Clearly I have NOT mastered this fine art of getting things done, as it has been a month since I last posted something.  Since then, however, I have been educating myself in the fine art of managing my time and the productivity of others.  I am currently availing myself of interns, with whom I am getting systemic changes accomplished that daily demands would have me ignore.  Like moving into Cooler Email, for instance, lock stock and barrel for managing my business from software-as-a-service.  There’s more to the story — stay with me.

Without some troops I would not tackle a project like shifting the locus of my business from my computer to another system so that others could share it.  Having that locus of control shifted makes many things possible that weren’t possible before.

While I have them (before they move on with their REAL lives), Ipek (on the left) and Semih (on the right) are making possible this transition to Cooler Email and other great tools of productivity.

On a related topic, I attended a business gathering last evening where we talked about execution of strategy.  The overarching theme of the evening was that for there to be a shift in the collective consciousness of bringing our heart to the business world, and not just our head, we all need to work for the common good and make decisions with the common good in mind, not just our selfish interests.

This is a theme of mine, and fortunately not JUST mine!  Working for the common good means that as we go about our regular work, we bring in the fine art of considering how what WE do will impact others.

I have helped Semih find a school where he will get his MBA, and I will help Ipek get a job.  I met these two young adults through an earlier intern, Orcun, whom I helped find a job and in doing so I lost him as an intern.  He replaced himself by introducing me to his two friends who needed internships.  THAT, my friends, is the FINE art of getting things done!  When I released my need for Orcun to be my intern, little did I know that I would end up doubling my workforce of interns!  My deciding based on the common good turned out to be good for me, good for Orcun, and good for Ipek and Semih.

I think that’s the way the world REALLY works, and it is NOT intuitive any more than leaning into the curve on a motorcycle is intuitive.  It is a choice, and in the end things get done that should get done, even though in the beginning we don’t see the whole picture.

Workers in China focus on performance, which means they focus on their strengths not their weaknesses.  There, according to Marcus Buckingham’s research, 73 % of workers focus on their strengths, and 27% focus play to their weaknesses compared with the United States where only 14% spend most of their day focusing on their strengths.  We need to build our jobs to fit our strengths.

In the U.S. we believe our strengths are what we are good at, except we may be good at it and we hate it!  We CAN do it, but it drains us.  A weakness is an activity that weakens you.  A strength strengthens you. The assignment from Marcus for the audience was to take a pad of paper, draw a line down the middle, and over the course of the day note what you’re doing and also whether you loved doing it or loathed doing it.

Marcus points to 4 clear signs of strengths:

1.  Success – you feel effective
2.  Instinct – you look forward to it — you like doing it
3. Growth – your synapses are firing, you are in the flow, inquisitive and focused
4.  Needs how do I feel after I have done it?  Did it fill a need I have?

At end of the week, pick one activity that you loved and write a strengths statement that is specific and general at the same time.  In his funny way of sharing a story, Marcus told of when he was interviewing Rosa.  He picked the verb “interviewing.”  Drill down to the specifics of what you really liked about that.   Marcus got specific around interviewing.  “I only like to talk to you if you are really good at your job.  I want to explore why you excel.”  That is specificity around the verb “interviewing.”

End up with 3 strengths statements, and do it twice a year.  Do the same self-evaluation for what you loathe.

Now, as a manager, what about the people you manage? How will you discover your peoples’ strengths, and help them play to those strengths?

Furthermore, what is your strategy to manage drainers — activities that need to be done and you loathe doing it?  Here are some choices.
1. Stop doing it
2. Team up with others who are strengthened by it
3. Offer up your strengths until it is what you do all day
4. Perceive the need, then use a strength to neutralize your weakness
5.  Suck it up and do it

First be honest about what weakens you.  Move your job so the best of your job becomes most of your job.

Responsibility of  a Leader

The job of a leader is to lead people to a better future.  A leader needs optimism.  If you are not motivated that way, you are a pessimist.  How to get agreement from those you are leading is by providing CLARITY, so that people can taste the milk and smell the honey.  There is a vividness about the future, and it is painted in a way that we can see ourselves in that future.

A leader needs to know:

1.  Who do we serve?  Exactly who, not something vague.  Giuliani focused on reducing crime as his focus.   Make a choice, be vivid.
2. What is our core strength, edge, then paint it vividly. Not something vague like “our people are our core strength.”  It’s too vague.  IPhone’s core strength is not partnering!  They have other core strengths, that’s not one of them.

3. Tell me the one score we are going to use.   The Balanced Scorecard is good for management, lousy for leadership.  Marcus gave a prison example where the leader said, “We serve the prisoner.”  Whether right or wrong, he was clear.   What measure?  The recidivism rate is the measure of success — if successful in creating that future, they will keep prisoners from coming back.
4. What action can we take today??   Giuliani, as an example of a leader, cleaned up New York City and his measures were to remove graffiti and have cab drivers wear collared shirts.
In his keynote, Marcus kept coming back to fears, saying that real leaders create momentum when they measure specific actions because specific actions calm our fears.  That is brilliant.   What stops us from focusing on our strengths is our fear that our weaknesses will damage us.  If we are following a capable leader into the future that is vividly expressed with one or two clear measures of success, we can then move confidently forward.  If our managers are focusing on our strengths with us, we can then enjoy our work and make our greatest contribution.

The appeal — to the American audience, not the Chinese one — was to up the ante on our game.  Get clear about our strengths and use them in service of a clear and vivid future.

Fear is a big saboteur of trust, one of many saboteurs.  I had the pleasure to spend the day with Robert Porter Lynch in a seminar, Trusted to Lead.  The time flew.

Dr. Lynch has studied trust in organizations so thoroughly he is writing two books on the architecture of what it takes to build trust, providing a breakthrough in generating successful relationships; one for academia, one for business leaders.

Specifically yesterday we were learning about the ladder of trust in organizations (as opposed to some quick and insufficient definition of trust) and how people climb up the ladder of trust (above the belt) or descend down the ladder of distrust (below the belt).  No platitudes or hollow concepts, this was a sturdy, application-driven workshop experience.  This video gives you a two minute moving snapshot (if you listen closely, because I was in the back of the room) of a highlight moment of the day.

One requirement essential to trust is to balance two interests; self interest (individual good) and mutual interest (greater good, noble cause).  Many folks would have their savings intact if the greedy few hadn’t tipped the scales to ignore mutual interest and gobble gobble gobble for themselves, never mind the impact on the rest of us.

Dr. Lynch’s research reveals that 80%-90% of people are capable of achieving that balance, and we all should look out for the dark side that is in the other 10-20% of the population.  Whether we like it or not, that element is indeed real in our society, and it can play a very strong hand in our experience of life.  If we don’t feel safe with one another, how can we trust?  If we don’t trust, we revert to fear.

I invite you, the reader, to be a champion for trust and to learn how to be that champion in your organizations.  At the creationship tip-top of the ladder of trust, fun and joy are present.  Are you having fun in your organization?  Are you being creatively collaborative?  You could be.  As Dr. Lynch says, “Fun is where Fear Disappears.”

Orson Wells says in his very special voice,”We will sell no wine before its time.” You can see this wine commercial for Paul Masson on YouTube. This blog is not about wine, though. It is about timing.

I understand why to sell no wine before its time — the wine isn’t ready to be consumed!  It would not taste right, it would reflect badly on the wine maker, it would “leave a bad taste in our mouth” (pardon the pun) from the experience.

What about the timing for discovering the world revolves around the sun, and not the other way around?  It took over 1000 years from the first person’s assertion of the earth revolving around the sun, not the other way around, before Copernicus gained credibility for this novel view of reality!   Indeed, Nicholas Copernicus was destined to put forward the theory of the earth’s motion at a time when the idea could be heard. During an earlier era Aristarchus declared the same, too early in mankind’s receptivity to gain credibility.   Although true, truth found no champions.

A modern forward-thinking mind, Dean Kamen, invented (among other things) the electric scooter Segway. His intention was that they replace cars for local transportation but they proved too expensive. I see them downtown upon occasion, driven by the neighborhood “safety cops.” Kamen, according to Fortune Magazine (May 3, 2010), has learned that change takes time and a group effort. Indeed Wilbur and Orville flew, yet it took another 50 years before flying was mainstream.

Although adoption curves have their own timing, they are shortening by and large.  For example, the speed of change is lickety-split on the web. My wonderful social media intern, Audrey Vernhet, informed me recently that Facebook could cost money in the next few months. I am NOT ready to climb on that adoption curve!

Speaking of adoption curves, I wonder when business leaders will take up the accountability for being trustworthy and hold each other to account for the position power they hold?  See www.trust-in-leaders.com for an opportunity to comment by completing the research request.  I welcome your thoughts.

This is the fifth year I have had the pleasure of judging the International Collegiate Business Strategy Competition in San Diego at the Bahia Resort.  Students come from all over the world to compete in this simulation of a real business, and it is an excellent learning experience for them, win or lose.

While this video is a long, amateurish video (I did it) of 20 minutes or so, the contents are worth watching for the joy of seeing professionalism at a young age.  The team included Ryan Rotariu, CEO; Asia Snook, VP Marketing, Kim McIntyre, VP Operations and Michelle Plamondon, VP Finance. Their challenge — to make executive team decisions while running a public, international company over a seven year period.  This is a stellar executive presentation to their “board of directors,” of whom I was one, in the Intercollegiate Business Strategy Competition (ICBSC), at the end of year six of the simulation.

I understand second hand that they participated in this simulation for a measley 1 college credit, and returned to college from the San Diego competition to take finals (they are undergraduate seniors).

Anyone who has presented results will be sufficiently impressed with their thoroughness of analysis, and indeed they did win against three competitors in their “world” of four competitors.  Enjoy!

Larry and I had occasion recently to dine at the University of San Diego (my MBA Alma Mater) with Frank Partnoy and several others from the Corporate Director’s Forum.  Pictured here to Frank’s right is Cindy Richson, an expert in corporate governance and critical member of the organizing committee of the Corporate Governance Conference that Larry chairs each year since its inception five years ago.  The group was gathered to discuss next year’s January Corporate Governance Conference.  I was there as a spouse, so my view of the event was somewhat different.

My fascination was with Frank Partnoy, law professor at USD.  First of all, he’s a very approachable and funny human being.  Second, he is the most entrepreneurial lawyer/professor I’ve met in a long time.  But third, and most fascinating to me, is the list of books that he has written, all seemingly devoted to uncovering the dirt on Wall Street and the investment world.

These books are entitled, in the order they were written, F.I.A.S.C.O.: The Inside Story of Wall Street Trader, followed by “The Match King,” about Ivan Kreuger, the infamous “Match King.”  Kreuger was known as the “Match King” because he held monopolies on the sale of matches in many countries, but his financial empire extended to banking, construction, film, mining, paper, railways, and telephones. He was a statesman as well as a financier, and usurped Jack Morgan as the leading lender to Europe. He rescued France from bankruptcy, and nearly saved Germany. He charmed everyone, from President Hoover to Greta Garbo to the journalists who put his boyish face on the covers of Time and The Saturday Evening Post. Kreuger favored perception over reality. He believed financial statements were an art, not a science. When asked to name his three rules for success in business, Kreuger advised “silence, more silence, and still more silence.”  He was found dead with a bullet through his heart.  He was labeled by some pretty significant historians, among them John Kenneth Galbraith (a favorite of mine) and Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. as the greatest fraud in history.

Frank’s most recent book is called “Infectious Greed: How Deceit and Risk Corrupted the Financial Markets.”  I can honestly say that I have not READ these books, cover to cover, but I have met Frank, and he’s a man with a mission and it’s a mission I heartily endorse.

Here’s what his website (www.frankpartnoy.com) say about Infectious Greed.  “Recent corporate scandals have brought our attention to the dangerously complex and unregulated financial practices of some of the world’s most successful companies. Frank Partnoy, author of the riveting business bestseller F.I.A.S.C.O.: The Inside Story of Wall Street Trader, brings his impressive understanding of complex financial transactions and legal expertise to a fascinating tour of the institutions, scandals, and business cultures that brought us to this moment. In tracing the evolution of increasingly complex derivatives’ use over the past fifteen years–and an appetite for risk and return that made it possible–Partnoy demonstrates that despite the media’s narrow focus on Enron, it was only the tip of the iceberg. The culmination of a steady erosion of personal and institutional control, today’s financial landscape is loaded with ticking time bombs with far greater potential for harm and loss than any other period in our history.”

Go Frank, go!  I hope this latest book sells as many or more than your previous books, and that the people who should learn their lessons do so.  The dinner was delicious, and thank you again for sharing your roasted garlic.

The University Club, where Larry and I are members, hosts a “Distinguished Speaker” series of presentation where all comers are welcome, up to the 200 capacity of their beautiful dining room.  This event last week was superb, and I took careful notes which I share with you here.

From top to bottom, the presenters were:

Moderator Stephen Mayfield Director San Diego Center for Algae Biotechnology
Panel Lisa Bicker CEO, Clean Tech San Diego
Lee Stein CEO, Prize Capital
Irene Stillings CEO, CA Center for Sustainable Energy

Here is pretty much what they said about the Clean Tech industry in San Diego, from my notes (taken on my iphone).

Clean technology means a way to be more energy efficient.   Regarding GDP vs energy consumption, the US consumes 25% of the world’s petroleum. The Chinese have been buying energy reserves so there is increasing demand on limited energy resources.  We have to be inventive to retain our standard of living.  Energy is the only commodity with an unsatiable demand  for it.

Lisa Bicker heads Clean Tech San Diego, a market connectivity organization.  Her comments:  San Diego has one significant intangible asset with tangible results, which is the great collaboration between and among agents of innovation and this is different from other areas.  Playing nicely with others helps us succeed.  Many local mayors have a commitment to transforming our community in green ways.

There are 672 clean tech companies in SD.  Half are creators, half are enablers.

Lee Stein:  Environmental Entrepreneurs need to be a business voice for the environment.  Regarding energy resources, today we are using the resources of 2.5 planets, which is not sustainable – 45 mill barrel/day shortfall.  AB 32, under attack now, will create 352,000 jobs by 2020 but a ballot measure out there sponsored by one company seeks to damage the good that AB 32 does, do not put it on the ballot, do not be fooled.

China’s green leap forward. They looked at California.  With their “Negawatt,” they seek to arbitrage energy and it’s just good business.  China is going toward solar and wind.  There will be a slow start and will import less energy from us and we could import energy from them in the future.  Innovatively, 57 degrees below the ground can be mined for energy for instance and it is happening.

Irene Stillings:  The California Center for Sustainable Energy helps consumers to make wise energy decisions.  The need is insatiable the supply is not.  The Chinese invest more in this area than US investors.  China is now leading in solar power.  California leads the country and provides the cues to Washington.  Excellent renewable portfolio standard.  For example, in California, Title 24 is a series of stringent building codes equal to basic LEAD standards.   There is no national energy policy yet.  We could have cap in trade limits and carbon tax.  Also incentives for offshore drilling and other things.

Residential and businesses want it. Going green does green your bottom line.  Currently we are seeing job growth in solar and algae.  We need energy efficient audits.  We need more quality auditors and installers.  Irene has increased staff by 25%, and her organization will train energy auditors.

Comments generated from questions of the audience:  In San Diego, too many resources are going into gaming the system rather than improving the opportunity to bring innovation.  We need to be more proactive in legislative before stuff becomes law and SF is good at this, we could improve.

What about water technology?  San Diego is home to over 100 water technology companies that are often stalled, like gray water.  More needed, but water is not as sexy as energy.  The need is much worse.

China is producing ten times the energy engineers as the U.S.. What are these organizations doing to generate the needed people?  Academically, Science in the US was not popular but very recently STUDENTS have figured it out and are flocking to the lab.  Policy has lagged behind to support student applications.

Students have environmental ethic and are making it part of their own choices.  Look at usfirst.org.

There is no silver bullet to the energy issues, but there should be silver buckshot!

I had the pleasure of introducing Dave Logan as the opening keynote presenter for the Association for Strategic Planning annual conference in Pasadena yesterday.

Dave is a USC faculty member, best-selling author, and management consultant. At USC, he teaches in the Executive MBA, Master of Medical Management and Executive Education.  As co-founder and senior partner at CultureSync, a management consulting firm, Dave works with Fortune 500 companies, governments, and non-profit organizations.   He’s written four books, including Tribal Leadership. He holds a Ph.D. in Organizational Communication from the Annenberg School at USC.

Although not an alumni of the Marshall School myself (I have a University of San Diego MBA), I first met Dave at a USC MBA Alumni gathering in San Diego several years ago, when his book Tribal Leadership was in pre-publication format.  Tribal Leadership is about leveraging natural groups to build a thriving organization.  Rather than TALK about the 5 stages of an organization’s culture, he DEMONSTRATED the five stages by assigning roles to 5 random individuals from the audience.

Dave was so effective at communicating the essence of Tribal Leadership that I immediately vetted him as a speaker for Vistage, where I was a chair at the time, and engaged him to speak to my CEO group about Tribal Leadership.  Again, Dave was interactive and inventive.  Using polling technology, he asked my CEO clients where they thought we were as a group within the five stages of Tribal Leadership.   The good news for me was, they gave the group very high marks.  Even more importantly, and to Dave’s credit, they were so committed to practicing Tribal Leadership distinctions in their organizations that they requested Dave return, which he did six months later.

I then garnered for myself a front row seat for the unveiling of Dave’s next book at the opening presentation of Landmark Education’s Conference on Global Leadership.   Called Three Laws of Performance, Rewriting the Future of Your Organization and Your Life, this book was an overnight best-seller.  I highly recommend that you pick it up if you want to read about deep, sustaining transformation in several highlighted organizations.  This book was co-authored with Steve Zaffron.

I could not think of a more dynamic way to begin our conference on strategic planning, with the theme of positioning for long-term success in a short-term world, than to hear Dave’s original thinking.  For me personally, he brings a focus to the BEING aspect of what we are DOING so that we can HAVE the results we seek. Dave embodies an extraordinary way of BEING engaging with content that is fresh, and rich, and delivering it so that the message sticks.

Dave left us with an immediate take-away, a model for devising an interim strategy, which I have pictured here, and which he invites you to use freely (open source)!  Best done as three separate questions in a group setting (for challenging your assumptions), it favors immediate results and in these trying times, who doesn’t want that?  If you have questions or if you want the PDF version please feel free to contact me.  If you find this useful, just please tell me how you used it, and what it did for you — I’ll tell Dave too!  He and I would like to know.

Here’s my intern.  Meet Marcel Schmidt, from Germany who is attending the California Internatioinal Business University (CIBU) for one semester.

I have appreciated interns throughout many of my years in San Diego, and none more than now!  Marcel actually found me on the internet!  He took the initiative to ask for an internship, and he is a very good producer of results.  His English is excellent, and he puts his head down and gets work done.

My responsibility is to see to it that Marcel has a good experience.  I have taken him to the MIT Enterprise Forum business case, I have invited him to take notes at an upcoming strategic planning facilitation that I am conducting, and I am asking him to sit in for me at a networking event where it matters that someone is in my seat when I am not there.  These activities integrate him into our culture, and my world, and hopefully enhance his interest in my success while contributing to his learning.

That is the good news.  The bad news is, of course, that he will leave.  It is a fair trade-off, in my view, because now he will go back to his country and his life and I will have contributed to him, and he will have contributed to Accountability Pays.

Having been the fortunate recipient of such good work, I look back on my own experience of school and wish I had been that smart, to work for someone and get a flavor of reality.  The closest I have come is the International Collegiate Business Strategy Competition (ICBSU), which comes to San Diego thanks to host school University of San Diego for the last time in April, because of budget cuts. It is seeking a new host University, which may mean that I will no longer be involved, and that breaks my heart.  I am one of many “judges” while student executive teams run a business (simulation).  Judging means occupying the board of directors seat for these executive teams — great fun.

But I digress.  There are excellent internship programs in San Diego at all the universities.  Additionally, UC San Marcos has a program where you can hire a team of seniors for $1,500 to take on a project — research projects are common — and the results have been stunning!  I have not partaken myself, but several of my client companies have, with good results.

This is the most important message we could hope to take into ourselves right now, given the despair that is so easy to soak up around us, seeping into our attempts at holiday merriment.  This message puts the authority for our futures back into our own hands.  (It does have a Christian quote or two, but they don’t have to be Christian thoughts.  Every religion brings this message in its own verbiage.  Listen from that universal place).

There isn’t really anything to say about this gift from Earl Nightingale, except it is worth the half-hour required to soak up the encouragement and the guidance.  I’ll stop now, so you can do just that!