Execution Is A Funny Thing

Execution is a funny thing. Most people know what to do, but actually doing it and taking action is a completely different game. In the execution phase an organization must focus on giving everyone necessary the proper training and development to be successful! Everyone must flawlessly execute their roles and responsibilities! The right skills and tools must be given to people inside the organization to execute the plan of attack!

There must be time given to learn the new skills and tools and everyone must not waiver and execution must be encouraged from day one! The organization must coach people along the way to help them get comfortable with all the skills, behaviors, tools, and changes. It works the same with individuals. Let’s look at driving a stick shift again. When learning how to really execute we go through different stages of learning. All of us have a comfort zone and we must work hard at expanding our comfort zone if we want to improve. Remember the first time you drove a stick shift? Let me take you back one step prior, remember when you sat in the passenger’s seat, before you knew how to drive a stick shift and watched somebody drive the stick shift that knew how? You probably said what I said at the time, “that looks easy”. At that point with driving a stick shift I was in what I call unconscious incompetent. In other words I did not know I was stupid. Not calling anyone stupid, just want to make the point. Now you get behind the wheel and the car dies, you restart the car 12 times, and someone is yelling, “push in the clutch”. Now I became conscious incompetent, or now I knew that I was, yes, stupid. But something happens after you practice over and over and over again. I finally reached the point to where I could drive the car, but I still had to think about it. This is the conscious competent stage. Good yet still must think about things as you go. You probably won’t admit it, but we would talk to ourselves and say things such as, “easy on the clutch” or “make sure to get in reverse not fourth gear”, or we would be stopped on a hill and someone was right behind us in our rearview mirror. We would say “&^%$” and then burn out the clutch to move forward. Now at some point you reach the stage where you are so good that you don’t even think about it anymore. You just start the car and off you go. This is the unconscious competent stage. It becomes second nature. This takes time and lots of practice to be able to execute on an unconscious level. As people go through these levels of learning we must encourage even the slightest of positive improvement or movement in the right direction!

First we must help people realize what they don’t know and help them create a learning gap, or they will think that they already know “how to do it”. If we shatter confidence when someone is in the conscious incompetent stage, it’s likely they will never expand their comfort zone. Remember when we talked about justification. People can justify why they never learned to drive a stick shift, or talk themselves into believing that an automatic is better. They do this when they feel discouraged when learning anything new. Justification is the mask when there is little confidence.

Once the execution phase is coming in for a landing and people are in the conscious competent stage mid-course adjustments must be made if needed. Getting everyone executing the fundamentals and principles of the plan of attack should be the number one focus. Results should be on the back burner with faith that executing on the right activities will provide the right results. Results are the end zone; executing on the right activities is each first down along the way.

Action Eliminates “Quiet Desperation”

Hopefully by now you have thought about and written down all the things you want to accomplish, both personally and professionally, and you are beginning to take action and move in the right direction. This is where we have to make it clear that we are not a “motivational speaking” company. The Chad Carden Group is a consulting organization that believes in getting results by execution and not by spending a lot of time discussing theory. Now to do that, we have to be realists. We tell you like we see it, and either you like it or you don’t. That being said we are not writing this to make you mad, but to make you think. Most people will never accomplish what they want to accomplish this year or next year or in their lifetime because they do not put their plan into action.

Having a vision, goals, and a plan on how to achieve these things is important and the first step, but without action it is 100% useless. We believe in writing down goals, visions, plans, and thinking positive, and at CCG we do all these things. But positive thinking alone won’t change anything. If you want to get in shape, just having a positive attitude for thirty days won’t do it. You have to have a great attitude along with taking action, such as going to the gym, eating healthy, exercising, and doing the things that you probably don’t want to always do. You could have the best workout plan, but without actually getting on the machine, lifting weights, doing pushups and sit ups, or running, the workout plan is 100% useless.

We all have heard or read that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. If you want things to be different you have to change what you do. Simple, period, that’s the way that it is. It reminds me of a story I once heard about a bear in a cage. The zoo put this bear in a cage that was ten feet long. They put the bear at one end, and put the food at the other end. Every day the bear would walk ten feet and eat, then go back over and lay down. Walk ten feet and eat, then go back over and lay down; he did this for ten years in the zoo. Everybody would watch him. They removed the cage one day, ten feet forward the bear would go over and eat, and then go back without bars….ten feet forward the bear would go over and eat, and then go back without bars. Now here is what’s scary, they moved the food fifteen feet away from the bear, and the bear went ten feet and stopped.

So many people in life get comfortable with what they have. They are ten feet forward and ten feet back. They get up and do the same things over and over and over again expecting different results. Then when the game of life is over, a lot of them look over their shoulder and say, “what happened?” Now the beautiful thing about living in a free society is that you don’t have to change or do anything differently. I believe that most people are living lives of what is called “quiet desperation.” Quiet desperation is where people have enough that it is not worth doing anything different, but they always ask the question: “Isn’t there more to life than this?”

So if you are sick and tired of being sick and tired with some area or areas in your life, change your actions, which in-turn, will change your results. What can you do today that will help you accomplish whatever it is you want to accomplish this year? Maybe you need to change careers, maybe you need to save some money, and maybe you need to move a relationship forward (or get out of one). Whatever it is, we suggest you do it and you do it today. Like the Nike slogan: “Just Do It”.

Build Skills And Abilities

How do we build confidence? By building and developing our skills and abilities. Most of the time we get “skill” and “will” confused. Too many times we fall into the “will” trap when it’s truly a “skill” issue and take the wrong approach with discipline instead of persistence in helping build the skill. Most people will make excuses or display avoidance behavior when they don’t have the confidence in their ability. Rarely does one display a “will” issue when they have confidence in their skills. If you know how to drive a stick shift you are more willing to drive one. If you don’t have confidence in driving a stick shift you might make “excuses” or come up with reasons why you can’t drive a stick shift. Same holds true with giving a presentation, or a sales call. If you’re confident in your abilities you will be the first to step up and say I can and will do it, but if you’re not confident excuses begin to creep in and others might look at it as an attitude problem or a “will” issue. Most people will make up excuses, not because they have a bad attitude, but because they don’t feel confident with their ability or their comfort level is low. That is why persistence while executing is crucial to positive movement, along with giving lots of encouragement along the way.

I was watching a football game the other day and was amazed by how intense it got when the game was close at the 2 minute warning. It seems as if the offense, which couldn’t move the ball all game, suddenly had a new game plan and was moving the ball at will against a defense that had stopped them up until that point in the game. However, if the game hadn’t been that close, the team’s intensity may have gone down and the players could have begun to “give up” and get ready for next week’s game. Sometimes that is how we are as human beings. If we have had a great year, and things are continuing to progress in a positive way, then our intensity goes up at the end of the year. If our year has just been the same year over and over, then we are saying, “I can’t wait until next year, things are going to be different, I am going to start over……” Get my drift?

I am going to challenge everyone reading this to persist through obstacles and those “curve balls” that life throws you, no matter what you are going through, persist! Don’t “write off” this year, this month, or this day. Don’t wait until next year, next month, or tomorrow to make changes, do it now. Make forward progress now and think about how much further you will be when next year, next month, or tomorrow is here. You’ll never know what progress you can make unless you take action. Here is one of my favorite quotes: “Actions may not always bring happiness, but there is no happiness without action”. Benjamin Disraeli (Former British Prime Minister).

If things are going great, do something positive to keep your momentum. If you would rather forget the recent past, do something positive now, that will move you in the right direction. Once again, we cannot change the past, we can only influence and impact the future.

Thinking Big

I have to believe that all of us sometimes don’t think big enough. I think big, and that has allowed me things in life that others may not have the chance to experience, yet I was very humbled after I read a story about Steve Wynn. Steve Wynn built the first “Mega” Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada (The Mirage, which is now owned by MGM). When Steve built it he had a construction loan, and his goal was to pay off the loan in seven years. When he went to his accountants and all of his financial team, he asked them what it was going to take to pay off the loan in his seven year timeframe. After they did the math they told him that he would have to profit $1 million dollars a day, 365 days a year, for the next seven years. If that happened he would be free of his loan in seven years. $1 million dollars a day profit, after he paid all his staff, and all his bills he would need to have $1 million dollars left each day, every day for the next seven years. Wow! To me that seemed impossible, but to Steve it wasn’t. Steve set his vision, to pay the loan off in seven years, and then he shared his vision with everyone on his team. They put a game plan together (preparation), and began to execute. What happened after they began to execute their plan? Well, Mr. Wynn didn’t pay off his loan in seven years; he did it in 18 MONTHS!!!! A year and a half is all it took for him to pay it off, which means he probably profited $4, 5, 6, 7, 8 million dollars a day, every day!! The best part about it is that after 18 months, all that profit went back into the company’s pocket and he could do what he wanted with it; he could invest it back into the business, save it, or spend it! Now I am not saying that all of us are going to profit $1 million dollars a day, but I would say that this story is a great reminder for all of us to think bigger than what we do; also that taking time to prepare a great game plan is the first step to executing. As Steve said, “Doubts don’t build empires…..Imagination does.” So let your imagination run as you set your vision and goals. Stretch you mind, spirit, and body and you just might be amazed at the results. Sarah, who is my wife and best friend, and I have been blessed at a very early age in life, but we make it our mission to “stretch” our thinking, and we encourage you to do the same!

Happiness Helps Us Persist

Happiness is a choice, and when we are focused and happy it’s easier (not easy) to persist through obstacles. We must choose everyday to be happy, while at the same time know what our definition of success looks like and strive daily to move towards that definition. You need to get out of your rut, which is just a grave without the dirt kicked in. My question again is, are you truly happy? I believe that it isn’t necessary to have reached your definition of success to be happy, but you must be moving in the right direction. If the answer is yes, pat yourself on the back. If your answer is no, then start now and begin to move in the right direction of success for you. If you haven’t yet, start by defining what success is for you, it must be yours, and then take the first step. Remember; don’t try to reach success tomorrow. Persist through the obstacles, and be patient as you move towards success whether you move a mile or an inch, the key is to move in the right direction. If you’re doing that, you will eventually get there.

Living in the present also creates happiness and persistence requires us to live in the moment and have a short memory when it comes to our missteps. Quit living in the past, it’s over, stop worrying about the future (it may never come) and just live in the moment. Michael St. Lawrence once said to me, “where you are is where you should be." If we can all live by that statement, life becomes a hell of a lot easier. Rick Leffke once said, “The goal when it’s all said and done, is to look back and say, that was a hell of a great ride!” To do that you must enjoy every minute. Stop to appreciate all the great things you have in your life and stop worrying about what’s not right. Also, forget about what you can’t control. Focus on what you can do to make your situation or life better. St. Lawrence is a deep philosopher and he said that one can argue that nothing else is happening in the world than where you are, and that’s why where you are is where you should be. Enjoy every moment. Enjoy where you are. Live in that moment. Carpe Diem, seize the day. There is no better time to start than now. When you do this, persisting through any challenges you encounter becomes easier.

Productivity Is An Interesting Topic

Productivity (execution) in the workplace is a measurement that most companies look at and measure. Large companies have so many challenges with productivity that they probably waste an average of 10,000 hours a day, 50,000 hours a week and 200,000 hours a month! To make that relevant, if we work 40 hours a week, for 50 weeks a year for 45 years that’s 90,000 hours we would spend working. In two weeks large companies’ waste more hours than we work our entire life and that’s from a conservative view. Now, I must point out that these numbers are not scientific, and I have zero foundation to publish these numbers, but after working with very large organizations for over ten years, I have reached these very non-scientific numbers.

As I work projects with large companies I’m always amazed at how these large organizations make money. Now I understand that lost productivity is always built into the overall business plan, but what I see is absolutely absurd. Way too much time is wasted every day. What could we do with that time? Continue to waste it, spend it or invest it. You could cut the workforce by 25% and still get 50 % more productivity!

What we need to do is evaluate, who is doing what, and is what they are doing productive or just busy? We have a lot a people working in that “rocking chair”. Remember, a rocking chair has a lot of movement but never moves forward. Are we productive or just busy? Most people split time between the two, and to be productive 100% of the time is not realistic. That being said we must evaluate what jobs are truly productive and what jobs spend most of their time being busy. Most people should be doing at least 75% of productive or profitable action, and if not, we should think about eliminating the position, or finding a role for them that is more suitable for them and the organization. Wasting our time is what we do best. We could continue to waste time and most companies would continue to move in whatever direction they are moving in. Some will continue to grow, some will stumble, and others will go under. But what if we concentrated on spending or investing our time a little more wisely? Just say 10% wiser; I’m not even looking for a huge leap here. What could 10% more productivity mean to a large organization? To a small business? To an individual? Let’s take a look at a large organization. If they waste 50,000 hours a week, what if they could buy back 5,000 hours of time per week, 20,000 hours of time per month? That might be worth looking into don’t you think? What about a small business? What if a small business could buy back 40 hours a month (10 employees 4 hours a month more productivity)? That’s 480 hours a year. Not bad. What about an individual? What if we could be more productive by 15 minutes each workday to move our career in the right direction, or 15 minutes a day building our abilities, or 15 minutes a day spending more quality time with our family? To be conservative let’s say we only do this 4 days a week, leaving 3 days to do our same routine. That’s 60 minutes a week, 4 hours a month, 48 hours a year. Over ten years that’s 480 hours of being more productive. In ten years could you build a business? Grow your career? Grow your family? Build your marketability? Hopefully all of us will see ten years, so here is the question. If we do or if we don’t become more productive, what’s the cost? Ten years will come and go, so what are we going to do with our time, waste it, spend it, or invest it?

If I told you every day you wake up you would have $1440 in your bank account, you couldn’t save it, and whatever you didn’t spend you would lose, what would you do with it? That is how many minutes each day we have? How are you going to spend and invest your time?

WHAT ARE YOU TRAINING YOUR CUSTOMERS/CLIENTS TO SAY?

My argument is that we condition or train our customers to say NO. For example, the retail world has trained us to say no. What do you typically say when you walk into a store and a clerk says “Can I help you?” Most people will say, “No I’m just -----?” That’s right, “looking.” When we call into a service or sales center and someone says, “While I help you with that, I want to look at your account and check to see what other services are available in your area”, what do you immediately think? Most will throw up their guard and say “they’re going to try to sell me something.” We must change our mindset to figure out what we are truly trying to accomplish when approaching our customer. Our transitions can be the “tipping point” in our conversations with our customers. It’s not what we say, but more importantly how we say it; our transition must be “inviting to our customers”, we must make it easy for our customers to walk down the path of a sales conversation that allow our customers to “buy” and not have a feeling of “I’m being sold”. There is a difference between buying something and being sold something. For example, if I went down to a car dealership and was talked into buying a car, signed the paperwork and drove off the lot, my mindset would be one of “oh boy was I sold on that one”. Now same car dealership but this time they actually take the time to find out about me, what I’m looking for in a car, and help me find the right car for me. At this point I would sign the paperwork, drive off the lot, and my mindset would be different. This time it would be more of a “look what I just bought” mentality, and there’s a big difference. People love to buy, but hate being sold.

We must work hard to create a buying environment for our customers. How do we do that? First thing is we must stop being predictable. When our customers know our next move we are in a losing battle. We must keep our customers thinking about benefits to them when buying from us. Not, “Oh now here comes the part when they are going to try and sell me something” attitude. Start asking your customers questions that truly make them think. Consciously be aware of every question you ask and always have a purpose for the question you are asking or don’t ask it. Too many times we ask questions because we think that’s the right thing to do. Consciously think to yourself, “What information do I need to gather to provide my customer with the best possible solution for them?” Then ask the right questions that will get you the information you need to help them. Helping your customer is selling to your customer. A lot of times I hear, “I want to give them the best customer service possible, but don’t want to sell!” I can argue that if you don’t sell them what they need/want you are not providing great customer service. Also, when asking questions your tone of voice needs to be a curious tone. Gathering information must be a conversation, not an interrogation. This is the key when creating a buying environment. When customers and prospects feel that you are only asking questions to benefit yourself they will immediately shut down or be very guarded with their answers. They will only open up if they know you are truly interested in them. Quit training your customers to say no and start inviting them to say YES.