You have a big problem. And you’re trying to solve it, but you just can’t. You keep saying to yourself and your team “Okay, here’s the problem”. “Here’s the issue.” “Let’s clarify the issue”. And all those words and focus, and the attempt to really gain an understanding of the problem… just aren’t working.

How do you get everyone to come together and find an explanation? Maybe you should try a new tactic: focus on the potential, not the problem. Be outcome-oriented.

When the race is just starting, picture yourself at the finish line.

The term “outcome-oriented” comes up in discussions about problem-solving, goal-setting, and strategy. Some people don’t like it. They say that you should instead focus on the process, because if you keep your eyes squarely on the prize, you’ll lose sight of everything that needs to happen along the way.  There’s a simple answer to that: every big project is made up of a bunch of little projects; manage those projects capably, and you’re golden.

Is your business flexible enough to handle the constant flow of change?

In today’s business world, there is no such thing as a constant. Changes come swiftly, and while consistency is vital, the only way to keep from crumbling is to be flexible. Whether working on a short-term project or mapping out long-term strategy, you must be prepared for the unexpected, and build flexibility into your blueprints. Good strategy means thinking up “if, then” scenarios ahead of time, but sometimes all the “ifs” can’t be predicted. So you have to prepare your team to react, and adapt, to change. Make sure your team has the tools to deal effectively with the unexpected: accountability and authority.

Accountability has to do with accepting responsibility and then taking actions that will get you to the place you wish to be. As a component of flexibility, accountability allows each team member to take on a role in adapting to change, and follow through with their tasks in an efficient manner – since they know that every other team member is also reliably completing his portion of the project (being accountable,) they have a sense of freedom to do their own work, because they know they are contributing to a viable project.

Authority is the power to make decisions and take actions that are in line with those decisions. As a component of flexibility, authority allows each team member to redefine the scope of their work and then do the work accordingly. Responsibility without authority is a deadly burden, and will drag your team members straight down into the water under the crumbling bridge.

A bridge is designed to get you from point a to point b. Maybe your whole business is a bridge; maybe one project is a bridge to larger business goals. Maybe you’re in a start-up phase and your bridge will take you to long-term viability or acquisition goals. Regardless of what phase you’re in, what your “bridge” is, you must engineer flexibility from the start, to ensure the business can handle the friction from multiple traffic streams and all the changes that will arise along the way. Flexibility should be an integral part of the way your business is structured – at every level, with every team, and in every employee’s duties.

The red pen is your friend

As a copywriter, I also know some other stuff. I know what it’s like to be assigned a 600-word article, punch out 1,000+ words and turn it in, figuring that more is better and the client just got a big bonus…. and then to be told, no, it needs to be no more than 700 words, max. I know what it’s like, at that point, to think “Okay, what am I going to cut? What vital piece of information will the reader now be forced to miss out on because my client can’t accept all the lovely,worth-their-weight-in-gold words that I’ve just GIFTED to them? I’ll go ahead and do this thing, but it’s not going to be good… not good at all.” And then you do it and find that, lo and behold, you were wrong… a few hundred words can indeed be chopped (fully 1/3 of the work, mind you!) and in fact the article – which is, after all, a story – will still be good. In fact, better.

I know what it’s like to then have the client say to you “Actually, due to space constraints, this article has to be cut down to 300 words.” And you think: “300 paltry words?! Now that is ridiculous. There’s no way I could possibly cut this work of art down to 300 words. What crucial points will the poor reader miss out on now? I’ve already taken out some of the best bits. Impossible. Okay… well, I’ll do it, but now it’s REALLY gonna suck.” And you know what? You do it and… no, it couldn’t be… better?!

Yep. It’s great. It’s so concise, so meaningful - every word makes an impact! Every vital fact has not only been preserved, but now each one simply shines. Ahhh… the art of concision. Such an elusion to so many novelists. We can’t cut our precious stories… how will we present every nuance of every character? How will the readers get all the back-story they deserve? How can we possibly show – not tell, no, no – in fewer words? Well, you should give it a try. I know you’ll like it… once it’s over. You’ll see. It’ll be for the story’s own good. Grab your red pen, and just start crossing out. Fear not the delete key and the backspace, dear author – they are perhaps the best tools in your arsenal.

You know that “new relationship” feeling? The one with all the euphoria? Well, that’s kind of what I imagine it feels like to be involved in a start-up. As a person who loves to collaborate on big ideas, I know that head-in-the-clouds, anything-is-possible feeling. It’s like everything is gonna be great – it’s a feeling of promise and hope and eager desire. For a marketer like me, it kinda equates with “engagement”. And in a business setting, that feeling gets ideas churning like nothing else.  Because there’s just So. Much. Possibility.  How can well-established companies, whose own start-up roots are buried deep in the bedrock, hone in on – and gain from - that feeling? One word: “Innovation”.

“Everything will change when your desire to move on overcomes your desire to hold on.” I read this quote from Alan Cohen recently, and it really stuck with me. I have found that adage to hold true in my own life, and it applies in business, too – perhaps especially for a company’s marketing department.

Is your marketing department afraid of innovation?

New businesses seem to always be jumping right onto the bandwagon – they see a great marketing opportunity rolling by, and boy do they hop on board. I think it’s because a new company still has such a great entrepreneurial spirit. Everyone’s excited because everything is so new – since the marketers don’t yet know what works for them, they’re open to new things. Instead of saying “oh, we tried that once, it didn’t work,” or “oh, well sure company X is doing it, but it’ll fail” they say “hey, here’s this new thing that might help us be a little faster, a little stronger, let’s try it!” They haven’t “learned” what doesn’t work for them, so they see everything through the eyes of potential. “Hey, this might work!”

It’s not just new companies that manage to do this, though; some very well-established companies manage to keep their entrepreneurial spirit alive throughout the business. Google, for example, doesn’t let their talent pool stagnate due to specialization. Under Google’s “20 percent time” initiative, employees are encouraged to have pet projects, and are even given company-time to work on those projects, to recruit team members and to advertise inside the company so that their ideas will catch on. Maybe every company can’t be Google, but we can all learn from this innovative, can-do grass-roots attitude.

In a previous post, I talked about how you can create your own engagement at work by taking on a pet project – well, I didn’t even know about 20 percent time then (I guess I was under a rock?), so that’s just proof that I’m a genius. Anyway, Google’s not the only company that concurs (about the innovation/pet project thing, not about me being a genius… though I’m sure they’d agree with me there, too) - Apple has Blue Sky, LinkedIn has InCubator, and William McKnight, IBM’s Chairman of the Board from 1949 – 1966 said, in essence, that it is imperative for companies to foster creativity, rather than stifle it, even in the face of mistakes…

“Management that is destructively critical when mistakes are made kills initiative. And it’s essential that we have many people with initiative if we are to continue to grow.”

Doesn’t the cover intrigue you? It’s a prelude to the gorgeous illustrations inside.

I have always loved maps. And graphs. In my home office, I have a giant map above my desk. Somehow that colorful map, with its measurements and lines,  just makes me feel good. Maps, charts, graphs, globes – all of it - I never knew why I loved these things so much, until I stumbled across two stunningly beautiful books by Edward R. Tufte: Envisioning Information and The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, and I am so in love with the images therein. With the graphs.There is, for example, on page 106 of Envisioning, the most beautiful, black-and-white comparison of river lengths, and somehow it took me right back to social studies classes as a kid. I always loved the pie charts and line graph illustrations in those weighty tomes. I think I now understand why. Tufte has made it so clear to me: these graphs, diagrams, studies and charts are all about sharing information. I love information! What a profound statement, huh? But seriously, it’s true – Information levels the playing field. Information is meant to be shared, to help make the world more beautiful. Information brings people together, and isn’t that what marketing is all about?

Marketing, as an information vehicle, helps people make decisions. It helps companies portray their highest ideals, their best offerings, to the world. I guess it could easily be argued that not all marketing is noble, and not all companies are noble – but at our hearts, I think all people are noble – and sharing information is noble, too. I know I’m not the only one who thinks so – today’s love affair with infographics tells me that. What’s your favorite graph ever?

The author writes that the boustrophedonic meandering of these rivers around the frame weakens comparison of their lengths. It’s still beautiful.

Perhaps, I thought, the “random” refers to the fact that the need is random – you randomly see that someone with a bunch of luggage needs help opening the doors at the train station, for example – your act of kindness, then, is not random – it is purposeful; it is a choice… as would be your reaction if you chose not to help the person in need.

Then I thought, Perhaps it’s okay that the phrase exists – if you randomly give a flower to a

A smile, and a few kind words, qualify.

stranger on the street, and you don’t see that they seem to “need” a flower, I guess that qualifies… maybe the phrase is just too-often misused (and therefore overused).

Then I began to think, Perhaps I’m just looking at this the wrong way – maybe I’m being a “Debbie Downer”. I decided to do some more research. Wikipedia says that a random act of kindness is “a selfless act performed by a person or people wishing to either assist or cheer up an individual person or people,” and that sounds like a fine thing to me – although, Hello, it’s me again: Ms. Know-It-All – Wikipedia’s definition does kind of prove my whole “need-based” point.

Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps…

Then I came across this great post at QueensU Be Well, a health blog for Queens University students, that helped me realize that the semantics of the phrase (which, according to my original thinking, should actually be something like “Kind responses to random needs,”) don’t matter – what matters is that we are all encouraging each other to simply be nice to one another. I know, I know, we should all be nice all of the time – maybe we shouldn’t have to be encouraged – but our pesky human nature prevents us from living ideally; or perhaps the nature of ideals prevents us from living them (after all – they can’t exist; that’s why they’re ideals). Pushing philosophy to the side along with the semantics, the bottom line is that kindness, random or not, should be spread. If I behave nicely toward you, rather than behaving meanly, it’s good for both of us: it makes us both feel good, and we’ll share those good feelings with others. So whether I want to call kindness a choice or a random act, doesn’t matter.

Did you know there is a Random Act of Kindness Day? In the US, it is celebrated on February 17. Perhaps on that day, I will hold the doors for two people at the train station.

"Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened." ~ the Dalai Lama

My dear friend Arindam granted me an honor, for which I am very thankful: The Candle Lighter Award. To borrow a description of the award from Arindam, this award originated for blogs “that bring light to the world [and offer] inspiration, hope, optimism, good advice, faith-filled assurances, and even humor”. Every day through his blog, Arindam fills the world with so much love and hope and honesty, that, if I were to choose one candle to stay lit and one to extinguish, I would extinguish my own and tell Arindam to keep moving forward. But I know that he wouldn’t want to hear that. He would have none of it – he would say that there is plenty of room in the world, and that we must fill it with as many hopeful candles as we possibly can – and he would be right. So it is with great thanks, and humble sincerity, that I accept the candle, and hope that I will be able to live up to Arindam’s expectations and light a candle for someone else. That’s what this life is all about, right: paying it forward, lighting each other’s candles so that, when it seems there is darkness, suddenly we realize how much great company we have.

To learn more about the Candle Lighter Award, please visit my friend Arindam’s blog:

http://arindammohapatra.wordpress.com/2011/12/29/candle-lighter-award-lighting-the-hope-in-blogosphere

Honorifics have their place and help to convey respect, certainly.  A curtsey or bow is sometimes called for. Many interactions, however, will require neither of those. And flattery is insincere and therefore a waste. The key to making people feel important is simple: just listen.

Now, I didn’t say it would be easy. Most things described as “simple” are not “easy” because they require some kind of a change. “Simplification” is a process. If you’re not a good listener, all you can do is: try, try again. Practice, after all, makes perfect.

The thing about listening is, it’s active. This is another one of those concepts that took me a while to grasp – the very phrase seemed misleading. How can listening be active? We’re not talking; we’re not doing anything but sitting there and staring at the other person… but that’s wrong. When you are listening, it’s true that you shouldn’t be talking – that’s called interrupting, and is, as you probably learned in kindergarten, very rude – but you should be working to understand what the other person is saying.

One of the things that many of us “good communicators” do is prepare how we’re going to respond, while the other person is still talking. You want to be on your toes, right? You don’t want to seem like you can’t hold up your end of the conversation. Well, guess what? You’re doing it wrong. In Dale Carnegie’s iconic book “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” Isaac F. Marcosson, a celebrity journalist, is credited with saying that people fail to make a favorable impression because they don’t listen attentively: “They have been so much concerned with what they are going to say next that they do not keep their ears open”.

If you have a really hard time listening – for example perhaps you get bored and start planning your grocery list, or you start looking around the room instead of  focusing on the person you’re conversing with – Mindtools.com offers this tip:

“Try repeating their words mentally as they say them – this will reinforce their message and help you stay focused.”

Here’s a bonus that comes with listening well: It makes you seem more interesting. Dale Carnegie says “To be interesting, be interested”. This is because people like talking about themselves and their ideas; if you give them a chance to do that, and you seem genuinely interested, they will, consequently, like you. So, hand-in-hand with being a good listener is encouragement.

Encourage others to talk about themselves and their interests. Ask questions (another component of active listening). Show some enthusiasm. Even if you aren’t totally on-board with what they’re saying – in fact, especially if you’re not totally on-board with it. Questions further communication; they open doors. Simply passing judgement by deciding that you’re not going to be interested is a door-closer. So you don’t like to talk about the types of submarines used in World War II – maybe you’ll learn something anyway. At the very least keep an open mind, and demonstrate that somehow. Don’t shut down emotionally – if you’re emotionally withdrawn, your physical presence won’t buy you a penny’s worth of dirt. You need to be actively participating by actively listening.

Really, making people feel important is as “simple” as following the Golden Rule. Don’t you want to be listened to? Don’t you want to feel that your thoughts, opinions, ideas and interests have value? Do you want to talk to someone who is looking around the room, fidgeting with their nails, making a mental “to-do” list? You have it in you to be a good listener – just think of how you would want someone to behave while you were talking, and do that. Simple. Right?

The fact is that culture change needs to come from the top. A group of committed employees, hungry for growth and engagement, can indeed make a difference, but it will be too small to affect the whole organization, as well as too short-lived. They’ll start an effort, strive to rally support, and wind up taking one step forward and two steps back the whole way. Management ultimately sets the tone for the organization. If your CEO, president, operating manager or Whoever’s-In-Charge has an attitude that employee’s are not the company’s greatest asset, then so will the next person in the chain of command, and so on. Managers, supervisors and team leads can definitely have an impact on their department or team, and the impact may spread – but unless it reaches the top, it won’t spread company-wide. As one of my favorite old-school children’s television hosts would say, you don’t have to take my word for it.

In an article by Gallup, “Leading Engagement From the Top,” (the title says it all, right?) researchers point out that engagement isn’t about happy-fuzzy feelings; it’s an integral reflection of the overall health of the company, right down to the bottom line: “Workplace engagement is the core of the unwritten social contract between employers and employees. It also serves as a leading indicator of financial performance.”

Here’s a healthy excerpt from the article, which has a lot of other great info, too:

“Engagement comes from leaders. People look to leadership to set the tone and expectations.” says [Sangeeta Agrawal, a Gallup consultant]. “If executives don’t set the stage and practice what they preach about engagement, it’ll be harder for others to follow”… The numbers support this. Managers who are directly supervised by highly engaged executive teams are 39% more likely to be engaged than managers who are supervised by executive teams with below-average engagement.

Bill Scott, a partner in Innovation Partners International, generously provided me with the following facts about the current state of employee engagement:

• Only 29% of the working population is fully engaged in the work that they do
• The American economy loses an estimated $350 Billion of productivity each year to unengaged workers. This figure comes from the Department of Labor
• Only 47% of senior leaders – the people who presumably have the most control over what they do – say they are fully engaged in their work
• Business units with engaged employees (1) average 27% less absenteeism, (2) are rated 12% higher by customers and (3) are 18% more productive than their competitors

These statistics are scary, and should be viewed as a call to action. The good news? According to another Gallup study outlined in the article “How Strengths Boost Engagement,” even in a situation where not every employee can understand and fully utilize his own strengths, there is a significant boost in team engagement when a manager receives coaching (typically a one-hour coaching conversation, according to the article,) on understanding and using his own strengths, and developing the strengths of others. A huge boost, in just one hour of coaching time.

Further, the concept of accountability tells us that we must each accept responsibility for our part of the problem. So if, like my friend, you’re not yet a CEO and you want to boost engagement in your workplace, what can you do? While it’s true that without the support of upper management, you will not be able to change the culture of the whole company, you can always change your own attitude and perceptions. Here are a few suggestions for generating your own sense of engagement:

• Find ways to use your strengths, even if your primary job function does not rely heavily on them. If possible, develop a “pet project” that can make use of your strengths – to make sure you get management buy-in, first ensure that all your “regular” work is done, and then make sure your boss understands how your pet project aligns with personal and company goals
• Choose to have a positive attitude
• Look for other ways to get involved in your company – is there a company-sponsored sports team, or a committee that you can join? Maybe you can start one (talk to HR about it)

Don’t give up trying to create a culture of engagement. There are always solutions to the problem before us – we just have to look for them – and if we don’t find the best solution, we must make our own.

If you can get someone to divulge what really motivates him, you can determine if you will in fact be able to make that motivator available to the potential hire-e. When you are able to deliver motivating factors to an employee, you’ll get the best work out of him, sans faute*.

She’s saying: “Yeah, I’m so excited to work for you because you value my unique contributions and will give me the chance to impact strategy, along with opportunities to grow!”

Examples of motivating factors:

• Money
• Input into strategy
• Title/Prestige
• Strengths-based work
• Ability to delegate
• Authority

Of course this list is not exhaustive; motivation can be complex and unique. Keep in mind, too, that motivations can change over time. A new hire who is desperate for a job may be motivated by money initially, because she has bills to pay and at least one mouth to feed. However, once she has a steady paycheck, she may realize that she is not satisfied, and want more authority, or more responsibilities.  She may want an intern so that she can delegate less-important tasks and focus on the more creative aspects of her role. By asking the right questions at the outset, a hiring manager may be able to predict these changes in motivation. One of the principals of Management by Objectives, as defined by Suters in his book, Succeed In Spite of Yourself, is that you tailor a job description for the person you are hiring. Doing so creates a solid foundation for success and growth. You can do this, in part, by ensuring that you know what will keep your new employee satisfied over the long-haul.

Another thing to consider, when examining employee motivation, is that younger generations view the corporate world very differently from their predecessors. Baby Boomers are often thought of as more loyal, because they stay with a company for the long-term; they want the gold watch. Generations X and Y, however, are often viewed as less loyal, more demanding. According to Henry Evans’ article “Gen X, Y, Z: How to Earn Their Loyalty,” younger generations simply value different things; they have different motivating factors. While Boomers may value a title, a reserved parking spot, and job security, younger generations care about feeling valued; they want to be involved and challenged. They want to be recognized for their contributions, and to be given guidance along the way.

No one wants to spend their whole career chasing an impossible goal. Gens X & Y will go where they can catch the carrot, and turn it into cake.

Really, it seems to me that what most people want is what should be SOP for every company, anyway: clearly defined objectives based on the company’s overall mission and vision, channeled through to every level of the organization.

People want to work for efficient companies that value employee contributions, recognize and reward achievements, and allow employees to shine and grow. Here’s the thing: lip-service won’t do it. What today’s employees are looking for is engagement, and if you can’t give it to them, they will find a company that can – or they’ll leave to start their own business.

So, when looking to fill your next empty spot, try to really uncover what the interviewee wants – not just short-term, but long-term. And interviewees, please, answer honestly – because if you can find a company that’s willing to keep you engaged, that’s more golden than any gold watch.

*without fail