Service

Service as Success

You don’t hire people to work for you, you hire people so you can work for them.  Your job as a leader is to help people succeed.  In his book, The Stuff of Heroes: The Eight Universal Laws of Leadership, William Cohen said, “Helping your employees is as important as, and many times more so than, trying to get the most work out of them.” 

You start with service. The basis for your actions as a leader should be the service you are providing to your team.  What are you doing to help them succeed? That is the number one question.

“It is high time the ideal of success should be replaced with the ideal of service.” ― Albert Einstein

You will get to know yourself through your service.  Helping other succeed causes us to dig deep into our knowledge and abilities.  Pulling from all you can to provide the best individual service to each person will hone your skills and perhaps lead you to solutions you might never have otherwise seen. 

“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” ― Mahatma Gandhi

Your success is defined by the success of those you serve. Leaders like to win, so how do you keep score in the area of service?  Simple, it’s the success of those you serve.  Their success is your success.

“True leadership must be for the benefit of the followers, not to enrich the leader.” ― John C. Maxwell

Do your employees love your company’s service?

employee experience leads to customer experienceWhy do people love Starbucks? If you have ever received surveys asking you to rate your most recent stop you know what Starbucks thinks is important. There is one question about the product and one about the price, all of the rest of the questions are about the service. Everything from the speed of service, to my favorite – did the employees make the visit special. If you visit the same Starbucks frequently, the employees usually know your name and the drink you order before you tell them – that certainly makes for a special visit. Yes, some people say the cost of a cup of coffee is too high here, but as Starbucks CEO, Howard Schultz says, “Cutting prices or putting things on sale is not sustainable business strategy.”

Higher cost with better service – how does Starbucks make this work? It started with the predecessor company to what we now know as Starbucks, Il Giornale Coffee Company. In his 1986 letter to employees Schultz outlined how a focus on service for the employees would lead to a focus on service for the customers.

“We believe in hiring exceptional people who are willing to work for exceptional results. In exchange, we are committed to the development of our good people by identifying, cultivating, training, rewarding, promoting those individuals who are committed to moving our company forward.”

I summarize it like this, “Customers are willing to invest in your company when they receive great service from your employees. Employees are willing to serve your customers when they receive great investment from your company.”

Here are the three ways you should invest in service of your employees to bring about great customer service:

Serve them. The leaders job is first and foremost to take care of their employees so they can take care of the customers. How do you do that? Talk with them, coach them, mentor them, invest your knowledge wisdom and time into them. This is the best way.

“We built the Starbucks brand first with our people, not with customers. Because we believed the best way to meet and exceed the expectations of our customers was to hire and train great people, we invested in employees.” – Howard Schultz

Support them. Give them what they need. Anticipate and deliver what you think they need. Ask and then deliver what you know they need. Think of the employee experience as they deliver the customer experience.   What do they need to make their job more productive and more enjoyable?

“You can’t expect your employees to exceed the expectations of your customers if you don’t exceed the employees’ expectations of management.” – Howard Schultz

Share with them. With service and support of the employees you can expect to see the results in the success of the company. Make sure you share that success. While every company is different in its means and methods of sharing, this is an important motivator. At Starbucks, employees are called Partners. Each year most Partners receive restricted stock called Bean Stock.

“Success is best when it is shared. Every time we raise value for a shareholder, we raise value for our people.” – Howard Schultz

Here are a few facts on the results of this service to employees:

Starbucks is the fifth most admired company in the world, according to Fortune magazine, and is the number one company worldwide in the food service industry.

  • Starbucks is ranked in the top 50 best companies to work for by Glassdoor.
  • Starbucks stock is up 17,300 percent since it went public in 1992.

Leadership success is the success of those your serve

service to others, albert einsteinA true leader is the one who strives for the success of others. Tom Peters, bestselling author of In Search for Excellence said, “Organizations exist to serve. Period. Leaders live to serve. Period.”

Now your service to those you lead won’t make them successful. Your job as a leader is to provide the opportunities for success to happen. Your service is to open doors, encourage your team to discover and use their strengths, teach and mentor, and focus on the vision. Those on the receiving end of your service must work hard to use the opportunities provided to succeed.

 

“The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between, the leader is a servant.” – Max de Pree

In the end, the leader who strives for the success of others will receive more in return than those who focus on their own success.

“What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world, is and remains immortal.” – Albert Pine

Your success as a leader is defined by the success of those your serve.

Those who don’t serve aren’t successful in the long run: Regardless of their position Regardless of their authority Regardless of their responsibility

Those that do serve are successful in the long run: Because of their words Because of their actions Because of their results

It is all very simple. As Mohammad Ali said, “Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.”

INVESTING IN PEOPLE

The Secret allocate our resourcesToday’s post is from our guest author, Mark Miller.

Ten years ago Mark and Ken Blanchard wrote a classic business fable titled The Secret. Today they are releasing a new 10th anniversary edition which includes a leadership self-assessment so readers can measure to what extent they lead by serving and where they can improve. The authors also have added answers to the most frequently asked questions about how to apply the SERVE model in the real world.

As practical as it is uplifting, The Secret shares Blanchard’s and Miller’s wisdom about leadership in a form that anyone can easily understand and implement.  This book will benefit not only those who read it but also the people who look to them for guidance and the organizations they serve.

The forward is written by my friend and mentor John C. Maxwell who said, “My challenge to you is simple: learn The Secret—then apply The Secret. If you do, your leadership and your life will be transformed forever. “

INVESTING IN PEOPLE

In challenging economic times, one of the easiest items to cut from the budget is training and development. The rationale is understandable. Rarely will any organization see immediate negative consequences when training is discontinued. It looks like found money in the budgeting process.

Unfortunately, this logic is flawed. Learning and development is like time-released medication: the benefits are derived over time.

Imagine someone who believes they don’t need to save for retirement. This month, even this year, they see no ill effects from their decision. However, if you play the movie forward, many of these same people live their final years in poverty. The decision not to save was painless in the moment – the pain arrives later.

Today I want to respond to a question I received just last week from a business leader: “Why should we invest in learning and development for our staff?” There are many reasons. Here are some of mine…

  • Improve performance – Learning and development may not have immediate impact on the Profit and Loss statement, but it better have long-term impact. We help people grow so we can help the business grow.
  • Ensure an adequate supply of prepared leadership for the future – We’re trying to build a leadership pipeline. This will not happen without thoughtful design and construction. Pipelines don’t build themselves.
  • Increase individual and organizational capacity – Growth should generate capacity. Every organization I know of is asking their people to do more with less. Without new thinking and methods, this mandate is a prescription for disaster.
  • Establish common language and models – When people align their thinking, it’s much easier to align their actions. My favorite example of this is around the topic of leadership. Does your organization have a common definition of leadership? If not, you’ll always struggle to create a leadership culture.
  • Build cultural cohesiveness – Shared learning experiences create common bonds. These experiences also help us grow a small company. Doing life together, including learning, fosters a unified culture.
  • Help staff increase their level of contribution – If you’ve created a healthy organization, people want to contribute at a higher level. People want to add more value. Learning and development facilitates this.
  • Introduce new best practices – Left to their own, organizations can easily become insulated from the outside world. They settle into patterns of behavior that often do not represent global best practices. Investments in learning and development can mitigate this tendency.
  • Combat complacency and stagnation – Living things grow. Growth creates energy and movement. Investments in learning and development are like water on a plant. Without it, growth is stunted and death is not far behind.
  • Maintain people as a competitive advantage – Are your people a competitive advantage for your organization? If so, an on-going investment will be required to maintain that edge. If they’re not, you’ll never enjoy that advantage without investing in them.
  • For me, there’s one more reason to invest in learning and development. I don’t see our people as an asset… I see them as a gift. I want to steward that gift well.
  • Mark Miller believes that leadership is not something that’s exclusive; within the grasp of an elite few, but beyond the reach of everyone else.  In the tenth anniversary edition of The Secret, Miller reminds readers of a seemingly contradictory concept: to lead is to serve. With more than 600,000 books in print, Mark has been surprised by the response and delighted to serve leaders through his writing.

 

 

The Key To Leadership Likeability: Help Out!

napoleon hill help others succeedLeadership Likeability is simply, “Doing something good for someone that helps in someway.” 

Leadership Likeability isn’t about how you can get your team to like you; it’s about how you can influence your team to help each other and others outside of your team. 

When one of your team needs help, do you want another member of the team stopping to decide what’s in it for them before they lend a hand? Of course not.  That’s why it’s up to you to set the example of helping others, even if it doesn’t appear that it will benefit you.     

“Example is the school of mankind, and they will learn at no other.” – Edmund Burke

Why is helping others important for your team?

It’s the right thing to do. We have all benefited from someone else’s help at some time in our lives.

“Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.”  – Mohammad Ali

It isn’t as hard as it seems. Helping others is really nothing more than small things done consistently.  

“Great opportunities to help seldom come, but small ones surround us every day.” – Sally Koch

It has great personal rewards. If you want to be a successful leader with a successful team, than helping others is the way to get there.

Brian Tracy says “Successful people are always looking for opportunities to help others.  Unsuccessful people are always asking, ‘What’s in it for me?’” Here is how that works according to Tracy, “The more you help others, the more they will want to help you.”

 

How to be a Likeable Leader

Likeable - Dale Carnegie making friendsThey key to being a likable leader is to achieve both the “What” and the “How.”

What – People will like you for achieving success for the company (or team) and the individual.

How – People will like you for setting the strategy for the company to succeed and providing opportunities for the individual to succeed.

What does a likeable leader do?

Success for the company (or team).  How do you define success for your company or team? It’s about the results:  Sales, Profits, Stabilization of the Community, Growth, Returns, Market-Share…There are many ways to say it, but in the end success for a company is measured by achieving the results that the industry demands.  It’s hard to be a likeable leader if you can’t provide a source of income for the people in your company or on your team.

“Effective leadership is not just about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results.” – Peter Drucker

Success for the individual.  What about the people that make up any company.  Their company or team is doing well, is that enough?  The answer is no.  By achieving success for the company or team you have provided stability and also a sense of pride in the group.  But people are more than just members of a team, they are individuals and individuals have their own dreams and desires.  Do you know what the individual dreams and desires are of the people in your company or on your team?  If not, how can you hope to help them fulfill that need?

“All successful people are big dreamers. They imagine what their future could be, ideal in every respect, and then they work every day toward their distant vision, that goal or purpose.” – Brian Tracy

How does a likeable leader do it?

Strategy for the company (or team).  The leaders job is to decide on the goals that once achieved will bring success.  And just as important, the leader picks the path that the whole company or team will take to achieve its goals (including where not to go). No company or team can hope to achieve long term success without a winning strategy. 

“Strategy is about making choices, trade-offs; it’s about deliberately choosing to be different…The company without a strategy is willing to try anything.” – Michael Porter

Opportunity for the individual.  Leaders must always keep in mind that a company or team is made up of individuals.  Your goals and plans may be strategic and energizing, but Monday morning comes and each person in your in your company or on your team has to know what they can do to help achieve the goals while bettering themselves. A company’s or team’s success is the sum of the individual’s successes.

“All that is valuable in human society depends upon the opportunity for development accorded the individual.” – Albert Einstein

Finally, here are a few daily exercises for the likeable leader:

Lighten up your approach

“If you look back on all the teachers that you liked, I am sure you will find they were very entertaining.” – Bill Nye

Look up and see others

“You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”  – Dale Carnegie

Lift up other people

 “Basically, likeability comes down to creating positive emotional experiences in others. When you make others feel good, they tend to gravitate to you.”  – Tim Sanders

 

Future, Present, Past – Three views of a leader

Losers-live-in-the-past_-Winners-learn-from-the-past-and-enjoy-working-in-the-present-toward-the-future_It appears as if the order of the words in the title are backwards – Future, Present, Past. But when it comes to leadership this is the correct order. Let me tell you why I say focus first the future, then the present, then the past.

When you are leading a team the first question they will have is, “If we follow you where will be going?”  Your team views the future possibilities with you as their leader.

The second question they have is “Now that we are following you do I like where we are going?” Your team views the impact of you as their leader in the present.

Their last question is “Now that we have followed you, do I like where I ended up?” Your team views the past and what they learned that helped them become the leader they are today.

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Lead from the inside out – this time it is all about you

Sometimreal riches are insidees leaders need to look inside and reflect on themselves. Your actions may be visible and impactful to everyone around you, but are they still connected to the core of your leadership strength – the desire to help others succeed? What happens when your leadership focus slowly switches from each individual succeeding, to your personal success in making that happen? Albert Einstein once said, “It would be a sad situation if the wrapper were better than the meat wrapped inside it.”

Here are three key areas that leaders should focus on as they lead from the inside out:

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Do all the good you can; for all the people you can; as long as you can.

Last week I had the honor of gathering stories of a life dedicated to serving others.  A great friend that I was blessed to work with for over eight years passed away.  He had had a lasting impact on my life, and over the last week I have seen that his positive influence reached farther than I had ever imagined. do all the good you can

John Wesley said the purpose of life is to “Do all the good you can, By all the means you can, In all the ways you can, In all the places you can, At all the times you can, To all the people you can, As long as ever you can.”

I reflected on this statement from Wesley while reading the stories about my friend.  Each story was unique and came from a variety of people from high school friends, college friends, work friends, and family.  But the message was always the same and I think the best epitaph anyone could receive: “Thank you for making a difference in my life.”

The takeaway for me was to rededicate myself to using every opportunity to add value to another person.  That’s why we are here.  Mohammad Ali said, “Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.”

I also realized that the service you do will mostly be small and passing events each day, and that is ok.  Aesop said, “No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.”

My friend was one of the happiest people I ever knew, and a life of service was his secret. Helen Keller said, “The unselfish effort to bring cheer to others will be the beginning of a happier life for ourselves.”

 

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