Things you can learn from Leadership Books

So you have a 30 minute drive to work. As you get into your car, you start thinking about what you need to do during the day. Within 5 minutes, you have a pretty clear list of 5 things to do during the day. The rest of the 25 minutes, your mind follows all kinds of paths around those 5 things losing clarity on what you were thinking about and spending a lot of your limited mental energy. If you really want to be productive, record those 5 things to do on your phone and turn up the radio. The mind takes energy and running it without being able to take action is wasteful!

Another thought from the book? Everyone believes they need to multitask in order to be productive. We have text messaging, emails, phone calls, instant messaging, and random visitors stepping into our office all happening continuously throughout the day. What is the impact of all of this noise on our ability to think? For a woman, it is the equivalent to smoking a joint while at work. For a man, it is 3 times worse. Constantly checking emails, phones, texts, visitors, and all other forms of information without prioritizing and limiting access limits your mind and makes you dumber. Your IQ drops. Want proof? Have you ever solved a complex business problem? Have you ever taken and passed a really hard test? Have you ever walked into a room and forgotten why you walked in? The difference between these complex tasks and stumbling over your own 2 feet is focus.

This book should be a standard for anyone who 1) has a brain and 2) uses it at work. The potential is nothing less than instant productivity!

Steve Jobs is widely considered to be one of the greatest of American minds. From his role in developing some of the first personal computers to his involvement in Pixar all the way to the development of the iPod, iPhone, and iPad, there are few people who haven't been impacted by his genius.

However, his biography reveals some complexity in his success that gives us some insights into true leadership abilities. People who worked with Jobs talk about his "reality distortion zone" where he would often ignore the truth in favor of his own vision. He was often a jerk who put people down who wouldn't or couldn't stand up to him. Yet, he managed to surround himself time and time again with great minds whose strengths could help take his ability to melt humanity together with technology to develop revolutionary products.

This is a MUST read for leaders everywhere!

CHANGE ANYTHING by the Authors of Crucial Conversations
Crucial Conversations is an absolute staple for anyone who works with other people (which is EVERYONE) and one of the authors has reached out to let us know that they are publishing a new book called "Change Anything". This will be a guide for changing behavior. You can check out their launch website and get a coupon for the book by clicking on the picture.

ENTRELEADERSHIP by Dave Ramsey
Twitter is buzzing with the announcement of a new book by Dave Ramsey called EntreLeadership. Dave Ramsey is a well known radio personality, author, and creator of Financial Peace University, a program that helps people understand the perils of debt and helps them find financial freedom. I always enjoy Dave's straight forward style and I look forward to reading his new book.

If you want tidbits, you can follow @EntreLeadership on Twitter.

If there aren't enough hours in the day for you, you don't need to get less sleep or spend less time with your family... you need a system. It is amazingly easy for the human mind to get distracted. An interruption of work flow doesn't cause an instant of interruption. It causes several minutes in a state of poor focus that takes time to recover. We also become inefficient when we have too many competing thoughts in our head. The secret is to have a system that organizes the noise. Your system brings order to the chaos.

Here are some quick tips for becoming more efficient with your time.
1) Don't answer the phone if you are busy.
2) Don't check emails until you are ready (turn off that chime alert)
3) Got an idea? Write it down!
4) Don't just think of daily tasks... think big picture too.

How in the world do you motivate people?!?

The truth is that people come pre-motivated. Science discovered this years ago with multiple experiments that started with monkeys and ended in businesses. Intrinsic Motivation is the most powerful and lasting type of motivation out there. Extrinsic Motivation (from rewards or threats) are like caffeine... they provide a short boost of energy followed by a crash. Yes... this includes all of those fancy bonuses and payment structures that exist in the business world.

People are self motivated when they live in an environment where 3 characteristics exist.
1) Competence - The better a person is at doing something, the more they want to do it.
2) Autonomy - Having a choice in "how" something is done is something everyone wants (if they are good at doing it)
3) Relatedness - The "why" is important after all... we want to feel like we are doing something for a good reason.

Every person is a like a man riding an elephant. Most of the time, the man is in control of the direction they go. Then a tiger comes out of the woods and the elephant takes over. The man represents our intellectual side. We "know" that we need to exercise or spend more time improving our business. The elephant represents our emotional side. 5AM is awfully early to wake up and go to the YMCA... and we hit the snooze button. The secret to accomplishing change is to find a path that directs the rider and motivates the elephant.

An employee of a large company wants to present an idea that will change the company, but she knows that it will meet resistance. She could show a series of charts and graphs and logically present her case, but that is only appealing to the riders in the room. Instead, she brings her idea to life in the room filling everyone with real excitement. Then she clearly plots a path toward making the "dream" a reality. This is how change happens.

People don't like the word "manipulation", but there are times when we need to sell people on our ideas. You can have all of the greatest ideas in the world and be completely ineffective if you have little or no influence on the people around you. Selling your ideas in a team environment is an important skill. The key is to remember that people buy on emotion, then justify with logic. When you truly have a great idea, you are probably passionate about it. Focus on why you are passionate about the idea and then get others fired up. Paint a picture of what life would be like if your new idea was implemented.

The counterbalance to this is that within a team, you must be open to the ideas of others as well. No one is strong in all areas. "Winning" does not mean that everyone accepts your ideas and moves on. "Winning" means that the best ideas were put out on the table and joined to form the best possible solution for everyone involved. Still... it starts with you being able to "sell".

It is amazing how interconnected everything is and much of that connectivity is not intentional. One example from the book is how much climate models are impacted by the amount of financing they receive. Models that get used are more likely to be used as the basis for new models which takes the entire climate model down a path that is largely impacted by economics. When you think about who pays for climate models, you begin to see the complex interactions at play.

As leaders, the key takeaway of this is that complex actions lead to complex results. Complicated processes or reward systems are very likely to have unintended consequences. Simple solutions are best when possible.

Stop Workplace Drama
by Marlene Chism

I've had the pleasure of seeing Marlene in action and if this book is half as energetic, you will enjoy it. Marlene's trademark "Stop your Drama!" presentations are well known and unfortunately, they are applicable in almost every workplace. I have just started reading this book, but I am already enjoying it. This is certainly worth checking out.