Month: September 2017

what does it take?

When our kids were younger and we had 4 under age 12, one with special needs, people would look at James and I and say “I don’t know how you do it.” It wasn’t only that we were raising our young family, but we also had tackled going into business for ourselves in one of the toughest industries to succeed at. We were well aware of the common belief that there is a 90% failure rate in the restaurant business, but we were committed to doing whatever it took to make it work. Our ambition and motivation stemmed in part from…if not eagerness, then single minded focus.

If I had to answer that query, how do we do it, we just do it. It may seem overly simple, but it really is just that. How do you do anything really? The facts were that we had no money, we actually were pretty deeply in debt and living week to week. We had 5 kids between us. But we were healthy, and we had love, and we had a strong desire to improve our life situation.

We approach our lives with the belief in doing whatever it takes. I know that this is the only way to truly succeed at anything. You cannot make a relationship work if you are thinking “Well, I will love him as long as…or until…” Being in business, or attaining success in anything is the same way. There are always going to be sacrifices, trade-offs. You have to sacrifice eating ice cream every night if you want to be fit. You have to trade off going out every night if you have kids. You have to forfeit guaranteed vacations if go into business for yourself. And you have to give up your time to grow your impact or your career.

This fact, that of sacrifice, holds some people back. They would rather stay in a static world of their own creation, where the sacrifices are convenient, and this is okay. Not everyone strives for greater things. But so many yearn for more, as evidenced by the huge industry that is called franchising. It’s a dream for so many to go into business for themselves. There are literally over 750,000 franchises in the US alone. Is this a guarantee of success? I would say no, the only guarantee is in the mindset of the owner.

So what kind of person does it take to be an entrepreneur? The same kind of person it takes to be a leader. You don’t have to be the owner, you can bring great value and attain great rewards, personal and financial, if you tackle anything you do with the same psychology. What does it take?
-It takes courage to take responsibility while others make excuses.
-It takes being dissatisfied with your current reality.
-It means being open to new ideas.
-It takes a willingness to put yourself at risk and to fail.
-It means seeing possibilities, not limitations
-It takes an all or nothing mentality when thinking of what you will do to make things better.
-It takes sacrifice.

unstuck

A grave is a rut with the end kicked out- Earl Nightingale

In my lifetime I have definitely been in ruts as far as my weight and health goes, I have been in ruts where I saw no end in sight to working 7 days a week, I’ve been stuck in thoughts that I would never find the right help I needed in my company. What else…stuck thinking I would never get out of credit card debt, stuck failing to launch a business because I didn’t think I had what it takes, stuck in my own self made thought prison of the loop of hopelessness. Stuck waiting for “tomorrow” when I would have more time, stuck doing a job that was not fulfilling because I didn’t think I could do anything else…I could go on and on.

Stuck is stuck and stuck sucks. Why do we get stuck? It’s almost like we are waiting for divine intervention, some big event or a giant hand to pull us up, something to save us and get us out of the rut. But what it takes is a decision. It takes pulling yourself up by the suspenders, and changing your thoughts. Your beliefs are what drives your behaviors, and if we are not designing our lives, we will be sucked into living our lives by default. The thoughts we think are what generates our emotions. If we are thinking we are stuck, we will feel that pain, that feeling of heavy weights on our feet, helpless to help ourselves. The feelings, the emotions, they control our actions. And our actions are what give us the results we are experiencing.
Thoughts=Feelings=Actions=Results
This will loop and loop, the results just verifying the truth of the thoughts, until we wake up and change the thought. Its a decision. A decision to take responsibility for yourself and to step up, out of the place that started out as the comfort zone, but has morphed into quicksand. Expand your image of yourself, use your imagination, there are no limits to what we can dream, and whatever we can dream we can achieve. Change your thoughts and change your life.

“We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” – E.M. Forster

understanding

“To blame someone for not understanding you fully is deeply unfair because, first of all, we don’t understand ourselves, and even if we do understand ourselves, we have such a hard time communicating ourselves to other people. Therefore, to be furious and enraged and bitter that people don’t get all of who we are is really a cruel piece of immaturity.” Alain De Botton

As we were driving home in traffic on Tuesday I noticed a white van driving kind of erratically next to us. My gaze was drawn over to the driver, who I saw flipping the bird to a car that had just pulled in front of him. As I commented to James about this guy, James put his blinker on to get over into the exit lane we needed. “Wow, that guy’s pissed about something, must have had a bad day.” This was going to put us in front of the white van, but there were few other options. As we put our signal on and changed over into the right lane, sure enough, we triggered another show with the angry driver of the van. He accelerated and pulled up beside us to give us a glaring stare and a wave of his middle finger. It was kind of humorous and also very sad that he was so upset about people driving in his lane. We joked about it “Don’t drive near me, this is my safe zone!”, but sheepishly remember times when we have also been aggravated about external things outside our control.

It reminded me that we are always attracting what we put out, and I think how sad that this guy is putting out “F-U”, so all he is going to get back is more of the same. The world operates as a mirror, and if you are spewing negativity, you will attract situations that reflect that reality into your life. If you are asking “Whats in it for me”, you will find yourself in places where the people or the universe is asking the same of you. Instead, if you are asking “how can I serve” and giving love, that is what you will attract back to you. Part of understanding ourselves involves looking at what we are putting out into the world.

If you are having issues with the people you are surrounded with, whether they are your kids, or your significant other, your coworkers, your boss…take a pause and look inside. Focus on understanding yourself, rather than the thinking and behaviors of others. The triggers, the things that annoy us, the things we judge in others…all of these are pointing to the same issues in ourselves. The reason we are bothered by these things is because we have work to do. I have a tendency to want an orderly, uncluttered environment (except my desk!), and it has been difficult sometimes as I get annoyed at my son’s messy room. You could argue that it’s my house, and I can mandate how he needs to keep his room, but what I am attempting instead is to understand that we all have very different perceptions, and maybe what I see as clutter, for him is familiar and comforting.

This work, the work of understanding ourselves, is what I believe is the foundation of all growth. You cannot give what you don’t have, so only by understanding and accepting ourselves can we truly do the same for others.

“One who understands others has knowledge, one who understands himself has wisdom.” – Tao de Ching

work out

I haven’t always believed in the power of exercise, it was more the opposite, in fact. I was the awkward girl who always got picked last for the team during PE, it was well known I was NOT athletic. It wasn’t just that I had no skills, but also no desire. I could never understand when they said “Keep your eye on the ball”. How the heck are you supposed to do that when it’s flying at you at high speed? Running was always a hated activity, I would beg my mom to write me a note on Fridays excusing me from the laps around the field that were a scheduled part of our physical education. I saw myself as chubby (though I wasn’t), unfit (which I was), and NOT the athletic type.

In my early 20’s I made a brief attempt at riding a bike, which resulted in a spill that left me with road rash on my knees and elbows, effectively curing me of the brief desire to change my image of myself. I set myself firmly back in the “unathletic” category. It wasn’t until my 30’s that I discovered the amazing life changing magic of working out. I can’t remember what inspired me other than a spark of interest in doing something for myself. I signed up at the local community center for an aerobics class and as luck would have it, I found the perfect instructor for me. She was energetic, young, and super fit. Her classes were full of people (mainly women, with a smattering of men) at all different levels of fitness, and she played amazing music as she motivated us to kick and stretch and work our abs to UB40’s Red Red Wine. As I entered my 40’s I was bitten by the desire to run. I began reading about running, and actually began to believe that it was something I could do. I started slow, and before you knew it I was hooked. I was addicted to the endorphins and the schedule I made for myself and the goals of running longer and longer distances. I completed a couple of half marathons and was having fun competing with myself. Then I broke my ankle.

The recovery for the broken ankle was one of the most challenging times of personal growth for me in my life. I was abruptly reminded to slow down as I was restricted to crutches and nothing but rest for several weeks. The independence I thrived on was gone, I could not drive myself anywhere, and my running career was over, at least for a while. What took its place finally is cycling. First on a tandem since I was scared to get back in the saddle, and now with my own mountain bike on steeper and steeper hills.

I just read an article about Richard Branson, the incredibly successful entrepreneur and billionaire where he was asked how to be more productive. His answer confirmed what I believe to my core, two short words that for me make the difference between a good day and an outstanding one. There is nothing like the feeling after you have done something super hard and worked your body, the one and only one we get this time around. It is the perfect way to gain a different perspective on life. “Work Out.”

maximizing

So what now, now that I’ve learned the lesson that the best way to grow my organization and impact is from the inside, by growing my people? I’ve learned about the difference between leading followers, no matter how amazing they may perform:
(10+10+10+10+10=level 50 effectiveness)
and creating leaders:
(10x10x10x10x10=level 100,000 effectiveness).

So my work is done, right? I just need to keep mentoring these leaders and its easy on out from here. Stall. Another lesson. Not everyone you are mentoring and developing will grow into the leader you need to take your organization where you want it to go. There may be good people that have the desire, but lack the ability. Let’s say you have one of your 5 that no matter what you do with them, they are not showing they are able to increase their leadership abilities. Now you have 10 x 10 x 10 x 10 x 5= level 50,000. This is a 50% decrease in effectiveness for your entire team. This is why you have to be constantly looking at who is in your inner circle.

Not only does your inner circle, or your support crew as we also call it, have to have great talent, but also a good attitude. And like gremlins when exposed to water, attitude will compound when exposed to others. Some things are not contagious, things like skill, experience, talent, but attitude on the other hand is contagious. It’s sad but true though that a negative, or wrong, attitude will spread more quickly than a positive one, that is why it is so imperative to know who is influencing your culture, and to constantly be working to ensure you have the right fit.

compounding interest

“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with,” – Jim Rohn

I often think of this quote and am grateful to have the amazing family and team to spend my time with. It’s really interesting to me how true it is that we attract who we are, because when I was pushing and climbing and focused on achieving, the people we were attracting into our organization were much the same. But as I began to pause and look around, and learn about what leadership is, there began to appear an incredible fulfillment as I began intentionally shifting from being a ladder climber to being a ladder builder.

My reasons were not predetermined, but rather as a result of finally being done with learning the same lessons over and over again. I think any problems we are facing in our organization, or in our lives, are here to teach us a lesson. They will keep appearing in different forms until we get to the root of the message and grow or change. How many times do I need to stub my toe on the hand weights that are sitting on the corner by the bed before I get the message and move them? When will I learn that if I am not focusing on my food and exercise I will feel crappy? When will I finally remember that blowing up never has the desired effect? When will I learn that the best way to grow our organization is to grow our people?

John Maxwell often says “To add growth, lead followers. To multiply growth, lead leaders.” The impact and effectiveness you have when you are creating leaders, not followers, is compounding. Every leader’s level of success is determined by those closest to him. This is your inner circle, the people you rely on to help you get things done, turn to for support, and seek advice from. In our organization, this consists of the leadership in each of my locations, the managers and key employees that are operating our businesses, the team within our team. In a smaller business, this may mean your entire staff.

Put it this way, if you add 5 superstar followers, lets call them “10’s” to your team, you have 10+10+10+10+10. The effectiveness of your team is at 50. But when you begin developing leaders by spending time intentionally mentoring them, giving them added responsibilities, give credit when things go well and hold them accountable when they don’t, you will begin to see the benefit of compounding. Your 5 superstars who are leaders’ effectiveness is now 10 x 10 x 10 x 10 x 10, or 100,000. I don’t know about you, but I like that math.

reputations

“Reputation is what others perceive you as being, and their opinion may be right or wrong. Character, however, is what you really are, and nobody truly knows that but you. But you are what matters most.” -John Wooden

So much of my identity has been tied to my business, maybe because I share the same name as my organization, but I think it is more than that. It used to be so very difficult for me to hear any negative feedback about what we were doing. Although I am not in every location all the time (impossible now with 4 different cities), I keep close tabs on what is going on. I get alerts on my phone whenever we get an online review, and it used to be that the alert would trigger a Pavlovian type response in my gut. I would feel a bit of dread, expecting the worst but hoping for the best. Most of the time the reviews were glowing, sometimes critical, and other times downright mean. I know we are humans, and as such imperfect, so there are bound to be mistakes and failures in our delivery, but that was a hard lesson to accept. I think it is a basic human need that we want to be loved, and when you think your business is you, and someone doesn’t love your business, it can feel very much like a lover’s rejection. At least that is what it felt like to me for many years.

James would remind me “don’t take it personally”, but that was easy advice to hear, not so much to implement. I can’t recall a specific moment where the transition started, it was more a process of learning to love myself and to believe in my own integrity and character as a person that helped me get off the roller coaster ride of emotions. Even if we are not business owners, we have reputations. There are people judging and sorting and putting us into boxes all day long. Just notice it, we all do it. “He is a great dad.”, “She is a go-getter.”, “He is a hothead.” The thing is that whatever box you get put in, your reputation, is based on the other person’s perception and life experiences, it may not have anything to do with you other than you share one similarity to something they have experienced in their past, so they file you there.

The only thing that really matters is who you are, how you act and the things you do in public and in private. I can see clearly now that my business is so very much more than me. It has grown and blossomed through the people that I have working with me every day. I am humbled and blessed to see the love they bring to our communities and the people we serve, without me being there. Its still a bummer when we sometimes blow it, but we are human, and what matters more is how we respond when we do make mistakes. This is where the test of our character comes, when we have the opportunity to learn, to show extra love when we failed to make someone happy, and to grow.

You are not your reputation, you are much more than that.

good to great

Some people seem to have a natural ability to provide genuine service. You can recognize them by the genuine smiles and eye contact that they give you, the open body language, the willingness to take time to listen or talk to you. There is a woman at the Safeway I shop at that is this way. No matter how long the lines or hot the day or grouchy the customer, she always seems to have a ready smile, lilting, upbeat voice, and positive attitude. I go out of my way to stand in her line when I see her working, irresistibly attracted to her energy and the knowledge that when I leave her line I will feel just a little bit lighter. There is the busboy at the restaurant we went to a couple of weeks ago who was balancing an insane number of dirty plates on his tray, yet took the time to look at each of us as he removed the dishes from in front of us, give us a slight nod and a smile. Or Manny, our amazing gardener extraordinaire who is always so busy but makes the time for us when we need a fence repaired, a tree planted, or help with our sprinklers.

We are blessed to have people like this in each of our restaurants, naturals who need no further prompting to do whatever it takes to ensure our guests are delighted. But not everyone is a natural. The Disney company has service down to a science, and has books and even a training program for companies to learn how to perfect customer service. If you have ever been to Disneyland or Disney World, you may not realize how much has gone into the training to create a magical experience for you. The always crowded parks are a testament to the success they have been able to create and maintain. With so many employees have they been lucky and attracted only naturals? I think no. But you can teach people what great service looks like.

We are definitely in a service business, but really isn’t any business? If we use as models the people that exemplify great service, and teach our team how to duplicate it, can we be like Disney? No matter what your thoughts are about the theme park (crowded, expensive, crowded) I don’t think anyone would argue that as a model for service and success in business, they have it down. We have taken the qualities that identify great service for our type of business, and listed them out on paper. We train our team, the naturals and the rookies, as to what great service looks like. We focus on great service, and service will improve. It’s the way it works. Where focus goes, energy flows.

gratitude

I spent many years of my life in search of happiness. I read books, searched online, tried to find it in other people and see if they could share some with me. There are books on my shelf that spell out at least 10 different secrets to finding it. My husband, who I am so attracted to for many reasons, one of the strongest of which is his eternal positivity, would tell me that happiness is like a butterfly, the more you chase it the more it escapes you, but if you just stand still, it will land on your shoulder and there you are. I loved the poetry of this secret to happiness, but I could not seem to translate it into real life.

I could not understand why I had such a struggle with dissatisfaction. I had so much to be grateful for, yet there always seemed to be something missing. Its not like I was never happy, but for me happy had an opposite, and the opposite was despair. It was a feeling that I was not worthwhile. It stemmed from some deeply limiting beliefs that I was not smart, that I was weak, that I was selfish, that I was unlovable. I was extremely hard on myself, it was like I had a strict headmistress in my head who followed me around all the time, beating me with a paddle over the head every time I made a mistake. She was always giving me instant feedback, things like “you are so stupid, why would you do that?”, and “you are so needy, no wonder you have no friends”, or “you should have known better, you are so lame”.

Over a period of time, I began to not just get tired of the despair and dissatisfaction, but to question where it came from. I began asking myself, why do I feel this way? What began is my journey to discovering what true happiness is to me. For me, happiness has no opposite when it is tied to gratitude. No matter where you are in your life situation, there are always things that you can find to be grateful for if you look. I began writing down as a daily habit 10 things I was grateful for. At first this seemed silly and compulsory, as I listed the big, easy things first, like my home and family, but as time went on, I began to notice the little things as well. It began the habit of looking at how much good there is in my life, no matter how much “stress” I created. I learned to appreciate the things that matter, to become present and notice the small things such as a drop of dew on a leaf, or the fog, or a small ant carrying food to his home. To be grateful to be alive every day to enjoy this world one more time.

The first words out of my mouth each day are thank you, a prayer to say thank you for another day. I am here in heaven on earth to enjoy this life, to help others along the path, to give love.

“Each day I see Jesus Christ in all of his distressing disguises.” Mother Theresa