GarthBox

A relationship hack learned a long time ago: if there’s something you disagree on, you both share the number on a scale of 1-10 how important it is to you. The person with the higher number is the one who’s decision is selected. Reason being? Most disagreements are merely sourced from a misunderstanding of importance to someone else.

You can apply this methodology to other facets of life, too.

When your boss asks you to do something, it’s worth sharing how high it ranks in priority of other efforts you have underway. Their reaction of your ranking will be exactly what you need to help either prioritize it more, de-prioritize, or simply put, you’re aligned. Most frustrations in the work space are sourced from the difference in expectations. There can’t be a difference when you’re both vocal about the ranking.

The two punch strategy to alignment and eliminating resistance: Rate the importance and share that rating.

Stay Positive & Smoother Sailing Ahead

They’re the risky ones, but the ones that pay off.

The decision to wake up at 5 a.m. to workout is a valid decision to make in advance, even if you’re one that’s up at that time anyway.

The decision that impacts others may be best made in advance of their knowledge. Not always, but sometimes.

Here’s the thing we know about decisions. Once we decide, our brains come in for the assist on rationalizing it further.

Having that rationalization down-pat may just help communicate with the team once the decision impacts them.

The way a leader puts their mark on being remarkable is their ability to decide fast; and sometimes that just means deciding in advance.

Stay Positive & What Are You Doing Tomorrow?

You can build repeatability into a product or service.

With how obvious repeatability is in some products (think Netflix or Venmo, for example), it can be written off as a fit for them but not us.

Repeatability with a book for example is unheard of, right? What author writes with intention of having their book re-read by someone?

Rare. But existent. (Think Tom Robbins or Paulo Coelho, for example ).

But I’d argue it’s worth addressing with whatever project you’re working on.

What can you do not to ensure it’s visited again and again? Can you build connection into it? Because that’s the key to repeatability. It’s not your project that turns anyone on, but the connection it enables them to have with others because of it.

Lean into that and you lean into repeatability.

Stay Positive & Need I Repeat Myself?

I just had someone come to check out the motorcycle I was selling. I smiled when I saw they had a trailer hooked up to their truck; a significant signal of purchase intention.

Oscar Wild mentioned that you can never be over-dressed or over-educated for meetings. Reason being? It sends a signal.

We’re walking beacons of signals. As many thoughts as we may have in a moment, we have as many signals being sent.

The look on our face. The way we sigh. What we’re wearing.

Just as it’s on us to control our thinking; it’s on us to control the signals we’re sending.

Stay Positive & Sorry, There’s No Off Button

People who make the time to do the things no one else makes the time to do? That’s the good stuff.

The volunteers. The leaders. The connectors.

The people who care the most in an org – that’s the good stuff.

Those who show up consistently. That’s the good stuff.

Stay Positive & Are You Good Stuff?

There’s no shortage of questions to ask yourself about a project or an ask you’re making to someone or a purchase or that text or…

But one to check in on is this: how is this impacting morale?

At the end of the day, your goals require people’s energy, and the best way to impact energy levels is to be intentional about doing so.

How will changing the target sales goals impact morale?

How will that text to your team impact morale?

How will submitting for that award – that won’t drive any new business – impact morale?

Ever wonder why every notable leader is considered a morale booster?

Stay Positive & They Need A Boost

I attended my quarterly barrel-aged beer analysis meeting today and we had a new addition to the tasting panel.

To catch you up to speed on what it entails: we blindly taste beer that has been pulled from a variety of barrels and we fill out a very thorough sensory sheet. After we go through them all, we share our feedback out loud about each one.

The newbie? It killed him to share. Every time it was his turn he was doubting himself or comparing his notes to someone else’s or bashing himself for not detecting something everyone else did.

But in this setting, the only wrong answer is no answer. He was right, no matter what he would say, and we had to remind him of that again and again for about 6 of the beers until it got slightly easier for him.

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I talked to a couple of colleagues recently about my bandwidth being stretched to the point of exhaustion. It wasn’t easy for me to do. it was like I was the fella blind tasting beers for the first time. I wanted to doubt myself, compare myself to others, bash myself for not being better.

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Controlling a narrative for ourselves will always be harder than we think. We can know what the right thing to do is. Hell, in the taster’s case, he could be told it four times and two minutes later still go back to his habit, in this case, self doubt.

Always hard, but… always worth it.

Stay Positive & Chase The Worth