May 2014 – Grandpa Bob Encouraging Leadership

Entering the Advise and Hope Phase

My role is to provide the best advice possible, asking the tough questions that nobody else will ask…

For the past six months or so, I’ve been a management consultant. I’ve also coached a couple people who want to improve their performance as managers and leaders.

Over the years, I’ve known a number of consultants, lawyers, and others who provide ad hoc services to companies and individuals. They always talked about how they loved their work. They tackled challenging situations for their clients. They provided excellent advice about how to work through them. It may have been how to grow a new business, limit risks associated with an existing business, or maybe the best way to find and retain the right talent.

And yet, there was always something missing. The missing ingredient? They didn’t own the execution of their advice. In fact, there’s no guarantee that their clients would even take their advice and run with it. They were in the “advise and hope” business.

I didn’t fully understand this distinction until my children became adults. As a parent, I enjoyed teaching our kids the ways of the world. Talking through new situations, and helping equip them to make sound decisions on their own. When they started actually making those (hopefully) sound decisions for themselves, I realized I had entered the “advise and hope” phase of parenting. I’m pleased that my children often seek my advice, but I know that the final decisions are up to them…as it should be.

Having experienced this subtle shift in my role as a parent made the recent shift in my professional life a bit easier. I fully understand that no matter how great (from my perspective, of course) my advice is, ultimately the client determines their next steps. They choose which parts of my advice to take, and which to ignore.

My role is to provide the best advice possible, asking the tough questions that nobody else will ask. After that, it is up to my client. I don’t get to own their decisions.

I own one thing: my sincerest hope that I can help my clients achieve success, even if they ignore some of my best advice.

Recipe for a Long, Happy, and Fulfilling Marriage

“Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togeder tooday. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam… And wuv, tru wuv, will fowow you foweva… So tweasure your wuv.”

We have two daughters. Our oldest, Julianne, married Steven nearly two years ago. Our youngest, Jennifer, is marrying Luke this weekend. We couldn’t be prouder of our daughters, or the men they’ve chosen.

We started a tradition of compiling a cookbook filled with recipes from our family and friends for the newly married couple. The following is the recipe I submitted for both of our daughter’s cookbooks:

Now that you’ve said “I do,” you’ll find that the ingredients in this recipe are a series of questions that begin with “How do I…”

Serve my spouse?
Learn that the words “I,” “me,” and “my” are far less rewarding than “we,” “us,” and “our?”
Ensure that my goals are in line with OUR goals?
Ensure that OUR goals are the drivers of OUR life together?

Enjoy the simple pleasures with my spouse?
Gather new experiences that I can share with my spouse?
Genuinely laugh with my spouse, often?

Challenge myself and my spouse to grow individually, and together?
Provide the patience and space my spouse needs to grow independently?
Take advantage of the space my spouse provides to grow independently?

Understand my spouse’s challenges and sources of frustration?
Understand what makes my spouse happiest?
Take pleasure in my spouse’s accomplishments?

Communicate openly with my spouse?
Embrace the opportunity to see things from my spouse’s point-of-view?
Think of life’s curve balls as OUR opportunities to grow, not obstacles?

Ensure that our new family is a vital part of the extended families that we each join when we get married?

Take care of myself physical, emotionally, and spiritually so I am physically, emotionally, and spiritually attractive to my spouse?

Make sure my spouse knows how:
- my love for him/her grows everyday?
- special he/she is?
- special I feel around him/her?

Provide the most life-giving environment possible for my spouse, everyday?

The quantity and mix of each ingredient is up to you. The secret is that NONE of these ingredients can be ignored, or taken for granted…EVER. This isn’t a corn bread recipe where it’s okay to skip the egg. Followed properly, this recipe will last a lifetime.

Enjoy your journey!

The Fallacy of Either-Or Questions

Either we’re a multi-dimensional work-in-progress deciding what’s most important…

Lately, I’ve seen a number of articles and blog posts that discuss the profound choice parents, especially moms, are making when it comes to work in today’s society. I’m not sure how “today’s society” differs from “yesterday’s society” or “tomorrow’s society,” but I’m willing to accept that.

Lots of famous moms have chosen to work, and excel at the work they do. Marissa Meyer, Sheryl Sandberg, and Beyonce Knowles, to name a few. Lots of not-so-famous moms have made the same choice.

Which brings me back to the articles and blog posts on this topic. The prevalent theme of these posts is that moms must decide between parenting and working. If they work, therefore, they aren’t parenting. If they don’t work, therefore, they aren’t going to be fulfilled.

I have no quarrel with either side of the “work or parent” argument (regardless of gender). Each of us gets to make our own choices. I do have a problem with the premise that either you do one thing, or you do the other. This Either-Or premise leaves a lot of dimensions out of life’s equation.

I’m sure everyone who makes the “worker or parent” decision has other important roles in their lives. They may be someone’s spouse, a brother or sister, an aunt or uncle, a grandparent, a tennis player, a backpacker, a writer (perish the thought!), a juggler, a volunteer at the local soup kitchen, a voracious reader, a hot air balloonist, a violinist, and a myriad other things that make up their entire being.

The truth is, we are like diamonds, with the potential for an infinite array of facets. Some of us are uncut, yet others show countless angles from a lifetime of experience. Whether we reflect, deflect, or absorb the light of life, depends solely on how we’ve allowed our journey to shape who we are.

Either we’re a multi-dimensional work-in-progress deciding what’s most important, or we’re a product of “society’s” Either-Or questions. I choose the former.

For Mother’s Day

Who thinks about you every day?

Who always roots for you, no matter what you try?

Who taught you the important lessons of life, long before your first day of school?

Who is proud of you, even on the days you may not be so proud of yourself?

Who hears what you’re saying, but knows from the tone of your voice, or the look in your eye, what you are really thinking?

Who knows the things that scare you, even better than you do?

Who makes your favorite meal, the one you had as a kid, the right way…every time?

Who thinks about you every day, even if you don’t make the time to call or visit?

If you are as fortunate as I am, the answer to each of these questions is easy. It’s your Mom.

A mother’s love is probably the most powerful force on the planet, and yet it can’t be measured. It is sustaining, and life-giving, and asks for nothing in return. It’s the secret ingredient in that special meal. The one that never tastes quite the same when you make it for yourself.

Mom, thank you for making me the man I am today. I don’t say it enough, but know that I love you and feel the warmth of your love wrapped around me every day.

Photo credit: ProFlowers.com

Is the Treadmill You’re on Taking You Where You Want to Go?

The treadmill prepares you, but won’t lead you…

Go in any gym and you’ll see a bunch of treadmills, elliptical steppers, and a few stair machines.

Treadmills can be set on a pre-programmed workout so speeds and inclines vary automatically. Or, you can manually set the pace with the click of a button. Maybe you have a distance in mind, or you only have twenty minutes. The distance you run, and ultimately the time you spend on the treadmill are yours to decide.

Ellipticals simulate running without impact. You may remember those Gazelle Runner infomercials with the pony-tailed guy who always seemed so happy gliding along. I don’t get ellipticals. I see tons of people using them, sometimes for thirty minutes at a time. They never seem to be sweating. It looks like they are just going through the motions. I suppose it’s better than nothing, but just barely.

Stair machines do a decent job of simulating real stair climbing. It’s a high-intensity workout. I’ve never seen anyone spend ten minutes or more (male or female) on a stair machine and not be sweating profusely when they step off that machine.

These machines all have one thing in common. They simulate the real thing. I suppose the same can be said about weight machines, kettle bells, and TRX straps. For many of us, these simulations are the real thing. Hitting the gym for a workout is what we do for exercise. We spend the rest of our time doing whatever it is that we do between workouts.

I had a conversation recently that got me thinking about this topic. My friend said his life is like a treadmill every day. The speed and incline aren’t in his control. He’s running about as hard as he can, just to stay on the machine. To hear him describe things, he can’t get off.

We’ve all had times where we’re stuck on the treadmill. Working hard, hanging on, and focusing on the energy needed to take that next step. It’s all we can do to stay on the machine. We tell ourselves that if we can get control over the speed and incline settings, we’ll be alright. For a time, that works. We get to set the pace. We have some control, but we’re still on the machine, not going anywhere.

The question isn’t how to avoid being “trapped” on a treadmill, or wasting time on an elliptical machine. It is knowing that our time on these machines can prepare us for something bigger and more challenging. They can prepare us to reach for our real goals, and not just achieve the goal of staying on the machine.

We gain experience, endurance, and strength from our time on these machines. How we put these to use is up to us.

Our goals in life can only be achieved if we think about them, even when we feel stuck on the treadmill. Use the treadmill to get in shape, but remember you always control the stop button. The time will come for you to step off the treadmill. You choose the timing.

The treadmill prepares you, but won’t lead you where you want to go. That happens when you step off the machine.