Attitide is Everything-Entitlement is Nowhere

Recently, I spoke to a wonderful group of Human Resource executives. The group from the Houston area known as the Bay Area Human Resources Management Association (BAHRMA) met to “sharpen their saws.” I was asked to participate and shared my thoughts on Strategic Performance, its value and how to get it.


During the presentation a young lady raised her hand to comment and told of a situation that echoes around our country, today; She told of an attitude of “Entitlement with which they struggle.”

The “Big E,” as we call it, is when employees express their belief that others and the organization to which they belong, are somehow blessed by their presence. Often there is no evidence supporting their right to a favored state, just a belief in their own minds that they, somehow, deserve special treatment, recognition, pay or all three.

She put it like this; “We are consistently faced with younger employees believing that we (older employees and the company) are somehow fortunate in our association with them.

They come to work late or miss deadlines and believe it to be Okay,” she says. “It seems, as if, they believe the organization should be thankful that they decided to come to work, at all.”

The Entitlement attitude seems to be more prevalent among younger employees. Our experience has been that many of the Generation Y employees do, somehow, believe that they have a right to a job. A belief, I support, at least in part. I believe that there is work for anyone who wants to work, not necessarily the work you may want, but work from which you can earn a living. That does, somewhat, differ from the Generation Y notion.

So, what can or should you do about an attitude of entitlement, whether it comes from Generation Y employees or elsewhere? We believe that corporate America is in control and if the attitude of Entitlement is an issue, in your company, you can do something about it. Here is what we recommend:



1. Clearly state expectations before you hire anyone.

2. Get agreement before you hire

3. Have a “Zero Tolerance Policy”

4. Operate with integrity



Many organizations complain about poor attitudes but shoot themselves in the foot by not being clear about the values of the organization, their expectations of the employee and enforcing their own rules. Organizations should know their values and clearly share them with potential employees, but few do, they should create a “Top Ten Reasons People Work for XYZ Corp.”, A Values Statement, and a clear, easy to read statement of expectations in the job a candidate is being asked to fill. Get them to sign and date those documents and keep them as a permanent record that the candidate acknowledged your expectation and agreed to them. That document should go in the employee file. That takes care of item 1 & 2, now lets talk about the rest.

Many organizations want people who have a great attitude, many do not, but it is their own fault. They continue to believe that they can put into someone something that is not there, hire someone that is marginal, and somehow expect superior performance. That seldom occurs. The key to having the right people and attitudes on your bus is hiring excellent people, in the first place and realizing we are all human and make mistakes, sometimes hiring the wrong person. When you hire someone who does not wish to adhere to something they agreed to before the hiring and obviously the wrong person for the job, fire them. That takes care of 3 & 4 above.

Applying these four simple rules will, I guarantee, diminish the number of employees that believe they are entitled to their jobs, but most importantly, send a clear message to the many people in your organization that you value their good work ethics and operate with integrity.

Five Steps to Improved Profits

Occassionally, there is a window of opportunity to advance profits without spending more money. We have just been through the steepest and most difficult economic decline of most of our lives. Now, is the time to plan to reap the rewards of the coming boom.
Being in a boom or bust is an experience a lot like the story of the bullfrog who was cooked before he knew it. As the water in the kettle, in which the bullfrog was placed was slowly heated to the point of cooking him and because he became accustomed to the warmer and warmer water, as the temperature rose and never knew what happened to him until he appeared on the menu as "Fresh Froglegs."
Having been around in 2008 when things were happening and seeing the happenings disappear in 2009, many small and large businesses were cooked before they knew it, because they insisted on business as usual.
Now is the time of recovery, amd many things will never be the same! Now is the time to act to fully take advantage to the irrationally exuberant times in the coming years. We wrote "The Target in 2009, because we had the time but also because I wanted to avoid mistakes I had made in the past and wanted to share my thoughts with as many people as possible.
Don't get me wrong, I did not dream up these 5 Steps, they came from 30 years of experience running a business much like yours. So here are my thoughts, expressed briefly, but in the book The Target http://www.targetthebook.com/ I spend much more time on each step:

Step #1- Make sure you know what you expect from each key position under your management or make sure you know what is expected of you, in your job, if you are an individual.
Step #2 - Make sure you know what skills, knowledge and talent is necessary to excel in key position within your organization or as an individual, make certain you know your strengths match the needs of the job you are to do.
Step #3 - Emotional Intelligence, knowledge of the impact of emotions on work performance is essential, even more important is having emotional competence. As a manger, knowing the impact of your emotions on the performance of you team and being able to manage them is an essential to competency. Coveting people who are emotionally aware is a attribute needed by managers and business men and women alike.
Step #4 - Talent is Worthless/Performance is Priceless, know how to apply your talent is more important than having the talent. You can be the most talented person in the world but if you don't know how to apply it, what good is it?
Step #5 - The environment in which you work or the environment you create for your people to work is an excellerater. The culture of a company or home or life determins the "fullness of the sail." Develop a winning culture for yourself and other.

There you have it. Five simple steps to improved profits. To buy the book, go to http://www.targetthebook.com/

EQ Vs. IQ-It's not what you know, it,s what you show, that counts!

How much you know may get you the job but what you do will determine your success. What and how you do what you do is greatly dependent upon how you do it. How we behave (what we do) is determined, in large part, by Self Management (how we manage our emotional self), one of the four pillars of Emotional Intelligence.

Self- Management seems simple enough. You just manage the way you act, right? Well, yes and no. You do manage the way you act, but what and how you do it determines your success.

While there may be other aspects to Self-Management, it is the management of emotions on which I want to focus. Reuven Bar-On, a pioneer in the Emotional Intelligence field suggests that there are six, key, emotional skills that impact effective self-management:

Assertiveness
Independent Thinking
Self-Actualization
Stress Tolerance
Impulse Control
Flexibility
A brief explanation of each will be valuable to those who are interested in honing their emotional skills.

Assertiveness – the ability to express and defend you feelings, beliefs, and thoughts and be able to defend the same in a positive way.

Assertiveness has two important parts: 1.) knowing what you feel, believe and think and 2.) being able to defend them, positively.

Knowing what you feel, believe, and think requires Self-Awareness (another of the four pillars of Emotional Intelligence). To be assertive, you actually have to know yourself and be clear about what you believe, think and feel. It is when you are not clear that assertiveness becomes aggressiveness.

Defending what you feel, believe and think requires courage and empathy. You must have courage to say what you believe feel and think but you must be able to say it in a positive way that can be accepted by others.

Independent Thinking – the ability to think for yourself without being unduly influenced by others.

Independent thinking, like assertiveness requires courage. It also requires self-confidence. Being confident in your decisions is, almost always, a prerequisite to independent thinking.

Self-Actualization – the becoming all of which you are capable.

Few people want to be less than they can. Yet, few believe it is within them to do so. Often, you see and hear people playing the “blame game,” blaming other people and things for their inability to maximize their talents, skills and knowledge. A person skilled at Self-Management will find a way to release their abilities and not only maximize it but leverage it.

Stress Tolerance - the ability to adsorb adverse events and stressful situations without experiencing physical and psychological setbacks.

Our environment is full of stress. Some environments are more stressful than others. Those skilled in the tolerance of stress know what brings stress, what the results of stress are and how to mitigate the negative impacts of it.

Impulse Control – the ability to resist or mitigate negative actions brought about by people or events

Know what “sets you off.” Guard against those people and things that do. If that is not possible, visualize yourself responding to negative people and events in a positive way. See yourself responding but in a thoughtful and positive way that is not an emotional reaction.

Flexibility – the ability to adjust your thoughts, feelings and behavior to changing situations in a positive way.

Flexible people are often described as calm, thoughtful, accommodating, supportive, and compromising. They are not weak or “wishy-washy.” They want and work to meet the needs of others as long as it does not compromise the success of the team or organization.

Few people are masterful at all six of these Self-Management tools. If you want to target one or all of these skills, my suggestion is to seek a coach that is knowledgeable and competent in the Emotional competency field and work with them specifically to become a Self-Management master.

Social Awareness-The Things Of Which Leaders Are Made

Do you have the ability to connect quickly with others and understand group dynamics before others? If you do you may have the makings of a great leader. Social Awareness is the 3rd pillar of Emotional Intelligence. Pillars #1 & 2 were Self-Awareness and Self-Management, respectively.
Have you ever met someone who didn't seem to fit in? If you have, you have met someone who did not have or exercise social awareness.
Being socially aware is not tied to how smart you are. You can have a high IQ but still be without social awareness. You might say, "How can that be?" Because Social Awareness is all emotional and comes mostly from those sectors like the Amygdala . The ability to be Socially Aware comes from the Limbic portion of the brain and is not tied to your cognitive intelligence.
There are really just two parts to this area of EI; Empathy and Organizational Savvy. Or put another way it is all about understanding other individuals and organizations or groups.
Empathy, for instance, is your ability to put yourself in your spouses shoes and see things from their viewpoint. It is enabled by one's ability to feel what someone else is feeling both mentally and physically. It is being so in tune with someone else that when their heart rate rises due to anger, so does yours. It is being able to feel then see like someone else.
Organizational Savvy, was mentioned by Robert Kelley as a work strategy of superior performers. It is about one's ability to feel the pulse of an organization or group. It is about being able to recognize the culture of an organization quickly.
In all, this 3rd pillar is a precursor to Social Management, the 4th and final pillar of Emotional Intelligence. It is an essential to great leadership. Leaders who are able to quickly understand and connect with others and the group are the leaders that have what many of us call charisma.

Self-Awareness-Three Steps to Become More Self-Aware

Self-Awareness is one of the four pillars of Emotional Intelligence. The other three are Self-Management, Social Awareness, and Social Management. In my view, you cannot be emotionally intelligent unless you are Self-Aware.
Although Self-Awareness encompasses many things, being aware of your own emotions and feelings is the first and most important step to becoming Emotionally Intelligent.

We often talk about how we feel and through any day, we experience many different feelings and emotions. These two words are sometimes used interchangeably, but there are differences. If we understand the differences, it can help us be more self-aware.

Emotions are the external expressions of an internal stimulus. Core emotions are Fear, Sadness, Happiness, Anger, Surprise, Disgust, Trust and Anticipation. Each of these emotions have different levels of intensity. For instance, a lower level of intensity for the emotion of Trust is acceptance and a higher level might be adoration.

Feelings are internal and lower levels of emotions like the example above, you might be feeling accepted because of a display of the emotion of Trust exhibited by your boss. Or, you be felling pensive because of the emotion of sadness, due to a friends death.

On the other hand, emotions, because they are often externally expressed by running, for instance, if your are afraid of snakes and you just saw one, or slamming you fist into your desk because you are so angry are easier to recognize

So lets begin building self-awareness with a three step process:

1. Begin the day with a commitment to identify emotions you experience.
2. Write down, in a journal, what emotions your experience throughout the day.
3. Identify the "Triggers" that release the emotions.

About "Triggers," these are events the release emotions. For example, you are "cut-off" in traffic and have to slam on the brakes to avoid an accident and you get angry. The trigger is: an unexpected and seemingly total disregard for safety. Knowing what triggers your emotions is a hefty piece of self-awareness.

Once you have successfully identified several triggers, use these strategies to mitigate negative emotions initiated by them. Let's take anger, for instance. Someone says something that angers you. What should you do?

1. Recognize the emotion for what it is
2. Pause, take a deep breath or two
3. Consider, the intent of the other person
4. Respond with in a gracious and understanding way by asking for clarification.

Recognize, Pause, Consider, and Respond works, try it. Of course, it is not the right response to all emotions, For instance, if you see a two-ton boulder racing toward you and you experience the emotion of Fear, you should eliminate steps 2 and 3. Go to step for and run, as fast as you can.

Self-Management-Release the Power Within

Self-Management seems like a boring topic. After all, if we weren't somewhat accomplished at managing ourselves, would be where we are today. And that, just may be why Self-Management is so important.
Most people think of Self-Management in terms of managing time, but, that is a very limited view and totally limiting. Managing yourself is composed of at least 3 parts:

1. Self-Esteem
2. Awareness
3. Leverage

What is Self-Esteem anyway? The official definition is: the disposition to experience oneself as competent to cope with the challenges of life and as deserving of happiness.
Self-Esteem has two interdependent parts

 Self Efficacy-the confidence in one's ability to think, understand, trust and make good decisions
 Self-Respect-the knowledge of my value and right to be happy while expressing my thoughts, wants and needs

Without Self-Esteem, there is little chance you will able to effectively manage yourself or others.
Awareness seems simple enough. We know when the sun goes down and darkness follows or when it rains, you get wet, if you are not prepared. But awareness is much, much more than that. One thing I would do, if I had my life to live over again, would be to take more time to be aware of things and people around me. Looking back, I seemed to have raced through life and missed so much. Take time to observe.
There is a story of a Tibetan neophyte who endured 3 years of silence and daily study, who had finally reached a the point of his final examination. If he passed he would qualify for official Monk status. If he failed, he would have to commit another 3 years to silence and study. But he was prepared and knew he could answer any question the qualifying panel might ask.
On the morning of the examination, he rushed, almost ran to the examination in all confidence. He thrust open the doors to face the panel of judges that would determine his future. We stood confidently before the panel awaiting the first question. One of the oldest and wisest among the panel stood and addressed the neophyte and asked: "What were the colors of the flowers on either side to the door that allowed entrance to this room?" Needless to say, three more years! Be aware of what and how is around you. Be aware of your own body and what is going on within it. You can't manage something of which, you are not aware.
Finally there is Leverage. I know leverage seems to be in a strange place, and what does it mean anyway?
I have known many people that have worked on their weaknesses but an even fewer number that have learned how to leverage their strengths. The first step in effectively leveraging strengths is to know what your strengths actually are. I often ask the professionals I coach, what are your strengths? And, I must say that, more often than not, they do not know. How sad that is.
Learning to leverage your strengths is one of the most important things you will learn in life, so, learn them well and early to gain an advantage. Know your strengths and know how to leverage them to get what you and yours want from life.

Initiative-A core attribute among superior performers

Most organizations are composed of average performers. Possibly, over 80 percent of every organization is composed of average performers. There is nothing wrong with average, unless you want to be thought of as a superior performer. When that occurs, average becomes less satisfying.
With as few as on in ten performing in a superior way, you might ask; what is it that determines superior performance. A simple, generic definition is: "Performing in a way that exceeds that of your peers." You might be thinking, how can I be a superior performer? Part of the answer to that very important question is found in your ability to see the advantage of going beyond. Beyond the manger's expectations, beyond the company's needs and beyond the job description.
Initiative is working in the "white spaces" of your job description. Initiative is helping and educating your fellow worker. Initiative is about making others look good and knowing that you don't have to worry about making yourself look good. My mentor and friend Zig Ziglar always said, "if you help enough people to get what they want in life, you will get everything you want."
PLAY LIKE A CHAMPION!