Well, we are doing it in a trance. The numbers around employee engagement are so bad that odds are high many CEOs are also disengaged. People’s rank has absolutely nothing to do with whether they have succumbed to a trance. We witness the trance in executives who lazily cut expenses by laying people off or tell HR to “fix the engagement problem” and walk away.

What do we have to learn from CEOs running magnificent and magnetic cultures? While preparing my new book “The Workplace Engagement Solution,” I studied them. When we explore great cultures such as Southwest Airlines, Google, HBO and Trader Joe’s, we find CEOs that embrace many of the values that represent an “Engagement CEO.” When an executive goes about the business of building a category leader, talent moves to the front of the line in terms of the necessary characteristics within the CEO. Board members and investors would do well to find CEOs with these traits.

If you are considering joining an organization where you want to thrive, it is also smart to evaluate the CEO or business owner.

 An Engagement CEO

• Takes charge of the culture personally
• Develops a strong leadership brand as evidenced by their consistent behavior and message
• Walks the talk, leads by example and leans toward democracy over elitism in any form
• Expresses continuous, genuine and worthy praise to their employees
• Constantly seeks ways to keep their talent current and relevant
• Treats employees as the organization’s greatest asset instead of a potential liability
• Packages engagement as a profit source rather than an expense
• Effectively manages and educates all stakeholders in the need for effective people initiatives
• Moves the vision from short-term financial performance to long-term value, brand strength, and reputation
• Tells themselves and others the truth, especially about change
• Is resolutely and directly connected to the front line
• Is transparent and expects transparency throughout their organization
• Shows respect towards all employees and learns from all of them

Many will treat engagement as a sidebar activity, a perk provided to the employees. However, the purpose of engagement is far more rigorous than simply making employees feel better. Engagement is about being awake, interested, alert, invested and present. Real engagement moves an organization beyond the business targets.

Making the decision to lead business culture is one of the few competitive advances that are in control of the CEO. Alas, this basic truth doesn’t even cross the mind of many leaders who block the thought with, “I don’t have enough time” or, “Profit margins are too slim to give this attention.”

There are no shortcuts to success. We learn nothing of value through the study of dysfunction. Any CEO engaged in category leadership knows this. In the end, the quality of our talent is going to determine if we lead the market or continually run to keep up.

As I studied engagement CEOs, it also became clear they lead engagement for a series of business payoffs:

• A fully engaged culture and a superior employer brand.
• The best possible products and services, and excellence in everyone’s behavior.
• The organization makes the world a better place.
• The organization makes every attempt to fully engage with every customer.
• Recognizes there is simply no substitute for human decency, compassion, understanding, and pursuit for “the high road.”

On a practical level, here is one example:

We live next door to a huge Ralph’s Grocery Store. It is literally 100 yards from our front door to the store. And yet, we spend most of our shopping dollars elsewhere. The majority of employees are sullen, don’t look people in the eye. In the morning aisles are blocked because they are stocking shelves after the doors open. Disengagement isn’t limited to the customer experience, it also potentially impacts our health. We have had to either throw out or return spoiled produce and contaminated chicken.

I’ve often praised Trader Joe’s for its remarkable culture where the average tenure of cashiers is 19 years. There is a cashier that calls out our names. I asked her about the stories of the longevity and loyalty of their employees. She said, “Nineteen years? Those are the kids. I’ve been here for 26 years.” I asked her why. She responded, “We’re a family! Here’s an example. There have been many times when I come to work before the store opens. If the general manager is here first, I find him scrubbing and cleaning the bathrooms. No one pulls rank, we work together.”

The two organizations offer a remarkable contrast regarding CEO behavior. At Trader Joe’s, everyone knows their CEO, Dan Bane, because he regularly appears at the stores. As we returned rotten food to Ralph’s, I asked if they knew the name of their CEO. They didn’t know who he was. I also asked a couple of them if they knew anything about Yucaipa Companies. The response was, “Who are they?” Yucaipa owns Ralph’s.

One company has a CEO who visits, asks questions, listens, and strives to make Trader’s a better place to work.

The other one is a commodity. Everything feels and looks cheap. The employees give the consumer little attention.

Which company will be the first to convert to robotics and virtual check-outs?

There is the rub. Technology will not replace accountability, emotional interest, and problem-solving on behalf of their customers.

Dan Bane made it very clear that employees are the lynchpin for customer satisfaction and loyalty.

In the other company, employees don’t even know the CEO’s name.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

Schedule 15-Minutes to Discuss Your Workplace or Career with David (Here)

(C) Copyright, 2019, Inspired Work, Inc. – (All Rights Reserved)

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We can gauge the “attitude toward gratitude” by watching and listening. Gratitude is often displaced by consumerism. Elizabeth Taylor was once asked to describe her basic spiritual philosophy and she responded, “More.” Taylor actually displayed enormous gratitude in her later years but think of it. When we want something different than what we have, it is hard to be grateful for that.

I write about, evaluate, and build employee engagement every day. The grateful tend to be generous in praising others and are gracious when praise is directed towards them. This dynamic is key to building and sustaining effective support systems. We didn’t need a lot of support in the old industrial revolution workplace – clocking-in and clocking-in seemed to be sufficient. But in today’s rapidly changing workplace, we need the right help all of the time. The praise-filled workplace is a helpful and engaged place to work.

I’m a big fan of critical thinking. There was a career book out many years ago called, Do What You Love and the Money Will Follow. I never bought the premise. But, I prefer Andy Warhol’s outlook when he said, “Do what you love, you can always sell it.” This is a far more active and optimistic outlook. Mr. Warhol’s results speak for themselves. The problem with the human mind is that we can reframe critical thinking as cynicism and even contempt. When a candidate freely and regularly uses the word “should” the hair goes up on the back of my neck. Because really, the only purpose of the word should is to indicate that wherever I am, it is the wrong place. Gratitude and harsh judgment cannot occupy the same place.

Gratitude shows up in words like, life is good, this is my dream job, I can’t believe I get paid to do this, I love the people that I work with, everyone has a smile on his or her face, people love me, they helped me get through difficult times, we solved that challenge together, so many people helped me do this, and more.

This past week was difficult. On Friday, we had a memorial service for my brother-in-law. He was 54 when the police found him in an intersection. He was slumped over the wheel in his car. Gone in an instant. He was the chair of the English department. He helped raise two of the most brilliant children I have ever known. He impacted many, many people. After the service, my partner and I went to the Diana Krall concert at the Hollywood Bowl. She delivered one of those sublime and transformative performances. Walking down the hill, I stepped in a grease spot, flew, sprained my ankle and tore a hole in my suit. The following morning I decided that I simply had to make it to a spiritual support group near our home. It is on the beach. I hobbled to my seat in pain feeling physically and emotionally banged up. But, during that meeting, I watched the waves roll in, and realized that I literally get to live across the street. I realized that all the challenges that I have today are high-quality problems. It is a high-quality problem to fall at a Diana Krall concert. It is a high-quality problem to wrestle with all the love in my life. It is a high-quality problem to have fatigue because I’m running a business and doing a media tour. It is a high-quality problem to grieve the loss of a great human being.

This is the nature of gratitude. Instead of dealing with survival, we get to work on becoming better human beings. The challenge is no longer how to get through the day, it is how to be kinder and more loving by the end of the day. The focus isn’t just making as much or accumulating as much power as possible. It is about how many lives we can touch, how much we can improve the world, and how we can help others be their very best.

This is what I look for in candidates.

We work towards building organizations filled with talented people who can also connect, look people in the eye, ask skilled questions, and demonstrate active listening. We seek to grow talent that explores the world of change around them, defines needed change within themselves, and speaks the truth. And as our talent develops the skills that build strong support systems, new intelligence flows in from the outside world, bringing innovation and critical improvements to organizational performance. As they build stronger relationships within and without, the culture becomes unstoppable. Employees develop an unparalleled sense of gratitude that stems from their ongoing personal growth, the precious quality of their work relationships, and the unshakable confidence that they can deal with anything the world of change dishes out to them. Yes, the reality will be messier than this bold vision suggests, but it is where we set our intentions that so very important.

This is what hiring the grateful leads to.

Brought to you by David Harder – Founder & President, Inspired Work, Inc.

(C) Copyright, 2017, David Harder – (All Rights Reserved)

Buy a copy of David’s new book The Workplace Engagement Solution here.

The post The Single Most Important and Overlooked Trait in Good Hires appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

This basic seismic shift is so frightening that many are doing what humans do. We point towards the symptom rather than the truth. Task based work is progressively becoming economically unsustainable. For those of us who do tasks, if we have not yet learned how to change our lives, this problem appears to be unfixable.

We come from a history that didn’t give us much on the topic of personal change.

Prior to the industrial revolution, change happened at a glacial pace. When we invented mass manufacturing, the world went through one revolutionary change that lasted for three hundred years. The kind of anger and political unrest that we witness today has a great deal of similarity to what happened three hundred years ago. Back then, the industrial revolution handed out pink slips to virtually everyone who worked. But, work didn’t stop, it moved. This is what we are witnessing today.

For three hundred years we built a solid middle-class out of task work. The middle-class filled out quotas, stood in assembly lines, finished tax returns, smiled and answered phones. Some became good task masters which led to mid-management roles. Now, we are having to make fundamental shifts that require new skills, wakefulness, and a change of heart. Because task work is being replaced by software and technology in bigger and bigger waves. What, pray tell, is left behind?

Today, most task work is driven by logic, which typically requires working from our left brains. Logic is all about numbers, critical thinking, black & white. Those of us who live in our left-brains have great difficulty perceiving right-brain work. Also, if we have been up to our ears in tasks, we might be a little bit numb.

In Daniel Pink’s seminal book, A Whole New Mind, he predicted that as we offload task-driven work to software and technology, new work would emerge. But it would be centered in the right-brain. At first, some of this work would be dismissed by left-brain workers. For example, right-brain work includes creativity, design, communications, influencing others, building relationships, engaging, consultative sales, strategy, among others, alot of stuff our parents warned us not to do.

In my new book, The Workplace Engagement Solution, I talk about how global engagement figures of 13% are not just a business problem, disengagement is a tragedy infecting our lives, families, customer satisfaction and day-to-day living. The great disengagement of the modern worker is leading directly to the scourge of our modern economy: underemployment. How many bright task workers are now part-time task workers, “consultants,” or individuals working way below the previous station in life? You probably know several and yes they are members of the “disappearing” middle-class.

Our political leaders do a great disservice by promising jobs and patronizing the underemployed by looking to the past. The middle-class is not being destroyed by the one percent. Task workers, unwilling to reinvent, are being eaten alive by resignation and aimlessness.

If the work that you do is centered on tasks, use your time to prepare for a new life right away.

If you have already been impacted by the elimination of task-work, consider the following:

A Change of Heart

Recognize that pursuing more task-driven work will result in more failure. Make the decision to set aside cynicism, contempt, aimlessness, resignation and frenzy as ways to block and forget this basic truth. Develop the willingness to invest in a new life.

Recognize that behind every epic change that eliminates old jobs, new opportunities appear. For example, 3-D printing will wipe out assembly lines and portions of shipping, distribution, & warehousing. It will also produce a whole new class of entrepreneurs who manufacture goods, products, even art from their homes and offices. Artificial Intelligence will wipe out a whole slew of jobs. But it will introduce millions of new ones. For example, when we cure cancer and make high-quality education available without charge, entire new careers will emerge. In fact, easily a third of the jobs we will have in ten years have yet to be invented.

Learn “The Courage Skills”

Moving from the old to the new world requires that we learn a new skillsets. As the speed of change increases, skills that we used to dismiss become vitally important. These can include the ability to draw attention to oneself, to sell, present, and to influence others. We will need to become adept in building effective support systems and communities that back our mission, vision and purpose. I am proposing something more mindful than “networking.” These are not soft skills. What a dismissive phrase! They are courage skills and we need to learn to use them with confidence and with a certain boldness.

Constant Learning & Growth

Active learners own the new world of work. In the years ahead, change will only grow more exponential. For those of us who simply react to change with anger, the future will be quite painful. For those of us who take the initiative to grow, the near future is already showing that we can create untold abundance, wealth, and freedom. The information is already available. It sprouts fresh and new every day. The more that we learn to learn, the easier it becomes because information allows us to make use of change to improve our lives, circumstances and the world around us. But, like a distance runner, we can’t get there if we walk one mile a month.

What is in the way? Fear and Numbness.

The average American watches four hours of Television and five hours using “devices.” We consume 152 pounds of sugar per year, use 80% of the world’s legal and illegal drugs, and have become masterful in checking out from these frightening changes rather than dealing with them head-on.

If you relate to any of us (and I believe we all do), invest time in learning how to change. If you are mastering or have mastered this new game, help inspire others to do the same.

Quite frankly, I want to live in a world where people are doing what they love, using technology to be even more successful and free, and solving the big problems in front of us.

Suggested Reading:

A Whole New Mind, Why right-brainers will own the future – Daniel Pink -(Riverhead Books) Order Here

The Inevitable, Understanding the 12 technological forces that will shape our future – Kevin Kelly – (Viking Press) Order Here

The Workplace Engagement Solution, Find a common mission, vision, and purpose with all of today’s employees – David Harder – Career Press Order Here

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

P: (310) 277-4850 / E: david@inspiredworkservices.com

(C) Copyright, Inspired Work, Inc. (2017) – All Rights Reserved

The post The Disappearance of The Middle Class? appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

How on earth do we unlearn? How do we identify the beliefs, the software, the education and conditions that are obsolete and delete them? How do we become skillfully suspicious of everything we know?

Many of us never have the gift of unlearning and yet that became natural for me because of a brilliant and wise mentor. I went to USC to become a classical pianist. As a freshman, I was fortunate to become part of concert pianist Daniel Pollack’s Master Class. There, I found myself in a ridiculously competitive environment but stayed ahead of the game by practicing until I dropped – day-after-day. During one session, Pollack asked what I wanted to work on. I pulled out a copy of Herbie Hancock’s concert album from Lincoln Center and shyly announced, “I want his job.” The idea of stepping out of classical music was dismissed on the spot. However, to my point-of-view, Frederick Chopin had also been a revolutionary very much like Hancock. Pianists of his time voiced great difficulty in being able to play his music because older styles filled their musical vocabulary. Later, I had the same challenge growing as a jazz musician. Old software got in the way. Quite simply, there wasn’t room for the new.

A rock singer told me of Phil Cohen, the legendary Artistic Director of Concordia University’s Leonardo Project. I asked what he did and she said, “He gets rid of blocks. He opens the door to becoming a true artist.” I had the good fortune to get a session with him. Phil was wearing a Heisenberg Fedora and sunglasses, sitting in the corner of a recording artist’s living room. He motioned to me, “Play something.” I performed a tortured little ballad that I was quite proud of. When I was finished, he asked, “You studied at USC? Did you play the Russian exercises for hours? Even on the floor?” After several affirmative answers, he continued, “You need an emotional enema. If you hope to play one living note of music you are going to have to forget everything you have ever been taught.”

It was one of the single most frightening moments in my life. By asking him to teach me to unlearn, I agreed to give up what I had been taught for 20 years. He had an acute radar in zeroing in on thinking and behavior that blocked the parts of me that had yet to flourish. Over the years, Phil gave me the skill of forgetting, of letting go of the “right way” to play or think or behave. I had the nicest piano of his LA clients so he moved everyone to my home. I used to sit in the hall and peek through the slats in the door simply stunned at the musical icons sitting at my piano or singing as he played. But what was even more exciting was to see some of the most successful artists in the world of music eager to surrender their best thinking – quickly.

Phil’s work informs so much of what I do. His teaching shows up when a client throws away the script and facilitates a miracle. I see it when a client who wants to be a writer forgets the syntax and let’s out his soul. It happens when someone answers one of our questions and realizes the one belief that continues to dictate his or her life is obsolete. The new truth can flow in. Time and time again, it is clear that untruth and truth cannot occupy the same place.

Self-inquiry is the most reliable way of beginning an unlearning process. Until we examine our own lives, we are usually living someone else’s life or instructions. Questioning our beliefs and way we live is key to having fulfilling lives and it is key to positive change. Periodic self-examination used to be enough. Today, change happens so quickly that continuous self-inquiry not only allows us to be more flexible and nimble, it paves the way for rapid and transformative growth. I know this because we teach it.

The ability to unlearn gave me the life that I lead today. It pierced through the righteousness that once held up a one-dimensional future where music was the one and only hard-won option. It opened the door towards realizing I am here to touch people’s lives. Unlearning allowed me to open my eyes in the morning and realize that life is now filled with meaning and purpose and goodness. Unlearning not only makes it easier to change, it make it possible to change. Because of mentors like Phil Cohen, I am no longer concerned with hanging onto my old or even current self. It is far more exciting to see what’s coming. By identifying the restrictions and letting go, each edition is better than the one before.

It doesn’t get better than this.

Each day, we get to see the world with new eyes.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

P: (310) 277-4850 / E: david@inspiredworkservices.com

(C) Copyright, Inspired Work, Inc. (2017) – All Rights Reserved

The post How Unlearning Gives You the Keys to Modern Life appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

In front of us is a world filled with more opportunity to craft successful lives than ever before. But, in order to fulfill that opportunity, we have to learn how to change on very personal and fundamental levels. We need to embrace continuous education and self-inquiry. Why? Because without a compelling and personalized sense of mission, vision and purpose to fuel internal motivation, employees will lack the initiative, the “juice” to go through the challenges inherent in actualizing the personal change that is required.

Welcome to the reality of future shock. Over the last thirty years, we progressively removed predictability and survival from the workplace. Then, technology introduced change with such growing ferocity that today’s average college graduate will change careers, not just jobs, an average of four to six times. If we dare to expect the majority of our workers to engage, we need to help them become change experts in ways that are not only valuable for our organization but also in ways that are personally meaningful. Like every other set of skills, when and if our capacity to personally change becomes as natural as other relevant skills – navigating software platforms, mastering social media advertising, and the like – we will become more effective in responding to other organizational, market and technical changes that are continuously thrust upon us.

This is where many managers give up and organizations throw up their hands. This is where we look to the high potential and assume they are special because they learned self-promotion, accountability, personal drive, extensive people skills, and solid self-awareness. Why? We are certainly not teaching these skills and attributes in our schools. The average American family watches Television 4 hours a day. Out of the hundreds of families that I’m aware of, I can count on one hand the ones that routinely teach and role model these skills at home. The fact is, everyone needs these life skills today.

Is a positive and democratic outcome attainable? Absolutely. After awhile, investing in leader training becomes redundant. Why not invest in everyone’s ability to change? Afterward, why can’t we hold everyone accountable to change and engage? Why not jump start a culture revolution and sustain that revolution through internal mentorship? Why not build a workforce that is confident they can change with or without the organization?

We can only change and we can only engage if we teach each other how to connect, how to draw healthy attention to ourselves, how to build effective support systems, how to ask good questions and listen to the answers, how to become an active learner and how to conduct solid self-inquiry. Self-inquiry? Well, most people are tired of adopting other people’s vision and view the continuous drone of “buy-in” as manipulation. No, we have to get people to learn how to define their own vision and present that effectively, even if it leads to a departure. How can we possibly get people to own their vision and work if we don’t have the courage to help them define and articulate what they want? Or, to listen?

Is there going to be discomfort? I’ve observed that we are frightened with or without the ability to affect positive change. Without it, we stand in fear hoping we won’t lose what we have. With the skills, we experience the discomfort of growing. Here, we constantly learn how to be more, more capable, more gifted, more secure, more happy, more intentional, and more enthused about the future rather than pining for the past.

Which one shall we pick?

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

P: (310) 277-4850 / E: david@inspiredworkservices.com

(C) Copyright, Inspired Work, Inc. (2017) – All Rights Reserved

The post Why Learning Engagement Gives Us an Inspired Future appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

The very nature of growth includes discomfort! Personally, I’ve experienced far more growth when a big mountain of obstacle drops onto my road than when floating in the Jacuzzi. As growth speeds up, many of us choose to take time out by stepping into “Option Paralysis.” This one often accompanies the high performer who does indeed have options and her or his narrative goes a bit like this. “Well, I have clearly outgrown what I’m doing but there are so many other things I could do. I could write a book, go into a new profession, start my own business, take a year off and travel.” The conversation might sound good, perhaps even glamorous. But, it is just as paralyzing and ultimately unsatisfying as presenting oneself as “clueless.” Because it is cruel loving someone for their potential.

Option paralysis can also show up with the feigned conversation that if we pick one option, we will lose another. “I would really love to become a professional photographer but if I do that, I will not be able to open a restaurant.” Behind all of these dialogues are several possible conditions:

• It is frightening to change and the option paralysis narrative obscures the message.
• We are too busy, even frenzied to conduct a high-quality self-inquiry.
• We don’t have the skills to conduct an effective “this is it” self-inquiry.
• We don’t believe we will get the right help if we pursue our real ambition.

No one is immune to fear of change.

I find that the most positive and transformative change requires courage, which is far more different than waiting for that ideal state of being unafraid, which can take a lot of valuable time. In fact, waiting to be unafraid often ends with all options being taken off the table. One of my mentors once told me someone came to him and said, “If I do what I believe I was put on earth to do, it could turn my life upside down.” He responded, “Perhaps you have a life that is worth turning upside down.”

Getting past option paralysis can be one of the single most rewarding of life’s experiences. Why not choose vision?

Why not pursue the means to become more of yourself, to give more of yourself and to experience the reward of being fully used?

Two days ago, one of my clients told me he was making 50% more in his new business than he did in his c-level job just one year ago. What an affirmation! However, what I found was even more moving and powerful is that he just turned down a job that he would have grabbed in a heartbeat, also just one year ago. He said, “I have far more power today. I make a far greater difference.”

For those of us who pursue growth, that is what I believe we want to experience:

·     Work that matters.

·     Making a meaningful difference in the world.

·     If it is important to us, making more money doing that.

For me, proving we can do this is what matters to me.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

P: (310) 277-4850 / E: david@inspiredworkservices.com

(C) Copyright, Inspired Work, Inc. (2017) – All Rights Reserved

The post Do You Have Option Paralysis? appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

• The CEO comes to human resources and ask the CHRO to “fix the employee engagement problem.”
• By the time the CEO reaches the door, he or she is disengaged.
• The human resources executive touts the new employee engagement initiative. Employees look past his or her shoulder to the CEO and see business as usual.
• An employee survey is issued. The results make managers feel more inadequate than ever.
• We send managers to a retreat center to learn how to draw or manipulate more enthusiasm, engagement, and productivity from the talent. They return enthused and the employees respond, “so what.”
• The human resources executive is shown the door because yet another culture or engagement initiative failed.

The CEO is usually off the hook in these scenarios. Why? This siloed and dysfunctional treatment of talent is the norm. Remember that 8% of America’s organizations have healthy cultures and perhaps only 3% also have strongly engaged work environments. We usually call the latter “category leaders.” Most CEOs are fixated on market, product, and shareholders. They literally don’t want to be bothered with people. They will give lip service to placate but they won’t pick up the baton.

Talent executives commonly place themselves at risk because they don’t know what they don’t know or simply won’t develop the courage to speak up. It is the norm. When we examine environments that are fully engaged, the CEO is consistently on the front lines fully engaged with the culture. The role of the CHRO isn’t diminished in these environments, it is actually elevated. Because culture and talent are taken seriously by everyone. Now, we can roll up the sleeves and build an employer brand, acquire talent that fits the tribe, train employees to be engaged and become an employer of choice.

I routinely tell organizations before we even get to the conversation of how to create full engagement that if the CEO or business owner isn’t prepared to lead the initiative and create the culture to “Save your money and save your face. Don’t do it.” In settings such as this, we are happy to create a few fully engaged teams as a demonstration. Ultimately? Engagement must be led by #1 and built from the inside out – an exciting adventure.

Is there a payoff in changing the pattern? Absolutely! If only 13% of the world’s workers are engaged, we need to build engaged workers. That process not only improves productivity, it generates gratitude. Engagement creates loyal customers. It is worth an enormous amount of money. But, that will never happen if the people at the top above them are also going through the motions.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

P: (310) 277-4850 / E: david@inspiredworkservices.com

(C) Copyright, Inspired Work, Inc. (2017) – All Rights Reserved

The post The #1 Reason Human Resource Executives Get Thrown Under the Bus appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

But don’t expect it to look like the past! Today’s average college graduate will change careers not jobs four to six times. In practical terms what does that mean for someone graduating today?

First, the great gift of a formal education is that it shows us how to learn. Active learners already rule the world. In earlier generations, we got a degree, we got a job and we worked. Now, we learn and grow every single day. This represents a vast change in our culture but the big payoff is personal growth.

Next, the happiest careerists will understand how to use skilled self-inquiry to redirect and reinvent oneself in fulfilling ways as the world continues to accelerate around them. This is something we have been providing for years. Asking oneself the right questions produces clarity, vision, and self-confidence – traits that can be crucial with new graduates.

Finally, the life skills that all successful people have are no longer for the elite. They are requirements for all of us, especially if we intend to stay out of the scourge of under-employment. We have helped over 40,000 people understand why they need the skills of selling, influencing others, building relationships and developing effective support systems. These are skills many parents didn’t have to develop and are not taught in our school systems. The lack of these skills represents current employer’s single biggest complaint. It is a dastardly idea to assume they are going to pick them up on their own.

If you are a parent or someone that influences and mentors young people, the new graduate is often in an especially vulnerable period in coming up to speed and thriving in the work market. After decades Oh The Places You Will Gocontinues to be the #1 college graduate gift and while it speaks to many of the more innocent themes of becoming an adult, we suggest insights and skills they can use right here and right now.

If you have a fresh graduate coming into the world, this is:

The Best Graduate Gift Ever! (Click on Link!)

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The problem for many older (30-70) professionals is in executing successful personal change before it happens from the outside, often in unpleasant ways. Many believe they can’t change or that change is a difficult and unpleasant experience. But, successful change is based on regular and skilled self-inquiry plus developing the specific life skills that bring us success. Every month, individuals come into our programs and craft these vivid new life stories. Their experience is so immersive that not only do they emerge with a new mission, vision and purpose, they understand how to keep reinvention moving forward.

Mel Spiese is one of those individuals and his story demonstrates reinvention can happen with strikingly elegant outcomes. He grew up in a very loving and supportive family. But, they didn’t push him to excel. As college approached, he walked into an ROTC office and realized he wanted to stop being disappointed in himself. During that conversation, he saw the Marines as an opportunity to grow from being average to becoming a man of excellence.

I met Mel Spiese about thirty years later. He walked in the door of our Inspired Work Program as a highly awarded and regarded Major General. For many years, Mel was the Commander of Training and Education Command where he led one of the largest learning organizations in the world. My first impressions of him were of a gentleman filled with tremendous integrity and humility. But, he seemed at a loss of what to do with his life. I have always been respectful of participants who grow up in an organization. These individuals have unique challenges in moving forward because their identities are so tightly connected to their “home.” Mel was going through that experience.

There is often a magic moment that I can see is approaching with a participant, when it is about to come together. Mel was grappling with the answers he had written to some of our questions.

Intuitively, I said, “You hatch people.”

His eyes lit up and he quietly responded, “Yes, that is what I do.”

We continued, “How many people have you hatched?”

“Over 300,000.”

“Is there one other person in the world that could make that statement?”

You could hear a pin drop. It was his turning point.

Within the week, we were working on his business plan. We quickly discovered that McKinsey, Forbes and The Corporate Executive Board recognize the US Marines as the single most effective leadership organization in the world. This is because everyone becomes a leader through values-based training. When someone’s life is on the line, it really doesn’t matter if they are being covered by a high-potential or someone who came from a broken career, they had better be a leader and someone you can depend on. This is why everyone has to embrace the values and code of conduct developed by the Marines.

Mel once said to me, “We don’t have employee engagement issues with the Marines.”

What Mel brings to organizations isn’t a set of formulas, he brings a set of values that establish a daily code in how to live and how to work. Many of us think of military training with someone yelling at recruits and pushing them through risky maneuvers. But what turns every recruit into a leader at the Marines is the daily practice of honesty, integrity, care, humility and more. Practice the values and you become a stronger and better person. You become Mel. This is what makes his work so special. He creates leaders out of everyone. Not one employee or worker is left out.

There is a video we produced of Mel’s life is available on his home page. It was taken in my living room and I am proud to introduce him to our readers. To see it, click here.

What can all of us learn from his example:

• There is always the perfect place for us if we take the initiative to look
• We are often so close to our value that a little objectivity from others is helpful
• Courage is the commitment to take action, even when we are frightened

Today, Leaders Can Be Made delivers values-based training to organizations throughout the world. If you have any questions about Mel or about us, please feel free to reach out.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

P: (310) 277-4850 / E: david@inspiredworkservices.com

(C) Copyright, Inspired Work, Inc. (2017) – All Rights Reserved

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