I realize that many of us feel fortunate in this current economic environment just to have a job. And all of us have a variety of personal ups and downs that can make the idea of a purpose statement seem almost trivial. It could even feel like an academic exercise to spend time on this. But my view is that investing in this is a very worthwhile and practical personal activity. Most of us don’t have the luxury of going into the woods to self reflect. But there is merit in having this intimate conversation with yourself over a cup of coffee or during a quiet walk. If you want a kick start, I suggest you get involved in an exercise called ”What’s Your Sentence:  The Movie.”

Many of you who read my blog know that I’m a fan of Dan Pink. And readers of his book Drive may remember the “What’s Your Sentence?” exercise from page 154. Dan has a 2-minute video (below) to get up to speed if you need a refresher.  The exercise asks you to distill your life — what it’s about, why you’re here — into a single sentence. It’s tough, but it’s powerful. I encourage you to participate.

The Character Triangle is a value and habit system and when you apply it to your life’s purpose it becomes exponential in its value to each of us and all the people we interact with. Please invest in yourself on this. You’re worth it.

With character and purpose,

Lorne

I really respect Thomas Friedman, the New York Times Pulitzer prize winning author, as great thinker and journalist. Some of you may reject Friedman and the NYT because your views differ with its political stance. But I ask you to have an open mind regarding quotes from Friedman’s article in the Sunday New York Times, October 25. 2010.

“We compensated for years of stagnating middle-class wages the easy way. Just as baseball players in the ’90s injected themselves with steroids to artificially build muscle to hit more home runs — instead of doing real bodybuilding — our two parties injected steroids, cheap credit, into Wall Street so it could go gambling and into Main Street so it could go home-buying. They both started hitting home runs, artificially — until the steroids ran dry. Now we have to rebuild America’s muscles the old-fashioned way.

…good jobs at scale come only when we create more products and services that make people’s lives more healthy, more productive, more secure, more comfortable or more entertained — and then sell them to more people around the world. And in a global economy, we have to create those products and services with a work force that is so well trained and productive that it can leverage modern technology so that one American can do the work of 20 Chinese and, therefore, get paid the same as 20 Chinese. There is no other way…

Lawrence Katz, the Harvard University labor economist, has it right. Everyone today, he says, needs to think of himself as an “artisan” — the term used before mass manufacturing to apply to people who made things or provided services with a distinctive touch in which they took personal pride. Everyone today has to be an artisan and bring something extra to their jobs.

For instance, says Katz, the baby boomers are aging, which will spawn many health care jobs. Those jobs can be done in a low-skilled way by cheap foreign workers and less-educated Americans or they can be done by skilled labor that is trained to give the elderly a better physical and psychological quality of life. The first will earn McWages. The second will be in high demand. The same is true for the salesperson that combines passion with a deep knowledge of fashion trends, the photo-store clerk who can teach you new tricks with your digital camera while the machine prints your film, and the pharmacist who doesn’t just sell pills but learns to relate to customer health needs in more compassionate and informative ways. They will all do fine.

But just doing your job in an average way — in this integrated and automated global economy — will lead to below-average wages. Sadly, average is over. We’re in the age of “extra,” and everyone has to figure out what extra they can add to their work to justify being paid more than a computer, a Chinese worker or a day laborer. “People will always need haircuts and health care,” says Katz, “and you can do that with low-wage labor or with people who acquire a lot of skills and pride and bring their imagination to do creative and customized things.” Their work will be more meaningful and their customers more satisfied……..”

I completely and wholeheartedly agree… WE ARE IN THE AGE OF EXTRA AND ARTISANS. WE HAVE TO COMPETE IN A WINNING WAY. LOCALLY AND GLOBALLY!

This idea may seem somewhat exhausting to you. But I encourage each of us to use it to our advantage. The Character Triangle gives us a framework and system that will help us become artisans and to put definition behind what “extra” means. It does not necessarily require us working Saturday and Sundays, but it does mean thinking about every day as a day we can sharpen our skills and add more value.

This is back to the good old fashioned commitment to being personally excellent every day. The CT will help! It is exhilarating to compete by being better everyday personally. If we commit to being great individually the collective force will take on a momentum of its own. Let’s win.

Live the Triangle,

Lorne

1. Say what you do (manage expectations)
2. Use Trials
3. Do what you say
4. Perpetually delight customers
5. Embrace social networks and go deep
6. Value transparency but protect privacy
7. Deal with negative publicity and feedback promptly and skillfully

Upon reflection, I think the same principles apply to our behavior as individuals in an organization. Self accountability involves delivering on our promises. When we do that; it builds trust with those around us.

Think about each of the seven trust builders above and how you might apply them personally. In Gansky’s book, she points out that San Francisco based Curtis Kimball’s Creme Brulee cart is so popular, he’s attracted 14,000 followers on Twitter. People tweet where he is, flavors offered, etc. Is it possible to create this type of response at work? How do we get fans raving about our work? Why is it important?

Building trust in our work environment is important. When we live in the Character Triangle, we take responsibility for our personal behavior. When we build trust amongst others, people want to work with us and for us.

In the Character Triangle,

Lorne

In the literally acclaimed novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery, there is a great quote about the great Asian-based game of “Go”:  “It has been proven that in order to win, you must live, but you must also allow the other player to live. Players that are too greedy will lose. It’s a subtle game of equilibrium… what matters is building well.” (p 110)

I don’t know much about the game of Go, but I do know there is much wisdom in it. I think what matters most is building well. When it comes to working with colleagues or other departments, the same principles apply:

1. Make it a partnership so you can both win.
2. Avoid zero sum (winner take all) situations. Don’t be greedy.
3. Build well. Be proud of the work you do and the contribution you make.
4. Bring other people and departments into building well.

Who are people and/or departments you can better apply these principles with?

You may also want to learn the game of GO.

Live in the Triangle,

Lorne

1. The miners chose NOT to be victims from the beginning. For 17 days without contact to the outside world they chose to live, to fight, and to move forward.
2. They worked together as a team, recognizing they each had a role to play in surviving. Imagine the respect for self and others during the 69 days. Anything else would have torn them apart.
3. They took 2 days worth of food and made it last 17. They chose to focus on what they had, not what they lacked. They had an abundant mind set in the scarcest environment.

The last miner up the rescue capsule, at his insistence, was the shift supervisor Luis Urzua. This man, while I obviously know little about him, likely embodies every element of the Character Triangle. His leadership was symbolized by his last act as shift supervisor. He chose to be first by being last.

While suffocating in total darkness sometimes generates the brightest light, you and I (thankfully) can embody and employ the aspects of self accountability, respect, and abundance daily without the need of a rescue capsule. What we need is the conscious presence and commitment to act that way daily.

Thank you to the Chilean miners and their competent and brave rescue team to remind us who we are and what living with character means.

Live the Triangle,

Lorne

Listening and journaling go hand in hand. If we’re going to live the Character Triangle it is important to capture the viewpoints of others and to specifically note commitments made (especially ours). So I highly recommend using a book to keep a record of our transcripts (an analogue version). If you are more digitally inclined the iPad is a great tool too. This may replace my Black and Red.

One final note: at the end of each day, write down how we “moved the ball down the field.” What progress, however small, did we accomplish? This simple but habitual journal entry will give us a sense of accomplishment. Also it is beneficial to write down one example of where we’ve applied the Character Triangle too. This way, cultural development and character development growth together.

At the end of reasonable milestones, we can review our progress. The little stuff ends up being momentum.

Do you have a black book? Start now. Get one.

with Character,

Lorne

As a CEO I have the opportunity to see all kinds of people at work at all levels. As I see employees progress or stagnate in their roles, there seems to be a point of excellence difference based on the degree one takes the lead as a problem solver regardless of position. Here is the process I see people who are effective at problem solving and pro-active in leadership, generally follow:

They have a self accountable mind set where they believe they can make a situation better.

They gather facts and data on the situation by actively engaging others who are impacted. This usually involves a formal or informal “campaign” of providing information on the impact of the problem and asking for suggestions in solution development.

They are decisive in choosing a solution supported by insight stemming from #2 above and then applying a solution.

But this next step is where some of the people who are exceptional at proactive leadership show their stuff… they have a campaign advertising the effectiveness of the problem-solving applied solution. People want to know that their input was put to work.

Success energizes the group and they are ready for more. If not, fatigue often takes over.

If we want data to support this process, review the work of Harvard professors as reported in Working Knowledge, August 30 2010. This research shows that information campaigns led to a 74% increase in suggestions to improve and even more when people learned about the effectiveness of working solutions.

Try the above process on a small or large problem in your area. See what happens. Otherwise we’re all talk and no action. Or as the saying goes, “All hat, no cattle.”

Living the Triangle,

Lorne

1. What are their key business objectives this year?
2. How do they get measured by their boss?
3. What are their career objectives?
4. What are their personal objectives?
5. What or who brings them the most joy in life? What do they do for fun?
6. What have been challenges and disappointments in life? Victories and celebrations?
7. What are their strengths?
8. What are their shortcomings?
9. What can you do at work to bring them the most value?
10. Who are the most important people in their life? Do you know the name of their loved ones?

There may be better and more questions to ask and answer but these are a start. I have hundreds of people working for me. I can’t know the answers to all these questions with every one of them. But I do try and answer as many as I can. I keep mental and written notes. This helps me connect at a personal level whenever and wherever I can.

My belief is that it is our responsibility regardless of our job, to know as much as we can about the people we work with. Doing so shows that we care and this is a basis for having a respectful relationship. The root of word respect is to “look again.” Answering these questions helps us look more closely.

How did you do on the quiz? Now is the time to learn more about our team mates as we go about our daily work.  Start tomorrow.

In the Triangle,

Lorne

Being abundant in both thinking and doing is one of the big three of the Character Triangle. I want to be surrounded by people who think this way.  I want to work and play with abundant “meshers.”

What do Zipcar, Groupon, Netflix, Crushpad, Thredup all have in common? They are new business models based on what Lisa Gansky describes in her brilliant new book The Mesh: Why the Future of Business is Sharing. A Mesh business is based on people coming together on a common platform to share in the use of goods or services. The commercial transaction is based on sharing. Gansky goes on to describe what she calls the “Virtuous Cycle of Trust”:  learn, test, engage, play…then rinse and repeat.  I encourage you to read Gansky’s book for the full meal deal description and understanding of Mesh. But my point is that Mesh, at its foundation, is about abundant rather than scarcity thinking. It’s all about expanding and sharing.

The virtuous cycle of trust is required between us as people in order to make sharing and partnering our preferred way of working. Hoarding resources is counterproductive. We need to leverage each other’s skills rather than negatively minimize each other. As a CEO there is no way I have all the skills to run a company on my own. I need to mesh with all the people on my team so that we can leverage, expand and contract our capabilities as the environment around us changes. As a company we also need to partner more with other valuable members of our ecosystem. To borrow a phrase from Gansky, I guess we could call this Mesh Leadership.

I want to challenge us to think about how we can better come together to share and leverage each other’s skills. How can we abundantly give what we have developed in ourselves? How can we seek out and openly engage and receive what others have to offer? Where and how do we behave in fearful/scarce ways? How is that restrictive? Or even harmful? This is a different and a more complete thought than teamwork. It’s bigger and more expansive. It is “Mesh.”

I am at the early stages of more fully incorporating mesh thinking into abundance leadership. But I know it is important. Join me on the journey. I will write a lot more on this in coming blogs.

Live the Triangle,

Lorne

Diversity, as a key element in developing RESPECT as a value, includes learning how to meaningfully connect with a variety of others in a wide range of environments. As a CEO, I want leaders around me who can walk into any environment and build value. We should learn to be comfortable and confident in all areas, from the board room to the front line; the academic to the mundane. This takes experience and practice. In order to develop this skill, we have to intentionally get out of our “safe” zone. I also don’t think it’s possible to be a great listener and therefore fully embrace the comprehensive value of being respectful if we haven’t been in the front lines with others. As an example, one third of our business is in Europe. I try and spend significant time living as a European.

This viewpoint is also expressed by Dr. Jeffrey Pfeffer, Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University.  In an October 1, blog on Big Think (Why MBA’s Should Take Acting Classes) Pfeffer notes that meeting lots of people should take priority over staying exclusively in the comfort zone of friends. “Its very important for you to meet people in a diverse set of industries and a diverse set of companies and a diverse set geographies.” I totally agree.

As part of an organization’s recruitment process I think we should place prospective candidates in numerous organization environments to see how they act and react. If they can’t navigate all levels of an organization, I am not interested in hiring them. If their passport isn’t stamped I would rather they did that first before joining us.

Pfeffer gives us a challenge in his blog: “Find 10 unique people we don’t know, who if we did, they could help us in our careers” …and as leaders overall. I like this assignment.

Let’s purposefully practice (read my recent blog on practice) by intentionally putting ourselves in unique environments with others. Why not start by getting to know five people outside of our departments but still inside the company. Then let’s seek out five people who we would really like to get to know because they will help us grow. Let me know what happens as you go about this. What will you learn about yourself? Others?

with Character,

Lorne