Archive for September, 2011

The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace September 7 2011 1096one responsehttp%3A%2F%2Feblingroup.com%2F2011%2F09%2Fthe-five-languages-of-appreciation-in-the-workplace.htmlThe+5+Languages+of+Appreciation+in+the+Workplace2011-09-07+10%3A21%3A57scotthttp%3A%2F%2Flocalhost%2F2011%2F09%2Fthe-five-languages-of-appreciation-in-the-workplace.html

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Earlier this year, I wrote a blog post called Can This Marriage (Customer, Team, Leader) Be Saved? in which I referenced a book called The 5 Love Languages and riffed a bit on how those might be applied at work.  A couple of days later, I got a nice email from Dr. Paul White letting me know that he was co-authoring a book with Dr. Gary Chapman, the author of Love Languages, on how they could be applied in the workplace.

It’s out now and is called The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace.  I spent some time talking with Dr. White yesterday and, with his permission, recorded the call so you could listen in. He talks about what the research says about motivating through appreciation and the top ways in which most people want to be appreciated. Here’s the interview:

He was also nice enough to share his top ten easiest ways to show appreciation to almost anyone.  You can download that here.

This stuff is easy to do and likely to make a difference, folks. Think about it:

• What kind of difference does it make for you when your boss or a co-worker expresses their appreciation?
• What kind of difference would it make for your team members if you expressed your appreciation in a way that works for them (hint:  something beyond the “great job everyone” email)?
• What is your No. 1 idea for anyone who wants to do a better job of showing appreciation to others at work?

 

The Strategic Viewer’s Guide to the President’s Jobs Speech September 6 2011 10973 responseshttp%3A%2F%2Feblingroup.com%2F2011%2F09%2Fthe-strategic-viewers-guide-to-the-presidents-job-speech.htmlThe+Strategic+Viewer%E2%80%99s+Guide+to+the+President%E2%80%99s+Jobs+Speech2011-09-06+08%3A54%3A08scotthttp%3A%2F%2Flocalhost%2F2011%2F09%2Fthe-strategic-viewers-guide-to-the-presidents-job-speech.html

There’s lots of speculation about what President Obama will say in his jobs creation strategy speech to Congress on Thursday night.  Will he be bold?  Will he be meek?  Will he seek compromise? Will he draw a line in the sand?

Perhaps the most important question is will he offer a viable strategy for creating jobs and reducing the unemployment rate? Lately, I’ve been reading a book that will help you and me answer that last question.  It’s called Good Strategy Bad Strategy  by UCLA business professor Richard Rumelt. Back in December 2008, Rumelt wrote in the McKinsey Quarterly  that the great recession was not the typical downturn, but a structural break that would require difficult fundamental changes to get the economy back on track. Almost three years later, it looks like he called it.

Since one of the basic jobs of leadership is to define a strategy that can lead to success, Thursday’s speech provides an opportunity for an evaluative case study.  In Good Strategy Bad Strategy, Rumelt says that there are three key elements that represent the kernel of any good strategy. Conversely, there are three signs of a bad strategy. 

So, building on what Rumelt offers, here’s your viewer’s guide to whether the President is offering a good jobs strategy or a bad jobs strategy on Thursday night. (The guide just might help you in your next strategy conversation as well.)

What Our Leaders Didn’t Learn on Their Summer Vacations September 1 2011 10983 responseshttp%3A%2F%2Feblingroup.com%2F2011%2F09%2Fwhat-our-leaders-didnt-learn-on-their-summer-vacations.htmlWhat+Our+Leaders+Didn%27t+Learn+on+Their+Summer+Vacations2011-09-01+10%3A49%3A57scotthttp%3A%2F%2Flocalhost%2F2011%2F09%2Fwhat-our-leaders-didnt-learn-on-their-summer-vacations.html

Long term readers of this blog may have noticed that I don’t write nearly as many posts as I used to that are based on politics. There are a couple of reasons for that. First, I try to keep this blog in the ballpark of leadership news you can use and there just aren’t that many good examples coming from our national political leaders. That leads to the second reason I’m not writing about them much anymore. What they’re doing is just flat out depressing.

So today’s post is a bit of a combo platter. On the one hand, it’s a cry of frustration. On the other, it’s one of those learn what to do by not doing what they’re doing posts.

Before Congress recessed for summer vacation and the President left for Martha’s Vineyard, the two sides (Why is it always about the two sides anymore anyway? Ah, but I digress.)  took each other and the country to the brink by locking horns over the debt ceiling. Historians may well look back on that fiasco as the tipping point into complete dysfunction. I guess it was too much to hope that as our leaders took some vacation that they would step back, reflect on what happened and come back ready to do things differently for the good of the country.

Yeah, that was too much to hope for apparently. In scheduling his much anticipated speech on jobs creation (the New York Times has the recap), the President asked for a joint session of Congress on the same night as the first Republican debate to have all of the current candidates in the field. Of course, the White House press office claimed that this was a mere coincidence and that they had never considered big footing the GOP. Not to worry, the Speaker of the House, in a historically unprecedented move, rejected the President’s request for a joint session. After an afternoon of naming, blaming and stare downs, the White House relented. The joint session speech is now scheduled for the next night, the start of the new season of the NFL. Great solution.

So, what’s the leadership lesson in all of this? There aren’t any good ones. So let’s look for the counterfactual lessons: 

• One, when you’re a leader, focus on the real work. 
• Two, put the greater interest ahead of your self interest. 
• Three, to get anything done, you’re going to have to occasionally work with people you don’t like and don’t always agree with. 
• Four, you’ll never get anything positive accomplished if you’re constantly doing petty things designed to show up the other side.

I could go on, but what do you think? What lessons – positive or negative – should leaders take away from our current political state? What can we do to make things better? As for me, I’m becoming increasingly intrigued by an organization called Americans Elect and the efforts of people like Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz to rally his peers to take a stand against bad leadership.