A Greatness Formula for 2009
January 5th, 2009If you want to be great in 2009, simply model the behaviors of leaders who have consistent records of greatness. Achieving greatness in 2009 consists of three components:
- Thinking
- Behaviors
- Alignment
Check out this excellent article on Becoming Great from Ray Brun, who directs The Alternative Board in the Bay Area of California.
Happy New Year and Best Wishes for Health, Wealth and Prosperity!
Joe Zente
How Your Business Can Be Like the Miami Dolphins in 2009
The biggest one-season turn-around in NFL history! Worst to First. How does a team go from 1-15 to 11-5 in just one short year? The answer is simple. When Bill Parcells took over the reigns in Miami this year, the first thing he did was let everyone there know that losing would not be tolerated. He had won everywhere he had been and the Dolphins would be no exception. He started out by raising the standard from Good(or was it Awful?) to Excellent.
Once those who accepted losing were kicked off the bus, everything else fell into place, because there was no one to drag everyone else down. And that, my fellow business owners, is how you are going to make it easier for positive change in the challenging year ahead. That is how you are going to go from good (or bad) to great. There will be no shortage of gloom and doom and naysayers in 2009. To survive, you must be around people who have a mindset of “I refuse to participate in this recession!”
Parcells fired all the leaders of the 1-15 calamity and hired a disciple of discipline, who had been his offensive coordinator when Parcells was the Big Ka-Tuna for the Cowboys. He then went on to do what all great companies do, and what Jim Collins, author of Good to Great calls, "getting the right people on the bus”. Collins had discovered in his extensive research that great companies made it their top priority to get great talent. For Parcells this meant 29 new players out of a 53 player squad. Out with all those who weren’t right for his bus and in with those who were.
I find it amazing that with new front office staff, new coaches, new players and a new system that everyone had to learn in a short period of time, they still went from 1 win to 11 wins in just one season. What would happen in your business if you went “Out with everyone who accepted failure, In with those who would do whatever it takes to win?”
Members of The Alternative Board have heard what Collins says- “Money is a commodity but Talent is not”. Here at TAB East Bay North we have honored many members with, “The Good-To-Great TAB Bus” as reinforcement to taking positive actions. Actually for most of the award winners it was not because talent they hired but because they finally harnessed the support and accountability they needed to make the tough decisions and get certain people off the bus. Attitude was right there with Talent when it came to improvement.
Speaking of attitude, this week’s Fairfield Daily Republic asks, “What housing crisis?” as it discusses TAB East Bay North member Steve Spencer, managing partner of Gateway Realty in the article, Realty Firm Turns Tide in November. The DR says Gateway Realty “posted their best November in five years”, but I know that this was actually their fifth straight strong month. I am not surprised that they are profitable during a recession because Steve has always stood firm with his philosophy of looking for opportunity when others just see problems. Steve, his partner, Bev, and their hundred-plus real estate agents have managed to survive one of the toughest markets anywhere, Solano County, and are now leveraging on the unique opportunities of an emerging entry-level market and investor opportunists.
Please pardon my USC bias for just one more football example of what you must do in 2009. Eight years ago, Peter Carroll was brought in to coach a ghastly football program of losing at the University of Southern California. For seven straight years he has continuously pounded his philosophy of “Win Forever” deep into the fibers of everyone associated with the USC program. His positive mindset as represented in that simple two-word mantra has been internalized by every USC team member. They have gone on to deliver him seven straight top-five national ranking finishes, seven Pac-10 championships, seven major bowls, and seven 11-win seasons for the USC Trojans.
What is your philosophy? Can you state it in one short sentence? As you develop your philosophy, remember that wherever you need to improve, all you must do is to change old belief systems and automatic, moment- by-moment "unthinking" thought patterns. What you do dictates what you get in your life. Thoughts and beliefs of yourself and your people are what determine what you do and how well you do it. All growth starts there. It starts inside your mind.
What is in your mind as you begin 2009? What is in the minds of your team members? Can you think of any time in our business lives where this type of mindset and leadership has been more important?
From the team here at The Alternative Board, we wish you a Happy and Prosperous New Year.
Ray Brun
Owner/Facilitator of TAB East Bay North
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