Archive for the ‘Management’ Category

Realistic or Awesome – You Choose

January 9, 2012

With New Year’s only 2 days away, I’m starting to hear the chatter of “resolutions”.  Love ‘em or hate ‘em – which is it for you?  I love ‘em!  It’s a fresh start, a do-over, the excuse to dream big and ask “What if?”.  I’m actually pretty good at sticking with most of my resolutions, though I tend to use all 365 days to get there.

My annual “lose 10 pounds” goal is almost achieved at 8 pounds lost . . .  I still have 2 days to go so there’s a chance.  Then again, perhaps not, since I just had cheesecake as my dinner.

So with the idea of resolutions and goals I have a new plan of action for achieving my 2012 goals.  I recently listened to an audio book called The 10X Rule by Grant Cardone.  The guy is a bit wacky but I like his thinking.  (He reminds me of Jim Cramer, that guy on Mad Money that always seems to be yelling directly at me.)  The whole theory of “10X” is to supersize your goals to be so big that it sounds insanely crazy.  He doesn’t believe in setting realistic goals because it doesn’t keep us motivated long enough to achieve them.  In our minds they become not that exciting so we tend to give up. We don’t go into it with the intention to give up but our psyche just seems to go there and before we know it we’ve lost interest.

I’ll share an experience as to why I think there’s something to this idea.  I had a client that I needed to sell table top exhibits for last month.  I’ve been selling these table top exhibits for various events for them over the past 2 years.  I only needed to sell I think 7 or 8 to hit the budget number but because of a shortfall in previous month’s income, we decided to go for 12.  (I’m not sure who set 12 as the goal but since it’s my story I’ll say it was me.)  Twelve tables fit in the room comfortably so that was my new target.   So calling the same ‘usual suspects’ of potential exhibitors I was feeling discouraged as I was just trying to sell 1 at that point.  (I should point out that this client’s industry was particularly hard hit with the economic downfall.  I’m not that bad of a salesperson.)  Though I knew calling the same ‘usual suspects’ wasn’t the best way to sell the exhibit spaces I was stumped as to who I should be calling.

Then, I had an unexpected moment of rejuvenation.  One unexpected encounter sent my mind racing in a whole new direction of prospects and the sales pitch they needed to hear.  It worked.  With renewed energy and a fresh list of contacts I started making calls.  I also set my new “Awesome Goal” – yes, I called it my Awesome Goal - which was 18, the absolute maximum number of tables we could accommodate.  So where do you think I ended up?   I sold 15 and had 17 tables filled; one we gave to a non-profit and one we gave away in exchange for a free service the company provided at an earlier event.  We had several new companies participate, plus I left the client with at least 4 more companies interested in exhibiting at the next event.  They didn’t participate this time only because of scheduling conflicts or too short notice – not lack of interest.  Two companies were also seriously looking into becoming members.  All that because I set an ”Awesome Goal”.

So what changed?  While a fresh perspective on the marketing of prospective exhibitors got me going again I became almost obsessed, energized and refocused on that “Awesome Goal”.  I had the list of companies taped to my wall and checked off each one as they sold.  It was exhilarating as I got closer to that “Awesome Goal”.  I didn’t start out with the intention that I had to sell 18 tables but it seemed almost so unreachable that as it started happening something else took over and it just happened.

I heard this similar concept in an article by Martha Beck (she writes lots of things for Oprah’s website and O magazine) and she referred to it as a “WAG” or a Wild-Ass Goal.  So as we head into 2012 think about your Awesome Goal (or WAG if you prefer) and think about what you’re going to do.  Are you going to play it safe with the realistic goals or go for it with the Awesome Goal?  I already have my list ready and it’s AWESOME!!

Happy 2012!

Posted in Creative, Leadership, Management, Marketing and Commmunications, Meetings, Strategy | Leave a Comment »

Social Media Policies

April 28, 2011

Interesting conversation this morning on the ASAE Executive Management Listserv about social media policies. It seems a consultant to an association said something on his personal Facebook page that the Board didn’t like one of the questions put to the list was, should the consultant be fired? Was it actually a violation of policies? Could it be objectively considered poor judgment? Interesting conversation.

And one of the follow up questions was, what is your association’s social media policy? Um, that’s assuming you have one. I posted the link to the SocialFish white paper on the subject. It’s a good read. We’re actually in the process here of developing policies, and I’ll report back on it when we’re done.

Anyone out there who’s already done policies have any insights to share?

Posted in Management | Leave a Comment »

Telling Stories

August 6, 2010

I don’t think this is unique to association management, but it seems every day I am reminded in this job that one of the most critical skills is telling stories. Human beings love stories. We’ve been telling them since the dawn of time, and as humans we have almost no choice but to be drawn in by a good one.

When we get mired in work, however, we end up doing things like staff meetings, and evaluation reports, and proposals, and memos. These are all fine (and necessary), but they still need to tell a story. They need a narrative that makes sense to people. Because without it, people will make up their own story, and that usually works against our interests.

Posted in Leadership, Management | Leave a Comment »

Over-communicating: The Art of Saying Things and Then Saying Them Again

February 9, 2010

Yes, the title of this post is redundant, but this is my leadership lesson of the week: over-communicating. I learned this one eons ago, and it has been passed down by probably every guru that has ever guru’d. Tell them what you’re going to tell them, then tell them, then tell them what you told them.

But when I get neck deep in the work, I forget it. I send the emails out, or we have the Board meeting, or I have the conversation, and then it’s out of my head. I have checked that box. I did my job communicating. I forget that in a week or two I need to send the same message out. I forget that my staff will perform better when I share more information than I think is necessary.

It is particularly important when an association has a decentralized committee structure. A lot happens at the Board level that is assumed to have been communicated down to the Committees. And it was, it just wasn’t communicated enough. We need to remind our leaders (both staff and volunteer) that when you get to the top positions, the decision-making responsibilities are often dwarfed by the communication responsibilities.

Then we should tell them that again.

Posted in Boards, Leadership, Management | Leave a Comment »

Scheduling Meetings

October 21, 2009

0787968056.01.TZZZZZZZOne of my favorite books of all time is “Death by Meeting,” by Patrick Lencioni. It’s not just a perfect title–it’s a good book that helped me understand why so many people hate staff meetings (but continue to do staff meetings!).

One of the biggest insights from the book is the idea of “contextual structure.” That is, how you structure, run, and prepare for a meeting depends on its context–it depends on what work is being done at the meeting, or what problem the meeting was designed to solve.

If this week’s tactical decisions need to be made, you don’t necessarily need to go around the room and have everyone talk about all the projects they’ve been working on over the last six months. Some of those projects, while relevant to the individual, may not have any tactical issues that need  the group to solve together, particularly this week. Or maybe, as Lencioni suggests, you can do a “lightning round” first to see if there are any issues that need addressing. Either way, these meetings will probably be brief and to the point.

But if you have a thorny problem that has strategic implications, you might need to set aside two hours, and you probably need at least one person (if not several) to do a bunch of homework and share information electronically before the meeting. The meeting itself might have extended periods of very loosely structured discussion simply because that’s what is needed to solve the problem.

I find, however, that in the office, what we do within our work teams is simply “schedule meetings,” as if all meetings were created equal. In this economy (and maybe in AMCs in general), time is a precious commodity, so if people feel their time is being wasted, it’s a big deal. I think that requires us to be clearer in how we design and schedule “meetings.” Everyone on the team needs to have a better sense of when they will be quick and tactical and when they might be deep and strategic.

Posted in Management | Leave a Comment »

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