Karl Edwards presents Working Matters

Tag: motivation

  • Listen In -> Employees… What Are They Good For? #1: Expense or Asset?

    You’ve met them both.

    One is the leader who views their employees as an expense to be minimized.

    The other is the leader who views their employees as an asset into whom to invest.

    The one is most often at odds with their team. Cracking the whip to make sure no one is slacking off. Squeezing out every last drop of effort, delaying promotions, denying vacations, and doing their best to protect the company from the unfortunate necessity of needing more hands and feet to get the job done.

    The other leader is grateful to surround him or herself with a complementary set of skills, experiences, working styles and passions.

    This leader is most often working in concert with their team. Building on strengths, strengthening weaknesses, expressing confidence, extending trust, and celebrating aggressive goals achieved.

    Working with people, of course, has both its ups and downs. What is significant though is the beginning lens through which you choose to views these problems and opportunities.

    Are your employees are an expense to minimize or an asset to maximize?

    The lens you choose will have a radical impact on how you deal with four common employee problems.

    Employees… What Are They Good For?
    Week 1: Expense or Asset?
    Week 2: The Problem of Finding Good Employees
    Week 3: The Problem of Retaining Good Employees
    Week 4: The Problem of Poor Employee Performance
    Week 5: The Problem of Stagnant Employee Progress

    What lens do you use when addressing employee problems? 

    Listen in.

    Each week the conversation will continue. Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Loving Monday: The Future Cannot be Postponed

    loving_mondayAspirations are fuel to the soul.

    Aspirations reframe our current circumstances into terms that tap into our dreams and hopes for the future.

    Aspirations, though, have to touch ground somewhere.

    That somewhere is Monday morning.

    That somewhere is in the choices I make today.

    Aspirations may be fulfilled in the future, but they always require engagement in the present.

    My point in this post is just this: The future cannot be postponed.

    All futures, if they are ever to take form, involve taking action today. Action postponed is future postponed.

    When it comes to our aspirations, though, we are dealing with matters of the spirit and heart. We are dealing with deep desires and ambitious hopes.

    We are dealing with all that makes us come alive and willing to work day after day and year after year in order to realize.

    Hence the urgency to live some portion of that dream today. To choose to take one step—however small or however far away from the goal it may feel—today.

    Maybe it’s a telephone call to make. Maybe it’s a essay to write. Maybe it’s a skill to learn. Maybe it’s a character trait to adjust. Maybe it’s a desktop to clear. Maybe it’s a problem to confront. Maybe it’s a mistake to correct. Maybe it’s a helping hand to extend.

    Just as long as it happens today. Something, one thing, anything, today.

    The future cannot be postponed. It will be here before you know it.

    What about your aspirations? Let’s make sure by taking a practical step today.

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Loving Monday: Staying in the Game

    loving_mondayThere are times when simply getting the job done isn’t enough.

    There are times when how the work was completed overshadows that the work was completed.

    We all get weary. We all experience boredom, stress, and fatigue among other difficulties at work.

    Very few of us can simply override these feelings by sheer force of will, working with as much vigor, enthusiasm and effort as we would in the best of times.

    We need a way to stay in the game when work and life pressures are weighing heavily on our spirits.

    Who would you give the promotion to? The person who is engaged or the person who is distracted? The person who is taking the initiative or the person who is doing the bare minimum?

    Who would you give the job to? The person who believes in their ability to make a meaningful contribution or the person who is trying to get away from a bad supervisor? The person who is eager to jump in with both feet, or the person who wants to know how much overtime is expected?

    We need a way to hold ourselves with poise and a comfortable confidence. We need a way to stay interested and engaged. We need a way to restore (more…)

  • Loving Monday: Detour to the Friendly Voice

    loving_mondayThere are a lot of voices around us.

    The boss voice telling us to get busy. The employee voice asking us to make a decision. The co-worker voice requesting assistance.

    We hear critical voices second-guessing our choices. We hear fearful voices resisting our initiatives. We hear angry voices attacking our motives.

    Each voice articulates something worth listening to and much more that needs to be ignored. We spend a lifetime learning to discern between what has substance and what is the speaker’s personal issues spilling out all over us.

    Getting our week off to a good start involves beginning with a friendly voice or two.

    Someone who believes in you. Someone who is already on your side. Someone who has demonstrated that they want good things for you.

    These people are a rich source of encouragement, affirmation, compliments, and confidence.

    Not that we are going to these people in search of the unsolicited pat-on-the-back. (Though that is certainly an idea worth exploring.) We are choosing, however, to begin our weeks with the truth about ourselves. A positive truth about ourselves that we can do something with.

    We are setting our perspective for the week in terms of our capabilities, our strengths and our potential. Beginning with a friendly voice in our ear, we are better situated to face the obstacles, the conflict, and the mistakes we encounter along the way.

    We cannot inoculate ourselves from the dark voices or the difficult events that arise in the course of a week. But we can be well-grounded in all that is solid and constructive in who we are.

    Why start the week with someone yelling at you or complaining to you, if you can take a small detour and find a friendly voice to enthusiastically greet you, affirm you, or appreciate you?!

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Loving Monday: Inserting a Warm Word in a Cold World

    loving_mondayIt would probably catch everyone off guard.

    Out of the blue, or so it would seem, you blurt out, “You really know your stuff. Thank you for all you contribute.”

    Or when she’s not looking, you sneak up and announce, “I couldn’t do this without you.”

    Even more inexplicably, you confess, “This team is one of the things I love most about this job.”

    It can be a cold world. Tight deadlines. Tighter margins. Nasty vendors. Nastier clients. And a tough economy to boot.

    We are busy. We are stressed. We are juggling multiple responsibilities, and it’s taking our full focus not to drop anything.

    It’s into this cold world that a warm word can make the difference between surviving and thriving.

    To hear that one’s ideas are appreciated, that one’s contribution is recognized, or that one’s presence is valued can transform a stressed, weary, minimal effort into an energetic and passionate engagement.

    We get caught up in the busyness and stress of the job’s intensity ourselves. It is easy to forget that people run on more than a paycheck to keep their motivation and energy levels up.

    Yes, it would be nice if someone directed a warm word your way. In the mean time, though, take the initiative yourself and insert a warm word into someone else’s otherwise cold world.

    Looking for a simple structure to guide your words? Download a copy of our “Say Thank You and Mean It” tool. (click here)

    Let me know what happens!

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Listen In -> The Hard Facts of Working with People #2: People Need to Contribute and Make a Difference

    Many of us, if we were honest, would prefer not to have other people on the team. But we need more arms and legs than we have ourselves!

    So we hire beings to function as utilities, which by their nature are anything but utilities. That is, we hire human beings.

    Hard fact to face about these creatures known as human beings is that they need to contribute and make a difference.

    Take this fact into account as you shape their job descriptions, responsibilities, communication patterns, and performance evaluations, and you will discover the most amazing source of energy, ideas, production and effectiveness imaginable.

    Ignore this fact and you will spend a fortune on high turnover, stagnant careers, negative attitudes, and a bare bones work ethic.

    You can crack the whip all you like. Yell and scream. Threaten and punish. Nothing will elicit anything more than the absolute minimum in effort.

    It’s your choice. Face this hard fact of working with people or not.

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Listen In -> Fake Goals #5: Goals That Are Double Standards

    Probably the most subtly evil of the fake goals are the ones which are double standards.

    The goals that you hold everyone to account except yourself.

    As attractive as the option might be to those who think their position entitles them to certain flexibility as regards their own accountability, it is a credibility-destroyer.

    First, double standards undermine any positive motivation your team may have been able to derive out of having a set of ambitious goals.

    Once you remove yourself from the accountable team, the motivation shifts from achievement to measurement; and the focus shifts from working hard to avoiding judgment.

    Secondly, you just fired yourself from the team. You put yourself on a different team. Instead of you being accountable for ensuring the team’s success, you make the team accountable for your success.

    I promise you, they won’t embrace that responsibility enthusiastically. Instead of getting 110% from a highly motivated team, you will barely get 51% (or whatever you passing grade is).

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Listen In -> Fake Goals #3: Goals That Are A Moving Target

    Want to be a hero in your client’s eyes?

    Try making irresponsible promises that you can later blame others for not being able to keep.

    You most likely know what we’re talking about…

    • The client calls and wants the deadline moved forward. You know the new deadline is unrealistic, but feel it would be disastrous to refuse or negotiate.

    • The scope of work on a project keeps expanding, but you decline to increase the fees involved so that you don’t discourage future business.

    Two realities that confront leaders all of the time.

    What do you do when the schedule or budget for a project changes?

    In this week’s show Claudia and I discuss how counter-productive and demotivating it is when you create a moving target by forcing your team to deal with the ramifications of a change in deadline or budget.

    Listen in for a constructive alternative.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Listen In -> Fake Goals #2: Goals That Are Arbitrary

    Why be limited by reality?!

    A second way to master the art of demotivation is by drawing targets out of thin air like, “Increase sales by 20%” (even during a recession).

    Why be constricted by facts when you can watch people scramble desperately to achieve what has no grounding in reality?

    In this week’s show, Claudia and I look at the pitfalls of setting arbitrary goals.

    As helpful and valuable as goals can be, if they are not grounded in reality, then they become elusive phantoms who haunt with threats of impending punishments.

    Instead of helping us plan better or motivating us to work smarter, arbitrary goals make our efforts feel meaningless.

    A lazy salesperson might exceed their target by the luck of a client’s purchasing schedule, while a hard-working salesperson might fall short of their target by virtue of a slow economic cycle.

    In this example, the lazy person would probably be rewarded and the hard worker would be punished.

    How arbitrary are the targets you set?

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Listen In -> Fake Goals #1: Goals That Are Vague

    Meaningful goals can transform a good idea into a practical reality. Fake goals can undermine and sabotage even the simplest of efforts.

    Claudia and I are starting a new podcast series this week entitled, “Fake Goals: Your Key to Perpetual Demotivation”.

    We begin the discussion in this week’s show exploring how to master the art of demotivation with goals like, “Work harder” or “Improve your attitude” or “Make fewer mistakes.”

    Vague goals are a common and quite subtle form of confused communication. You know what you mean when you set a vague goal like, “Your attitude needs to improve.”

    But I promise you that you’re creating for yourself hours of arguing over whether or not a vague goal like this has been achieved.

    And of course, we won’t leave you with the problem without discussing practical alternatives.

    Listen in.

    Here’s an overview of the entire series:

    Fake Goals: Your Key to Perpetual Demotivation
    Week #1: Goals That Are Vague
    Week #2: Goals That Are Arbitrary
    Week #3: Goals That Are a Moving Target
    Week #4: Goals That Are a Dangling Carrot
    Week #5: Goals That Are Double Standards