Notebook #7 25 ways to take responsibility
Make a list of 25 ways I could take responsibility (without authority) if I cared more about changing things than credit, authority, or blame:
- Start a book club
- Join the local chamber
- Present at a local conference
- Speak more politely to customers. Take an interest in their professional goals
- Set personalized professional goals and have coworkers encourage/keep me accountable
- Create an “elevator” pitch to be used in public
- Start a snap chat account
- Volunteer
- Follow up with clients after work is done
- Put in extra time to make sure projects are fully complete and technicians have the proper tools needed to finish
- Document tasks that need to be documented.
- Encourage coworkers
- Begin building better culture
- Plan offsite after hours social gatherings
- Start a newsletter
- Start a blog documenting what I learn each week
- Learn about client’s business hurdles and become familiar with their industries
- Say thank you to every delivery person or customer who enters our building
- Search for potential new employees while interacting with others
- Write a potential business plan for the office and present it to the boss
- Take a class or online course to further my personal learning
- Find an industry best practice that isn’t being followed and start meeting it
- Take out the trash or clean the dishwasher or sink
- Bring in asnack
- Provide better coffee
- Show appreciation of “extra” work with small token or gift
- Be the first to answer the phone every time
- Answer the phone after 1 1/2 rings every time
- Show early
- Fill up the company car and take it through the car wash
Notebook #6 Happens to be Don't forget Rule #6
If I were a better person I'd share the exact name of the person who shared the story, but I'm not. So I guess you'll have to give Acumen $$$ and take the Seth Godin Leadership course to figure out who this came from. The crux of this lesson is that a dignitary was visiting with the Prime Minister and during the meeting two individuals walked in at separate times screaming that the sky is falling (one's hair was on fire). Both times the Prime Minister calmly stated "Don't forget rule #6" and the individuals went on their merry way. The dignitary asked what rule #6 was and the Prime Minister replied "Don't take yourself so ____ seriously". You can figure out what the ____ is but for proper citation it would rhyme with something that holds water back.
The Assignment:
1. What happens when you bring mindfulness to the project?
2. Is the Project the same as you? The project is serious. There is a lot on the line. But what happens if you take yourself a lot less seriously? Many people find it makes it easier to take a problem seriously if they let themselves off the serious hook a bit.
3. Give an example of a moment in the past when you forgot Rule 6... and whether, in retrospect, those behaviors paid off. When someone asks why you're not panicking, perhaps the answer might be, "would it help?"
So what does happen when you bring mindfulness to the project? Well I suppose I'd have to know what mindfulness really means, but I'm a stubborn old soul who doesn't really take the time to understand the new fad of "mindfulness". When I was younger, didn't they call that cool under pressure? A calm demeanor? Some might argue that the opposite of mindfulness is mindlessness, but I'd say the opposite is panic. Panic is rarely a good thing and so as best I can I am mindful of the situation as often as I can be. I used to be the IT guy in an environment with 500 computers and 900 potential users. (Give or take a few, my blog I get to fudge a bit) When things would break I could easily have more than a dozen people telling me to fix it all with the best intentions. At that moment I had two choices. I could get frustrated at all the people telling me things are broken, or I could step back and look at the problem as a whole. Backup and look at the cause rather than the symptom. Freaking out about a flooding basement and the insurance claims and the lost baseball cards might be an acceptable thing to do. Don't you think turing off the faucet or plugging the leak would be a better place to start? Perhaps in all this the short answer is that brining mindfulness to a project really brings clarity towards a solution. I can't believe I didn't mention that the best cure for being serious is to be funny. I can't always pull this off, but in the case of extreme anger or frustration to be able to drop a one-liner that puts it all into perspective is so important. It is way more fun solving an incredibly stressful problem with humor than letting the stress eat you up.
Is the project the same as me? Of course not. Unless I'm the project, in which case you'd have to talk to my wife, she'd know more. The project is never the same as me. I'm the doer, the maker, the solver. The product or project is a creation or collaboration that I played a part in. It may contain my preferences or biases, but ultimately it is something I've done, not something I am. The success of the project has very little to do with my value as an individual. Zig Ziglar used to say that "Failure is an event, not a person". What a great quote to answer this question... as much as I (all of us?) like to make our work an extension of our selves as individuals the reality is the project is a thing, not a person. The success is an event. Cherish the time you spend working or the discoveries you make along the way to creating the project, but if it gets turned down pick yourself up, crank some Pearl Jam, and move on to the next one.
Remember what I said about listening in the first giant run on paragraph? Listen, listen, listen, then solve? When I don't listen I jump to conclusions and when I jump to conclusions I'm usually not right. I can't think of a specific example to share, but in general it goes something like this:
a. I see what I content is a problem
b. I create my own reality around the situation
c. I ask for some clarity from someone else
d. Before the person has said the fourth word I freak out and go off on a passionate and angry tangent. This is awkward because I'm not usually serious, so to be angry and serious at the same time only to find out that...
e. I'm wrong. It's awkward. My blowing up because I didn't listen and I forgot rule #6 and I made the problem about me solved nothing. It also made me look bad, and I'm not a looker to being with.
There is a definite line between being in a high stress situation and completely freaking out, and acting like nothing is going on. Find that line and walk it like a tight rope. In my role as an employee or even as a leader is to listen to a problem and make sure it goes away. That is different than solving because sometimes people bring problems because they have the answers, they just need to vent. Which is why you listen first, talk third. In the middle you should listen some more.
In the end panic solves very little. Using your talents and abilities to create and do boldly without being too attached solves a great deal.
Group Policy and User Password Expiration
Today at the office I came across the article below and thought it was worth sharing. I used this tip to prepare for an organization wide password change that is coming up. By exporting the results to a text file I was easily able to determine which accounts could be untouched, and which accounts needed to be changed.
(http://serverfault.com/questions/226365/password-policy-vs-password-never-expires-question)
To determine if there are any account passwords set to never expire you can use the command prompt and enter:
dsquery * -filter "(&(objectCategory=person)(userAccountControl:1.2.840.113556.1.4.803:=65536))" -limit 0
To disable the setting for everybody enter:
dsquery *-filter "(&(objectCategory=person)(userAccountControl:1.2.840.113556.1.4.803:=65536))" -limit 0 | dsmod user -pwdneverexpires no
However, there might be accounts that don’t need their password expiration set, or that should be done manually. For that, I simply used the first command and added >> filename.txt so I could write all the accounts to a file. Using this text file you could determine which accounts (Like administrator, scanners, etc.) can be ignored at the moment.
dsquery *-filter "(&(objectCategory=person)(userAccountControl:1.2.840.113556.1.4.803:=65536))" -limit 0 >> results.txt
Notebook #5. Not Mambo #5
The following is a timed writing reflecting on a short video lecture. I know it will be well thought out and cogent, but at it is certainly nothing more or less then my opinion based on what I think I know. (I don't know that much)
Who am I following? Who did I enroll?
- Who am I following? I follow my faith, my wife, and a guy I work with. I also follow a number of business authors and others who probably spend too much time on twitter, but at least they have something to show for it - i.e. real products and companies.
- What does it mean for me to be enrolled in that journey? It means I'm a member of a faith community and I can't think of a better thing to be enrolled in considering the climate today. I mean climate as in people not temperature. Faith helps keep your head on straight and surrounds you with like minded people to help you along your way. If I don't follow my wife I'd probably get lost. Family keeps be focussed on the important things like relationships and responsibilities. Without family I'd probably binge work, read, or bicycle. All good things of course, just in slight moderation. I follow the authors and co-workers because I've lived in two organizations for my adult work life. Outside opinions and ideas keep my brain working. Not thinking is not an option.
- What commitments are you making and what compromises do you refuse to make? I'm making the commitment to try to continuously learn more and hopefully become a better leader. It isn't always easy but I will not cheat. When I scan the rearview mirror I want to be proud of what I've done with no compromises.
- Now that I considered the people I'm enrolled with, what would it mean for someone to be enrolled in following me? It would probably be a disaster. With all the people I do follow, I do lack the focus needed to tie it all together. I think the focus is narrowing, but at this point I'm too (self-diagnosed) ADD to put it all together. It would mean an exercise in exploration and not always being content with what is. It is a bit of irony that as a service employee I despise paying others to do service work for me. Not because I don't trust, but because I want to do it on my own.
- Are they getting the same satisfaction as you are? No. The people I follow seem to have a purpose, ideas, and a focus that keeps them moving each day. I move a lot, in different directions. People following me would probably get a tummy ache.
- Are they making the same commitment?
- What are they seeking?
- Think about the C people in my organization and then figure out what about their role makes them act like C people? Are there round holes for these round people?
I'm skipping 6-8 simply because I don't know how to answer those at the moment. I think #8 is a simple yes. There are round holes for everybody, they just don't have to be in my organization. They are C people (those waiting to be told what to do) because they are either afraid to take the initiative, don't want to take initiative because it isn't "worth it", or they simply aren't motivated to think while at work. In a knowledge economy work has to be stimulating, although I think many parts of my job are stimulating and can't understand why others don't share the same excitement. Perhaps they (C's) are just waiting for someone to fire them so they have the permission to get out and try something that really resonates with them.