does give a LEG UP on everyone else that has similar (or even more) talents.

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
How does one GET personality?  Your parents.  Sorry, I DO NOT yet believe that you can manufacture personality.  You seem "fake" if you try to do so.

How does one become more PERSONABLE?  Well, now that IS possible.  Make yourself APPROACHABLE.  Make yourself ACCESSIBLE.  Make yourself a RESOURCE to the people around you.

You will find that most people LIKE people with whom they feel they can easily associate.  The FUNNY thing about it all is that if you learn to ASK QUESTIONS, SHUT UP and LISTEN, you will easily be liked and labeled as having GREAT PERSONALITY.

Smile, be friendly, be engaging, available and approachable… then most of all – LISTEN!  Everyone loves to talk and your ability to listen will INCREASE your likeability.

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator – Don’t Be a Part of the Problem

"To solve any problem, here are three questions to ask yourself: First, what could I do? Second, what could I read? And third, who could I ask?"
- Jim Rohn

Look at the world around you.  Would you agree there are INJUSTICES left and right?  Often people are left holding the bag on a RAW DEAL for no logical reason other than, SH*T HAPPENS.

What is it that we can DO to ensure that does not happen o us (or at least happens less often)?

BE A PART OF THE SOLUTIONS… not the problem.  What does that mean? 

That means DERIVING ways to resolve issues or improves processes BEFORE you go off the handle about how "screwed up this and that is."  It means NOT creating disdain amongst your colleagues by "venting" with no solutions offered and no discussion with the people that may be able to help you in creating solutions.  Frankly, it means KEEP QUIET until you talk to the people that can help or SOLVE the problem on your own.  Everything else is POINTLESS!

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
Problem solving is CHALLENGING.  It requires that you SEPARATE yourself from the situation emotionally in an effort to find ways to overcome LOGICALLY.

By becoming part of the group SOLVING the issues, you gain a few key advantages, such as, personal investment into the solution, designing of the solution in your favor, trust and respect from the people for whom you SOLVED the issue.

Sure, COMPLAINING feels great for a few moments; yet, what does it solve?  Very little.  Rather than EXPENDING that valuable energy in a pointless rant, REFOCUS it on finding better ways to eliminate the fail point from the system, and ENSURE that you will not have to waste that energy again.

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator – Pick a System…

"A system under pressure shows all its weaknesses."
- Unknown

What if you had access to the most EFFECTIVE and EFFICIENT system in the world?  That would be pretty darn cool!  Now, what if your entire team EXCEPT one person used that system? 

Systems are built in workflows - inputs, outputs and management throughout the process.  The system is based upon the EFFECTIVE administration of proper inputs that yield the correct outputs.  Fail to input accurate information and you are GUARANTEED to receive a failed output.

What is the MOST COMMON failure in a system?  The human interaction.  Why is that?  Often, it is the human ego.  "We" do not want anyone telling us the "best' way to do anything… we want to do it "our" way.  Sound familiar?

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
What can we do to IMPROVE the system?  How can we gain more CONSISTENT outputs and greater yield?  PICK A SYSTEM!

What system is best?  The one EVERYONE will use.  It matters less if it is the best, and more that it is accepted and utilized by all parties.  Even Microsoft Excel can be the worlds' best contact manager if all sales people and management within a given company AGREE it will be the exclusively utilized system. 

A business system is just like rules of a sport – when everyone AGREES, it doesn't matter if it is "right or wrong," since, even in the event you ARE playing by the wrong rules, the overall acceptance of game play makes the WRONG rules… well, RIGHT!  Make sense? 

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator – Put It in a Pressure Cooker

"The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once."
- Albert Einstein

There is a funny thing about a DEADLINE… it creates HUGE efficiency in execution!  Nothing creates more PRODUCTIVITY than a deadline that is looming down on you.

What is it about a DEADLINE that creates such high yields of output?  FOCUS!  It is the necessity to harness the HIGHEST levels of focus available in order to tune out all other distractions and execute solely the tasks that you MUST complete in order to achieve your goal.  (i.e.  The day before you go on vacation)

So why are we NOT able to focus at that high level more often?  Why are we not able to simply create that mindset and execute as if we were in a pressure cooker? 

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
It is human nature to be distracted by what is "loudest" or most interesting.  We are creatures of impulse that are easily engaged in something that offers more immediate VALUE than what the task-at-hand may be.

Consider a VIRAL VIDEO sent to you in email while you are working on a month end financial summary.  Of course, it will not hurt anyone to take 5 minutes to watch this video, right?  And then 5 minutes to comment back to the person that sent it, 5 to send to your other friends, then you MUST get up and go across the office to chat with your buddy so he can YouTube it.  45 minutes later…  You get the point.

When you CREATE and HOLD ACCOUNTABLE real deadlines with rewards or punishments, you are able to create a pseudo-pressure cooker environment similar to that experienced before an imposed deadline is forthcoming.  Give yourself an INCENTIVE to meet goals early. 

Maybe taking Friday off if you complete all your tasks by Thursday sounds good, eh? 

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator – Group Your Solutions

"When life gives you lemons make lemonade... the sell the peels for zest and the seeds to a farmer down the street."
- Zachary Barker, famous in his own mind

Decisions made in a "silo" result in solutions made for the silo.  We do we ASSUME that every decision we make or solution we build must solve ONLY its direct purpose?  Why can we not build BETTER solutions that solve multiple problems with one, MORE EFFECTIVE solution?

When you got dressed this morning, what were the reasons your chose your outfit?  Was it solely for FASHION?  Maybe JUST for comfort?  On the other hand, possibly for the LONE purpose or SPEED?  Likely, the decision was not for any ONE of those reason, while more likely for ALL OF THEM!

Daily we seek BEST solutions to solve the greatest volume of personal needs with minimal solutions.  Business is NO DIFFERENT.  Need a new client and want to make some new friends?  Throw a PARTY for the type of people you want as clients and invite your friends!  It is likely your friends are friends with some of the people you invite and then you have SOLVED both challenges.

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
Being DYNAMIC in your problem solving is a WINNING attribute of the most successful people.  Is it any wonder that a seafood storeowner also has an ownership interest in a couple boats, a trucking company and a packing business?  Why would they pay someone else a PREMIUM when they could lower their overall costs and sell more seafood?

When you are trying to solve your BUSINESS NEEDS, look at your personal, social and political needs as well.  Where do the COINCIDE?  Where do you have OPPORTUNITIES to bring the same group of people together and create an environment that SOLVES all of the needs you have in those varying areas?

Is it underhanded to solve another problem under the premise of a more obvious one? OF COURSE NOT!  It is INTELLIGENT and SAVVY.  It is EFFICIENT and EFFECTIVE.  It is WISE and PRAGMATIC.  It is how you GET AHEAD while others wonder how you "accomplish so much in such a short amount of time."

Be WISE… Solve the MOST of your challenges with the MOST IMPACT, MINIMAL EFFORT MANNERS. 

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.