Why I Love the Law of Sacrifice and Why You Should Too!

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Having It All Together … Right!

You probably know someone who seems to always have it together.  They are everywhere and in everything. To the naked eye they always seem to excel at everything they do.  

There is no slowing down! Is there a committee? They’re on it. Have an event that needs organizing? Ready to go! They are raising 55 children and spent quality time with each of them. Working two full-time jobs. Volunteer at the local shelter. Raising money to fight some disease. Writing a book. And have the happiest spouse in the world.

Social media amplifies this picture. Not only do we get descriptions but also vivid pictures of their perfect life, perfect children, perfect job, and idyllic state of mind.

In reality, there are parts of their lives that are neglected. That’s not a maybe, it’s a certainty. The picture we see, often filled in with our own perceptions, is a flawed photo.  I exaggerated the description above intentionally because that’s what we often do when we think about those high achieving types. We make them bigger than they are. Then we compare ourselves to them, imagining that they have everything in their perfect life while our lives are hollow shells full of meaningless events and a cesspool of problems.  It’s unfair!

The law of sacrifice cannot be violated

It’s also unreal.  The truth is that people who seem to have it together are not living perfect lives.  They may be accomplishing more than we are right now, but that’s not because they have it all together.  It’s not because they are necessarily more talented than we are; in fact, often they may be less talented.  And they have problems too, they just don’t share them around as much as some others do. THEY KNOW THAT EVERY THOUGHT THAT HITS THEIR HEAD DOESN’T HAVE TO HIT SOCIAL MEDIA!

Applying the Law

But what they really have that helps them succeed is an good understanding and effective application of the Law of Sacrifice.  As one of my mentors John Maxwell says, “You must give up to go up“.  You have to let go of some things in order to have other better things.

That’s a scary prospect for many of us and perhaps even a little depressing.  When we think about the Law of Sacrifice or giving up, we picture big things.  We can become a CEO but our family life is non-existent. If we want to make a lot of money we have to get rid of our moral compass.

Again, it’s that penchant for exaggeration.  And it’s also good old resistance helping us find reasons to not make any changes.

Simplicity in the law of Sacrifice

Even a time turner can't save you from the Law of SacrificeIn truth, the Law of Sacrifice is actually pretty simple. It’s all about priorities. Every single one of us has the same 24 hours in a day and seven days in a week. Barring Hermione Granger passing down her Time Turner to us (which you can actually buy) we cannot change that restriction on our lives.

That being the case, we change what we can. If we can’t change time, we change how we invest our time. Most of what takes up our time aren’t major things, they are trivial things. Therefore, most of the sacrifices we have to make are not between two high priorities, but between a high priority and a low priority.

Giving Up Good for Better

You actually look at giving up lesser things in order to get greater things.  You sacrifice an hour of television time every day in order to read a personal growth book.  Give up a couple of free evenings each week to work on a master’s degree.  When you learn to really apply the Law of Sacrifice, what you are really doing is simply learning to

Say No to the Good So You Can Say Yes to the Best

My father excelled in the credit union business during his career.  He was President and CEO of several credit unions over the span of many years and also was a high demand consultant to credit unions nationwide for many years after that.  He was a pioneer in the industry. We have the largest ATM network in the country due to his efforts.

To get there, he had to spend long hours working. He gave up some evenings of watching TV to earn a GED and then a degree.  Yet, he was never an absentee husband or father.  He coached Drum Corps and Little League.  He was a Scoutmaster. We went on trips.  Dad was at dance recitals for my sister.  While there were sacrifices to reach the level he achieved the sacrifices were giving up lesser things to get those greater things.  He did not give up one great thing to achieve another. Was he perfect? Did he mess up the choices sometimes? Certainly. Yet he made the decision and honored the commitment.

Obey the Law and Love It

Know that you have to give up to go up. The Law of Sacrifice is alive and well and it is immutable.

Embrace that. While it sounds like you are being deprived you are actually being set free. When you apply the Law of Sacrifice and set your priorities it frees you from what isn’t a priority. When you shape your schedule around those things that are priorities, it frees you up to say no to scheduling lesser priorities.

Some laws are intended to provide liberty instead of tyranny. When you apply the Law of Sacrifice there will be hard choices to make. But the good news is that the choice is always yours.

do you have trouble finding clarity on your priorities? Not sure where to start? contact me today for a free discovery strategy session.

The Dirty Secret of the Multitasking Leader and Why You Should Stop

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This Multitasking Leader Comes to a Screeching Halt

About few years ago, my son and I were driving home from a Boy Scout meeting.  We turned through an intersection and proceeded a few hundred yards forward when I looked down to change the radio station.  At the same time, the car in front of me decided suddenly that they wanted to turn right into a parking lot and hit their brakes.  Lots of noise later, they have a beat up rear-end and my car is totaled.  Thankfully, no one was hurt. 

A Do Everything World

woman trying to multitask with two phonesWe all do it.  Folding laundry and watching TV.  Driving and changing the radio station.  Texting on your smartphone while talking to an employee.  Sitting in a meeting and sending an email.  Trying to do more than one thing at the same time because we don’t think there are enough hours in the day.  It’s called Multitasking and it is the biggest time waster of all!

“Wait“, you might say, “multitasking is a critical part of functioning in work and life today!  How can you say that it is a time waster?“

Because it is. The evidence is mounting and irrefutable.

And you need to stop.

The Overwhelming Case Against Multitasking

A multitasking leader may argue that multitasking is essential. You think you need to be able to do multiple things at once to get everything done. Too many hours per day are already spent at work, so you may believe that if you don’t multitask that you will spend even more time and get few things done.

But numerous research studies suggest that actually the opposite is true. It is BECAUSE you are multitasking that you aren’t getting things done! Here are some of the more recent studies and the conclusions they have made about why multitasking is detrimental.

  • You are MORE EASILY DISTRACTED. (Stanford Study)
  • Your MEMORY GETS WORSE. (same as above)
  • You become more ANXIOUS AND DEPRESSED (Plos One)
  • It actually makes you LESS EFFICIENT AND LOWERS PRODUCTIVITY (JOEP Vol. 27 Issue 4)
  • Evidence shows more mistakes are made when multitasking instead of focused work.

Your Bad Multitasking Self

The idea is that if we are multitasking then we are working on multiple things at the same time, juggling everything and keeping things going.  

But that’s not what happens.  In most cases what happens is it simply means that you are doing multiple things badly.

It doesn’t help that multitasking is encouraged by many employers today.  First, many companies advertise jobs where they specifically state in the job requirements that they want someone who can effectively multitask.  I guess my question is, how exactly do they measure that?  

Secondly, with layoffs and streamlining, employers tell the survivors they must learn to do more with less, which unfortunately includes less staff.  But not less work.  While they don’t explicitly say it, they expect you to pick up all the slack and still do it within the same time frames.  So your choices at either to put in twice as much time or “multitask”.

You are not Multitasking

multitasking in WindowsFurther, understand that what you are doing is not actually multitasking.  

It is actually just task-switching.  

What it reminds me of is the Microsoft Windows operating system on computers.  Early versions of Windows offered a way to jump between tasks. You could still only run one thing at a time, but you could jump between applications.  That was called task-switching. It wasn’t until later versions where Windows would allow you to actually run multiple applications at the same time.  

What we do when we allegedly multitask is the first one – we are simply task-switching.  Problem is, we aren’t a computer with an operating system designed to do that, so we have a lot more trouble than Windows did jumping from one task to another.  And that’s saying something.

Proof that multitasking takes longer

We are actually designed to focus on one thing at a time.  Again, lots of research to support this.  Health Magazine cites a 2013 University of Utah study that found the better you thought you were at multitasking, the worse you actually were.

However, you may believe you are an excellent multitasking leader. As I have presented this information to groups in the past, there many in the crowd who, despite the overwhelming evidence, maintain that they are an excellent multitasker.

Let’s put that to the test

This test is derived from Dave Crenshaw, author of The Myth of Multitasking. 

Part 1

  1. multitasking leader test part 1Get out a sheet of paper and lay it down so it is wider than it is high (landscape style).
  2. Draw four lines across the paper. 
  3. Get someone to time you on this. On the first line write “multitasking is a thief“. On the second line write the numbers 1-21. Record the time it took you to do both tasks one after the other. It should be about 30 seconds or less.

Part 2

  1. multitasking leader test part 2On the next two lines you will do the same thing, again being timed. 
  2. This time, you will write a letter on line 3 and then a number on line 4, then back to line 3 and another letter and then a number on line 4.
  3. Do this until done. Record your time.

You should find that A) it took you much longer, B) you likely made a mistake, and C) it was more stressful.

The Conclusion

In summary, you suck at multitasking.  

And so do I and so does everyone else.

So, if you were doing something else while you were reading this, stop.

Now leave your comments and thoughts.

Okay, now you’re done.  Go back to that other thing.

 

Leadership Time: The Number One Tool for Leaders to Be Effective

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Finding Leadership Time

now clock.. Demands on our leadership time are everywhere. There’s lots of information out there about time management and how to find more time and get the best out of your available time.  In our world, we have lots of things that demand our time and want a piece of our day.

  • Our work which can take 40 or more hours a week
  • Our house which demands we clean it occasionally
  • Our family which would like meals every now and then
  • Our kid that would like us to take them to dance class
  • Our other kid that would like us to them to football practice
  • Our other other kid who would like a playdate
  • Our elderly parents who would like use to drop by and help them with something
  • Our church committee that wants us to volunteer to help out with the rummage sale
  • Our spouse who would like us to pay a little attention to them while they tell us about THEIR day
  • The dog who would like to go for a walk
  • Our laundry that needs to be washed
  • Our friend who would like to catch up over coffee/beer
  • Our local charity that wants us to participate in a fund raiser

And the list goes on.  From the moment we rise until we collapse exhausted in our bed, there are demands on our time.  They come at us from all directions and call us to action on their behalf.  And we respond, because we are people of action and people of action take action when called upon in the service of others, right?

Too Much

So, how do you deal with all that?  Isn’t there some special trick or time management technique that is going to help me get all this in?  Isn’t that some super secret technique that I can apply that will help me manage and free up my time?

The Time Management Solution

Well, as a matter of fact, there is!  This is actually a secret that has been available for centuries but little used as of late.  

In fact, it seems like many people aren’t even aware of this secret, not even sure of its existence.  

It is both simple and hard.  

Yet if you apply it constructively, you will be amazed at how much time it will free up.  

Do you wanna know what this secret is; the key to handling your time with skill and clarity?

Here it is.

Listen up!

Come closer!

The secret is:

Say NO.

no is one of the best time savers in the world

No joke! It’s that simple.  Say NO.  When someone says, you are such a go-getter can I convince you take on another project for our church committee?

NO.

You don’t owe an explanation.  They are not entitled to one.

You are not an evil person for saying NO.  You are not selfish.  

In fact, you are being considerate and caring.  You are wanting to save yourself for the things where you can really add value by choosing the places you serve and when you serve.   A Mayo Clinic report even suggests that learning to say NO is healthy, allowing you to be at your best for others.

In context, the key is you are not going to say NO to everything.  However, you are going to say NO when the activity is not the best use of your time, talents, and abilities.  

You will say YES where the opportunities to serve allow you to provide maximum value.  As John Maxwell says, you must learn to

Say NO to the good so you can say YES to the best!

A Story of Not Saying NO

Years ago, I was asked by my church to serve as the church treasurer.   A high profile role and I was lured by the promise that such a position would bring me to the forefront of the leadership within the church.  Let’s be clear. I will likely never be known as a financial wizard.  My wife, Sherry, balances the checkbook and handles accounts.  She is good at that.  I am not and don’t really want to be.  Despite all that, I said yes.

Big mistake! 

Because of my lack of skill, it took way too long to complete any of the responsibilities of the role.  Balancing accounts became an all-nighter.  This was not made easier by my general distaste for doing any of it anyway.  So my motivation waned, the job suffered, and eventually I left the role by mutual agreement.  

I said yes to the wrong thing.  It was not the best use of my skills and abilities and did not allow me to provide maximum value to the church, so we all suffered as a result.

Get Your Leadership Time Back

Employ the secret today.

Expect the best out of yourself and refuse to be placed where you cannot give it.

Do yourself and others a big favor and employ the strongest leadership time management tool you have: your ability to make a choice.

How to Say No Gracefully

I learned this secret from Bob Burg. I have applied it many times and it works just great! If it works for you, the credit goes to Bob.

When someone makes a request you wish to say no to, use a response that is both gracious and polite. Simply say,

“Thank you so much for considering me. While it is not something I choose to pursue, I want you to know how grateful I am that you thought of me.”

If they press the matter, give a shorter but final response. Still polite and gentle.

“I would rather not. Thank you.”

As I mentioned earlier, the one thing you NEVER DO is give a reason for saying no. When you give a reason, you have now opened discussion for someone to convince why your reason is wrong, ill conceived, or thoughtless. Don’t. 

Choose to give your best by saying no.

Struggling with how to communicate effectively with the people who matter? I can help you with strategies to make you more effective. Contact me TODAY for a free Discovery Strategy Session.

 

How Leaders Leverage Reflective Experience to Improve Their Teams

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Experience Happens

You have probably heard it said hundreds if not thousands of times during your life.

Experience is the best teacher.

Every day, from the moment you rise until you put your head on the pillow, you are going through a series of experiences.  Some experiences are what we would call good; nice things happen, we feel happy about it.  Others….not so much.

Mistakes are painful when they happen, but years later a
collection of mistakes is what is called experience.
-Denis Waitley

Here’s the thing:  if every day we ALL have experiences then why is it that most of us don’t get any smarter?

More Than Experience

someecards.com - They say experience is the best teacher. That's why I'm so smart. I've screwed everything up at least twice.If experience were truly the best teacher, then would it not logically follow that each of us would be getting smarter every day and would never repeat the same mistakes because our experience would have taught us better?  Is that what happens in your life?  Is that what happens around you?

You know what I am talking about, the people who keep making the same mistake they made yesterday and the day before, getting the same results, and not getting that it ain’t gonna work that way.  Why?  

If experience is the best teacher, then they should have already learned not to do that again.

I have to admit to being hard headed this way sometimes.  I’ll do the same dumb thing over and over again, somehow expecting different results.  I might rationalize it, excuse it, or simply learn the wrong lesson from previous experience.  I’m not an idiot, I am a fairly bright guy.  

Why isn’t experience teaching me anything?

Reflective Experience is the Plus

The truth is that experience alone is no kind of teacher at all.  It is REFLECTIVE EXPERIENCE that really makes the difference.  It is how we analyze what we experience that allows us to draw the appropriate conclusions and lessons from what happens to us and engage in positive behaviors to prevent it from happening again.  

Reflection needs to be timely; it needs to happen within a short period of time after the experience.  It should not be rushed.  The best approach is usually to spend a little time at the end of the day thinking about what good things happened, what not so good things happened, and examining them.   Ask questions about each experience:

  1. What was good (or not so good) about it?
  2. Who was involved?
  3. What was the outcome?
  4. Was that the outcome I anticipated?
  5. What would have been a better or ideal outcome?
  6. Why did it happen that way?
  7. What can I do differently to change the outcome?
  8. How can I use this to add value to someone else?

Reflective experience from others

experience can be painful, but reflective experience helps us learn the lessons.The last question leads to the last point.  As the Denis Waitley quote said above, mistakes are painful.  So even if we are learning from our mistakes, we still have to go through the pain.  Just a show of hands out there,
who likes to go through pain?

Yeah, didn’t think so.

So how can we avoid the pain?  Simply by learning from others experience.  In fact, I believe that other people’s experience can be absolutely the best teacher for us.  Examining the experiences of others allows us to be more evaluative about it because our minds are not clouded by emotion or pain.  We can assess the decisions, the process, and the outcomes and attempt to come up with practical applications to help prevent it from occurring in OUR lives.

One of the best ways to to allow people to share stories with you.  Stories allow experiences to be personalized; we connect with them better and connect with the people involved.  Reading the biographies (and autobiographies) of people we admire also is an excellent way to do this.  If they have any level of transparency, they will readily share their mistakes in their stories and we can derive great lessons from people we know to be accomplished persons.

How the Leader Uses Reflective Experience

First, the leader uses reflective experience to for their own improvement. You can’t take others anywhere unless you are prepared to go there yourself. Therefore, a leaders learns from their failures as well as their successes. They own up to failure, analyze it, and derive the lesson from it. They examine the experiences of others and derive the lessons as well.

And there is a lesson to be had. No matter how traumatic or painful, there is a lesson there. It may take some searching. You may have to spend time grieving first. But there is a lesson to be had.

Finally, great leaders help guide their team in gaining reflective experience. They help and encourage their team to grow. Nothing is a crisis, only a lesson.

Action Plan:

  1. How are you going to implement regular reflection on your experiences?
  2. Pick at least two people that you want to learn from this month.  Get books about them, publications, web sites about them, or just sit down over coffee (or drinks) and talk to them.  Make notes on what you learn

Need your guidance in learning the lessons of reflective experience? Want to share how reflecting on experiences has helped you? Contact me at 321-355-2442 or psimkins(at)BoldlyLead.com today!

Why What Many People Think About Leadership is Wrong

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05Managers or Leaders

comparing management and leadership shows the differencesIf you listen to how many people talk about leadership, one thing becomes clear. They don’t really know what leadership is. You may hear them talk about someone being promoted or hired into a position of leadership.

That also tells us that many people put management and leadership in the same bundle.  When people say that the leader should be finding new opportunities for the team and focus more on improving process, they are really saying that these are behaviors they would like to see in their managers that obviously they aren’t seeing. But it’s not leadership.

Remember the simple formula:

managers are about process, leaders are about people.

So seeking new opportunities and improving process, making life easier for employees; those are the job of the manager.  Equipping, empowering, encouraging, motivating, and growing are the roles of the leader.

That said, to be a truly effective manager you must also be an effective leader.  In fact, perhaps what employees are really telling us is that they would like to see their managers both be more proactive in their management roles but also would like to see them be better leaders than they are.

Leaders are Grown

I mentioned earlier that leaders have a responsibility to grow their followers. It’s an enormous responsibility. But for a leader to grow others, they must first grow themselves.  You cannot give what you don’t have to give.  I think leaders are recognizing this more and more.  A Pew Research survey asked people what they think they need the most in order to be better equipped for the jobs.   What were the top answers?

Interpersonal skills. Communication skills. In other words,

Leadership SKILLS

The challenge is that we can’t just throw a band aid on it. Offering one training course won’t do it. Sending someone to  a conference isn’t enough. Giving them a book to read will not make them any more of an effective leader than sitting in a boat makes you a good sailor.

Leaders Sail the Waters Daily

leadership is about growing dailyWhile sitting in the boat you are surrounded by the tools you need to sail, but you must first gain knowledge about sailing.  You must spend time developing and applying the skills to sail. Knowing how to gauge the wind. Navigating the water. Determining course. Bringing all elements in line with moving in the desired direction on the water.  You must know how to trim the sails and handle the helm. How to coordinate the crew and change direction as the sea and wind changes to keep the ship on course.  You must be mentored by a more experienced sailor.  You also must learn from your mistakes on the water.  And you must do all of this day in and day out to become the sailor you need to be. The sailor you are meant to be.

If you are not engaged DAILY in developing your leadership skills, the growth necessary to become an excellent leader will simply not occur. At best it will be haphazard and slow.  

For optimal leadership growth, it needs to be

  • Daily –  you must do something every day to develop your skills
  • Intentional – you must have a plan for the skills you need to develop and how you will develop them
  • Scheduled – you must set aside time on your calendar for it; otherwise any excuse will help you avoid it
  • Guided – Someone needs to help you see and navigate the process; like a coach or mentor
  • Progressive – build on a skill one by one; don’t attempt to master anything in a day

Spend as much (if not more) time on developing yourself and your people as you do your business.  When you do, you will be surprised to find how many of the other process-oriented problems will take care of themselves.

Not sure how to start on your intentional leadership journey? Call me Today for a FREE discovery Strategy session at 321-355-2442 or email me.

Here’s some ways to get started

  1. Identify three skills you need to develop further.  Remember to work from a position of strength and not weakness; in other words, identify your three strongest skills and seek to make them better. I can help you with this.
  2. Pick the one you want to start on.  Locate resources to help you develop that skill and secure them.
  3. Set aside time on your calendar DAILY to work on it.  It should be the same time every day.  Guard it ruthlessly; let nothing short of a client need or spurting blood interrupt it.
  4. Keep me posted on how you’re doing.  I want to hear your success stories and your challenges.

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