All posts by steve@kerrzone.com

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Leadership

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I wonder why it has taken me so long to get around to posting some of my thoughts on leadership.  I had a conversation today about getting things done within a corporate environment or other bureaucracy.  For me one of the key drivers to success in these environments is leadership.

Of course there are a myriad of  factors that influence whether a goal is achieved, how fast and the quality of the results.  For me, without question – good, effective leadership sits on the top of all those variables.

Consider some examples

Would Germany have overcome Great Britain in the Second World war had it not been for Winston Churchill?  India peacefully left the British Empire, could this have happened without Ghandi?

The examples of a goal achieved against overwhelming odds because of a great leader are numerous.  Each of us can probably name a number of great leaders we have observed during our lifetimes both famous and not famous, that is leadership applies not just to global historical figures but to local environments as well.

What are the key attributes of successful leaders?

Think of those leaders you admire, maybe it is even yourself.  What are the key qualities you observe?  Here are some of my thoughts on the top attributes:

  • exhibit high levels of emotional intelligence, that is things like; self awareness, compassion, honesty,  sincerity, self assurance, personal initiative and this list goes on but research shows the EI attributes I have listed here to top the list.
  • ability to communicate, not only be heard but also to hear
  • strength of conviction – knowing what the objective is and believing in it
  • capability to leverage the leader within for all their followers,  this is sort of like the leader following the followers to catch up with them.
  • Strategic Vision – seeing the way before others do

Mostly though, when asked about the key thing people notice about a leader they admire the most common response is it was someone they liked.  Strong and effective leaders are always above all likable.

What happens without strong leadership?

My personal observation of many situations both workplace, personal and political is a leadership vacuum invariably leads to poor results  while good leadership leads to positive high quality results.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Filtering

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As we go through the days of our lives (sounds like a soap opera), each moment we are using our personal filters to translate and understand in formation.

I read a quote the other day that spoke to one of my own basic filters.  It made me think about filters in general and how they influence our interpretation of the world and thus our behavior.

The Quote

For myself I am an optimist – it does not seem to be much use being anything else.  –  Winston Churchill

Back to Filters in General

Filtering is highly individual.   A key to successful use of filters is self awareness.  Simply put,  if you understand how you filter things it enables you to put your behaviors into situational context and provides a frame for modifying how you interpret and thus react to incoming information.    (When a sentence starts with “simply put” you can almost be sure it isn’t).

The Optimism Filter

A good example of this is the optimism filter.  The over-used “Is the glass half full or half empty?” is a great summary of how this filter works.   The data (a glass with liquid in it) is the same for all observers, but how you interpret the level of liquid in the glass (i.e., positively or negatively) can be very dependent on your basic filter – optimism or pessimism.  Most interesting fact here is the interpretation of each filter is basically correct.

However, it is a bit more complex!

Overall this filtering framework covers far more than just the optimistic/pessimistic characteristics and for any given individual an integrated  myriad of filtering types are in play interacting in different ways.

Many of you will have at one point or another taken those simple questionnaires which are used to classify your personality type (e.g., Meyers Briggs, Birkman colors, and so on).  These personality categories are based on the most consistent outputs for that type – on the whole.  That is, in specific situations the combination of filters in that personality type tends to react consistently.  In essence this personality type defines your basic frame for filtering and reacting to your environment.

Understanding your filtering mix can help you shape your personal interactions,  for positive results.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Gun don’t Kill, People Do!

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The recent mass shooting in Oregon has triggered another storm of discussion around “gun violence” in the United States.

First off, I think this is another great case of political speak.  Gun violence hardly adequately describes what is for me basically random mass murder using guns.  Gun lobbyist’s argue just because people use gun’s to murder, this is not a reason to restrict the availability of guns.

I know, why don’t we ban all murderers instead, that will solve the problem.

The real concern is the threat of murder.  In reality, one of the easiest and most effective tools to use for murder is a gun.   I could use a hammer. my bare hands, poison or hundreds of other options.  That being said,  statistically, murder by gun far exceeds any of the other methods as the most used.

Mass Shootings – Key Traits

Mass shootings are a well studied phenomenon in the United States (around the world too). Here are a few key observations:

  • majority conducted by males
  • majority of males subjects are thirty to fifty
  • majority of murderers suffered documented mental issues
  • for mass killings using guns almost every case resulted in the gunman killing themselves (suicide) or allowing the authorities to shoot them to death (still suicide).
  • Ease of availability of guns was defined as a key factor in every case.  This was considered a key enabler for the gunman being able to carry out their plans.

Note:  Professionals that study these crimes advise the only viable method of prevention is through leaks (i.e., the gunman talking about the attack beforehand) and this prevention method mostly relies on luck.  There is not solid way to ensure leaks are heard and communicated to the right place.

Considering these key attributes of the random mass murders occurring in the United States it seems obvious to me the number one  variable that can be exercised to mitigate the risk of occurance is limiting the availability of the weapon of choice – guns.

Is there a problem?

In Saturday’s Globe and Mail there was a chart showing  annual gun deaths per capita for thirty-two developed countries.  United States (no surprise there) came out as the highest and not by a little but five times higher their nearest competitor.  Canada was middle of the pack with five murders per million people.  It is easy to do a little searching and find among those thirty two countries those with the lowest rate of gun deaths have the most restrictive laws.  For me this is statistical proof in the value of restricting access to guns.

We can only hope

Is it finally time for the United States to come together as a nation and react to this problem in a real and effective way?  We can only hope.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Whats your brand and why do you care

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Personal coaches and consultants have been touting the importance of maintaining a strong positive personal brand for years.  What is it and why should you care about it!

Brand is quite simple, it’s a word, image or title that is immediately identified with a series of attributes.  Basically those attributes become the identity associated with the word, image or title.

For example:

  • MacDonald’s – fast, cheap, efficient, tasty (arguable I guess) honest, clean, standardized, etc.

My desired brand web identity might be something like:

  • Kerrzone – smart, witty, interesting, clear, accurate.

Personal brand identity is basically just a brand that is associated with your name.  Like all brands, it is hard to build, easy to destroy and potentially of great value to you (if it is positive and you leverage it effectively).

What do you own that is used more by everyone else than by yourself? – your name.   Others might use it, but as the owner you really care how they use it (or you should).  Do people view your brand positively or (probably outside your hearing) are they saying – sleazy, lazy, obstinate, stubborn, obtuse and so on.

SELF AWARENESS

The foundation for a strong personal brand starts with self awareness.  In a corporations case they use tools like social media, surveys, focus groups and marketing studies to determine what people think of them.  Individuals don’t usually have access to nor a desire to use these kinds of tools and so need to rely on self-awareness to assess (and react to) what others think of them.  Self awareness lets you uncover your identity and decide if you want to change it.

If you are aware that others view you as sleazy, lazy, obstinate, stubborn and obtuse and you are good with that, there is nothing to do.  Self awareness is about managing your image proactively not by default or re actively.

In essence the way you behave is what determines how others view you and overtime this creates your personal brand.  This brand is not something to be squandered.   Think about how important it is for you to manage your brand, whether in a business or personal context you are far more likely to achieve your goals when others view you positively.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Kudos to Amazon

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My faith in large corporations customer service capabilities was restored by this uplifting story I heard the other day.

An expensive on-line tread mill was purchased through Amazon.ca.  The product included a one year manufacturers warranty.   The purchasers received the product, shipped and as when expected.  It was set up and the exercising began, to everyone’s satisfaction.

Having some home exercise equipment can be very help to keep ones self in shape.  Personally I am not a big practitioner of home exercise preferring to exercise by walking at least 10,000 steps a day (A goal which I consistently exceed).

For about four months the tread mill performed as expected and then, alas it stopped working.   The manufacturer was called (toll free) and a conversation ensued.  It turns out the original manufacturing company went under chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States and was sold.   The purchasers canceled all existing warranties.   Unfortunately that included the warranty on the machine in question.   The option was to purchase a $700 part and install it themselves.  It might fix the problem or it might not.  The part could not be returned, so it was a crap shoot.

This led to a call to Amazon.  Just a, “hey, bought a large item through your service and it broke, warranty was canceled due to bankruptcy, is there anything you can do.

After waiting for some time well the service representatives briefed their supervisor, the response came back.  Amazon offered to pay for the part and follow-up in four weeks to see if it worked and if not would consider future assistance.  They were asked if it would be okay to use the $700 to purchase another tread mill and give up on this one since it was not clear if it could be repaired.   After further consultation with a supervisor this arrangement was approved.  And the part cost reimbursement went through.

So, there is only one thing to say – kudos to Amazon.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can

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Building on a theme started yesterday, today’s post builds on the idea a key step to success is believing you can achieve your goals.

A reader shared a quote with me that corresponded with some of the thoughts I had put forward in yesterday’s post.    “If thought was all it took to change the world, all teenage boys would quickly become girls with large breasts”

Self Talk

Self talk simple refers to the things you say to yourself within the confines of your own mind.  Some of these thoughts are conscious, most are unconscious and you don’t even realize you are doing it.  Pause for a second on the bus, a walk to work, getting up in the morning and listen to yourself.  You will probably be surprised to notice conversations in your head really do go on.  For example, on getting out of bed it would not be surprising to hear you tell yourself, “I am so tired already, what a day is coming” .

Paying attention to self talk is a very helpful step in changing the way you feel.  You can consciously speak back to yourself and change the way you feel.  ” I am not tired and this is going to be a great day”.

Studies has been done to gauge the power and effect of “self talk” and the impact of consciously listening to yourself and fighting back.  The results are pretty unanimous that self talk is real, it matters and can be used to promote achievement.

If you have not already done so, give it a try (i.e,. consciously listen to yourself and talk back).  You may be surprised by the results.

Outside the Sports Context

Yesterday’s post had a sports context.  One aspect of this approach is the objective is clear, in sports your goal is winning and you know (based on the rules of the game) how to do that.

In life, first capture your personal objectives clearly (on paper, in your mind, record a message to yourself)  Then focus on believing you can achieve and like in sports, while your skills play a part, positive attitude and belief you can succeed play a large part.  If you are a male thinking positively probably won’t grow you breasts, but thinking positively (supported by self talk) will undoubtably increase the likelihood of success.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Winning – Skill or Desire

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The national hockey league season is about to begin.  This got me thinking about winning, is it skill or desire that drives the champion team.

Let’s take the Edmonton Oilers.    In the last six years they have had the worst record in of the league for four of those years and were a losing team in the other two.

In the last six years the Oilers have taken the first pick overall four times.  Few would argue that the skills of the player chosen as the first round – first pick  overall, are high.  So the Oilers have chosen at least four top tier highly skilled players, arguably all star material.

And I should note the 2014 pick was third overall while the 2014 was a respectable seven, still pretty high in the pecking order with lots of skilled players available at the time to choose from.

If talent were all that mattered these six players should make the Oilers a top tier team and a serious playoff contender (Even if they were traded it would be for good skills right).

The results from the 2015 pick are not in yet (we’ll see this season) but my prediction is the desire, that is the hunger for the title is still not there.

Psychology Matters

A colleague of mine once postulated if you can visualize the win, than you will (win that is),   All you need to do is see it, feel it and it is yours.  Skill matters of course but it is probably less than half the equation.   Your psychological state is a much a factor in success as ability.

Before I get a flood of comments about this statement it’s understood that the concept “if I think I can than I will” is not absolute.  But, it sure helps.

So What about those Oilers

As long as the fan’s fill the seats and the large salaries are paid out the Oilers drive to succeed, in a very competitive league will not be enough.

Were I making the first round picks none of them would be minor league or junior stars.  Selecting a player with unrecognized  potential and holding out the incentive of stardom and associated financial awards is far more likely to spark that drive and determination needed to win in the NHL.  That is, someone who is really hungry to prove their worth.

Most importantly is that success breeds success so all I need is one player to ignite the spark( that is with drive, desire and reasonable skill).  Everyone else on the team will step up.   Once the power of the team kicks in they become unstoppable.  Winning breeds winning.

The Oilers are trying the old formula – get the stars and and the rest will take care of itself.  Sadly, I don’t think that is true.

My prediction for this years Oiler’s – in the bottom four finishers.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Poor Service Rant

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I am not sure if the older you get the less flexible and forgiving you become.  Over the years I have exhibited a very high tolerance for iffy or downright awful customer service.

As time has progressed, my patience has diminished.  In the past couple of years I have sent written complaints to the President of Bank of Montreal, President of BMW Canada and President of SunLife Canada.  All of my issues were resolved quickly.

Today I had one of my worst experiences ever.  It was with the BMW Assist call center and unfortunately for my loyal readers, I am going to rant about it a bit.

Customer Care Agents (nice title, not accurate)

I received a letter today – Sept 28th.  The letter was dated September 9th and advised my BMW Assist subscription expired on Aug 25th and this was my last chance to renew by September 24th.  After that service would be permanently deactivated and I could not renew.    Given Sept 24th had already passed this was not too helpful.

I had called the BMW Assist call center on August 11th and requested they renew my subscription so I thought an error had been made and I would just call their friendly Customer Care Agents and they would help me and fix the mistake.

Hard to Believe

The agent that answered my call investigated and told me he could not renew my subscription and I would need to contact my BMW Center.  BMW Assist did not renew Canadian subscriptions.   He was unable to tell me how to contact my BMW Center (address or phone #) but this is what I had to do.  I protested that I had renewed my subscription through this call center two years ago and when I had called on August 11th they told me it would be renewed so I was positive they could do it and if he couldn’t help me I wanted to talk to his supervisor.

Supervisor Phil (operator #7091) came on the line and I got a better story.  He clarified they could not renew my subscription because it had been permanently canceled on September 24th.  Maybe my local BMW Center could help (what that was, where it was and how it could help eluded him).  He agreed I had called on Aug 11th but had not provided renewal instructions.  I asked if my word that I had in fact provided those instructions was not good enough.  He said it did not matter he could not renew my subscription if he wanted to.  I suggested BMW Assist had made a mistake and should fix the mistake they had made.  Phil did not agree with me.

I advised Phil that I would be escalating to Andrea Piotrowski the Customer Services Manager who sent me the notification letter about the last chance to renew.   I asked for her e-mail address but Phil would not provide it.

And that’s all folks

So that is my rant in a nutshell.  Now I am off to write my letter to Andrea Piotrowski.  I am going to include the link to this post in my note to her so she can comment on this post directly if she so desires.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Do I care about my net worth

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Financial Net Worth

Your net worth is basically the value of all household property minus household debts.  Net financial assets is a variation where personal resident and lifestyle property is removed.

Note: The value of a person (i.e, their worth) and financial net worth are totally unrelated.  High financial net worth does not make a good person and visa-versa.

Most personal financial manager (PFM) software products referred to in yesterday’s post include the capability to list all household assets (e.g., owned resident, boat, household goods) as well as financial or investment assets.  Both your net worth and net financial assets can be reported from the PFM.  Monitoring these numbers over time give an indication if you are building wealth or if it is eroding.

In conjunction with looking at spending, net worth  provides another indicator or how you are doing.  This can help you make decisions about changes you want to make in your ongoing financial behavior (e.g, lifestyle, investment risk management, etc)

(A reader made an interesting comment on yesterdays blog – and I paraphrase a bit –  “about paying yourself first”. Tracking net worth/net financial worth will help you understand how you are doing on that front).

Thoughts on Net Worth

Where you fit in the net worth spectrum is a personal choice and the value of being classified as high net worth or not is zero.  What matters is that your lifestyle meets your expectations and that the financial component required to meet that lifestyle is right for you personally.   This is where financial planning, that is an awareness of how you are positioned is what really matters.  This let you manage and make changes as desired.  It becomes your choice, not forced upon you.

Some information I read recently (might have triggered this post somewhat)

In a 2015 study, Boston Consulting Group listed the number of millionaires based on financial assets by country.  Their findings showed  418,000 millionaires in Canada (approximately 1% of the population).  Including personal residence and lifestyle property this number would be much higher.   Forbes indicated in a 2014 article that around the world the average millionaire had financial assets of $3.5 million.

Most research I conducted calls those with a million or more in financial assets high net worth individuals.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Why bother with financial tracking?

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Continuing the financial planning theme from yesterday, I am going to focus on tracking in a little more detail.

This will lead to a discussion of financial net worth in a future blog.

Tracking

Years ago (before the dawn of personal computers) I tracked all my families income and spending manually using a financial ledger (yes a real book) which I wrote figures in (yes with a pen).

In the early nineteen-nineties I was a early adopter of quicken for windows (a so called personal financial manager – PFM).  I used it for tracking my income and expense as well as an ongoing financial net worth calculation.  It was much quicker and less messy then the ledger system, which went bye-bye.   I strongly recommend if you are not using one of these “apps”  you start right away.  As mentioned in yesterday’s post all financial planning stems from this one basic foundation – ongoing tracking.

Which Financial Tracking Tool

For getting started basically you want a product that contains functionality that lets you enter each expense and and income entry by category and by account type (e.g., checking, saving, investments, loans etc).  Most products have default categories to track spending by and you can add your own custom.

Although I am an early adopter and long time user of Quicken I have flirted with other products.  In the end though the benefits of alternate tools have not been enough to drive me to change.  However,  I would recommend a google search to find the application you are most comfortable with (there are some great free shareware products out there).

I got a tool and I am entering every transaction, so what?

The basic tracking information you are gathering in the tool has three principle uses.  (Disclaimer, this is planning 101 so I only am describing the basic uses, there is a lot of advanced stuff you can do)

  1. Report on spending by category over a specified period – You can do this review weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc.  I personally just do it annually (so it is not a lot of work and is just once a year).

    I keep all the summary output of spending by category for each year (my current spreadsheet has 25 years of data).  I can compare what the difference in category spending is year over year; year over overall average; and so on.  This lets me see trends at a glance and make decisions.  For example restaurant spending is on the rise, automobile repairs tripled year over year but are close to the average.

    These observations (which I basically make once a year) let my wife and I manage our spending behavior to match our lifestyle, rather than visa-versa.   This is not a work intensive exercise and the benefit is amazing.

    For example the rising cost of the auto maintenance category could lead to a decision to use public transit (reducing auto cost) so more money is a available for other things we prefer.

    I should note that the analysis you make should be as broad and long reaching as you can, not just a tactical year over year consideration.

  2. Income vs. Expense – I will describe this in a future post.
  3. Net Worth Calculation – I will describe this in a future post.