I remember the time when many of the factories in the area of Wales where I grew up came under Japanese ownership and management. The new attitudes, methods and approach were nothing short of a huge shock to the local managers and workers! I remember having a conversation with one of the top executives at that time when he explained to me about the Japanese bosses’ visit to their factory . They had prepared thoroughly for their arrival and didn’t think there was much room for improvement. However, this was not the opinion of the visiting bosses! Their belief was that there was always room to improve.
That improvement might be very small but it was necessary. An improvement in quality, speed, process, safety, leadership or productivity – it didn’t matter what but it needed to happen!
This is the time when a new word was introduced to the local vocabulary, KAIZEN, a Japanese word that means "continuous improvement". Kaizen was a system that involved everyone in the factory, from top management to the cleaning crew. Everyone was encouraged to come up with small improvement suggestions on a regular basis. This was not a once-a-month or once-a-year activity. It was continuous.
In most cases the suggestions were not ideas for major changes. Kaizen is based on making little changes on a regular basis: always improving productivity, safety, effectiveness and efficiency while, at the same time, reducing waste.
Adopting the Kaisen corporate approach to our personal world can have a big impact. Small changes consistently made will have big results in our lives. The minutes we spend each day on managing some aspect of time usage could result in the future in having hours to spend doing something of greater value.
Kaizen is avoiding the crash diet weight loss method in favour of eating one bite less at each meal. Then, a month later, eating two bites less. Kaizen, as one person described it, is starting a life-changing exercise programme by standing, yes, just standing on a treadmill for one minute a day.
So, if you are slowly seeing the Kaizen way, why don’t you start your own personal Kaizen?
•The first step is to sit down and make a list of all the areas you want to improve in.
•The second step is to write down the one small next action you need to take in the direction of improvement.
•The third step is to take it!
Finally, set a date to review the above and apply it once again.
Make your improvements small and gentle and you'll stick with them.Remember, Kaizen is based on making little changes on a regular basis.
“To get through the hardest journey, we need take only one step at a time, but we must keep on stepping”
I once made a statement that my family to this day won’t allow me to forget and won’t accept either that the words were taken out of context! It was while we were walking away from the Eiffel Tower-inspired lattice tower in Tokyo that I said something like “… and that was probably the best day of my life.”
Once I’d uttered those words I believe it was my elder daughter who jumped in first with the comment – ‘Oh yes Dad, better than your wedding day? Better than the day your children were born?’
Trust me, no attempt on my part to put my statement in context as I am about to do in this blog, will prevent my family from repeating their version of the story where my wedding day and my children’s births rank beneath this other event in my life.
Of all the conferences and events that I have attended, there’s one day that stands out as the best. It was held in the heart of London and it cost me a lot in time and money to attend. I’d invited others to go with me but ended up going on my own and on the homeward train journey I recall thinking:‘Today’s been worth every pound and every minute spent. It was certainly an effort well worth making.’
The day of teaching I attended was a day on Leadership Training and it was the first time I’d been at a ‘live’ John Maxwell event. I’d read some of his books, heard him on CD but I’d never experienced him live. Little did I know back then that one day I would be one of his team, certified to teach his material and train others to be better leaders.
The conversation as I walked with my family back into downtown Tokyo was triggered because my younger son had just finished and enjoyed one of John Maxwell’s shorter books The Difference Maker: Making Your Attitude Your Greatest Asset. If you want a book that is an easy introduction to the Maxwell Library, then I recommend this one heartily!
I believe that the time, effort and money invested in developing ourselves, ranks as the best investments we will ever make. How much time effort and money are you setting aside to invest in yourself as you prepare plan the year ahead?
Without a doubt I can pinpoint significant events or times in my life that are defining moments or turning points.
One of the tests I have for using the label Defining Moment for an encounter with someone, a book read or a CD listened to is the answer to the question – Has it stood the test of time?
One such event took place back in 1999 in Atlanta. It had been a long day of meetings and workshops but although I was tired I decided to attend a two hour evening session to listen to a speaker I had never heard of. The meeting title was “How to have your best year ever”, and the speaker was Jim Rohn.
I could have listened for another 2 hours! I have listened to that talk time and again and to many other talks given by Jim Rohn. I have quoted him regularly and continue to listen to him on CD as I travel.
What is it about him that has such lasting appeal? That is a question I asked myself as I was listening to one of his CD’s for the fourth time during last week! The answer is ‘I don’t know’! Certainly I have heard greater orators and what he says is so often just plain common sense. Yet I find him captivating and many of his quotes come to mind regularly, inspiring me to go on if I’m flagging or to redirect my thinking if my thought patterns are becoming fuzzy.
Jim Rohn always focuses on the fundamentals of human behavior that most affect personal and business performance and his is the standard to which those who seek to teach and inspire others are compared. He possessed the unique ability of bringing extraordinary insights to ordinary principles and events.
The amusing impression I get from people who recently listened to me speak for 40 minutes, is that all they remember is a Jim Rohn quote that I used! Friends are still coming up to me and saying: ‘I know, I’m not a tree!’
I refer to Jim Rohn often in my blogs and, to end this particular one, I will quote him fully so that you have some context for the ‘I’m not a tree’ comments’:
‘If you are not happy with where you are, move. You are not a tree’.
Sometimes I come across a quote, a phrase or a statement that stops me in my tracks. It’s not always because it contains 100% truth or is profound in some way. In fact, at times, a statement that contains more falsehood than truth can stop me in my tracks! What makes these statements special for me is that they cause me to press ‘pause’ and ponder their content.
One such statement is:
“You spend every minute of your day doing things you said ‘yes’ to.”
This statement is one that, sometimes, I think contains 100% truth and at other times, 50% truth at the most! However, the sentence does cause me to press that pause button and gives me time to think about choices, decisions, time and, yes, whether I should say ‘no’ more often.
I know that more often than not, when I’m over-worked, lacking margin, feeling pressure or unable to meet a deadline, it’s because I’ve defaulted to saying ‘Yes’ when I should have said ‘No’.
Reading an article titled 8 Essential Strategies to Saying ‘No’, I was struck by strategy Number 3 – Value Your Time. Time - I only have a finite amount of it - is probably my most valuable asset. So why do I mismanage it by avoiding saying ‘No’ to what will rob me of its best use?
There are six key types of time which we all need:
• Creative and productive • Physically energetic and active • Playful and entertaining • Learning and developing • Reflective and spiritual • Restful and relaxing
Which type am I missing out most on? And more to the point, would saying ‘No’ more often make a difference?
During a talk I gave on ‘Building a Legacy’, I introduced the term ‘a Frasier moment’ to describe a moment or an event that, if used positively, can become a defining moment in life.
I coined this term after watching an episode of Frasier from Series 7 called The Late Dr. Crane
In this episode, Frasier finds himself confronted with an announcement that he has died and ends up reading his own obituary! It is a very funny episode and this particular incident is especially so.
As Frasier reads his obituary he begins to reflect on everything that he’d hoped to have accomplished during his lifetime and he finds himself a little surprised at how he is described in the obituary! Regrets immediately begin to form in his mind until he is quickly reminded by his assistant Roz that he is not actually dead and that he still has time to alter the course of his life and thus end it with fewer regrets.
Being confronted by one’s own death is a sobering moment and most of us, hopefully, will go through life without ever having the experience. However, there is a lot of evidence to suggest that engineering such an event and working through the consequences of looking back over life from its end can alter life direction and help a person to re-evaluate priorities before it’s too late.
Examples of this engineering process can be found in many books and personal development programmes.
• One of the habits S Covey regards as one of the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is to ‘begin with the end in mind’. • In his great book The E-myth Revisited, Michael Gerber goes so far as to get the reader to imagine sitting in his own funeral listening to what those who mourn his passing are saying about him! • Dan Sullivan has a powerful exercise for the participants of his Strategic Coach Programme called ‘Absolutely Unacceptable Regrets’. The starting point is answering the question: “At the end, what would be the 5 regrets that you absolutely don’t want to have about your life?”
I encourage you to carve out some time from your schedule to look back on your life from a future point - be that 10 years from now or from a ‘Frasier moment’. This kind of reflection is foundational to us at Pedalion when we work on creating ‘A plan for life....and beyond’.
“Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music.”
Angela Monet
Several times over the past two weeks I have been stopped in my tracks by what I can only describe as the passion people have for certain things, things that other people could not muster a moment’s interest in let alone sink their life savings into!
Let me mention two examples that will help illustrate this:
At the moment I am enjoying Howard Schultz’s latest book Onward: How Starbucks Fought For Its Life Without Losing Its Soul. Within the first dozen pages of this book by the founder of Starbucks I find myself amazed once again at the passion he has for coffee. I say ‘once again’ because the same sense of amazement hit me when I read his first book Pour Your Heart Into It.
I sense that Shultz might very well have caught this passion for coffee during his visit to Italy in 1982, a trip he describes as the seed that blossomed into the Starbucks Coffee Company of today. Watching a barrista prepare an espresso for him in Milan prompted Schultz to think, “This is not his job, it’s his passion”.
The other illustration of passion comes from a video in which people talk about “one of those useless sports” that “has no value to society” yet they are prepared to launch a magazine about it and to “put their life savings into it without a blink”. What the founders of The Surfers Journal have achieved because of their passion for surfing is legendary. And the video is produced by another legend, Yvon Chouinard, the founder of the clothing and gear company Patagonia.
In order for you to get a feel of this ‘passion’ the best I can do is give you the link to the video - http://www.youtube.com/user/patagoniavideo - and suggest that you take 10 minutes out of your schedule to watch it. I’m sure you will feel more relaxed and inspired afterwards!
Reading these books and watching the video made me think that if I had half the passion that Schultz has for coffee and that Steve and Debee Pezman have for surfing, then I could accomplish 100 times more than I am achieving at present!
If you don’t drink coffee and would never surf don’t think that there isn’t anything you could be passionate about - Make it a priority to find your passion.
“If there is no passion in your life, then have you really lived? Find your passion, whatever it may be. Become it, and let it become you and you will find great things happen FOR you, TO you and BECAUSE of you.”
“The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never score.”
Bill Copeland
Discussing, setting and teaching on goals plays a big part in client meetings. However there is inevitably a debate as to the effectiveness of goal setting and whether having them is of any value or not. I have read the key books on goal setting and achievement and listened to great speakers teach on the subject. I have experienced the benefit of setting goals and also enjoyed reading the classic book “Goal free living” by Stephen M Shapiro.
When the opportunity came to listen to Bill Hybels ‘live’ and not on cassette tape or video recorder, I jumped at the chance. And the three day conference I attended in The Cardiff Arena was indeed a turning point in my life. I left there with renewed vision, restored belief and a recognition of the immense responsibility that leaders have no matter in which sphere of life they lead.
Since then I have listened time and again to his talks on cd, have read his books and attend nearly every conference he speaks at. Certain men you come to respect and admire more than others and Bill Hybels stands apart as a leader of leaders.
Picture courtsey of Carlos Porto and FreeDigitalPhotos.net
I recently encouraged a number of clients to read the following story that’s a familiar one to me. It’s the kind of story I need to read from time to time to correct my perspective. Pedalion is all about reorganizing life around what’s important. Discovering what is important and not losing sight of it, that’s the hard part! Enjoy the story.
A young businessman was at the pier of a small coastal village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Seeing several large yellowfin tuna inside the small boat, the businessman complimented the fisherman on the quality of the fish and asked how long it took to catch them. "Only a little while", the fisherman replied.
A little surprised, the young business man asked, "Why didn't you stay out longer and catch more fish?" The content fisherman said, "This is enough to support my family's immediate needs. I don't need any more." "But what do you do with the rest of your time?" asked the confused young man. "I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take a walk with my wife, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my buddies; I have a full and busy life."
The lad scoffed, "I am a Harvard MBA and could help you. You should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds buy a bigger boat with the proceeds from the bigger boat you could buy several boats, eventually you would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman you would sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing and distribution. You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to LA and eventually NYC where you will run your expanding enterprise."
The fisherman asked, "How long will this all take?" to which the young man replied, "15-20 years." "But what then?" The business man laughed and said "That's the best part. When the time is right you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich, you would make millions."
"Millions, sir? Then what?"
"Then you would retire, move to a small coastal fishing village where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take a walk with your wife, stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your buddies."
I remember being attracted to and buying a book in Barnes and Noble called ‘Die Broke’. It was a book that I couldn’t put down and one that I referred to for a long time afterwards. It remains on my book shelf and has been read by a number of clients too.
It attracted me initially because it challenged conventional thinking. In the world of finance, business and marketing I love that kind of book (for more thoughts on this read the blog Holiday Reading which will be up soon). The author advocates a fresh thinking on retirement - how to live more sensibly until you die and what to leave as an inheritance after you die.
Here are some of the reasons why I liked the book when I read it:
It drives a 2 ton lorry through the working life finishing line of 65!
Over 30 years ago I was being taught that the way we break life up into education, career and then retirement is crazy. So, any book that promotes new thinking on the myths surrounding the fairly modern and western idea that reaching a certain age sidelines you, is inevitably going to be a hit with me!
It puts an emphasis on living in line with the values that are important to you.
If climbing the corporate ladder means sacrificing family, friends and other important values then step off that ladder. Too many people have climbed it only to find it is leaning on the wrong wall.
It encourages us to take our eyes off leaving a large inheritance after we die and to enjoy what we have before we die even if we ‘Die Broke’.
It’s better to enjoy seeing money being put to good use during our lifetime than to leave a large inheritance.
I got the impression from reading this book that if we were to put the plan into practice we would live freer and more fulfilled lives. The chances of ending our time on earth with lots of regrets would be greatly reduced if we adopted some of the unconventional thinking promoted in this book.
Contact me if you want more detail or some guidance on how to start living more intentionally and unconventionally! You are unlikely to drift into a better way of living - it will require planning.
I once made a statement that my family to this day won’t allow me to forget and won’t accept either that the words were taken out of context! It was while we were walking away from the Eiffel Tower-inspired lattice tower in Tokyo that I said something like “… and that was probably the best day of my life.”
When the opportunity came to listen to Bill Hybels ‘live’ and not on cassette tape or video recorder, I jumped at the chance. And the three day conference I attended in The Cardiff Arena was indeed a turning point in my life. I left there with renewed vision, restored belief and a recognition of the immense responsibility that leaders have no matter in which sphere of life they lead.
