Becky Robinson's Blog, page 43

Take Charge of Your Feelings – with The Mood Elevator

Mood swings. We all experience them from time to time, whether as a result of fluctuating hormones or changes in circumstance or fluctuating energy levels. But what if we could learn to level out those swings, and keep ourselves at the upper end of things? What if you knew how to control your moods despite the harsh rumors at work, discouraging news headlines, disagreements with family, or other undesired turns of events?

Think of your moods like an elevator, and you’ll quickly recognize that you ride up and down it every single day, sometimes more than once. That’s normal, right? But it doesn’t have to be! As the author of today’s book points out: “There may be events that stimulate our thoughts, but it is the thoughts that determine our moods.” We can learn to control our mood swings by controlling our thoughts — no matter what’s happening around us — and enjoy a nice long stay at the top levels of the Mood Elevator.

Discover ‘The Mood Elevator’

We all ride the Mood Elevator up and down every day. How well we do it impacts our relationship, our personal effectiveness, our career, and our experience of life. Most people take that ride for granted and don’t think it can be influenced. But what if we knew the right buttons to push to move to the top of the Mood Elevator? Wouldn’t it be useful if there were proven ways to make visits to the lower floors less frequent and less intense?

In this very practical guide, Larry Senn provides an operating manual to keep you out of the emotional basement. He shows how to recognize when you’ve become so accustomed to being stuck on a lower floor – worried, stressed, anxious, and judgmental – you don’t even realize it, and what to do to interrupt those negative thought patterns and start going up again. He urges us to cultivate mental attitudes like curiosity and gratitude that will keep us on the higher floors, and explains how to quiet the mind and nurture positive thoughts without succumbing to Pollyanna-ish denial. And as someone who took up triathlons at the age of seventy, he speaks from experience when he emphasizes the inseparable connection between physical health and mental health.

Meet Larry Senn

Dr. Larry Senn is the founder of Senn Delaney, the culture shaping unit of Heidrick & Struggles. He has been referred to in business journals as the father of corporate culture, based on his pioneering research on organizational culture. Senn Delaney has worked with over 100 Fortune 500 CEOs and their teams, university presidents, state governors, and members of U.S. presidential cabinets.

Larry’s personal purpose is to help an ever-widening number of people live life at their best mentally, emotionally, physically, and purposefully. The Mood Elevator is one tool he has created to make that a reality for tens of thousands of people. Larry is a culture consultant, highly-rated conference presenter, and author. His earlier books include the best-selling book Winning Teams, Winning Cultures and 21st Century Leadership.

What People Are Saying

“I am impressed by the proof that Larry Senn presented in how mood changes thoughts on a personal level and culture on a corporate level. Whether you want to improve your outlook and behaviors in your life or improve what happens at work, this book will teach you. These sixteen chapters make sense, especially in these turbulent times.”

— Jane Anderson, 5-star Amazon review

“This small book packs a whole lot of punch. It strengthened my ability to learn how to stop, breathe, and trace my thoughts. Mindfulness is a new found path for me, and this book helps me continue to follow it.”

— Patricia Lomelin, 5-star Amazon review

“The value of ‘The Mood Elevator’ is not just in bringing new ideas to the attention of us all … it’s in the comprehensive and engaging packaging of that information. The author has a conversational style, well seasoned with real-life examples (sometimes using himself), and a nice way of wrapping each section up and tying it to the others.”

— John Smith, 5-star Amazon review

“Larry Senn uses scientific research, personal experience, and effective anecdotes to help readers find their own path to understanding what moods mean and how to be in control of them. Not a positive thinking book, ‘The Mood Elevator’ offers real, useable information that everyone can benefit from. It’s logically laid out, the right kind of challenging, and worth reading a second time.”

— Dawn-Marie, 5-star Amazon review

Learn More

Visit the website to download a sample chapter, watch the video trailer, access the free Mood Elevator graphic, and find tweets and graphics to share across your networks.
Watch the recent webinar with Larry, where he shares more about transforming our lives simply by becoming more aware of our moods.
Add the book to your Goodreads shelf.
Buy your copy or share a review on Amazon.

Stay Flexible on Social Media

As social media managers, we constantly think ahead and plan content for next week, next month, and beyond. After all, the number one rule of social media is “post consistently.” Content marketing requires a constant stream of content. So we plan content and editorial calendars. We create project timelines. Tools like Buffer and Hootsuite allow users to schedule content in advance, making our lives much simpler. Facebook allows pre-scheduling on Business Pages and in Groups. It’s fantastic. All we have to do is set it and forget it.

Until events such as the ones in Charlottesville last week take place. I saw an ad on Instagram last Monday for a paint company, advertising using white paint to create an open, airy kitchen. The ad had the word “WHITES” in huge letters at the top.

On any other week, the ad would have been creative and, likely, effective. The kitchen was beautiful.

In the current political climate, though, the ad came off, at best, as tone deaf. I seriously doubt that the paint company set out to make a political statement with an Instagram ad. By not remaining flexible and paying attention to the world around them, that’s exactly what they ended up doing.

No longer can you set content in advance and forget about it. The social media world moves too quickly for that these days.

Does that mean you shouldn’t plan ahead?

Of course not. Campaigns still need to be planned out to maximize effectiveness. Pre-scheduling posts is still an incredibly helpful practice. Social media managers can’t just fly by the seat of their pants and expect to be successful.

We do need to remain flexible though and pay attention to the world around us. A well-intentioned tweet or post can take on an entirely different meaning based on current events. In some circumstances, pausing social media posting entirely may be appropriate. Christy Kirk wrote last year about why Weaving Influence took our social media channels and our client channels dark in response to the Orlando nightclub shooting.

Being flexible is also an asset in many positive situations. There are countless examples of brands taking advantage of a social media or cultural moment with huge success. Who can forget Oreo’s “You can still dunk in the dark” tweet during the 2013 Super Bowl blackout?

Being flexible allows you to take advantage of a trending hashtag on Twitter or to share a timely news story that relates to your brand, both of which will help you increase engagement and visibility on your social channels.

Social media moves quickly. Planning ahead is important, but so is staying flexible.

What examples of a brand taking advantage of a positive moment or event have you seen?

The Three Rules of Intelligent Restraint

We’re throwing it back! This week we’re showcasing a guest post from Alison Eyring about the theme from her latest book,  Pacing for Growth , which launched on February 20, 2017.*

In endurance training, you can apply simple rules of restraint to ramp up and ramp down your training program ahead of a race. These rules of thumb help you make important trade-offs between exertion and recovery.

For example, one rule of restraint I’ve always found helpful for running is the “10% Rule.” This rule says that each week, you only increase the length of your longest run by about 10 percent. You also can apply the 10% Rule to the total volume of running in a week. What’s important is ramping up running volume in a disciplined way.

Rules like the 10% Rule enable you to increase your training levels, but not so fast that you get hurt. At the same time, they restrict exercise volume to allow the body to recover and get stronger so that you’re ready for the eventual race.

There also are rules of restraint that guide recovery if you are hurt or injured, perhaps as a result of failing to pay heed to the rules about training volume! My sports coach advised me not to train for three days after experiencing a sharp pain, and to go see him if the pain didn’t go away.

Applying these rules of restraint helps me and other athletes build capacity without getting hurt. As the weeks pass, the body is able to go faster and farther without breaking down. The practice of restraint in endurance training is often the difference between an athlete who is still going at 60 and one who burns out or injures herself to the point of quitting the sport.

Unfortunately, we don’t have simple rules of restraint to help us build capacity in an organization or a team. The rules we have in business prevent us from breaking laws or standards of governance. For example, we have limits on the financial value of a gift, or a policy on what can or cannot be said in public about the firm’s strategic plans.

Rule #1: Focus Overrules Vision

Vision is important and gets you going, but focus is what gets you across the finish line. The right focus clarifies how to allocate resources like time, money, and support. Growth Leaders use focus to drive behavior that’s consistent with important values, and to build both “vertical alignment” and “horizontal alignment.” Focus conserves energy that is needed to perform today as you transform for tomorrow.

Rule #2: Routines Beat Strengths

Strengths are useful, but they can become a liability when overused. The right routines efficiently shape the new ways of thinking and behaving that we need for growth. Effective growth routines allow small change that can trigger larger changes to happen across the organization. Growth Leaders create and utilize routines that conserve energy as they make it possible to learn or change faster.

Rule #3: Exert, Then Recover

Exertion and recovery need one another for maximum effect. You have to train with the right levels of exertion to build your capacity, and you have to engage in the right kind of recovery to allow your body and mind to keep exerting. To deliver results and build capacity for growth at the same time requires high levels of exertion that consumes personal and organizational energy that must be replenished.

These types of rules are important. But while they keep us from doing bad things, they don’t help us drive positive things, like improved customer service or successful execution.

Which of these — focus, routine, or allowing for recovery — do you find to be most challenging?

 

*This post is an excerpt from Chapter 1 of Pacing for Growth by Alison Eyring.

Guess What? Work and Life Don’t Have To Be at Odds

When I was pregnant with my first, I heard the same saying over and over again.

“You have no idea how much you can love something until you have a child.”

It seemed like such a cliché.

I tried not to roll my eyes—mostly because this was usually used as some kind of punctuation to a long list of sacrifices and complaints shared by those wise parents who had gone before.

And then March 10, 2014, happened—and I knew exactly what everyone was talking about.

My love for Eleanor is indescribable and immeasurable—and somehow it keeps growing.

I knew having a kid would forever change my life, but I didn’t know by how much and how.

After having her, I never thought that less than a year later I would, uncharacteristically, quit my job with no real plan in place. After all, my adult life had all been perfectly orchestrated career moves.

However, after returning to work following my maternity leave, I kept thinking I would get used to being away from my child and only being able to see her for a few hours a day. But it never felt right.

In fact, everything about it felt wrong.

My boss scoffed when I resigned, and said I was making an irreversible mistake. Even my parents questioned my decision.

Thankfully, I found encouragement in the successful women who reached out to me to say they wished they had done the same—kids grow so fast, and that time is irreplaceable—and women who said they did the same and were able to continue their upward career trajectory after their kids were school-aged.

Lucky for me, within a month of leaving my job, I was introduced to Becky Robinson and her genius business model of Weaving Influence.

At Weaving Influence’s core is the understanding of the importance of the ever-elusive work/life balance.

But with Weaving Influence, work/life balance isn’t elusive. It’s attainable. Why? Because flexibility is one of its core values.

People can use their talents to help others and continue to grow their careers, all in the comfort of their own homes.

And, I dare say, everyone (workers, clients, and team members) involved with Weaving Influence benefits from the value of flexibility. Here’s how.

For the Worker

Happiness. Well, let’s start with the obvious. Being able to spend quality time with your family and loved ones while still growing professionally and helping others grow professionally is pretty great. I have to say I’ve never felt more balanced and happy since working a flexible job. And, it’s worth mentioning, that happier workers are more productive ones.

Family. I’m not the only one in my family that’s happier. I dare say my kids and husband are, too. Eleanor and Cal get the attention they need from their mama. And Jake and I are better able to work as a team because my schedule can bend with the needs of our household. The same goes for most others on the #WIteam.

For the Client

Greater access. Being in a flexible work environment means that our services aren’t confined to the 9-to-5 work clock. We answer emails at night and take calls on the weekend. Being flexible means that we shift our day to meet other’s needs and schedules too.

Better efficiency. Working during nap times or when grandma comes to visit means you have no choice but to be efficient. There’s no lollygagging when Weaving Influence work begins. It’s go time with a razor-thin focus. You never know when that kid is going to wake up.

For the Team

Communication. Because we have team members scattered around the globe and working all different hours of the day and night, the #WIteam knows the importance of communication. We can’t assume people overhear news in the hall, so we’re sure to share and document everything in our project management system. Emboldening these communication skills carry over into other parts of our lives, too. I’m way more organized since joining the virtual workforce.

Understanding. I have an admission to make—and I’m not proud of this: before I had kids, when co-workers would leave early from work for a family obligation, I sort of thought they might be slacking. I know, I know. It’s terrible.

Now, as a work-from-home/stay-at-home mom, I’m way more empathetic and understanding that people have other things happening in their lives than just work. This understanding is ingrained within the #WIteam and it makes meeting people where they are easier. We aren’t intractable in meeting times and modes of communication—and this makes ideas a reality faster.

Not to sound cliché (or maybe I should, because after all, clichés turn out to be truths), the flexibility of Weaving Influence has made my (and others’) dreams come true.

Sure, it’s not all skittles and sunshine—there are times when I’m on a conference call while trying to calm a crying baby and satisfy a demanding toddler.

But I have the opportunity to be present in my family’s life while still doing what I love professionally and, well, that is pretty darn amazing.

5 Tips to Stop Driving People Crazy

We’re throwing it back! This week we’re showcasing a guest post from Susan Fowler about the theme from her latest book, Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work… and What Does, which re-launched in paperback on February 27, 2017.

If you want to drive yourself crazy, notice how often you hear the word “drive” in workplace conversations. Drive for results. Drive for performance. Drive ____ (fill in the blank with your organization’s current focus). Here’s one that really drives me crazy: We need to drive engagement. The worst is some version of: We need an incentive to drive motivation.

Do yourself and the people you lead a favor. Stop thinking you can drive people. You can drive cattle, drive a car, or drive a golf ball. But driving people for results, performance, or motivation, only drives them crazy.

Five questions to determine if you are driving people crazy — and tips to stop it!

Over the next week, catch yourself when you utter the word “drive.” Notice if your use of the term “drive” belies potential beliefs, values, or practices that maybe sabotaging your results and debilitating the people you lead.

Do you have an underlying assumption that people don’t want to achieve their goals? Is “driving performance” a euphemism for giving people a kick in the backend? Are you “driving performance” because you’re afraid people will underperform?

TIP: Revisit your basic beliefs about the nature of people’s motivation. The truth is, people want to thrive. No one wants to be bored and disengaged. Question your beliefs about human nature and you may discover that people want to succeed even more than you want them to.

Do you throw incentives at people to drive performance?

TIP: You are operating on outdated approaches to motivation. Instead, help people discover their own meaningful reasons for achieving goals.

Do you conduct contests to drive behavior?

TIP: Contests may be fun, but research shows that after the contest ends and people receive their prizes, they revert to their old behavior. Contests are a lazy way to promote new behaviors. Instead, work harder to convey the benefits of new behaviors from the individual’s perspective —  not just the organization’s.

Do you hold people accountable by driving metrics without meaning?

TIP: Frame metrics or expectations in a compelling way so people can relate to them at a higher level. Tie metrics to the welfare of the whole, a noble purpose, and the organization’s values.

Do you believe that people perform better under pressure? Do you think that driving your agenda spurs people into action?

TIP: Let go of the idea that pressure promotes performance. Wake up to the fact that driving people generates pressure, comes off as a threat, or instills fear—strategies empirically proven to diminish the quality of people’s work, stifle innovation, endanger mental and physical health, and prohibit sustainable performance. Try talking to people about their reasons for achieving goals. When it comes to people’s motivation, what matters most is the reason for their motivation.

When people thrive, you don’t need to drive.

Driven managers are the worst at driving people crazy. I worked for a driven manager once. Marty was so driven to succeed that every day was a competition. He was so driven to win that he berated employees in public to get them to work harder. Marty justified his actions when he won (met the metrics). He blamed everyone else when he didn’t. One day, I had enough. I walked out of his office, got in my car, drove myself away without a word, and never returned. It’s ironic that the best thing I did during my time with my most-driven manager was to drive myself away.

Thinking back, I realize that Marty’s drive came from his need for power, to prove his own worth, and to fill some personal void. Today, I actually feel sorry for Marty. But, I feel worse for people working for managers whose actions may not be as obvious as Marty’s — whose subtle actions are just as insidious.

Recently, I was wary to work with a powerful Wall Street executive. I envisioned another Marty—or worse — a Marty in sheep’s clothing. The executive allayed my fears when he eliminated the word “drive” from speeches and written materials for an upcoming conference.

This powerful executive recognized that he couldn’t drive people to be more just, client-focused, and service-oriented. By choosing to focus on people’s thriving, he could give up driving and tap into people’s honest, authentic, and optimal motivation.

Try eliminating “drive” from your vocabulary this week and see how far you and your people can go without being driven.

 

 

This post was originally published on susanfowler.com .

Flexibility in Hiring

Our team is a great hybrid of virtual and local. In the beginning of my company, I hired mostly remote team members and enjoyed the flexibility of finding the right person for each role; without the limit of geography, I could hire anyone.

As the company grew and leased office space, I began to rely on and value in-person, instant collaboration and moved toward hiring more local staff. At times, this felt difficult. I didn’t feel convinced that I could find the talent I wanted in our small-town market.

Earlier this spring, as we sought to expand our local office team, we interviewed a lot of people who didn’t quite fit. Later in the process, we met a fantastic candidate. A recent college grad, Sierra jumped right into our office team, quickly contributing to several key areas. Had I been inflexible, I wouldn’t have offered her the office position at all as she revealed, during the interview process, a plan to move to California soon with her fiancé.

Because flexibility is a core value, we did offer Sierra a position despite her planned move. As a result, we benefited from months of fantastic in-person collaboration with Sierra and we will now continue to thrive with new California-based team member.

If you are a small business owner struggling to find the right talent, consider the possibilities associated with incorporating more flexibility in your hiring processes. Ask yourself the following questions:

What am I hoping to achieve with my upcoming hire? If you are clear about the job you are hiring someone to do, it will be easier for you to be flexible about how the job gets done. Had I been hiring a person to manage our shipping department, I would not have been able to be flexible about the person’s geographical location.
What are the non-negotiables for this position? Once you know the non-negotiables, you can make a list about what is negotiable. You may find that geography, work hours, and even full time vs. part-time status are all considerations you can become flexible about in order to add stellar talent to your team.
What will I gain if I say yes? If the person you’re interviewing seems like a great culture and skills match, becoming flexible about details may be the right answer. Just be sure any non-negotiables are clearly stated and agreeable to the person you’re hiring. For me, having time to train Sierra in person before she moved away seemed to be an important request.

Our team went out last week to wish Sierra well as she heads to California for her new adventure. The best news of all is that we will continue to collaborate with her once she settles in AND those of us in the office have had months to enjoy her physical presence. I’m happy I applied our value of flexibility to hiring.

How do you practice flexibility in your business?

 

Live Life at Your Best, with Larry Senn

Larry Senn is a corporate visionary, speaker, and author, whose personal purpose is to help an ever-widening circle of people live life at their best mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. We’re thrilled to showcase the new website that we’ve designed and developed for him at TheMoodElevator.com.

Meet Larry Senn

Dr. Larry Senn is the founder of Senn Delaney, the culture shaping unit of Heidrick & Struggles. He has been referred to in business journals as the Father of Corporate Culture, based on his field research: the first systematic study ever conducted on the concept of corporate culture. His studies were published as his doctoral dissertation in 1970. This led him to an early personal vision of finding a way to enhance the lives of people, the effectiveness of teams, and the spirit and performance of organizations. That vision became Senn Delaney: the first firm dedicated to shaping the culture of organizations.

Larry is on a mission to make “culture shaping” an everyday practice of companies around the world. His purpose is to inspire leaders and organizations to live life at their best. He has worked with dozens of Fortune 100 CEOs, as well as State Governors, U.S. Presidential Cabinet Members, and presidents at some of the largest universities in America, to help transform and enhance the spirit and performance of their organizations.

Larry runs 6 triathlons a year and is very active in the marriage between mind and body. He is married to his beautiful wife, Bernadette, and has five children. He resides in Huntington Beach, California, and also enjoys spending time in Hawaii and Wisconsin in the outdoors and with friends and family.

Corporate Culture & The Mood Elevator

Larry brings a powerful story and great messages to any leadership conference. His presentation style is very dynamic and energizing, and he has been the highest rated speaker at most conferences where he has presented. Rather than a lecture format, he employs an audience participation “experiential” delivery method that engages people, is memorable, and provides great takeaway value. Two of his main topics are corporate culture and the Mood Elevator, also the title of his newest book.

As the Father of Corporate Culture, no one has more experience, data, or stories to tell about the importance of culture and how to shape it. The topic of culture can take different forms, including performance, engagement, customer experience, and strategy alignment. Larry combines client-gathered data with experiential “Ah Ha” inducing exercises, table discussions, and other highly interactive activities to create relevant, engaging presentations.

The Mood Elevator, something we all ride up and down every day, is also a great conference topic. As someone who took up triathlons at the age of seventy, Larry speaks from experience when he emphasizes the inseparable connection between physical health and mental health. He shows how to recognize when you’ve become accustomed to being stuck on a lower floor, and how to interrupt those negative thought patterns and start going up again. When shown the Mood Elevator graphic, people intuitively see that it is a story of their life and want to know how to better ride it. Everyone gets a pocket card of The Mood Elevator, and it becomes a prized possession for years to come. The book itself is also a great gift and takeaway for many groups.

Learn More

Check out Larry’s site to learn more about his passion for corporate culture, the Mood Elevator, and helping people lead at their best. Be sure to visit his new blog for interesting anecdotes and helpful tips about each of these topics. While you’re there, check out the page for his upcoming book (The Mood Elevator), and follow the links at the bottom to connect with Larry on social media.

P.S. It’s not too late to participate in Larry’s upcoming book launch! Sign up here, then register to join his webinar on August 17.

 

Interested in our book design or web design/development services? Contact us to learn more!

The Hidden Strengths of Flexibility

Have you had the opportunity to see any demonstrations of three-dimensional (3D) printing? With 3D printing, layers of a substance are manipulated by computers to create a three-dimensional object. 3D printing used to be something scientists only dreamed of; now it is used routinely in industries like manufacturing, medicine, and engineering.  

The first exposure I had to 3D printing came when I read the book Bend Not Break, by Ping Fu. Although elements of the book’s veracity have come into question, my reading of it still exposed me to the science behind the process.

One of our organizational values here at Weaving Influence is flexibility. What does that have to do with additive manufacturing (3D printing’s advanced version)?

Being Flexible Does Not Mean Being Weak

Scientists at the University of Florida used 3D printing to create implanted medical devices that are stronger and more flexible than conventionally produced devices.

In the work world, a value of flexibility has the potential to make us stronger and more flexible. If we come to our roles having preserved our energy in order to concentrate it where it is most needed, we can most effectively serve our customers.

Being Flexible Allows Customization

The scientists mentioned above were able to personalize devices to individual patients through 3D printing. Hero Forge makes intricately designed miniatures with 3D printing.

Weaving Influence is able to respond to varying client needs because we have assembled a multi-talented group of professionals who can respond precisely to client needs. Because of our flexibility, we are able to secure services of people around the world who might not be able to report to a physical office every day but who can contribute from wherever they are.

Lighter Does Not Mean Weaker

As I’ve absorbed more information about additive manufacturing recently, I have learned the term “lightweighting.” It doesn’t exactly mean what I first assumed. When Altair produced a large gantry with additive manufacturing, they were able to reduce the farming component’s weight by 103 pounds without sacrificing strength. Why is that good? A lighter component is easier to transport, relies on less gas, and is less stressful on the human beings having to move it around.

Our organizational value of flexibility helps us perform the services-related equivalent of “lightweighting.” People with definable strengths are able to function efficiently while minimizing administrative drag.

And Then There’s the Mars Example

In his book Spaceman, astronaut Mike Massimino shared his experience making repairs to the Hubble Space Telescope. He and his team had practiced the procedure over and over and over; nothing should have gone wrong . . . until something did. One of the screws they had to unscrew in order to repair a part was stripped and would not budge. Eventually, a roll of tape and a pair of vise grips (no lie – read the book!) saved the day, but Massimino could not drive down to the local Ace Hardware and pick up a spare – he had to solve his problem with only the implements and supplies the mission had taken to space.

Massimino solved his problem; but as NASA works toward its Journey to Mars, what will people do when they need tools or other implements in order to survive?

They’ll PRINT THEM with 3D printing!

Our organizational flexibility allows us to do the same thing: create something that works, efficiently and strongly, when it is needed.

Those kinds of results are out of this world.  

To Communicate Well – Tell a Story

We’re throwing it back! This week we’re showcasing a guest post from Willy Steiner about the theme from his latest book,  Discover the Joy of Leadership , which launched on February 6, 2017.

I thought I wanted to be a playwright because I was interested in stories and telling stories. – Francis Ford Coppola

It is estimated that by the time a child is four, they will have heard over 30 million words, many of these in the form of stories or nursery rhymes that are told by parents and family. In other words, we are immersed in stories our whole life.

The bottom line is we are hard-wired for stories; but I don’t think we recognize what a huge reservoir of insights, lessons learned, and experiences we have to share with others.

I took up storytelling as a hobby a couple of years ago and have performed around the Chicago area. Most of these are of a personal nature about my experiences with family or friends, but I really started to consider how important stories would be for my clients as key leaders in their organizations. I use stories frequently in my coaching conversations.

Stories are, by their very nature, more memorable and easier to relate to than a list of bullet points on a PowerPoint slide. You connect with people intellectually, emotionally, and even physically when you consider the style and the body language of a storyteller. Storytellers are, by nature, collaborative and giving, and can have three major choices in terms of the intent of telling their story: to inform, to inspire, or to provoke.

I believe leaders in organizations need to employ the use of stories more in their communications. The question is how do you do that? How do you construct a good story you can use as a key resource in your bag of leadership tools?

Constructing a Great Business Story

The steps are:

Who – are you thinking of?
What – was the issue or opportunity?
Where – and under what context did this occur?
Result – what happened?
What’s changed or lessons learned – the moral of the story?

If this intrigues you, then follow the steps and begin writing your story. START WRITING NOW! Don’t worry about getting it right the first time or making it perfect. Once I develop an idea or topic, I do the outline, flesh out the idea, and work on various sections over a period of time, often while walking, and may spend 4 to 5 hours getting it right, usually over a week or so. Good storytellers work hard at their craft — and if you’re going to tell a meaningful story in your work world, it requires the same level of effort.

Final Tips on Storytelling

A couple final thoughts:

Keep your story between 5 and 7 minutes long. Any longer than that and you will start to lose your audience.
Less is more. Strip away any extraneous information. Interesting anecdotes or observations can actually be a source of clutter to a good story. If anyone could wonder about the relevance of any of your points, take them out. I’ve had feedback about stuff I thought was pretty cool that others could not discern the relevance. Out that went.
A good story is NOT solely about the storyteller. You are the vehicle for sharing the insights, experiences, or lessons learned. Your feelings or the impact on you do matter, but go well beyond just your perspective.

For so many of you that I’ve known over the years, you are incredibly rich sources of stories, lessons learned, and insights to share. They should not go untold.

Ask yourself:

Will I spend the time to develop a good story? You’re in no hurry, so you can do this over as much time as is needed.
For each story you intend to tell, what are you informing, inspiring, or provoking others about? If you don’t know, don’t tell the story.
Are you worried about whether or not you can be a good storyteller? Don’t worry about it, because you’ve been telling stories your whole life. You just can be more purposeful.

What personal experience could you share a story about today?

Shipwrecked!

Partnership, a core value of Weaving Influence, takes many forms. Internally, we partner with one another to ensure not only that we are serving our clients well, but also that we are serving one another well. We partner with other companies who are experts in fields that complement ours, enabling us to expand our service offerings and meet the needs of our clients. And, we partner with our clients. We don’t wish to be a vendor from which someone purchases a service. We want to come alongside our clients on their journeys and create success and opportunities together. Those clients with whom we have the most success are the clients who share and embrace this value of partnership as we work together to achieve their goals.

Customer service expert (and client) Chip R. Bell believes that when you partner with your customer, you build loyalty. In fact, he wrote a book called Customers as Partners in 1994, and you’ll still find the idea of partnership woven through his most recent works.

Our family recently experienced this brand of innovative service while we were on vacation. It caught us by surprise, delighted us, and, indeed, built loyalty.

We were wrapping up a long weekend at Austin Lake RV Park and Cabins with a 2-hour pontoon rental. We’d enjoyed the scenery, trying out several different fishing spots around the lake (none of which resulted in the catching of a single fish), and it was time to head back to the dock. There was only one problem. The motor would not go down into the water. It would start, but that was it.

We were shipwrecked! You can see by our “Shipwrecked Selfie,” that while we had drifted to the edge and were literally in the weeds and the trees, we weren’t really concerned for our safety. But we did have to wait until another boat came by, as we were in a beautiful valley with no cell service. About an hour in to our misadventure, we saw the owner of the campground, Bill Cable, come around the bend on his jet-ski.

What I was expecting was that he would ask after our well-being and apologize for the malfunction of his boat. We were perfectly fine, and not at all upset that we had to float on the lovely lake for an extra hour. Nevertheless, I expected he would be somewhat serious and apologize.

Instead, he approached the pontoon wearing an orange t-shirt, overalls, and a big grin. He circled us three times before sidling his jet ski alongside the boat and coming on board. He first addressed our kids (ranging in age from college down to elementary), and enthusiastically told them they were so lucky because now they had great writing prompts when they went back to school about what happened on their summer vacation!

He quickly fixed the motor. And by fixed, I mean he plugged it back in! (In our defense, the plug was inside a compartment and we would have had no idea where to look!) Before he returned to his jet ski, he thanked us — yes, thanked us — three times! He said, “They never let me out here on this!” He wished us a great day and as we went in one direction to the dock, Bill sped off in the opposite direction to enjoy the gift we’d given him — time to play on the lake on a beautiful day! He didn’t just make us his partners, he made us his partners-in-crime!

The encounter gave us all pause and a giggle. My oldest son looked at me and said, “I think you should introduce him to Chip Bell!” And it’s had me thinking…

Sometimes the customer experience doesn’t always go as expected, but when both parties engage in the spirit of partnership, it is possible for each party to take away something of value and feel satisfied, or better, with the outcome.