You’ll see from a few posts ago that we were having major issues with our online shopping cart. Our design division director was working hard to learn what he needed to learn to create a working shopping cart that enforced our brand. Try as he did, programming is not his focus by profession. He is a good programmer, but his heart lies in design. Persistent and wanting to get it right, he continued to bang his head against the wall, going round and round to solve problems that kept popping up. When it began affecting our clients, we had to stop playing around and resolve the issue. A little bit of investigating opened our eyes to the variety of shopping cart software available on the market. We solved all of our problems in one fell swoop and even added several features we had not considered. And, to boot, it was highly cost effective. Here we were so blinded by trying to get it right, that we failed to just raise our heads high enough to look around and realize that there were other companies out there completely devoted to solving our problem. How funny that we were being stubborn and trying to figure it out ourselves. Sometimes, leadership is the ability to pick your head out of the trench and look for an alternative solution.

I have to say that lately, myself and my staff are loving that we all work from home. We have nearly two dozen people who freelance for our company and they do some from the confines of their own residence. As I was watching the news this morning, I see that companies are starting to talk about possible four day work weeks to combat the high price of gas. Typically four 10 hour days that would replace the standard five 8 hour days. As I was watching that, I felt suddenly blessed. With the flattening of the world, has come the ability to run a business virtually. We work from three time zones, make our own schedules and no one has to spend a dime on gas to get to their job. Lucky indeed as we watch those around us really getting hit hard by these current times. Can some or all of your staff work from home? Consider the pain they are feeling at the pump and see if you might be able to solve some of that for them by trusting them to be accountable from home. Leading is about creating solutions to problems, and this is a problem that is affecting everyone right now. Step up and be part of the solution.

Yesterday, we were on a call with our client Dr. Kay Vogt, a family business advisor, working on the storyline for her upcoming book, The Family Business. Our discussion centered around something that hit very close to home with me and that is attitude. When you’re building something–a company, an organization, a team, a brand–there are always an unlimited number of reasons not to press on. The obstacles often feel so numerous that they seem impossible to overcome. And yet we build anyway, and the entity grows because we focus not on these reasons why it will not work, but rather on the reasons it must work. And those reasons are all related to how the entity will affect people, change lives, and better the world.

Great leaders have to focus on the positives in order to do their job well, in order to inspire; because it is from that place of inspiration, where the magic happens and obstacles are overcome with creativity and ingenuity never before imagined. The capability of mankind to find solutions and overcome challenges is absolutely mind blowing. But we cannot do it from a place of fear. Fear and anxiety are the enemies of creativity. They actually shut down portions of the brain that would otherwise be effective.

The last seven years with the current administration has been one of anxiety and fear, which has stifled the country. We have some of the most brilliant minds on the planet, but the country as a whole is working from fear. To me, this is what makes Barack Obama such an appealing candidate. Last night when I heard him speak in Minnesota–as I have often heard him speak throughout his campaign–he brings integrity and honor to the political process. He applauds his opponent Hillary Rodham Clinton for making him a better candidate for competing with him. He honors John McCain’s service record. He comes from a positive perspective that honors those around him and his platform is one of possibility. As a business owner, I understand first hand, that when I take responsibility for creating a positive environment within my company, the people who surround me feel they are coming to work to play each day. This is an environment where people spring out of bed, excited for what they are going to create next. Conversely, when I come from a place of fear and anxiety and spread that to my team, they dread the day ahead of them, and they give all of their energy to just get to the end of the day so they can get home and relax. Who would you rather be–an employee dreading the day, or thrilled to be part of something?

When a leader instills fear–nothing feels possible and therefore few people rise to the challenge. When a leader has a positive attitude and helps the people to believe–anything is possible and miracles happen. A positive leader, with an amazing attitude will fall on his face more, will take greater risks, will challenge the people to LIVE everyday, and the people will LOVE life for the roller coaster it is. Such a leader is worth their weight in gold. They build better companies, faster teams, stronger countries. Attitude is everything. Consider yours.

I have found that many company mission statements are very long, difficult and boring, and many leaders will use that company mission statement as an attempt to try to inspire people. But the key here is to get people fully engaged in a mission that is exciting and that lines up with not only your customers’ values but your employees’ values. Getting people engaged in your mission statement is just like having a powerful marketing engine. If you want to be successful in marketing, you have to keep things simple and then sell a solution to a pain that the buyer is feeling, to their desires, needs and wants. So, when it comes to getting people engaged in your mission, it is important to make the mission super simple and then go to your constituents one by one, getting their buy-in using the pains, desires and needs of that person as a pitching point. At the same time, in today’s workforce, people have to know that the work they are doing is meaningful and is helping change the world in some way. This is why companies like Google are so successful. The employees say that they are inspired by meaningful work and a company that is dedicated to changing the world for the better.

When getting people to engage in your company mission, consider the following:

1) Keep your mission simple. Disney’s mission to make people happy meets the needs of not only theme-park visitors but employees around the world. Happy employees make for happy customers, and the Disney team knows that this is the mission that permeates every decision made.

2) Answer the question “Why are you in business in the first place?” Did you go into business to have more freedom, to be more creative, to help people become healthier, wealthier or wiser? Answer this question, and let your customers and employees know exactly why you are here/why they are here.

3) How can you deliver extraordinary service? Your mission statement should in some way let both your customers and employees know that you are doing everything in your power to be quick, deliver outstanding quality and to deliver a true experience that will be rewarding. Employees will be much more engaged if they know that work is fun, exciting and educational.

4) Consider the type of relationship you want to develop with both your customers and employees. Do you want mutual respect, collaboration or teamwork? Spend time with your employees discussing how to design the relationship so that your company’s mission is achieved.

5) What are your core values and philosophies about life? Have you shared these with your customers and employees? If not, then it’s time to do it by including your beliefs in life in the description of your mission statement. If your goal is to “make people happy”, then why is that important?

6) Get your employees involved in discussing your mission statement. Hold open forums and town hall meetings to get the juices flowing.

7) Use words that “sizzle.” By using the word happy, excited, or inspired, you touch an emotional chord with people, and as we know, emotions can get people engaged in a deep way in your company.

Like anything in business, developing a short, simple mission statement takes time. By giving some thought to the above questions, developing a great mission statement that meets the above and then getting your employees involved in it, you will find that work is much more fulfilling and joyful…and that’s what we all want…to be happy!

To learn more about how to engage your team in the mission you are trying to achieve in your company, pre-order EDGE: A Leadership Story today.

In just a few short weeks, since putting the challenge to my team to begin taking over their divisions more aggressively, I am seeing dramatic changes among our group. The joy is more intense.  The growth is more expedient.  The results are more frequent.  And all that came from me trusting them more and managing them less.  We still brainstorm together and I still push them in certain areas, but they are enjoying being free to build their own teams around our clients and their brands and the power of that is intense.  They are creating more, bringing more fresh ideas to the table and ultimately, finding their true place within this company we are growing.  Under their guidance, we are building new revenue streams (New Site), creating more value for our clients, and growing our tool box.  When I was micromanaging, the company was only as strong as I was, but now, the company is exponentially more powerful as it expands under the creative direction of the full team. Turns out that the best thing I have done in a long time is to actually do less.

So, I’m doing the obligatory morning drive today, taking my son to school and whatnot. Naturally, I have the iPod going. On comes a song that I haven’t intentionally listened to in years. It’s from a Carly Simon best-of collection. It’s a fun, funky, silly song, as some of hers were. Now, this might seem like a strange beginning to a post about work and leadership, but bear with me… Anyway, some of you may know this song. Some may have danced to it in some club while wearing bell-bottoms. The song is called “Attitude Dancing,” and today it took on a whole new meaning for me, much different than the one it held thirty five years ago when my sister and I were dancing to it on the high-low pile, multi-earth tone shag carpeting in the living room. Hey, I was a child of the 70’s!

I’ll share bits of the lyrics with you….

“…cop a different pose, from the pose your in…shine a different attitude from underneath your skin…” Carly goes into the chorus repeating over and over again, “Attitude dancin…” while the background singers say, “…don’t be afraid to change your attitude…don’t be afraid of a new attitude…free up your spirit with a new attitude…” It picks up again with “It don’t really matter what steps you choose to do. There’s only one thing matters, and that’s your attitude, your attitude, your attitude…attitude dancin’…” The last verse says, “If you’re at a loss, just observe some natural dude…and turn into a mirror of his attitude…”

A song about dancing, you say. Au contraire! There’s a message here about authenticity. About taking responsibility for what you project. About realizing that who and what you are on the inside dictates the “steps you choose to do.” It’s not the steps themselves that you need to think about. It’s being intentional about your “attitude,” about the things that matter to you that you need to consider. Those things determine the steps you take and the moves you make from the inside out. And if you’re “at a loss,” find something or someone you admire to emulate until the steps become second nature to you…until they take on your own signature style. That’s when your work doesn’t feel like work. It’s simply part of your life, part of the mission you are on, another segment of the bigger picture of you as a whole and what you can bring to the world. Dance like that and you’ll never dance alone…

NEWS

Contact:
Lee B. Salz
Business Expert Webinars
Chief Executive Officer
9784 Troy Lane, Minneapolis, MN 55311
763.416.4321
lsalz@businessexpertwebinars.com

April 21, 2008, Minneapolis, MN - Business Expert Webinars (BEW), an international community of business experts, comprising best-selling authors, award-winning speakers, and business gurus, announced its launch today with more than 100 speakers and 700 live business education webinars that begin airing in May 2008.

“We are using webinar technology to deliver business eLearning,” said Lee B. Salz, President and CEO of Business Expert Webinars. Topics include all genres of business -sales, networking, public relations, marketing, real estate, human resources, entrepreneurship, management and many others. Visitors interested in participating can view the extensive schedule and sign up for webinars at BusinessExpertWebinars.com. Each webinar is taught by a live presenter on the phone and is supported by a presentation delivered over the Internet.

“People are frustrated with the free webinar offerings where the price of admission is a sales and marketing pitch. Either the entire webinar is an infomercial or the content is delivered at a high-level in the session and concludes with, ‘if you really want to know how to do this, buy my CD, DVD, book, etc.’ Thus, they aren’t really free,” said Salz.

Leadership expert and co-author of Millennial Leaders, and EDGE: A Leadership Story, Bea Fields is one of the experts who will be featured through Business Expert Webinars. “It is an honor to be partnering with Business Expert Webinars, Lee Salz and over 100 top professionals to bring a few cutting edge leadership classes which are relevant to today’s business world,” said Fields. “This webinar platform is first in class and will offer business leaders the opportunity for ongoing learning and development from the comfort of their own office at a very affordable price. I have viewed the list of upcoming classes, and the business community is in store for a real treat.”

About Business Expert Webinars
Business Expert Webinars is an international community of business experts that comprises best-selling authors, award-winning speakers, and business gurus. For more information, visit BusinessExpertWebinars.com.

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 FAST COMPANY Magazine has a great interactive portion to their website.  It is usually on the right of the home page.

The question posted by the staff right now is this:

How can you empower a company’s employees to think like its owners?

Here is how I responded:

I would never encourage empowering employees to think like the biz owners, because this stifles creative thinking. But, if you are talking about getting everyone in the biz aligned around vision and mission, this starts with the owner being respectful of employees, open to their ideas and highly accessible to them (you can’t get aligned around a company mission and vision if you never see or have access to the owner). It also requires the owners to be true leaders…people the employees want to model.   To be a true leader requires being open, actually listening to and respecting employees for the talent and ideas they bring to the company and then being transparent enough to admit when a mistake is made. It’s all about being a “See Through” CEO. Then, employees will be willing to see your perspective as an owner.

Meet The Bloggers

Bea Fields

Bea Fields is the President of Bea Fields Companies, Inc. and the Founder of Five Star Leader Coaching and Training, a leadership consulting firm currently serving over 800 clients world-wide.

Her latest book, co-authored with Scott Wilder, Jim Bunch and Rob Newbold, Millennial Leaders: Success Stories From Today’s Most Brilliant Generation Y Leaders is now on sale through Barnes & Noble and Amazon. The new book explores and analyzes Generation Y - the young adults currently between the ages of 18 and 30 - from a socio-economic standpoint. The book highlights 25 members of this generation who have already made a name for themselves, and provides crucial insights for business and political leaders seeking to tap into this demographic. Along with Corey Blake and Eva Silva Travers, Fields is also the author of Edge: A Leadership Story (Writers of the Round Table Press: May: 2008).

Fields’ educational background includes a bachelor’s degree from The University of Alabama, and a certificate degree in Leadership Coaching from Georgetown University in Washington, DC. She holds several important certifications which include The International Coach Federation’s Professional Certified Coach (PCC) designation and the Guerrilla Marketing coach certification. She received the Thomas Leonard Award in 2006, which is an honor bestowed on a coach who has exhibited mastery in the profession of executive coaching.

Bea Fields Companies, Inc. has had great success in using a variety of leadership and business development programs to assist clients in the areas of leadership and team development, strategic planning, business development, strategic alliance development, training and event development, creative writing, leadership branding, and public speaking.

In addition to her consulting work, Fields maintains an active role in her community. She has served on the Board of Visitors for The University of North Carolina’s Children’s Hospital, and the board of directors for The Sandhills Children’s Center in Southern Pines, North Carolina. She has also served as a director for The FirstHealth Hospice Foundation in Pinehurst, North Carolina, and The Episcopal Day School in Southern Pines, North Carolina. She is the Chairman Elect for the Board of Directors of the Moore County Chamber of Commerce.

Fields lives in Southern Pines, NC with her husband, Mike. She is the mother of three: Ann Fields, Sophomore at Duke University, Katie Fields, Sophomore at Wofford College and Jack Fields, who is a Senior at Pine Crest High School and will be attending and playing golf for the University of North Carolina starting in August 2008. For more information, visit http://BeaFields.com or http://FiveStarLeader.com.

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Corey Blake

With more than a dozen national commercial campaigns including Mountain Dew, Pepsi, McDonalds, Wrigley’s, Hasbro, and Mitsubishi under his belt and appearances on popular T.V. shows like The Shield, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Diagnosis Murder, VIP, and Fastlane, Corey Blake put an end to his lucrative commercial and television acting career to pursue his passion for writing. In 2000, he founded Elevation 9000 Films and went on to spearhead the original Elevation 9000 Film Lab that eventually inspired the motion picture production company LA Film Lab Entertainment and Writers of the Round Table Inc.

For the past eight years, Corey Blake has played a key role in the development of more than three hundred screenplays and manuscripts. He has won nine festival awards for his work in entertainment and contributed articles to nearly three dozen industry publications including Script Magazine, Writer Magazine (cover article), and the Los Angeles Journal. Corey Blake’s work as a writer and development producer has been featured on Fox News and in articles in Backstage West, MovieMaker Magazine, Hollywood Scriptwriter Magazine and Dance Magazine. He has been invited to speak at the Missouri Writers Guild, the Society of Southwestern Authors 36th annual Wrangling With Writing Conference, Midwest Literary Festival, Screenwriting Expo 4 at the LA Convention Center, the Virginia State Reading Association Conference, and the Spring into Romance Writing Conference.

Corey’s name is attached as the author or co-author to twelve projects for release in 2008 and 2009 including fiction, non-fiction and screenplays. He co-authored Edge! A Leadership Story with Bea Fields and Eva Silva (May 2008), and told Robert Renteria’s From the Barrio to the Board Room (January 2008).

Corey is proudly married to Dr. Dawn Blake, a Psychologist. They make their home in the suburbs of Chicago and Corey travels frequently back to Los Angeles.

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Eva Silva Travers

Eva Silva Travers holds an Associate of Arts Degree in Radio and Television and a Bachelor of Arts in Literature and Writing Studies. With roots in both print and broadcast media, Eva is a writer with a broad scope of experience. In the corporate world, she has enjoyed success as a writer, producer and digital editor for several production companies and as a radio newscaster/announcer. Her real passion, though, thrives in the creative world. Eva has been involved with the creation of numerous scripts, screenplays and treatments for major production companies and is co-author of Edge! A Leadership Story with Bea Fields and Corey Blake. She devotes most of her energy to growing the Creative Department for Writers of the Round Table, both as a writer and a project manager. Prior to finding “The Table”, Eva sold a screenplay to internationally recognized Graz Entertainment after winning a Student Emmy Award for a documentary on teenage alcoholism while in college. In addition, she speaks and facilitates workshops in schools and public forums on the creation of engaging characters and successful manuscripts. She is an active member of the Los Angeles Writers Group.

As time allows, Eva also enjoys writing freelance restaurant and pop-culture reviews, having been published in numerous periodicals. She has also acted, modeled and done voice-over work part-time for nearly thirty years and still completes occasional assignments. She lives in Los Angeles and San Diego with her two wonderfully rambunctious sons and her talented husband, drummer and Vaultmeister for the Zappa Family Trust, Joe Travers.

Writers of the Round Table is a boutique firm that specializes in the development, marketing and distribution of exceptionally written content: Professional Manuscripts, Fiction, Screenplays and Legacy Writing. With in-house account managers, writers, graphic designers, marketing, PR and publishing services, the company takes clients on a two to three year journey towards the publication of remarkable manuscripts and the full branding of their messages.

Writers of the Round Table Press

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