Monthly Archives: December 2011

Dec 05 2011
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Business, Creativity, Leadership

Move

Plan A) Move
In a world that is moving, move with it.
Things happened Saturday and Sunday while you were checked out. Check back in and move.
Advance, progress, change position, and move.
Make a MOViE with your own life, don’t watch one.

Whatever you do, don’t be idle.

Plan B) ________________?
There is no plan B, because it distracts from Plan A.
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Dec 02 2011
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Business

Trifocal Leadership

Leadership requires us to view our world through trifocal lenses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1) Intermediate Vision

  • Today the consumer came in your store or clicked your site. The leader determines how to respond.
  • The leaders eyes here will keep his doors open tomorrow.
  • This is the vision and action of WHAT you do, the widget you make, or the service you give.

2) Reading Vision

  • Like a coach studies film, the leader studies where he can get better and where he can give “atta boys” to his followers.
  • “Leaders are readers.” Dave Ramsey
  • Checks the metrics: Leaders keep the score and know their numbers. The numbers don’t lie.
  • This is the vision of HOW you do what you do.

3) Distance Vision

  • Leaders ask “The Question Behind The Question.”
  • Leaders dream the world they long to see, and plan the steps to get there.
  • Leaders align with John Maxwell’s philosophy of “if there is HOPE in tomorrow, then there is POWER in today.”
  • This is the vision of WHY. This is where the leader sees himself as having not just a job, but a calling.

Proverbs 28:19 sums it up better than I ever could: “Where there is no vision, the people perish.”

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Dec 01 2011
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Business, Leadership, Marketing

The Finish Line is the Starting Line.

Great businesses don’t let the interaction end at the sale.

The individual that served me at Nordstrom sends me a thank you note a month after I purchased a pair of jeans. Apple asks me to come into the store so they can show me a few new things on the iPhone 4S. The Peninsula Hotel set the bar for me in what service is when I stayed there, and last week they asked me to come back again for two nights – one of which is free.

You wouldn’t tell your wife you love her once and then never again. And you would not offer to serve her on your honeymoon and then never again. For a relationship to thrive it must continually give words of gratitude and offer to serve.

In my industry the market is down, yet I’m having the best year of my career. Out of 93 homes I’ve personally sold Y.T.D, 57 of them were transactions with someone I’ve done business with before, consider a friend, or a friend referred them to me. Or to put this another way, 61% of my business this year was relationship based. Facebook didn’t do it, Twitter didn’t do it, billboards didn’t do it, and television didn’t do it. People either came back because transaction #1 went well, or people came because someone told them their transcation #1, #2,  or #3 went well with me.

Next time your customer swipes his/her credit card for what you provided, remind yourself that the relationship is not over…its just beginning.

You will build a world-changing businesses when it is built on relationships that serve in response to gratitude.

PS – I’ve read a couple great books that go into more detail on this –  Thank You Economy and Tribes.

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