Seth Godin’s Advice

December 13, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Seth Godin’s most recent post caught my eye. Partially because of how short and simple it was and partially because of the message.  You might have to read it more than once to let it soak in but there is A LOT of great advice embedded in this simple post.

Insulate yourself…

from anonymous angry people

Expose yourself to art you don’t yet understand

Precisely measure the results that are important to you

Stay blind to the metrics that don’t matter

Fail often

Ship

Lead, don’t manage so much

Seek out uncomfortable situations

Make an impact on the people who matter to you

Be better at your baseline skills than anyone else

Copyedit less, invent more

Give more speeches

Ignore unsolicited advice

 

Check out Seth’s blog here.

 

Wh advice do you have going into the new year? Share in the comment box below and don’t forget to connect with me on Facebook andTwitter.

Filed Under: Advice, Business, Business Tips, Leadership Tagged With: , , ,

3 Opportunities Your Business Is Missing Part: 3

September 7, 2011 By Leave a Comment

You may have built the company from the ground up or you may have been there since before it was even close to being the company is today, but I bet there are a few hidden treasures in your company that you didn’t know about. Not hiding in the boiler room or the basement, but right in front of you, in fact you probably greet half of these treasures on a daily basis.  Pay attention and you will catch on quickly.

This is post 3 of 3 in this series.  The other opportunities you’re missing are just as important so click for Part 1 or Part 2.

There are things you could be doing to be a better boss. No one is going to come right out and say it, except for your boss and that’s not the perspective you want to get.  One of the biggest challenges we face is separating how we see ourselves from how our employees see us.  Your leadership could mean an increase in productivity, sales and better customer service, but you have no idea you’re doing anything wrong or at least not doing what you need to be doing right.  This means that you need to open up a better channel of communication with your employees.  If you let them know that you care enough to improve in your position, it might just motivate them to improve in theirs.  If you show them that you are really trying to make their jobs easier, it might just inspire them to make yours easier as well. This will also make it a lot easier for your employees to come to you right away instead of letting stress, resentment and anger build.

    If you haven’t caught on yet, all of the good ideas you need are within your reach, you just have to know where to look.  You should know something about all of the jobs in your company but your employees should know everything about their job and even a little more.  Letting your employees get away with just doing their job is like letting someone walk out the door with all of your secrets and ideas.  I recommend you take full advantage of the expertise and experience of your employees and I promise that you won’t regret it.

     

    Filed Under: office chair experts, office furniture experts, Running a Business Tagged With: , , , , , ,

    How To Filter Your Search For Ideas

    July 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

    As a leader in your organization you never ever want to miss a good idea.  You also rarely have the time to evaluate and separate everything you hear and see into the valuable and worthless categories they need to be in.  Information is streaming faster than anyone can comprehend, so how do we sort through it all without losing our minds?  You have to create a filter or several filters that let you find the best ideas and information based on your priorities and needs.

    The best way to start is to get specific.  Telling your team that you want them to look for ideas to help the company is too broad a mission statement.  Try to target one area that needs to improve the most.  From there you can break it down in to problem areas and areas that have a lot of room for improvement.  Decide on whether you need a solution or an idea before you begin the hunt and make sure everyone is clear on the specific goal.

    To create a mental filter based on what is most important you need to identify your top priorities.  Think about what problem needs to be solved to free up your time and/or other resources.  Let your team/employees know that that finding a solution or idea is a priority.  You will then have several different sets of eyes and minds sorting through the information highway to find the best idea or solution. You can also use tools like Google Alerts to help target the information you are looking for based on keywords.

    Once you use your resources to narrow down your search you have to start doing some of the thinking.  You may have 20 different solutions for the same problem the difference, like with anything, is in the context.  The next think you have to do if find out which of those situations is most similar to yours.  For example, you might not be able to use an idea or solution form a huge corporation if you only have three people working for you.  You also need to consider your time restrictions.  If you don’t have a the time to make one of the ideas work move on to the next one.

    Filtering applies to any information source you come across, even your personal ideas.  Most people don’t have the time to really explore every idea that presents itself so it helps to have a way to narrow down your search.

     

    For more business and innovation tips and ideas you can follow me on Twitter and connect with me on Facebook.

     

     

     

    Filed Under: Ideas, Innovation Tips, Leadership, Managing Creativity Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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