STRATEGY CENTRAL

How often are you thinking about how you can improve what you’re doing?  One of the things that I’m always preaching to the organizations that I work with is that we can do this better!  I’ll go off on a mini-rant about the idea that we really should be able to tweak this or that and end up with a better result.  Of course, I do it in a good spirit…I don’t think anyone ever feels demeaned…it’s really just a hope to encourage the team to try a new thing next time.

I’m loving a lot of what I’m finding in Marshall Goldsmith’s book, What Got You Here Won’t Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful because it’s really all about getting better!  How about this way of asking for feedback from the team you work with?  Simply ask, "How can I get better?"  How’s that an improvement?  Many of us have made the mistake of asking, "What do you like about the way I’m doing what I’m doing?" or "What do you hate about what I’m doing?", but those are set ups for negativity.  That’s where, "How can I get better?" comes in.

Can you see this working for you?

How can I get better?

A somewhat frequent idea here at StrategyCentral is that the goal is to get to there.  What am I talking about?  Mostly I’m using "there" as a synonym for "vision".  Lots of us have a dream about how things might turn out for our organization.  But we might not give our own development a second thought.  And we should.  I love this line from What Got You Here Won’t Get You There:

"In the arc of what can be a long, successful career, you will always be in transit from ‘here to there‘.  Here can be a great place.  If you’re successful, here is exactly the kind of place you want to be…But here is also a place where you can be a success in spite of some gaps in your behavior or personal makeup.  That’s why you want to go ‘there‘ (p. 18)."

What’s the point?  In the same way that we implement a strategy to help our organization move in the right direction…we can have a personal plan.  Do you have one?  This book likes like one that’s going to to have a lot to say to me.  I’ll keep you posted.