What Would Walt Do?

You may have seen that I’m leading a Customer Service Expedition to Disney World with my friend Vance Morris in February.

I’ve, mostly, been discussing it in my Customer Service tips and newsletters, but it’s critical to understand that ALL GREAT CUSTOMER SERVICE STARTS WITH GREAT LEADERSHIP.

While at Disney World, you’ll discover the secrets Disney leadership uses to get minimum wages employees (cast members) delivering, what is considered by many to be, THE MODEL for The World Best Customer Service.

My friend and mentor Dan Kennedy is a self described curmudgeon (a bad-tempered or surly person), yet he seldom goes on vacation anywhere other than Disney World. He says, “One of the reasons I go to Disney World is that I am never told no.”

Vance Morris, my co-host on our Disney Business Accelerator Service Boot Camp is a past ten year executive with Disney. I’ll be asking this question to Vance and other current Disney execs we meet with at the boot camp. “My friend says he comes to Disney World because he’s never to no. How do you train your team to not say no when the answer is no?”

What question will you ask the current
Disney execs when we meet with them?

P.S. February in Orlando sounds pretty nice eh?

What would Walt do
with your business or practice?

There is an insidious decline in customer and client service in America with many customer service departments focused on neither service nor customers. This gradual, seemingly harmless, decline may not be easily noticed, but it is having a grave effect on the profits of businesses across America. And if Walt Disney were to rescue some these laggards of customer service, here is what he would do…

The first thing Walt would do with your business is to infuse some magic into it. But not the magic that you may be thinking of… A different sort of magic.

You generally do not hear or use the word magic in business, unless of course you are a magician. You won’t find magic on a balance sheet or in a financial statement of any business. Most bean counters will probably not be able to measure the return on investment (ROI) for magic, nor is it depreciated or amortized over the next 20 years. How then, does the Disney company, a multi-billion dollar global enterprise manage to generate so much money around magic?

We all know that there really is no magic. Only the illusion thereof. To the audience the magic show is something that can be completely amazing, filled with wonderment and joy. Not knowing how the trick or illusion is performed is all part of the fun of a magic show. However, to the magician performing the show, the perspective is the polar opposite.

A magic show is merely a very systematic event, a series of repeatable steps designed to create a specific outcome; the delight and amazement of the audience. Now to answer the question posed above… Disney really has practical magic all figured out. I hate to burst your bubble, but contrary to popular legend, Disney does not have a mine where pixie dust is extracted and then showered on the cast members (Disney speak for employee) before every working shift. They just have a REPEATABLE, replicable system to perform their show.

It is practiced.
It is updated.
It is practiced again, and again and again.

Then it is performed. Whether it be at a restaurant at one of the resorts, an attraction at a park or the route the buses take, all the magic at Disney is created with repeatable, replicable, practiced systems.

The next thing Walt would do with your business would be to implement some WOW components to how you serve your clients. The question Walt would ask you is “how can you create an experience out of the mundane”

The Wow Component means not only to meet the expectations of your clients or guests, but to exceed them, on a repeatable and consistent basis. To be sure, there are many companies that may WOW their clients occasionally. Maybe the occasional “above the call of duty” experience. Getting upgraded for free on a flight, extra whipped cream on a sundae, or an employee just did everything possible to make an unhappy client, happier.

But to truly Disnify your business, you need to make exceeding your clients’ expectations your standard operating procedure. In order to consistently exceed your clients’ expectations, you must be dogmatic, strict and unyielding in your pursuit. Analyzing your clients’ experience (from their perspective, not yours), understanding your Client Compass (Needs, Wants, Stereotypes and Emotions) and committing every part of your business (Processes, Infrastructure, Design and Training) to creating a magical experience.

The next thing, Walt would introduce to your business is to have an obsession with details. Walt Disney was famous for his attention to every detail and he dictated that everyone had the same attention that he did.

Every business should be about the details. One small oversight of the smallest of details is the beginning of the end for you. You must be unwavering in your demand for adherence to every detail in your business.

One of the chief causes of failure today is the striving for unearned success. Doing just the bare minimum in providing service and then wondering why your client never calls you back. I recently had an appliance repair company come to the house to fix a noise in the drier. When they arrived the technician was in a clean uniform (it was already 2 oclock and he had been working), placed a mat on my porch to wipe his feet, placed a towel under his tool bag and used special mat to slide out the drier so he would not scratch the floor. Now mind you, the drier is in my basement on a concrete floor and he still used the special mat. Deciding on the right “level” for each thing we do is important.

Walt once said: even if I’m the only one that notices, some things are still worth doing, because I need to be prideful to be motivated. I’m paraphrasing, but I’m close. I have to be proud of what I do, at least comfortable with it, regardless of others’ appreciation. And if I lived on others’ appreciation, my service would be nowhere as powerful as it is. Few clients can appreciate every nuance, my reasoning and the psychology behind the service I provide, many take it for granted, hardly anybody faints from awe or gives my technicians standing ovation.

Walt would then create a Service Theme and Service Standards for your business. Disney’s Service Theme is “To create happiness for people of all ages everywhere.” Vaguely sounds like a USP, doesn’t it? This Theme is the foundation and prerequisite for all undertakings at Disney. Every decision made by the cast and management is measured against it.

Service Standards are then set to create the specific actions that are necessary to achieve the Service Theme. Disney has ONLY FOUR Service Standards. Here they are in order of importance: Safety, Courtesy, Show and Efficiency.

This is cut in stone.
It is immovable.
There is no questioning it.
This is the guiding principle for everything that happens at Disney.

Safety: Safety is built into everything they do. It is the first consideration when they are designing Rides and Resorts, Emergency Services, Environmental Protection, Prevention, Training and Policies & Procedures.

Courtesy: Courtesy is taught from day 1. The fundamentals include Treating every Guest as a VIP, knowing the answers to questions (or finding the answers), giving the personal touch, using friendly phrases and gestures and being aggressively friendly.

Show: Show is integrated into every element of setting and theme. This includes Cast Appearance, Costumes, Documentation, Show Quality reviews, Standards Manuals, and of course, Cast Members are performers as well as service providers.

Efficiency: Efficiency involves both the utilization of facilities and systems and the cast members who operate them. Points that are considered include: Capacity of Facility, Guest Flow Patterns, Sales, Speed of Service, Space Utilization and Operational Readiness.

In order to have over 75,000 employees providing a seamless, exciting and memorable experience to millions upon millions of people 365 days a year, you must have a systematic process to avoid the utter chaos that would ensue.

There are processes for every little thing that occurs at Disney. From putting air in bus tires, to the bus drivers’ greeting to guests, from how many lanes are needed at the entrance to the park to how the parking lots are filled up, there is a step-by-step, exacting procedure for each.

And as with any good plan, process or system, there are clog or combustion points, and breakdowns can occur. And instead of creating a happy memory for a guest, that clog point can turn a good day into a bad one rapidly. One example we worked on was the “Lost Car” problem.

Imagine if you will that you have rented a car, (Continued P10 – What Would Walt Do?)
that by the way looks like just about all the other rental cars in Orlando, and you parked it in a veritable ocean of other cars early in the morning. Then after 8, 10, twelve hours at the Magic Kingdom, they emerge only to forget where they parked. Was it Goofy 5, Pluto 4 or Daisy 9? (Disney names and numbers its’ lots after their characters). The tram drivers also announce those locations as guests board the trams, but still, cars are lost.

Now instead of leaving those sunburned, exhausted and weary tourists wandering will-nilly through the acres of parking lots, the cast came up with a fix of sorts. Since the parking lots are filled in a specific order, the tram drivers began keeping track of what lot and row they were in at the time the cars were parked in the morning. That list was then distributed to the next shift of parking attendants. So if the guest could remember at least an approximate time they arrived, they could narrow down where the car was.

Examining your processes and choke points could reveal some serious client and guest pain points.

Finally, and this really is the bottom line point: You are running a business. Disney, at the end of the day is a BUSINESS. And the whole point of running a business is to generate PROFIT. As of this writing, Disney has just increased it park entry tickets by another 5%, and NO ONE is complaining. If they are, they are doing so quietly, as the theme parks are having record attendance. Also, as of this writing, Disney announced that they have raised their stock dividends a whopping 34% after a year of record results.

IF that’s not a reason to Disnify your business, I don’t know what is.

Join Vance Morris, ten year Disney exec and me at Disney World Ferbruary 27 – March 2 and discover how to Disnify Your Business.

Get your Invitation and complete details at https://keithlee.com/disney-info.

How to Have the PAY Discussion

How to Have the PAY Discussion

There is no discussion that creates more anxiety for a business owner or manager than that of talking pay with a team member.  It doesn’t need to be like that.

When you have guiding principles, and a written document, that everyone understands, the discussion simply become another business discussion.  It simply, is not a big deal.

I was talking with a Kyle, a private client, last week and we got on the topic of pay, and raises.

He had previously done Performance Reviews in his business and like most business owners he hated them.  He admitted that he was, in fact, months overdue in getting them done because he hated them.

He was also feeling guilty because the Performance Review was the time they discussed pay, which meant he was behind in giving raises.  Then he confessed that one of the main reasons he hated Performance Reviews was the pay discussion.

Everyone was used to get a raise at their review, and he had a lot of people that didn’t warrant a raise right now.

I pointed out to Kyle that his experience with Performance Reviews and pay is the same as everyone’s.  It’s a NO-WIN for both parties.

I told him the experience of my brother-in-law at Boeing who hated Performance Reviews and why the discussion of pay during Performance Reviews was a NO-WIN for both parties.

When my brother-in-law had a Performance Review and was told he did everything great and got a dollar raise, he left saying to himself, “I did everything great and I got a measly dollar.”

But, seldom would he leave being told that he did everything right because the manager knew he had to limit raises, so he had to find something that was lacking.

So he would be told that he was lacking in some area, and then the next time we saw him he complained about how he wasn’t appreciated at Boeing.

Performance Reviews are stupid to start with.  Managing one’s performance in REVIEW is idiotic!  Adding pay into the discussion is BEYOND IDIOTIC!

Kyle’s question was, how do you address pay in The Make-You-Happy Management System?

My answer – “Pay needs to be transparent.  I don’t mean everyone needs to know everyone else’s pay.  In fact discussing your pay with others in our business if forbidden.”

“What I mean by transparent is, they need to know what is taken into consideration in determining pay.”

We then talked about the pay document included in The Make-You-Happy Management System.  It’s entitled, “How Pay is Determined.”

I told him this needs to be shared with every team member on their first day of employment.  It will make pay transparent for that individual, and it will motivate them to continually look for ways to improve the business.

I also told him he needs to distribute the, How Pay is Determined document to his entire team right away.

How Pay is Determined has eight bullet points that spell out exactly how each person’s pay is determined.  Kyle and I discussed the preamble to the document and the first bullet point.

How Pay is Determined

It is the manager’s responsibility to review the pay of each of their team members, at least, once a year (more often if the manager sees fit).  Whenever the manager thinks it is necessary (s)he should review the team member’s pay with the president of the company, and make recommendations for adjustments.

This is a discussion of how pay is determined:

If you are on commission you should expect that your pay will rise and fall with your commission and that you will create your own pay raise.

While many of the issues discussed below may apply to commission positions, this statement deals primarily with salaried and hourly positions.

A number of issues are involved in determining wages at <Business Name>.
Here are a few:

  • Prevailing wage – The reality is no manager, including the President of the company, sets the pay at <Business Name>. The biggest factor in setting a pay range is the market.

It is very simple.  If our wages are too low, we won’t attract or keep quality employees.  If our wages are too high, we won’t make money and we will be out of business.

Just because someone is here for a matter of time it doesn’t mean they automatically get a cost-of-living raise.  It is very possible, in fact likely, that we currently have positions in which the job being done simply is not worth any more money to the company.  At this point, regardless of how well the job is being done, a wage increase would be very small and possible nothing.

A huge problem with mature businesses is that over time their payroll can get out of line with the rest of the industry and the company can no longer be competitive (think United Airlines, Trans World Airlines, Pan American Airlines, General Motors, Ford).

When we as a company are more efficient and productive than others in our market place our team members can be at the top of the pay scale for a particular job.  In fact, we can create a NEW top above what the market pays for a particular job.

This is why it is so important that you are an active participant in our continuous improvement.  You are needed to insure that our MJRs service both our internal customers and clients in the most efficient and effective way possible.  You need to speak up when you see an opportunity to improve a MJR.

In every Personal Development Interview you will be asked, “Since we last met, what did you find that was broken, or could be improved; and what did you do to fix, or improve it?”  It is critical that you always look for ways to improve our deliverable to our clients.

The How Pay is Determined document then goes on to discuss the other seven factors in determining an individual’s pay in a Make-You-Happy Management System business.

There is no reason for a pay discussion to cause the anxiety it does.  Discover how to truly take control of every part of your business in my book, “How to Control Your Business and Your Life.”  It’s free for you.  All I ask is your help with shipping and handling with a $2.97 fee.

Click here to get “How to Control Your Business and Your Life.” 

Exposed! Owner of Company Named ”Best Business To Work For In Washington State” is a “Ruthless Manager”

By Lois Lane

It was reported today that Keith Lee, the owner of American Retail Supply, which was named the Best Small Business to Work for in Washington State by Washington CEO Magazine is a Ruthless Manager.

How is that? How can the owner of the company named “The Best Small Business to Work for in Washington State” now be revealed as the co-author of the New Edition of No B.S. Ruthless Management of People & Profits?

It was reported today that Dan Kennedy, the author of numerous No B.S. books, chose Keith Lee as the co-author for his newest edition of No B.S. Ruthless Management of People & Profits.

Our Lois Lane caught up with Mr. Lee as he was sneaking into his office today and asked him how he could head the Best Business to Work for in Washington State and be a Ruthless Manager.

Mr. Lee replied… “I don’t choose the names for Mr. Kennedy’s books, and Dan and I don’t
agree on everything, but when it comes to managing a business and the people in it; we agree much more than we disagree.”

Keith pointed to page 14 in the No B.S. book where Dan Kennedy writes about business owners, “And one thing they all have in common: gripes, complaints, disappointments, frustrations, pain and agony with regard to their employees. Much of this has to do with unreasonable expectations and a misunderstanding of the actual nature of employer-employee relationships. Some of it lies squarely at the fault of the business owner for failing in one or more of the Three Requirements for Having Employees: Leadership, Management, Supervision.”

Mr. Lee continued, “While I don’t think the nature of the employer-employee relationship need be as adversarial as Dan, the expectations and the nature of the relationship needs to be addressed during the employees’ first day of employment. With our DVD training business owners who use our Make-You-Happy Management System set those expectations during the first hour of employment.”

Mr. Lee agrees wholeheartedly with Mr. Kennedy’s statement that business owners failing in one or more of the Three Requirements For Having Employees is the cause of many of their headaches.

Mr. Lee says, “Business owners usually lead, manage and supervise as they were led, managed and supervised, or how they learned in business school; neither of which work very well.”

Performance Reviews Suck

Mr. Lee pointed to Performance Management. Every business owner knows that they need a Performance Management System but the only type of system they know about is Performance Reviews and they know that Performance Reviews Suck. With this the business owner continues with Performance Reviews knowing that they suck, or they stop them altogether, and are left with no Performance Management System.

Mr. Lee informed this reporter than Dan Kennedy agrees that Performance Reviews are “like looking in your rearview mirror to drive your car.” Mr. Kennedy’s tells the story of how the late Mike Vance, who worked personally with Walt Disney on the original Disney University and other projects, laughed and scoffed at standardized annual or quarterly ‘performance reviews.”

Mr. Lee’s management system replaces Performance Reviews with Personal Development Interviews.

Mr. Lee went on to explain. “Just listen to what they’re called. Which would you rather give… a Performance Review or a Personal Development Interview? Would you rather review someone’s performance, or develop someone?

What if you’re on the receiving end? Would you like your performance reviewed or would you rather have someone work proactively to develop you?

Which do you think gets better results, developing people and coaching them or reviewing their performance after the fact?

Traditional management focuses on catching people doing things wrong. If every time I do something wrong the boss catches me, but he doesn’t catch me when I do things right, my creativity is stymied and I stop using my creativity, stop stepping out front, and stop helping the organization grow by using my creativity.

Conversely, when we start catching people doing things right, we encourage empowerment. People start to do things in the organization. Productivity improves on an ongoing basis. Improvement doesn’t just come from management but from the whole organization interacting with each other and picking each other up. The organization is permeated with a motivating environment.

Another benefit of this type of management is you create a learning organization. Researchers tell us that as we move forward, people are going to stay with organizations where they have an opportunity to grow and learn. There are going to be many more skilled positions than there are people to fill them. And if there are a lot of skilled positions and not enough people to fill them, money isn’t going to make the difference. Money is going to be a given. You’re going to have to pay in the competitive market to get good people.

But they want to work in a place where they can grow, where they can enjoy themselves, where they can use their creativity to help the organization grow, and that happens in a learning organization. That’s exactly why my company, American Retail Supply was named the Best Company to Work for in Washington, by Washington CEO Magazine.”

What You Accept You Get

What You Accept You Get

Dan Kennedy asked me to write three chapters in his book, NO B.S. Ruthless Management of People and Profits.

My Make-You-Happy Management Systems clients think it’s very odd that I contributed three chapters to a book with the words Ruthless Management in the title. They point out that my system is anything but Ruthless.

I won’t go into details as to why Dan wanted me in his book, but you’ll get a taste of why I’m in his book in this article.

In the article Dan talks about Donald Trump ripping the towel dispenser off the wall and toss it down the hall. I’m not that kind of guy.

But I can sure as heck see myself, like Eisner, firing a group of employees, at a Disney Park, for not smiling.

No one, in any of my businesses, would expect to have a job if they were ever found to give rude customer service, and yes, I’ve set that example by firing someone on the spot, even when we were short handed.

I’m told businesses write people up THREE TIMES for consciously and deliberately doing something wrong.

Are you kidding me??? As Donald Trump says, You’re Fired!

And yes, and I’ve done that on the spot when I found someone consciously and deliberately doing something wrong.

You need to create a culture in which NO ONE would consider doing something consciously and deliberately wrong… and if they do, they’ll start walking out the door on their own.

You can get Dan’s Ruthless Management Book at Amazon.

Dan’s article is here in blue.

Here’s a secret I’ve discovered about million-aire and multi-millionaire entrepreneurs: they want what they do and their companies do to be right. Not 80% right. Not 90% right. Right, period. They are, therefore, very much disliked by a lot of people, and if they are “big” enough, by the media. Jobs. Bezos. Trump. Working for them, many ex-employees say, was hell. But maybe it was being incompetent in their employ that was hell.

Winning isn’t just a statistic on a spreadsheet or a bank account balance. It is the customer, Mrs. Matilda Smith, in Rockford, Illinois, getting what she asked for on her pizza or the right product in the delivered package or a human answering her call in fewer than four rings. Customer appreciation is not a once a year sale or an automated thank you e-mail. It is an authentic attitude, top-down, permeated throughout an organization, actually occurring – and measured, policed and enforced – every day. I don’t care how big your company, if you don’t actually care about the people, the individuals, giving you money, they will drift off in search of a place where they feel valued and appreciated.

Another secret about rich entrepreneurs: they don’t just seek success. They HATE failure. They often react to it violently. Martha Stewart was known to drop into a K-Mart store, find her branded goods sloppily stocked and throw the entire inventory from shelves onto the floor. Eisner instantly fired a group of Disney Park employees caught not smiling. Walt had a fit over one’s lousy delivery of The Jungle Cruise script. I saw Trump tear an empty towel dispenser from a restroom wall in a Trump hotel and throw it 20 yards down a hall.

These people are said to terrorize their employees, their associates, their vendors. But how calmly should you accept failure? Should you “stay calm and carry on”? Only if you want more of the failure you calmly accept. If your blood doesn’t boil and offenders see fire shoot from your eyeballs, your lesser response will be taken as permission. If there is failure and new training, new controls, new supervision is not installed as remedy, then “let’s TRY and do better” will be taken as permission.

There are places where incompetence as failure has dire and instant consequences. The jailer who forgets to lock the inmate’s cell or misses the razor blade in the body search may wind up quickly dead. It’s a fine object lesson for other jailers. The cruise ship captain who is busy texting and gets into too-shallow water and capsizes and sinks the whole thing, and injures and drowns passengers, goes to prison. As it should be.

Creating dire and instant consequences for incompetence and failure is a good thing in any and every business. I’ve told of Chuck Sekeres’ “3 strikes and you’re out” for his in-bound telemarketers: three calls in a row without a set appointment, you’re out. Next batter up. No quarterly performance evaluations. Don’t even wait to be told. After 3, get up and slink out. Minute by minute.

Drop three passes in a game, butt on bench. If possible, traded. Fail at managing the V.A., the IRS and Benghazi, shouldn’t three strikes be enough? They tried to impeach Clinton over one intern. I used the word RUTHLESS in my book title “No BS Management of People and Profits” because, damn it, we desperately need a lot more ruthlessness in a lot more places. In homes, in neighborhoods, in small businesses, in big companies, in government. You can start with you.

Here’s some reality. Dan doesn’t like employees. He tells everyone to have none, or as few as possible. I guess I can’t disagree with that. You certainly shouldn’t have more employees than you need.

With that said, I think employees (team members) are the ultimate leverage tool in your business. Every additional employee should send more to the bottom line FOR YOU!

And no, in my system, we don’t get performance at a high level by being Ruthless. We get them performing at a high level by setting high standards, creating systems that allow them to produce at a high level, getting buy in from them, and conducting Personal Development Interviews that make every individual feel important and appreciated.

Schedule a 30 minute free consultation with me to discover exactly how to do all of that. Go to https://keith12.youcanbook.me/

The Law of Reciprocity and Your STAFF

The more I coach business owners the more I’m convinced, the teacher learns more than the student.

A few days ago I told you Dave Coyle, the owner of a very successful chain of dry cleaning stores, In The Bag Cleaners, in Wichita, KS, told me that everyone wants to feel important and appreciated and Personal Development Interviews give Dave, and his managers, a specific time to sit down with each team member and show them they are important and appreciated.

I posted this video on YouTube to tell you about that.

Then in the comments section below the video on YouTube Dave added.

“The hidden truth (or maybe not so hidden truth) behind this video is that when you learn to make team members in your organization FEEL important and appreciated, the law of reciprocity kicks in, and your team works much harder, and more autonomously, because they FEEL invested in. When they work harder, they are empowered, and the business owner has more freedom to enjoy the rewards of business ownership. And you see a business owner like Keith who is able to do videos from his boat!! This video is a result of Keith becoming a master at Personal Development Interviews – which inspire and motivate team members! “

Thanks, Dave, for the wish words on The Law of Reciprocity.

The Law of Reciprocity from BrianTracy.com

“Have you ever felt the need to help someone who has helped you in the past? This is known as the law of reciprocity. It is one of the many different persuasion techniques that you can use to influence others.

Law Of Reciprocity

Persuasion by reciprocation is based on the law of reciprocity. It’s considered by many to be the most powerful law of human nature. Basically, it states that,

“If you do something nice for me I’ll do something nice for you. I feel obligated to reciprocate.”

For example, if we go out to lunch and I pick up the bill, you almost always offer to pay for it next time. Next time we go out to lunch, you insist on paying for the bill.”

How are you using The Law of Reciprocity with your staff? What are you doing, other than giving them a pay check, to have your staff feel the need to help you and your business?

Do you have my newest book, Performance Review Suck, How to Replace Demotivating and Counterproductive Performance Review with Motivating, Inspirational, and most Importantly Productive Personal?

You can get it here.
https://www.performancereviewssuck.com

When you implement Personal Development Interviews you initiate one of the most powerful laws of human nature with your staff.

Do What You Do So Well
That People Can’t Help Telling Others About You

Keith Lee
Keith@KeithLee.com

How to Empower Every Member of Your Team

I’m mostly a black and white kind of guy.  There’s good, there’s bad.  There’s right, there’s wrong.  There’s proper behavior, there’s stupid behavior.  You succeed, or you fail; and you don’t blame anyone else.

So when I heard the term “Situational Leadership” I thought, Holy cow, another feel-good, politically correct excuse for not performing. I was wrong – way wrong.

Situational Relationship Behavior is the extent to which the leader engages in 2-way communication; in other words, your interaction with people.

High relationship means you’re highly engaged.  You’re giving them additional training and support on an ongoing basis.  You’re interacting with them quite frequently.

Low relationship behavior means that you’re not as engaged in 2-way communication.

Task Behavior is the extent to which the leader is engaged in spelling out the duties and responsibilities.  High task behavior means the manager is more detailed and directive toward telling the subordinate step-by-step what to do.

Low task behavior is when the manager assigns the task, delegates the task, and is not involved with actually getting the job done.

A new employee (team member) typically starts in Q1 (see picture) and the manager does a lot of Telling (high task, low relationship).  There is a lot of instruction showing them how to do the job.  You’re not patting them on the back yet because they haven’t shown anything yet.  You’re teaching and training them, so there is not a lot of relationship behavior.

After a few months, the new employee is making some progress and it’s time to move from telling to Selling (high task, high relationship).   The manager is still directing and showing, but the communication is more 2-way.  The manager gives a lot of reinforcement while explaining, clarifying and persuading.  The manager is mining for ideas from the team member and teaching them to think on their own.  The leader still defines the roles and tasks, but seeks ideas and suggestions.  The leader pats them on the back.  The more you can guide them to thinking things out the more beneficial it is to you in the future.

As the individual grows, it’s time for the manager to move from selling to Participating (high relationship, low task).  The person understands the job and knows how to do it, but doesn’t have a lot of confidence yet.  They need reinforcement on an ongoing basis until they develop confidence.  The manager gives the individual a lot of support, pats him on the back, and stays very close.  Because the individual knows the job, there is much less directive behavior from the manager.

As the team member becomes more and more competent, he becomes a true expert at the job and the manager moves to Empowering (low relationship, low task).  The team member is doing 80% or more of the talking during the PDI.  The manager is observing, monitoring, reinforcing, and delegating.

Your goal as the manager is to get your staff to Quadrant 4, but as the arrows in the graph above show, it’s not a one-way street.  Depending on the job or task, you may move down or up a quadrant, or even two – and sometimes even three.

In one of my businesses, one of my vice presidents is fabulous at her job and my management style is almost always empowering.  But she’s not a numbers person, so when it comes to working with numbers my management style moves to Participating and sometimes to Selling or even Telling.  With her it was not uncommon for me to say, “That number doesn’t make sense, check it out.”

It’s also important to understand that you’re working with people, not machines.  We all have personal lives away from business and for all of us, our personal lives influence us at work.  Sometimes it’s critically important to move down a quadrant when a team member has personal problems.

Leaving your empathy and understanding behind, you have a lot invested in someone who’s in Q4.  Moving up on the relationship scale to Participating or even to Selling is sometimes critical to get that person back up to speed.  And, of course, if things get worse you may need to move to Telling with get this done or you’ll be fired.

For a complete discussion of Situational Leadership get my book Performance Reviews Suck for FREE. I just ask that you help with postage and handling by paying $2.97.

Click here to get the book.

Do What You Do So Well
That People Can’t Help Telling Others About You

It Starts and Ends with Trust

How to Get Your Team to Open Up… It Starts and Ends with Trust

I learned a number of great lessons from my mentor, retired ex-partner, and founder of American Retail Supply; Dick Thompson.  One of the best was, “When you point your finger at someone, three fingers are pointing back at you.”

As I share this story with you, please understand that 3 fingers are pointing back at me.  This was one of my biggest failures as the president of our company.  In hindsight, I should have done a much better job making sure this manager understood and truly bought into the Make-You-Happy Management System and its reliance on team member participation.

Middle management can be a particular challenge with the Make-You-Happy Management System, especially when that manager has previously managed in a business that does not practice Z-theory management (participative management).  It can really be a challenge when the middle manager has previously leaned towards X Theory (authoritarian management).

It’s critical that your middle managers understand and buy into Z-Theory Management when you use The Make-You-Happy Management System.

When I owned American Retail Supply, our headquarters were in Kent, Washington, and we had distribution and sales offices in Denver, Dallas, and Honolulu.  One of our division managers asked me this question, “When facilitating a MAT, how do you get the ball rolling when you’re just staring at blank faces?  I just sometimes feel like people have enough energy to complain, but are unwilling to use their energy to help solve the problem or think of a positive/better solution.”

When he sent me this email, he had been with us for almost a year.  I had been working with him on this and other, similar issues and I knew what the problem was.

I would normally not put this type of answer in an email, but I wasn’t making much progress and I thought it was time to put our previous discussions in writing.  Maybe that would get through.  Here’s my answer: “The problem you express above is a symptom, not the disease.  The disease is they don’t believe you’re sincere when you tell them you want their input.  In other words, they don’t trust you.

Think back to us talking at the show in Las Vegas.  You said that you do this to show you’re decisive, or you do that to show that you’re understanding or fair.

That’s when we talked about a silly management philosophy that says that a new manager should come in strong and tough and you can then back off after you get respect.  That’s what I perceived that you were thinking and doing when you started managing.

I told you that was a bad idea.  A good manager should come in and be appropriate and fair to show that you are appropriate and fair.  Once you get their trust and show them that you really want to listen and be their coach, cheerleader, facilitator and nurturer of champions and not a cop, devils advocate, pronouncer and nay-sayer they will open up.

If they don’t open up, it’s because they don’t trust you.  They don’t see you as a coach, cheerleader, facilitator and nurturer of champions.  People open up to coaches, cheerleaders, facilitators and nurturers of champions.  They don’t open up to cops, devil’s advocates, pronouncers and nay-sayers.

As we’ve continued to talk since Las Vegas I still hear you saying that you said this to show you’re decisive, or you do that to show that you’re understanding or fair.  That’s being manipulative –  not being a coach, cheerleader, facilitator and nurturer of champions.

Again, you need to do what is right and appropriate because it is right and appropriate – not to be decisive, or strong or anything else.

Ask yourself this question, what have you done consistently with each and every person in your division to show that you are a coach, cheerleader, facilitator and nurturer of champions?  It is absolutely critical that you think of this from their point of view and not from the “I do this to show I’m that” point of view.

My first suggestion is to look in the index of the Team Handbook in the Make-You-Happy Management System under “meeting tools and techniques – warm-ups”.  There are ideas in there to get involvement.

Again, that’s going to be tough because if they don’t trust you they’ll just see that as a way to manipulate them.  I would still try it.

Ask them what things they think need to be improved, or what problems they have with getting their jobs done efficiently and effectively.

If you’re still getting nowhere try this.  Say, “In Kent they answer the phone the same way every time.

  • Greeting – “Thanks for calling”
  • Identification – “American Retail Supply”
  • What you can do for them – “How may I direct your call?”

They developed their greeting in Kent from watching a DVD by “The Telephone Doctor” who says, there are two reasons to have a greeting before you identify the company.

  • Often the person calling isn’t ready to listen right away
  • Sometimes when we answer the phone we start talking before we have the receiver all the way to our mouth

Keith asked us to come up with a similar greeting for us.  He also said when he calls he sometimes doesn’t know who he’s talking with and it would be good to hear your name in the greeting.

So, with that in mind, he asked us to come up with a greeting that would be the model for answering the phone in each division where we don’t have a dedicated receptionist to say “How may I direct your call?”

How should we answer the phone to include:

  • Greeting
  • Identification of the company and the individual
  • What you can do for them
  • If no one answers say, Bill, what do you think?  Then come up with a greeting everyone can agree on and implement it.

Here’s one I would love to see you discuss, “I want to come up with a dress code that everyone thinks is fair and appropriate for the job.  Who would like to help with this”?  This is what I suggested that you do right after you got flaked on the dress code you implemented without getting the team involved.

You decided that would show weakness.  I think it shows just the opposite, that you know you’re not perfect and you’re confident enough to admit it when you make a mistake.

Click here https://keithlee.com/freedom-for-business-owners to discover how to manage your entire team in one hour a week so you can spend your time on the important things in your business.

 

 

 

What Goes Around Comes Around Especially When Disaster Strikes

“How the Make-You-Happy Management System Will Help You and Your Business When Disaster Strikes”

What Goes Around Comes Around is one of my wife – Patty’s – favorite sayings, and since we’ve been together since 1970 I’ve heard her say it thousands and thousands of times.

The Make-You-Happy Management System (MYHMS) puts a huge emphasis on respect for clients and customers.  Remember, in the MYHMS clients are the people that most businesses call customers, and customers are your internal customers; team members, vendors, the FedEX guy, the mail man, etc.  This leads to treating all of these internal customers like… CUSTOMERS, and you know, what goes around comes around.

On July 20, 2003 we had a fire at our distribution center in Denver that destroyed everything.  Twenty thousand square feet of inventory, office supplies and fixtures, computer, everything gone, overnight.  I remember the date, because it happened on my 29th wedding anniversary.  Little did I know how much one of Patty’s favorite sayings would affect us over the next few months.

Let’s look at just a few aspects of the MYHMS and how they helped us during this disaster in Denver:

  • The MYHMS with its Z-theory management and emphasis on not only listening to your team members but empowering them creates team members who know they are incredibly valuable, feel appreciated. This, along with the philosophy that all of us who work in a MYHMS business are customers to each other leads to people who truly enjoy their jobs. The way the team in Denver, and our other locations pulled together to get the job done through this was amazing.
  • At the very heart of the MYHMS is a fanatical devotion to Make-You-Happy Client Service. This created loyal clients who rallied around us.
  • The idea that your vendors are your customers creates vendors who help you when you need it.

When you have all of this going for you and have a disaster you’ll truly find out that, “What Goes Around Comes Around.”

Team Members Come To The Rescue

On the sales end, we were fortunate in that we had a show room at the Denver Merchandise Mart.  We added another phone line and were up and going there right away.

Our warehouse staff was concerned that they may not be able to work while the Denver distribution center was out of commission.  I assured them that we would keep paying them.  They could have easily just sat back and collected the money over what ended up being about a month, but each of them offered to take their vacation at that time.

In addition, as soon as anything came up that they could do they went at it full speed.  They shopped for warehouse racking, found storage units, and shopped for new office furniture.

When the time came to start putting things back together the entire staff in Denver came through like gang busters to get us up and going, working weekends and extended hours.

In addition, our staff in Kent came to the rescue also.  We shipped most of the orders that would have come from our Denver distribution center out of Kent.  Like Denver, when needed, our staff in Kent worked long hours, with a great attitude to get the job done.

In addition, our entire staff, in all of our divisions, did an incredible job keeping up with all of the different shipping arrangements that needed to be arranged to take care of clients and get product to them.

I will forever be grateful to our team members… What goes around comes around.

Vendors Come To The Rescue

Our vendors were absolutely incredible!

As a distributor, we buy product in huge quantities, often truckloads.  We store these and ship them in smaller quantities when our clients need them.  Some of our vendors will allow us to drop ship smaller quantities, but they have extra charges to do this.

While we shipped a lot of orders for the mountain states and east out of Kent and charged our clients what the freight would have been from Denver, with the loss of the entire Denver inventory we didn’t have enough inventory in Kent to do this all of the time.

Our vendors came to the rescue and, every one of them, agreed to waive their minimum order quantities and extra charges and ship to our clients directly when needed.  This was a huge commitment from them and their teams as they are simply not set up to do this in the quantities that they did for us.

I will forever be grateful to our vendors… What goes around comes around.

Clients Come To The Rescue

What a time to find out how loyal our clients were!  Things took longer.  For the most part things ran well, but some things simply took longer.  It took longer for us to let them know when the order would ship because we had to be sure whether we were shipping it from Kent or the vendor, whether it was something that could drop ship from the vendor or not, and lots of other new questions.

And then it still took longer, to get the product from Kent rather than Denver.  Most often the vendor simply couldn’t get it shipped the same day like we do.

We were amazed and thankful that our clients (Continued P5 – Disaster Strikes)

stood by us.  In fact, we got letter after letter thanking us for taking such good care of them under the circumstances.

I will forever be grateful to our clients… What goes around comes around.

What Goes Around Comes Around Negatively Also

Over the years I had been approached numerous times by a business associate to buy his business.  He gave me an idea of the price he was looking for and I always told I didn’t think it would fit at the time.

One day he called me and said he wanted to sell the business.  I again told him I again that I really didn’t think it would fit.  He replied, “I’m going to make you a deal you can’t refuse.”  So, I listened.  It was a deal I couldn’t refuse.

The other owner and I had the same supplier for one of our product lines.  In our case they were a significant and good supplier.  For the other company this supplier represented the huge majority of his business.

Over the years the other owner talked to me about all of the problems he had with the supplier and in fact showed me some of their correspondence.  I couldn’t believe the derogatory tone of the letters from the owner of the business who wanted to sell to the supplier.

He certainly had no idea that he and the supplier were in fact on the same team.  He had no comprehension that he should treat a supplier like an internal customer

I found out during the negotiations to buy the business that after years of this derogatory treatment the supplier decided he simply wasn’t going to sell to the other business anymore.

And, in this case the guy who wanted to sell the business did not have an alternative supplier and it was going to take a good deal of time to find one.  The seller knew I had a good relationship with the supplier and that the supplier would sell to me if I bought the business.  The seller also knew that his list of potential buyers was very small, because the seller would not have had a relationship with the new buyer and would see it as still dealing with the old owner.  What goes around comes around.

So yes,

I got the company in a deal I couldn’t refuse

It didn’t surprise me as we trained our new team in this newly acquired business that our Make-You-Happy Management with its emphasis in respect for everyone was a foreign concept.  And it didn’t surprise me at all to learn that the old owner was very much an X-theory manager with the attitude of I’m the boss, I’m the manager, I’m the owner.  I built this business with my blood sweat and tears do what I tell you to do and that’s that!

The new team was thrilled to hear about the new management system.  What goes around comes around.

You can get my hardcopy book (not an e-book), How to Control Your Business and your Life, Proven Secrets to Creating Highly Productive Teams at www.HowToControlYourBusiness.com.  Your cost is $2.97 and that includes shipping and handling.

Exposed!!! Owner of Company Named, “Best Business To Work For In Washington State” is a “Ruthless Manager

It was reported today that Keith Lee, the owner of American Retail Supply, which was named the Best Small Business to Work for in Washington State by Washington CEO Magazine is a Ruthless Manager.

How is that?  How can the owner of the company named “The Best Small Business to Work for in Washington State” now be revealed as the co-author of the New Edition of No B.S. Ruthless Management of People & Profits?

It was revealed today that Dan Kennedy, the author of numerous No B.S. books, chose Keith Lee as the co-author for his newest edition of No B.S. Ruthless Management of People & Profits.

Our intrepid reporter, Lois Lane, caught up with Mr. Lee as he was sneaking into his office today and asked him how he could head the Best Business to Work for in Washington State and be a Ruthless Manager.

Mr. Lee replied… “I don’t choose the names for Mr. Kennedy’s books, and Dan and I don’t agree on everything, but when it comes to managing a business and the people in it; we agree much more than we disagree.”

Keith pointed to page 14 in the No B.S. book where Dan Kennedy writes about business owners, “And one thing they all have in common: gripes, complaints, disappointments, frustrations, pain and agony with regard to their employees.  Much of this has to do with unreasonable expectations and a misunderstanding of the actual nature of employer-employee relationships.  Some of it lies squarely at the fault of the business owner for failing in one or more of the Three Requirements for Having Employees: Leadership, Management, Supervision.”

Mr. Lee continued, “While I don’t think the nature of the employer-employee relationship need be as adversarial as Dan, the expectations and the nature of the relationship needs to be addressed during the employees’ first day of employment.  With our DVD training business owners who use our Make-You-Happy Management System set those expectations during the first hour of employment.”

Mr. Lee agrees wholeheartedly with Mr. Kennedy’s statement that business owners failing in one or more of the Three Requirements for Having Employees is the cause of many of their headaches.

Mr. Lee says, “Business owners usually lead, manage and supervise as they were led, managed and supervised, or how they learned in business school; neither of which work very well.”

Performance Reviews Suck

Mr. Lee pointed to Performance Management.  Every business owner knows that they need a Performance Management System but the only type of system they know about is Performance Reviews and they know that Performance Reviews Suck.  With this the business owner continues with Performance Reviews knowing that they suck, or they stop them altogether, and are left with no Performance Management System.

Mr. Lee informed this reporter than Dan Kennedy agrees that Performance Reviews are “like looking in your rearview mirror to drive your car.”  Mr. Kennedy’s tells the story of how the late Mike Vance, who worked personally with Walt Disney on the original Disney University and other projects, laughed and scoffed at standardized annual or quarterly ‘performance reviews.”

Mr. Lee’s management system replaces Performance Reviews with Personal Development Interviews.

Mr. Lee went on to explain.  “Just listen to what they’re called.  Which would you rather give… a Performance Review or a Personal Development Interview?  Would you rather review someone’s performance, or develop someone?

What if you’re on the receiving end?  Would you like your performance reviewed or would you rather have someone work proactively to develop you?

Which do you think gets better results, developing people and coaching them or reviewing their performance after the fact?

Traditional management focuses on catching people doing things wrong.  If every time I do something wrong the boss catches me, but he doesn’t catch me when I do things right, my creativity is stymied and I stop using my creativity, stop stepping out front, and stop helping the organization grow by using my creativity.

Conversely, when we start catching people doing things right, we encourage empowerment.  People start to do things in the organization.  Productivity improves on an ongoing basis.  Improvement doesn’t just come from management but from the whole organization interacting with each other and picking each other up.  The organization is permeated with a motivating environment.

Another benefit of this type of management is you create a learning organization.  Researchers tell us that as we move forward, people are going to stay with organizations where they have an opportunity to grow and learn.  There are going to be many more skilled positions than there are people to fill them.  And if there are a lot of skilled positions and not enough people to fill them, money isn’t going to make the difference.  Money is going to be a given.  You’re going to have to pay in the competitive market to get good people.  But they want to work in a place where they can grow, where they can enjoy themselves, where they can use their creativity to help the organization grow, and that happens in a learning organization.  That’s exactly why my company, American Retail Supply was named the Best Company to Work for in Washington, by Washington CEO Magazine.”

You can get Keith’s hardcopy book (not an e-book), How to Control Your Business and your Life, Proven Secrets to Creating Highly Productive Teams at www.HowToControlYourBusiness.com.  Your cost is $2.97 and that includes shipping and handling.

Leading & Motivating by Brian Tracy

*Note from Keith:

Brian Tracy is an absolute living legend.  Brian’s goal is to help you achieve your personal and business goals faster and easier than you ever imagined.  His exciting talks and seminars on Leadership, Selling, Self-Esteem, Goals, Strategy, Creativity and Success Psychology bring about immediate changes and long-term results, and you can bet his articles will inspire the same in YOU to bring about huge, long-term success.

Here is an article from Brian Tracy that reinforces the principles in the Make-You-Happy Management System.

Leading and Motivating

By Brian Tracy

It’s been said that Leadership is not what you do, but who you are.  This, however, is only partially true.  Leadership is very much who you are, but it cannot be divorced from what you do.  Who you are represents the inner person, and what you do represents the outer person.  Each is dependent on the other for maximum effectiveness.

The starting point of motivational leadership is to begin seeing yourself as a role model, seeing yourself as an example to others.  A key characteristic of leaders is that they set high standards of accountability for themselves and for their behaviors.  They assume that other are watching them and then setting their own standards by what they do.  In business, there are several kinds of power.  Two of these are position power and ascribed power.

Position power is the power that comes with a job title or position in any organization. If you become a manager in a company, you automatically have certain powers and privileges that go along with your rank.  You can order people about and make certain decisions.  You can be a leader whether or not anyone likes you.

Ascribed power is the power you gain because of the kind of person you are.  In every organization, there are people who are inordinately influential and looked up to by others, even though their positions may not be high up on the organizational chart.  These are the men and women who are genuine leaders because of the quality of the people they have become, because of their characters and their personalities.

Over the years, we have been led to believe that leaders are those who stride boldly about, exude power and confidence, tive orders for others to carry out.  However, that is old school.  The leader of today is the one who asks questions, listens carefully, plans diligently and then builds consensus among all those who are necessary for achieving the goals.  The leader does not try to do it by himself or herself.  The leader gets things done by helping others to do them.

This brings us to five of the qualities that you already have to a certain degree and that you can develop further to stand out from the people around you in a very short period of time.

The first quality is vision.

This is the one single quality that, more than anything separates leaders from followers.  Leaders have vision.  Followers do not. Leaders have the ability to stand back and see the big picture.  Followers are caught up in day-to-day activities.  Leaders have developed the ability to fix their eyes on the horizon and see greater possibilities.  Followers are those whose eyes are fixed on the ground in front of them and who are so busy that they seldom look at themselves and their activities in a larger context.

The most motivational vision you can have for yourself and others is to “Be the best!”  Many people don’t yet realize that excellent performance in serving other people is an absolute basic essential for survival in the economy of the future.  Many individuals and companies still adhere to the idea that as long as they are no worse than anyone else, they can remain in business.  That is just plain silly!  It is prehistoric thinking.  We are now in the age of excellence.  Customers assume that they will get excellent quality, and if they don’t, they will go to your competitors so fast, people’s heads will spin.

The second quality, which is perhaps the single most respected quality of leaders, is integrity.

Integrity is complete, unflinching honesty with regard to everything that you say and do.  Integrity underlies all the other qualities.  Your measure of integrity is determined by how honest you are in the critical areas of your life.

Integrity means this: When someone asks you at the end of the day, “Did you do your very best?” you can look him in the eye and say, “Yes!”  Integrity means this: When someone asks you if you could’ve done better, you can honestly say, “No, I did everything I possibly could.”

Integrity means that you, as a leader, admit your shortcomings.  It means that you work to develop your strengths and compensate for your weaknesses.  Integrity means that you tell the truth, and that you live the truth in everything that you do and in all your relationships.  Integrity means that you deal straightforwardly with people and situations and that you do not compromise what you believe to be true.

The third quality is courage.

It is the chief distinguishing characteristic of the true leader.  It is almost always visible in the leader’s words and actions.  It is absolutely indispensable to success, happiness and the ability to motivate other people to be the best they can be.

In a way, it is easy to develop a big vision for yourself and for the person you want to be.  It is easy to commit yourself to living with complete integrity.  But it requires incredible courage to follow through on your vision and on your commitments.  You see, as soon as you set a high goal or standard for yourself, you will run into all kinds of difficulties and setbacks.  You will be surrounded by temptations to compromise your values and your vision.  You will feel an almost irresistible urge to “get along by going along.”  Your desire to earn the respect and cooperation of others can easily lead to the abandonment of your principles, and here is where courage comes in.

The forth quality of motivational leadership is realism.

Realism is a form of intellectual honesty.  The realist insists upon seeing the world as it really is, not as he wishes it were.  This objectivity, this refusal to engage in self-delusion, is a mark of the true leader.

Those who exhibit the quality of realism do not trust to luck, hope for miracles, pray for exceptions to basic business principles, expect rewards without working or hope that problems will go away by themselves.  These all are examples of self-delusion, of living in a fantasyland.

The motivational leader insists on seeing things exactly as they are and encourages others to look at life the same way. As a motivational leader, you get the facts, whatever they are.  You deal with people honestly and tell them exactly what you perceive to be the truth.  This doesn’t mean that you will always be right, but you will always be expressing the truth in the best way you know how.

The fifth quality of motivational leadership is responsibility.

This is perhaps the hardest of all to develop.  The acceptance of responsibility means that, as Harry Truman said, “The buck stops here.”

The game of life is very competitive.  Sometimes, great success and great failure are separated by a very small distance.  In watching the playoffs in basketball, baseball, and football, we see htat the winner can be decided by a single point, and that single point can rest on a single action or inaction, on that part of a single team member at a critical part of the game.

Life is very much like competitive sports.  Very small things that you do, or don’t do, can either give you the edge that leads to victory or take away your edge at the critical moment.  This principle is especially true with regard to accepting responsibility for yourself and for everything that happens to you.

You become a motivational leader by motivating yourself.  And you motivate yourself by striving toward excellence, by committing yourself to becoming everything you are capable of becoming.  You motivate yourself by throwing your whole heart into doing your job in an excellent fashion.  You motivate yourself and others by continually looking for ways to help others to improve their lives and achieve their goals.  You become a motivational leader by becoming the kind of person others want to get behind and support in every way.

Your main job is to take complete control of your personal evolution and become a leader by becoming the kind of person others want to get behind and support in every way.

Brian Tracy is legendary in the fields of Management, Leadership, and Sales.  He has produced more than 300 audio/video programs and has written over 40 books.  www.BrianTracy.com