Monday, January 26, 2009

Are you sweating yet?

Thomas A. Edison made the famous quote that genius is "1% inspiration and 99% perspiration."

So my question is "are you sweating yet?"

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Inauguration Day

February 20, 2009.
I have been alive for 10 Presidential Inaugurations - 11 after today. I can honestly say that none of them has made a large or lasting impression on me...until today. Just to be clear here - I'm not talking about Presidencies - just inaugurations. I have to say that I have never really looked forward to an inaugural address before, so this is sort of an odd feeling. I am looking forward to listening to President Obama on this amazing, historic day.

My grandmother is 97. Today will be her (if I counted correctly) 29th inauguration day. William Taft was in office on the day that she was born. The last major war that we had fought was the Civil - ok, ok, we'll count the Spanish American War in 1898 - but still.

What are we going to see in the next 97 years? Will today prove to be the day that we look back on as a turning point? Will a message of hope actually inspire the actions in Washington and throughout the country that will do justice to the hope that led them? Right now we are mired in almost all-consuming economic turmoil, and certainly the economy will be the first order of the day for the new administration, but we cannot loose sight of the long-range opportunities that we have. We cannot let our desire for economic salvation turn us from the long-term changes that can create a better country and world. Energy independence. Curbing environmental destruction. Our health-care system. Education. And yes, Jobs. Good, stable, well paying Jobs.

Seems to me that today is as good a day as any (maybe even better than some) to stand UP and stand FOR. There are so many things to rail against in this day and age. It is up to each and every one of us to stop railing AGAINST and start railing FOR. What is near and dear to your heart? Stand up. What do you want to see accomplished before the end of your days? Stand up. What charities need your help? Stand up. What charaties don't even EXIST yet? Stand up. Clean water? Stand up. Clean air? Stand up.

The hard part about standing up, is that when everyone else is sitting down, you stick out. But keep this in mind: if YOU are standing, how much easier will it be for the next person, and the next, and the next.

Today is a day of hope. Today is a day of new beginnings. Today is a day of change.

Stand Up.



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Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Plan, Do, Check, Act

Plan, Do, Check, Act (PDCA) this is a carry-over from my days in Continuous Improvement / Kaizen. At that point in my life, it was targeted at manufacturing processes, but the concept has a lot of application across all aspects of life.

So often we just "do" - or at the very best, "plan, do, " but it is in the last two pieces that the power lies.

Quick terms definition:
Plan: Pretty straight forward. Plan is the plan. Who, what, why, where, when (or by-when) and how. All of these components together create a complete plan. When you are in "plan" take the extra time to create a complete plan.

Do: Also pretty clear. Work the plan. Do what you outlined that you would do.

Check: This is the reflection time once you have worked the plan. Did the plan work? If not, why not? What can be tweaked to make the results even better? Go through the plan, step by step and make sure that you did actually work the plan. Which parts worked and which parts didn't? Dissect the both the plan and the results.

Act: Implement the changes that you came up with in "Check." Keep in mind that Check and Act are basically a loop constantly tweaking and making the plan better (hence the Continuous in continuous improvement).

So now, let's take a quick look at this. It is pretty easy to figure out how one would use PDCA in manufacturing: you want to decrease the defects produced in a widget, so you make a complete plan, work the plan, check the progess and act on the information - but how do you make the jump from making parts on an assembly line to loosing weight, or getting your dream job?

The process is completely transferable. Let's take a look:
The goal is reduce the stress in your life:
Plan: First of all, how are you going to know that your stress is lower? Determine what you see as "lower stress" and write it down. Now, who, what, why, where, when and how: Who is pretty straight forward, YOU want to reduce YOUR stress right? So it is primarily an internal process. What: This is where you would insert your definition of "lower stress" - what is the measurable result (when I say "measurable" it might just be "sleep better" or "be less cranky"). Why? This is important because it is what puts the gas in your engine. It is your motivation behind "less stress". When: in this example, when is both when you will start, and when you will measure your progress along the continuum. Finally we get to "how". How is the specific things that you will do to reduce your stress. I will meditate for 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the evening. I will take 5 deep cleansing breathes when I feel myself getting angry or stressed. I will read one book that I WANT to read.

Be careful to find the balance between a complete plan, and planning paralysis. A good plan well implemented is a lot more powerful than a GREAT plan never implemented.

Do: work your plan. It is that simple. Just DO what you outlined in your plan.

NOW comes the good stuff.
Check: your checkpoints should be in your plan. So you know that after 3 weeks, you are going to check in with yourself and your progess. Are you doing what you said you would? Why or why not? What obstacles can you remove? How do you make it easier to do that which you want to do?

Act: Implement the changes. Set a new checkpoint.

Check. Act. Check. Act. Check. Act.

Before you know it you have created a new normal.

Give it a try. Start small. Let yourself get a feel for this and build some success at it.
Most importantly believe that you can.

I'll check back in later.

Sunday, January 11, 2009

To Lead...

What does it really mean to lead? How exactly does one go about doing it? Can it be learned or is it inborn?

One sure way to lead is this: Stand up. State where you are going. Start walking. Talk to people along the way about where you are going and why, and pretty soon, when you look back, there will probably be some people there.

I truly believe that great leaders are not born to it. I absolutely think that it can be learned. It doesn't matter if you are an introvert or an extrovert, it doesn't matter if you are shy or outspoken or educated or not. It is simply about believing in something passionately and moving toward that common end.

Walk boldly.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Tension

First of all, Happy 2009. After taking the last couple weeks "off" from working on this blog, I am really ready to get back into it on a fairly regular basis. I am excited about all that 2009 will have to offer in the midst of the difficulties that we will surely face.

As I have been pondering a new year and the last couple of entries I have starting thinking about vision, shifting the bell curve- and tension. Tension is what creates action. When I originally wrote "playing the bell" back on December 4th, I was really thinking of how a person can drive change withing a community - large or small - but it dawned on me recently that the standard bell curve applies to our PERSONAL actions every bit as much as it applies to a community of people. We have our personal upper and lower ranges of deviant behavior - and by deviant I simply mean that it deviates from our "normal" - and a range of behavior that we consider to be comfortable or normal. We can shift our own normal just like we can shift the normal at a group level.

Both shifts have to do with tension. I don't mean the kind of tension that exists between 2 co-workers that don't really like each other, I am talking about the state that is created when where is ARE is different that where you WANT to be. It is why vision and goals work. You create an internal force that recognizes the difference between the states of being. Having an understanding of where you want to be, and not being there is uncomfortable. It creates a restlessness...a tension. Movement toward the desired outcomes ease that tension, because it narrows the gap.

We don't like tension. We don't like to be uncomfortable. We don't like change. The beauty of the standard curve is that we only have to endure the discomfort for a short time - then the new behaviors become the new normal, and we have to look for the next stretch.

Obviously I still have some more to work on with this, but I'd rather post something rough and keep working on it than wait until its perfected. It is uncomfortable for me to put something not "done" out into the public sphere, but that is precisely why I am doing it.