The new year is here. We have our vision set, goals in place, motivation dialed up. Inflation is up, the stock market is down, and COVID is surging. Time to pause, take a breath, and gain some perspective. You may have heard us say, “Growth is the mastery of change.” Change is inevitable, but growth is not. So what do you do? You take the lead and take control of growth. Join us as we explore three things you can do right now to get settled, get focused, and get started on a fulfilling and prosperous year!
Ambition delivers the fuel. Acceptance reduces the friction. No growth engine can be sustained over time without the operator keeping both in constant balance. But what must we accept? Meaningful success is not just about bringing energy to the fight. It’s about understanding how to eliminate the barriers we create, so you can clear a path to your goals and perform at your highest potential. In this episode we talk about addressing the ROOT of all self-inflicted barriers. Get this right and whatever your personal, professional or business goals for 2022, you’ll get there faster, with far less effort, waste and stress. I promise!
This is a time when many of us assess what we’ve accomplished over the last year, consider where we fell short and think about how we can improve as we look to the future. We may recognize goals that were relatively easy to achieve, and others that were more difficult to start. The secrets top performers use to set and achieve proper goals for themselves are the same as those used by leaders to inspire and activate others. Are you willing to explore the ‘dark corners’ of yourself? If so, we welcome you to join the conversation.
This episode represents a departure from our usual topics. Chris and I loosen up and have some fun sharing personal stories about the annual confluence of family and business stressors. Hey, we're only human. Stress affects us all. But it doesn’t have to slow us down or block our path to growth. We can learn from it. We can leverage it. And we can put it to work for us.
It's Thanksgiving and leaders are looking to upgrade their sales teams as they plan their attack on the coming sales year. Jack Welch, former chairman and CEO of GE famously said he never hired using first impressions and subjective opinions. We love the advice, but what can CEOs and sales leaders do to deliver on that advice? Join us as we explore the answers and share some secrets.
James opens the episode by recounting a conversation with a tech CEO about the most productive way to think about raising her sales team’s potential and performance. It starts by making sure the ‘why’ that drives each member of your team is aligned with the ‘why’ that drives your business. Too often these ‘whys’ are diametrically opposed. Then, you must bring it all home by adjusting your sales team’s process, methodology and skills to give life to this new way of thinking and improved results to their pipelines and paychecks.
Chris kicks us off with reference to the life and death of Achilles, the heroic warrior from the Iliad. In this episode we explore the process of moving yourself, your team and your company forward, from being stuck in the ‘Hero's Trap’ to being empowered by the creation of a ‘New Growth Engine’. Making the transition means you have to leave something familiar and comfortable behind, but it also means you have the ability to take your game, wins, rewards and recognition to the next level.
What does a culture that demands heroic efforts from leaders and people say about the potential of an organization? When heroic efforts are the norm and normal efforts are the exception, people and teams underperform. Short-term goals may still be hit, but long-term value will always suffer. The performance costs can be measured in higher turnover, loss of key employees, longer periods of time between growth milestones, lower operating margins and lower valuations. Healthy leaders build scalable teams and healthy cultures. The value of change is undeniable and its within every growth company’s reach.
More than ever, valued leaders and team members want more from their experiences at work. Their definition of what is meaningful to them has changed significantly as we exit the pandemic, and organizations are failing to keep up. In this episode we continue our conversation around meaningful success with a deep dive into four transactional behaviors that hijack the investments companies make in their most valued employees, and in many cases, cause more harm to the company than if they had done nothing at all.
If your goal is to build a team that has the potential to be world class, where should your focus be? Can you sustain world class outcomes by simply focusing on heroic individual achievements, or must you cultivate a deeper understanding of what the larger ‘team’ requires to succeed? In this episode we continue to explore the lie of heroic efforts and the value of seeing your ‘band of individual contributors’ as an organization of aligned and disciplined team members.
