Want to play more and get more done?

Several years ago I had an executive client, he just didn’t seem to be able to get things done. He was into work before anyone else and stayed late. My coaching — he could not arrive before 7 a.m. or stay after 7 p.m.! I recommended boundaries for him to work within. Not only did he get more things done, he developed a relationship with his wife and kids! He was my first millionaire!

Ask yourself:

  1. Do you want to have more free time to do the things you love to do?
  2. Be part of your family’s life?

Most people would answer, “Yes!” The challenge is, you know you have a multitude of things that need to be done and don’t believe you have time to play.

Answer: Schedule it. (I know it sounds simple and it’s not always easy!)

Process:

  1. Write down everything that needs to be done (yes, everything!), everywhere in your life.
  2. Highlight the top two items.
  3. Schedule them, take focused action and get them done.
  4. Celebrate! You deserve it.
  5. Repeat.

Yes, it is that simple! Other benefits:

  1. You won’t have time to overthink things — you will actually get them done. (Remember, there are only two!)
  2. You’ll learn how to delegate and not be so picky! (Your employees will thank you for these new opportunities.)
  3. You will learn to prioritize and focus on the important things. (Not the busy-work, which doesn’t provide the results you want.)

The key: Honor your schedule! 

This is a very simple process.

Remember, I did not say it would be easy.

The challenge: Do it for one week and let me know the results.

©Jeannette L. Seibly, 2015

Need to transform your management practices? Contact me before it’s too late! http://SeibCo.com/contact

Jeannette Seibly is an award-winning and internationally recognized business advisor. For the past 23 years, she has helped thousands of people work smarter, enjoy financial freedom, and realize their dreams now.  She has an uncanny ability to help her clients identify roadblocks, and help them focus to quickly produce unprecedented results.  Each client brings their own unique challenges, and her gift is helping each one create their success in their own unique way. Along the way, with her commitment, she helped create three millionaires.

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Do You Have Silly Customers?

Recently I had an on-line experience with a person that offered a free book – at least that is what my computer said. When I attempted to order it, the link didn’t work. I contacted the author’s customer service rep who agreed that there was a computer error on their end. It turned out that the book wasn’t free and I was called “silly” for expecting it to be free.

An example of a better way to handle this happened to me a couple of years ago. A reader wished to purchase my It’s Time to Brag! book online in a PDF format (this was before I setup an agreement with Kindle and am no longer selling PDF copies). (Time2Brag.com) The person didn’t have a good on-line experience so I gave her the book, complimentary, with my apologies! (No, there was not a problem on my end.) I did not have another on-line issue, and more importantly, I kept a customer.

Three things to remember if you sell on-line:

#1: It costs way more to attract a new client than to keep a current one.

#2: When it is brought to your attention that your system is not working, you need to thank the person and offer them something in return. Obviously, don’t call them “silly!” After all, they took their time to help you solve a problem to keep your technology working correctly so you can continue to attract and keep customers.

#3: Customer service interactions via email (or other electronic means) may not translate in the tone you intended. It’s important to slow down and reread your correspondence out loud (and listen to yourself) before sending it. Remember, keep it simple and smart because the average national reading level is 6th grade.

Get your brag on — your customers are about to stray! http://SeibCo.com/contact

Jeannette Seibly is an internationally recognized business advisor. For the past 23 years, she has helped thousands of people work smarter, enjoy financial freedom, and realize their dreams now.  She has an uncanny ability to help her clients identify roadblocks, and help them focus to quickly produce unprecedented results.  Each client brings their own unique challenges, and her gift is helping each one create their success in their own unique way. Along the way, with her commitment, she helped create three millionaires.

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Are your employees on the same page with you?

Many bosses, including you, inevitably will get upset with employees who are not doing things the way you would do them. You expect them to know what to do after reading a manual or being shown once how to do something. Rarely do you stop to see what is missing from the employees’ perspectives so that they can produce consistent work product and be on the same page with you.

3 key points to get your employees on the same page with you:

  1. Review your training, systems and procedures. What’s missing? The average national reading level is 6th grade — this can reflect a person’s ability to adequately read, write and comprehend any material and put it to good use. It’s critical to remember that people learn differently. Some people need to talk it out to ensure they understand. Some need to be shown how to do something more than once. Still others need to “try” it themselves first, and then ask for coaching to fill in the gaps.
  2. Use legally and scientifically validated job fit tools for hiring, coaching and managing. This helps you understand objectively why people fail to do work the way you would do it. Also, it creates a laser-like opportunity for you to provide guidance for skill development (this will help you and your employees).
  3. Set specific goals, and then manage the milestones to ensure the project and people are all moving forward. When people fail to deliver the required results, coach them by focusing on the task at hand. Do not try to fix the person – it will never work and leave them, and you, frustrated. Instead, you need to be very specific about your instructions and other times you’ll need to help them understand the bigger picture.

©Jeannette L. Seibly, 2010-2015It can be lonely at the top! An experienced business advisor, always accessible and at a nearby desk can make a positive and powerful difference for you, and your employees. My goal is to be your in-house advisor, your ally and sounding board as you navigate the complex world of your business! (Contact: JLSeibly@SeibCo.com OR 303-917-2993)

Transform your failures into greater success. Get my copy of “We all fail! How can we use failure to create greater success?” http://ow.ly/Kp34R

Are Superstar Clashes Getting You Down?

As a boss, it’s challenging to manage high performers. Most of these superstars know they know their stuff. Since they believe others are less knowledgeable and less capable than they are, it sometimes taxes them to listen to others. Even to their boss!

If they’re causing you sleepless nights, most likely you aren’t the only one. As their boss, it’s up to you to manage these superstars and their egos, to keep them engaged and growing with your company.

Look beneath the surface. We often believe that if a top performer does well in one area, s/he will do superbly in other areas too. This is not true. Unfortunately, if you’re not using scientifically validated assessment products to ascertain their thinking style, core behavioral traits, and occupational interests, you may lose them. Superstars hate to fail. Provide them challenges, not to be confused with busy work, which they are quick to spot and resent.

Expect good people skills. Too often as bosses, we overlook our superstars’ interpersonal skills. When we step into a dispute to resolve it for them, it creates more animosity between the superstar and co-workers (or clients). Instead, expect them to work it out themselves by a set time and report back to you the results.

Understand their strengths and weaknesses. Use a qualified 360-degree feedback assessment to focus on their effectiveness and not whether someone is likeable. This can help you uncover any of their missing leadership skills, and focus them on developing themselves for future positions and opportunities.

Remember, money is not a motivator. While your superstars may demand more and more money, higher salaries will not provide the incentives necessary for them to continue to excel. Find other ways of compensating them based upon results (e.g., perks, vacations, gift certificates, etc.).

©Jeannette Seibly, 2010-2015

It can be lonely at the top! An experienced business advisor, always accessible and at a nearby desk can make a positive and powerful difference for you, and your employees. My goal is to be your in-house advisor, your ally and sounding board as you navigate the complex world of your business! (Contact: JLSeibly@SeibCo.com OR 303-917-2993)

Transform your success into great success. Use a qualified 360-degree assessment to move you forward faster. http://SeibCo.com/contact

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Why is Your Leadership Credibility SO Important?

When busy leaders fail to establish credibility for themselves and their companies, it leaves others wondering about them personally and professionally. Credibility influences the loyalty of internal and external customers. If the marketplace’s perception is that the business, its leader, their products or services are untrustworthy (not credible), this perception drives purchasing decisions whether the perception is accurate or not.

As a leader, your employees emulate you. The keys are to Honor:

  • Your word. Follow through. “I’m too busy” is one of the biggest excuses busy professionals use to justify their behavior. Have you considered, if you’re too busy to follow-through, you’re probably too busy to provide the quality of products and services promised? Get yourself well-organized to keep track of your commitments and find the money to hire necessary support. Develop a dependable system to follow-up and follow-through. Then, follow it!
  • Your company’s vision and mission. Credible leaders consistently make decisions that support their companies’ values. Implement them in a manner that promotes positivity. Too often we follow our ego (aka as our own self-interests) and this quickly limits sustainable company growth. Others will shy away from doing business with you if they perceive association with you could limit their own success.
  • Your commitments. We judge others by their behavior and ourselves by our intentions. What are your commitments? Are you conscious of them when making decisions that impact others? Most people make decisions based upon the tiniest fragments of information and forget about their values and commitments. As a leader, this can be excruciatingly painful if you need to defend your decisions. Instead, apologize and admit when you are wrong. Encourage others to provide you with their opinions and fact-based solutions in the future – don’t forget to include the impact on others. Simply make good decisions based upon all the information you have; your credibility hinges upon them.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2011-2015

I specialize in straight talk with immediate results. With proactive and extensive “people” management experience, I have been particularly successful in coaching and training business owners, their executives and managers, to achieve unprecedented results by working with and through others. 

Build faster credibility when introducing yourself — get your “brag” on with a copy of my book, It’s Time to Brag! http://Time2Brag.com

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Highly effective bosses have highly effective employees

As a boss, you love those days when you and your team feel productive and appreciated — you’re in the zone! Everything is going well. Your projects are done on time and within budget, and healthy disagreements are kept to a minimum. It gets even better when a new idea from your department has saved the company (and client) money and time — solidifying your reputation as a highly effective boss with highly effective employees. Everyone is happy and satisfied.

These types of days don’t happen by accident. They are created by design when you have the right people and you are the right boss.

Hire for Success.  Use objective and scientifically qualified pre-hire assessment tools to assess accurately for job fit, including: thinking style, core behaviors and occupational motivation/interests. Create a 180-day Success Plan and On-Boarding process that helps the new person get up to speed quickly and become an integral part of the team.  Also, use these validated tools to help you build a strong team, by knowing where the strengths and weaknesses lie.

Coach for Results. Use laser-like coaching to get better results. It starts with believing your employees are great contributors, and allowing them the freedom to do their work. It builds trust and loyalty.

Build the team.  Provide learning moments when they make mistakes or there has been a failure. Don’t forget to provide on-going training and outside coaching to help your employees soar to new levels.

Share your expectations. Clarify your expectations of others, and then be a great role-model. For example, as the boss, you arrive on time for meetings and actively participate.

Set the tone for appreciation. Celebrate and acknowledge your employees individually and as a team, on a daily basis.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2015

It can be lonely at the top! An experienced business advisor, always accessible and at a nearby desk can make a positive and powerful difference for you, and your employees. My goal is to be your in-house advisor, your ally and sounding board as you navigate the complex world of your business! (Contact: JLSeibly@SeibCo.com OR 303-917-2993)

Transform your failures into greater success. Get my copy of “We all fail! How can we use failure to create greater success?” http://ow.ly/Kp34R

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Creating a Job-Fit Company

Are the right people in the right seats on the right bus?

When employees (and bosses) are in the right job (job-fit), it creates a fun and rewarding work environment! The team and individual members make significant contributions to the success of the organization. Everyone experiences high levels of job satisfaction and loyalty. There is a synergy of ideas and working relationships that excel beyond the norm. Sales increase. Customers experience higher satisfaction working with the company. Profits soar. These are the results of job-fit.

Unfortunately, more than 63 percent of the working population do not fit their jobs! Why? We rely upon traditional selection methods and then rationalize hiring failures as “not our fault.” We accept poor job-fit mistakes as part of the norm. We fail to create and follow a hiring and selection system. The fact is a business is often better off leaving an “empty seat on the bus” rather than randomly filling the position with someone not well-suited to the job.

Hire the Right Person. We are often snookered by verbally adept candidates. We fall into this trap when someone has the ability to sell themselves, whether they possess true interest or capability to do the job well or not. Studies show, poor job-fit produces unhappy employees. Those who are unhappy in their work create miscommunication, make more mistakes, fail to focus on critical elements, and blame others for their inability to produce required results. They are overly focused on things that don’t matter rather than solutions that fit the vision and values of the company.

Understand the Financial Impact. Hiring people who do not fit your job requirements and your company’s culture will cost you time and money. They may even irrevocably damage your reputation. The wrong person can actually increase your business and product liability.  Unfortunately, there is no line item on your financial statement about this costly outcome. But if you analyze the true expenses, tangible and intangible, you’ll be shocked and dismayed by these hidden costs. For a quick and easy calculation, read Page 20 of Hire Amazing Employees, Second Edition (http://BizSavvyHire.com) or contact me at JLSeibly@SeibCo.com

Select the Right Tools. Develop promotion and selection processes built upon gathering reliable, valid, relevant information. This can be a challenge since we consider using scientifically designed assessments as costly, and not as important as our gut feelings. The added falsehood is that we believe we can coach, train and motivate anyone to do anything. This is wrong!

Select assessment tools that meet Department of Labor (DOL) guidelines (for a copy of the guidelines, contact me at JLSeibly@SeibCo.com) and that provide information regarding how well their mental engine, their ability to drive the engine, and their interest in doing so, fit within your company, for any specific job.

Train the Interviewers.  Many interviewers rely upon their intuition and perceptions (their guts). The pitfalls are only hear what they want to hear. They don’t catch or ignore conflicting signals. The facts are, job candidates say all the right things and make the right type of promises to get the job offer. How often has this happened to you? Use a structured interview process to discern candidates’ depth of job skill. Implement use of qualified and scientific assessments that contain interview questions. Then, use these behaviorally based questions to provide a structure to ascertain reliable job fit.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2010-2015

Are you looking for business advice and laser-coaching to resolve an issue or situation? Contact me. I’ve been a business advisor and author for over 20 years. I’ve guided the creation of new solutions for 1,000’s of business challenges and published the book, Hire Amazing Employees (BizSavvyHire.com). Check out my website: SeibCo.com.

Are Elephants Monopolizing Results?

Most of us have heard the expression “there’s an elephant in the room.” Elephants are those unspoken issues that hang around because no one wants to talk about them. They limit our ability to achieve intended results. Yet for a variety of reasons, people fail to address the elephants for fear of personal or professional reprisals. Ironically, expressing those concerns in a professional way can make a significant difference in resolving them.

While some may use the excuse, “it doesn’t matter” or “it’ll go away on its own,” elephants will monopolize and limit the results of any company, association and/or project when ignored.

Sensitive Elephants. If there is a topic that needs to be addressed that can be embarrassing or hurtful to others, have a private conversation with the few people who can resolve it.  Don’t get caught up in recycling “ain’t it awful” or “it shouldn’t be that way” or “it’s too hard.”  Come up with a workable outcome everyone can live with – even if everyone does not wholeheartedly agree.

Overwhelming Elephants. While the issue may seem enormous, start the conversation simply and slowly. Allow others the opportunity to voice their concerns without fear of reprisal. Many will find the elephant isn’t so big after all. Once everyone is on the same page, brainstorm solutions and create focused action plans to disappear the elephant.

Dancing Elephants. When you don’t tell the truth, the elephant will dance from one area of the company into another. Remember, the truth is required when addressing the details, creating new systems and adjusting attitudes of the people involved.

Get help from an outside business advisor to ensure the elephants in your company are no longer monopolizing its results.

©Jeannette Seibly, 2011-2015

It can be lonely at the top! An experienced business advisor, always accessible and at a nearby desk can make a positive and powerful difference for you, and your employees. My goal is to be your in-house advisor, your ally and sounding board as you navigate the complex world of your business!

(Contact: JLSeibly@SeibCo.com OR 303-917-2993)

 

Want to Achieve Faster Results?

Do you …

  • Allow people and circumstances to limit your results?
  • Fail to listen to sage advice because it doesn’t fit your point of view?
  • Accept excuses instead of creating openings for action?

These ineffective management styles will limit your ability to achieve faster results. Your skill in working with people, systems and issues to create win-win outcomes is required for success. Failure to acquire new skills will derail your career!

The world of work is changing. It requires executives, business owners and entrepreneurs to develop a new level of guidance, direction-giving and implementation approaches that work.

Listen for required change. Change for the sake of change can be time consuming and expensive. Mimicking your competition will not guarantee a positive return on investment. It pays for you and your team to listen to the marketplace, while strategically customizing solutions that work for your company and customers!

Stay in focused action. Don’t buy into the common excuse, “I’m too busy.” As the leader, it’s up to you to provide the direction and ensure what needs to be done is accomplished. Get everyone on the same page and guide a clear course of action. It doesn’t work when you change the goal to fit the actions taken. Handle the uncomfortable details and make the hard decisions now, with integrity.

Hire a coach. When you hit a wall, and you will, don’t slug it out alone. A coach helps you recognize your blind spots, and those of your team. These insights, when put into workable action, will elicit the best in others, making them (and you) easier to work with and open to listening to others’ input.Enjoy achieving faster results.

 It can be lonely at the top! An experienced business advisor, always accessible and at a nearby desk can make a positive and powerful difference for you, and your employees. My goal is to be your in-house advisor, your ally and sounding board as you navigate the complex world of your business! (Contact: JLSeibly@SeibCo.com OR 303-917-2993)

©Jeannette Seibly, 2015

 

#1 Energy Zapper

Excuses, excuses, excuses!  It takes the same amount of energy to entertain the internal and external chatter about why you shouldn’t need to do something, as it does to simply get it done. It’s amazing how much time we waste with our excuses.

Want to be more effective?

  • *Schedule Use your cell or Outlook to schedule time to get the task done, and honor it as an appointment with someone important. YOU.
  • *Do or Delegate Just because you don’t want to do it, doesn’t mean others may not welcome the opportunity. Give them the chance to shine.
  • *20 minutes If you’re still finding excuses, set a timer for 20 minutes. Focus on the task during that time and see how far you progress. It’s amazing how small steps lead to big accomplishments.

Now, get into action!

Jeannette Seibly has been an international business and executive coach for over 20 years. She has guided the creation of three millionaires. Are you the next one? http://SeibCo.com/contact

© Jeannette L. Seibly, 2010-2014