day 1348: Closer Than It Seems

"When the Lord saw Moses coming to take a closer look, God called to him from the middle of the bush, “Moses! Moses!” “Here I am!” Moses replied."

Success and failure share a trait; they both, like the images in the right-hand side mirror of our cars, can seem closer than they really are.  Success can feel close, but might still be a ways away so we have to stick with it, don't take our foot off the gas, and don't assume that we can change course before we achieve the success that we are trying to achieve.  Failure, on the other hand, can feel so close that we start to get fearful and paralyzed of what might happen next, when we are still far from failing.  The truth is that success and failure are located just about the same distance away from where we are.  We can't over anticipate either nor overreact to what we encounter along the way.  I have seen too many people who make decisions based on not accurately knowing where they are on the road to either success or failure.

God can seem close and far, but here's what we have to remember: He is always closer to us than He appears.  What that means is that if we just allow Him to be as close to us as He desires, that it just gets better and better.  We can't go wrong in that He wants to inhabit every part of our day, our thoughts, our actions and our attitudes.  As we work through today, and the meetings, phone calls, emails, etc., take a moment between each activity and ask Him to come closer.  He will and the closer we get to Him, the more great and wonderful things can happen.  When Moses got closer to God, Moses could hear God call His name. Now how cool would that be? Why don't we find out?!

Reference: Exodus 3:4 (New Living Translation)

day 1347: Greener Grass?

“You must not covet your neighbor’s house. You must not covet your neighbor’s wife, male or female servant, ox or donkey, or anything else that belongs to your neighbor."

A former colleague of mine is up for a big promotion. It's the job he has waited for his entire career and if he gets it then he is at the top of his functional area and the years of working hard within the company will have been worth it all!  I checked in him the other day to see where things stood.  He told me that the decision was down to him and one other person.  I was puzzled because who else inside the company could be in competition for the job?  He responded, that it was him against an external candidate!  I cringed for him.  I was quickly reminded of how easily we look to the outside and think the grass is so much greener.  Sometimes, when it is time to upgrade or change direction we have to go to the outside but I have always been of the mind that internal choices need to be decided and dismissed before that decision so that those who have worked hard and held their loyalty are not put in this awkward position of, "Am I not good enough?"  While the grass looks greener, let's not forget that it takes more fertilizer, water, nurturing and caring to keep that grass green, than it does to maintain the turf that we know that is not as fragile or will fail under who we already are.

Somewhere in our human nature we are built to want what we don't and can't have.  It's a problem in us, otherwise we wouldn't have been given the Commandment about coveting.  When this desire of ours translates into people, positions, promotions, raises, etc. we are treading on think ice.  We need to check our motivations as it hard to be wrestling with these issues and still be bringing glory to God in our work.  Let's consider today if we are working with a gratitude for what we he, or are we working with obsessions over what others have that we want? That grass, while it looks greener, can't be come our obsession.

Reference: Exodus 20:17 (New Living Translation)

day 1295: Crossing the Generations

"But I lavish unfailing love for a thousand generations on those who love me and obey my commands."

A favorite opinion writer of mine is David Brooks.  I am fascinated with those like Brooks who can cover a far-ranging set of topics.  Brooks is a also a sociologist and brings interesting insights into communities, behaviors, norms, etc. A while back he wrote a column in the New York Times on how we change throughout the decades of our lives.  He placed these descriptors on each:

In our 20's - superman (person), possibilities, feverish energy, joiner, brave, entrepreneurial, unsympathetic to others

In our 30's and 40's - political scientist, lower estimations of own power and greater estimation of the power of institutions where you participate, faith in your navigation skills, adaptation, responsive to the "market" around you

In our 50's and 60's- sociologist, understanding of the power of relationships over individuals, managing and coaching, ambition fades and is transferred to the appreciation of ambitions of others, reflective and sentimental

In our 70's and 80's - historian, favoring tradition, appreciation of luck/fate, recognize the power of the dead over the power of the living

See yourself in this set of descriptions?  See your customers/consumers anywhere in here?

This is a path we will all walk, the question is what we will be like when we get there and what we will do to make the most of the understanding of what it means to successfully cross the generations.

As we start this New Year (my Pastor likes to say that the whole month of January is the start), we need to consider how we are aging and maturing in chronological, emotional and spiritual levels.  We may already have our 2014 goals set, but like anything else, success comes from looking and relooking at where we are and where we are trying to go.  If our spiritual growth is not at the top of our 2014 priorities, then we should recalibrate now and ensure that we have our priorities correct.  How we cross the generations is important and how we think about the future starts today.

Reference: Exodus 20:6 (New Living Translation)

day 1236: Records Retention

"Moses, as you and the people worship Me, I will meet with you and give you My presence. And when I reveal My glory to you, it will cleanse you."

What to keep?  What not to keep? What to keep and for how long?  These were once loose rules that we each made up for ourselves, but today, we can get in trouble for not keeping something long enough, or worse yet, for keeping something too long.  There are people who now make their living advising others on their records retention policies.  I grew up business-wise in the age of retaining. With the advent of the digital age we have gained with each year a greater and greater amount of available storage. The cloud and services like dropbox and box give even the smallest of businesses the chance to store and retain what never could have been kept before. There aren't enough steel storage case cabinets available to handle what even one of us stores today digitally. But, is this a good thing?  Ask a lawyer and the answer will be no.  Whatever is available is discoverable.  Whatever is randomly stored or randomly deleted is suspect. Knowing the different is the key.  It behooves us to have a policy of record retention, follow and embrace it.  Ironic, but in this age of more availability , that less is still better.

Every now and then we can also benefit from a little cleaning out and inventorying what we are retaining in our lives, both figuratively and literally.  God gives us the opportunity to come into His presence and have Him clean out our pasts and the sins that keep us from the relationship with Him that He desires.  We should have our own personal records retention program with God where we meet with Him daily to allow him to remove and cleanse us of our sins so that as we move forward to bring Him glory we can do so fully.

Reference:  Exodus 29:43 (King James Version)

day 1188: One Thing

“You must not have any other god but me."

I watch the smartphone category with much interest and intrigue. What I find most fascinating is that the market remains bifurcated along the lines of work and personal interactions and no one has figured out how to blend those two so that the working person actually isn't caught in between.  RIM (makers of the Blackberry) owned the working market. They had, and have, the support of the security people inside of corporations and government.  The President of the U.S. carries a Blackberry, so it's proven that they have the security advantage.  Unfortunately, they don't have an application economy and marketplace, so that means that a business person can't access those fun apps that others can, and really, just because we are at work doesn't mean that we can't and don't need a little fun at the same time.  They have tried to blend the two together by allowing us to have two firewalls but that still isn't enough to make them unique above all others.  The one thing that Blackberry has going for it, that all other other smartphones have abandoned is, the raised tile qwerty keyboard.  Business is about speed and accuracy.  As we all know who are sitting in front of a keyboard right now, a raised tile keyboard is the only way to ensure both.  Yet, I never see RIM featuring this, what is now their unique feature.  In each of out businesses we have one thing that the other doesn't.  Do we know what it is?  Are we bold and courageous enough to bring it forward and market, sell and stand behind it? That one thing may be the one thing that takes you to number one!

It is clear what our one thing must be and that is our full belief and following of God.  As early as it gets God laid out that commandment to us and told us to not put any other god before Him.  No, of course we don't walk around talking about our other gods that we worship, but as we all know it is easier than we like for other gods to find their way into our lives and move up in our priorities.  We have to be careful and always on the watch that we keep our focus and commitment to God first and all else second.  Work, our jobs, our careers can become our god if we are not careful.  Let's start this week with ensuring that we have our one thing clear and firmly in the forefront of our lives.

Reference: Exodus 20:3 (New Living Translation)

day 1182: Delegate!

"Both you and these people who are with you will surely wear yourselves out. For this thing is too much for you; you are not able to perform it by yourself."

There are lots of reasons to delegate and many times we will use the argument of growing and developing others as an incentive to get someone to take things off of their plate and to give to others. It is a great reason and maybe the most important one, but there is even a more baseline reason. This is that if we try to do it all ourselves we are setting ourselves up for burnout, overload and ultimately failure. No one can take it all on their own shoulders and succeed. The underlying reason we don't delegate is our own insecurities around the work not getting done and reflecting poorly on us or the fear that if we have others do the work then we won't be valued as much. In this day and age that translates into a fear for job security. This is a real fear but if we are prioritizing correctly then we can offload the little stuff, or the less strategic and then get back on track in getting the bigger work and projects completed. Believe me, if we show that we can multiply ourselves we will have more work than we know what to do with.

If none of this is enough to make us think that we need to get better at even simple delegation, read what Moses' Father-in-law said to him when he saw Moses being overworked and failing; "Both you and these people who are with you will surely wear yourselves out. For this thing is too much for you; you are not able to perform it by yourself." That is straight talk with no punches pulled. Fortunately, Moses recognized the wisdom in this and went about making very strategic changes and ended up setting up a work system that endured well beyond him. If today you feel and see the signs of burn-out coming, try first doing some simple delegation. It will work more than you might imagine and with a little more imagination and delegation, you may well find yourself back on even footing and working on the right things again.

Reference: Exodus 18:18 (New King James Version)

day 1148: Help Wanted

 "But find some capable, honest men who fear God and hate bribes."

A good, well written job spec can make all the difference in who applies for a job and the ease by which a decision is made about who is the best candidate. If we know what we are looking for and can spell it out well then it will entice those who we want and weed out those we don't. Within all of this the spec has to also be compelling to someone who is just learning about our company. It has to be a call to action for either the candidate seeing it or the recruiter who is hunting for the best person. I love Ernest Shackleton's 1907 ad in London's Times, recruiting a crew to sail with him on his exploration of the South Pole:

Wanted. Men for hazardous journey.
Low wages. Bitter cold.
Long hours of complete darkness.
Safe return doubtful.
Honor and recognition in the event of success.

He ended up with more people than he could hire. What this job spec does is get at the heart of what type of person he valued. He was looking for courage, endurance, stamina, and adventure. When we hire, do we think enough about the core set of values and principles that we want within a person? Bad hires are usually not because of a person not having the right skill set, it is usually about the person not fitting culturally with the company, which brings us back to values and principles. In one of the first stories of hiring in the Bible, Jethro tells Moses what kind of people he should "select" to replace some of Moses' duties. We read this in Exodus 18:21; "But find some capable, honest men who fear God and hate bribes." Again, we see values and principles as core to the specifications. If today you are hiring, or being hired, don't forget the importance of putting values first and then letting all the rest flow from there.

Reference: Exodus 18:21 (New Living Testament)

day 1082: Idols

"Remember, you must not make any idols of silver or gold to rival me."

I am writing this before the Oscars are presented.  You will be reading this the morning after.  I don't know who will win, but there is a pretty good chance that there will be plenty of lifting up above the head the little gold statue of Oscar. Some will actually kiss Oscar. Others will talk directly to it as they thank those who helped them get to the podium.  And yes, there will be those who thank God for helping them get to this point in their career.  It is not ours to judge so I always take that thank you to God as sincere, otherwise, why would they do so?  But, like in all of our work and the rewards that we can achieve we need to be sure that we understand what the "idol" is that we are pursuing.  "Businessperson of the Year" isn't given out, but we each are striving to achieve this.  Our companies love to be on the most admired, best places to work, fastest growing, best quality, etc. lists.  In a way we are all striving and working towards our moment of recognition.  What we must remember in our business is from whom it is we are hoping to accept the award!  Let's be sure that we are seeking the recognition from our customers and employees, not just our shareholders, our Boards or ourselves.  The latter might feel good for the moment, but it's the other constituents that we want to really please.

God told us to make sure that we never create any idols on this earth that we put in competition with Him. We have to be really careful here because they may not, and usually are not, made of gold or silver in the form of an idol, but they are gold and silver that comes in many forms and likenesses.  Money, fame, recognition, and power are all by-products of being good at our jobs and work.  Each of these can turn sour though as we know.  Greed, pride, selfishness, etc. can be the outcome of what originally felt innocent to begin.  There is nothing wrong in the pursuit of excellence, accomplishment or quality. But, when these get away from us and become the end game and we lose what our true focus should be, then we are running afoul of what God's purpose for us is to be. Let's use this day to remind ourselves of perspective and what it is that we are really trying to achieve.

Reference: Exodus 20:23 (New Living Translation)

day 808: Thou Shall Not Steal

:Thou shall not steal"

Yesterday there were many places on the internet that were dark in protest and demonstration of not supporting current legislation regarding internet piracy. The SOPA/PIPA bills have caused quite a stir and controversy between content creators and content distributors. Hollywood and Silicon Valley are not happy with each other right now. This is not a new struggle and it predates the internet. Content creators have always been highly protective of their intellectual property (rightfully so) and done all they can to maximize the opportunities from their work. Before the internet, copying, plagiarism, recreating, etc. were all there. The internet and file-sharing (which Napster introduced many of us too) just made the problem worse and put the opportunity to use and manipulate intellectual property in the hands of the masses. Technology companies want to democratize content distribution so that more people can see and enjoy the content creators' work. At the heart of the issue, and there is a compromise and a middle-ground to be reached; it is about the respect of another and being honest, or not. It comes down to basic values that are either followed or not. If someone steals from another, there will be repercussion and backlash, whether it is legislated or not. We are all better off starting from a place of honesty to build trust and when that happens consistently then many of the questions fall away.

Moses brought us God's written word when he delivered the Ten Commandments. God knows our nature so He had to be blunt and clear with us, "Thou shall not steal". Sounds easy to understand, but if it is so easy to not to do, then why did God have to tell us not to do it? Because, Father knows best, that's why! We should all take a good hard look at ourselves and how we work. Do we steal? On the big things, of course not, but how about on the little things where cutting a corner, smoothing out an expense report, knocking off an hour early here and there, taking credit for someone's idea, copying that photograph from the web for our work without paying for it? Do we do those? The little things are as big, if not bigger than the obvious stuff. At least, in God's eyes they are. He didn't say "Thou shall not steal the big and noticeable stuff". At the heart of who we are, let's be sure that we don't find ourselves stealing.

Reference: Exodus 20:15

day 671: The Cloud

"Now whenever the cloud lifted from the Tabernacle, the people of Israel would set out on their journey, following it."

Everywhere you turn, there is talk of "The Cloud". Amazon made a splash a few years ago when they introduced their cloud services. Salesforce.com is built in the cloud. Box.net markets themselves on the cloud. Apple has put their own name on it with, the "iCloud". It used to be that clouds meant bad weather, or the things that blocked the sun. We counseled people who had their "head in the cloud". But today, business is moving into the cloud and it's the billions of dollar idea. The cloud we are talking about is actually a set of servers that allow for a company or user to not have to have clients and servers to run applications and software. This is a big deal for developers who now don't have to expend money or resources on running their own hardware. For users it puts many applications anywhere that we couldn't get to before unless we were at our own PC. We don't have to understand all of the intricacies of new technology, but it is good that we stay current on where the technology is going and how it can apply in our business. If an organization or business today doesn't explore cloud computing then they are likely to miss out on some real enhancements.

The Bible is full of accounts of clouds and the metaphors that come with them. From the clouds came the rainbow that is a lasting promise today from God. God's voice came from the cloud declaring that Jesus was His Son. Jesus left the earth in a cloud as His disciples watched. The people of Israel found their way through the desert by following the cloud that would tell them it was time to move on in their journey. God was in all of these clouds! There a real clouds and there are the metaphors that teach us lessons. As another daily worKING reminder of who has given us this opportunity to bring glory to God, let's let ourselves be triggered back to think about our Lord when we are hearing about, learning and using our new technology definition of "The Cloud".

Reference: Exodus 40:35-37 (New Living Testament)

day 453: Simple Delegation

There are lots of reasons to delegate and many times we will use the argument of growing and developing others as an incentive to get someone to take things off of their plate and to give to others. It is a great reason and maybe the most important one, but there is even a more baseline reason. This is that if try to do it all ourselves we are setting ourselves up for burnout, overload and ultimately failure. No one can take it all on their own shoulders and succeed. The underlying reason we don't delegate is our own insecurities around the work not getting done and reflecting poorly on us or the fear that if we have others do the work then we won't be valued as much. In this day and age that translates into a fear for job security. This is a real fear but if we are prioritizing correctly then we can offload the little stuff, or the less strategic and then get back on track in getting the bigger work and projects completed. Believe me, if we show that we can multiply ourselves we will have more work than we know what to do with. If none of this is enough to make us think that we need to get better at even simple delegation, read what Moses' Father-in-law said to him when he saw Moses being overworked and failing; "Both you and these people who are with you will surely wear yourselves out. For this thing is too much for you; you are not able to perform it by yourself." That is straight talk with no punches pulled. Fortunately, Moses recognized the wisdom in this and went about making very strategic changes and ended up setting up a work system that endured well beyond him. If today you feel and see the signs of burn-out coming, try first doing some simple delegation. It will work more than you might imagine and with a little more imagination and delegation, you may well find yourself back on even footing and working on the right things again.

Reference: Exodus 18:18 (New King James Version)

day 452: Try Being Open

Other people who have our best interest in mind have some important things to say to us, if we will listen. I have worked with many a person, and have been guilty of it myself, who don't listen well and when feedback comes their way, they shut down, become defensive and begin to rationalize why what they are hearing is of no value to them. I recently was giving feedback to a senior executive about some things I saw him doing that I personally observed in a board meeting. He listened to me over the phone without response as I spoke and at the end of what I wanted to say he spent the next half an hour telling me why I was wrong. Since these were things that I personally saw him do it was a little like I told him that I saw him wearing a blue shirt and him coming back trying to convince me that no, it was not blue, it was actually red. Not only, in my humble opinion, did he miss out on what I think could have made him better, he also has not endeared himself to me to want to try and provide feedback to him in the future. I will of course, because it is part of my responsibility as as board member, but if it wasn't, I wouldn't want to walk into that thicket of thorns again. We should all realize the value in being open to hear what others have to say to us. We don't have to look any further than the story of Jethro and Moses in Exodus Chapter 18. Jethro gave Moses the solution to how Moses could grow and scale his activities. When Moses listened and tried what Jethro suggested, he showed what can come from listening to others and being open to new ideas. Sometimes, we just need to be reminded to stay open and not to close ourselves off to the thoughts and feedback of others. Today, consider this when someone says, "I have been thinking", or "I have an idea", or "Can I talk to you?". Take these opportunities as a gift and put them to good use.

Reference: Exodus Chapter 18 (New Living Testament)

day 417: Don't Go It Alone

It is a tendency within our jobs to find ourselves going it alone. As I have written a number of times, I believe this is largely a function of how business and organizations are architected to operate and how they compensate. We work within hierarchies and teams bottle neck around a leader who may or may not truly recognize or care about the overall strength and health of the team versus the work just getting done. These are the leaders who say, "You, just go get it done and I will reward you for it." They may not be that blatant, but that is the tone and the gist of the message. So, from there what do we do? We run off as individuals and we do whatever we can to be sure that we succeed and achieve personally in the eyes of our superiors and while we say we care, we actually don't spend too much time worrying about the overall team. This is why it is so hard for us to hear someone else say, "It is important that we/you work within the team." We understand it and it makes sense but in the next hour someone will be recognized, rewarded and/or given more responsibility because they took on the load themselves and made it happen in solo fashion. It is very situational but I do believe that part of what we are supposed to leave behind is that we have made others better along the way. Unless we are willing to let go of some things and get out of the way, then we will have missed this opportunity and potentially missed the greatest impact we can make within our careers. Let's be honest, if at the end of our work days all we have to show for it is our own success and not the success of others there won't be many reunions or phone calls in the future about the good old days. Plus, the burden that we carry by ourselves is likely to shorten our work-lifespan versus sharing the work with others. Jethro told his son-in-law Moses this in Exodus 18:22; "...So it will be easier for you, for they will bear the burden with you." Today, you may find yourself in a place where you have been going it alone for too long. Today could be a great day to start looking around and letting go of some of what you like to do, so that others may grow. A little sharing right now and not going it alone could be the beginning of something great for you.

Reference: Exodus 18:22 (New King James Version)

day 416: A Good Job Spec

A good, well written job spec can make all the difference in who applies for a job and the ease by which a decision is made about who is the best candidate. If we know what we are looking for and can spell it out well then it will entice those who we want and weed out those we don't. Within all of this the spec has to also be compelling to someone who is just learning about our company. It has to be a call to action for either the candidate seeing it or the recruiter who is hunting for the best person. I love Ernest Shackleton's 1907 ad in London's Times, recruiting a crew to sail with him on his exploration of the South Pole:

Wanted. Men for hazardous journey.
Low wages. Bitter cold.
Long hours of complete darkness.
Safe return doubtful.
Honor and recognition in the event of success.

He ended up with more people than he could hire. What this job spec does is get at the heart of what type of person he valued. He was looking for courage, endurance, stamina, and adventure. When we hire, do we think enough about the core set of values and principles that we want within a person? Bad hires are usually not because of a person not having the right skill set, it is usually about the person not fitting culturally with the company, which brings us back to values and principles. In one of the first stories of hiring in the Bible, Jethro tells Moses what kind of people he should "select" to replace some of Moses' duties. We read this in Exodus 18:21; "But find some capable, honest men who fear God and hate bribes." Again, we see values and principles as core to the specifications. If today you are hiring, or being hired, don't forget the importance of putting values first and then letting all the rest flow from there.

Reference: Exodus 18:21 (New Living Testament)

day 393: Strike The Rock

As business leaders in the secular marketplace we are constantly challenged and brought to task by our teams and the people who work around us. I like to say that if you are going to be a leader, it just comes with the territory. I have been in more than one situation in my career where when faced with the fork in the road, or the difficult decision to be made, or the feeling of inadequacy, that at the same time my team and peers were looking at me with the eye of challenge to see if they were going to agree or disagree with what I was about to do. I have never personally faced a full scale mutiny but I have seen it happen to others and when it does it is not pretty. What is amazing about it is that it typically builds up over time and then it is something very small that triggers the team feeling emboldened enough to go to their bosses and boss and register their complaints. Seldom do leaders recover and survive this level of dissatisfaction unless the next level above them intervenes and gives them the authority and the tools/resources to change the course. At my church we are studying Moses and what he went through when leading the Israelites. In Exodus Chapter 17 we read of how the people were about to remove Moses from leadership because they didn't have water. They quickly turned against him and if not for God's intervention telling Moses to strike the rock with his staff to create a flow of water, then Moses may have been done as their leader. I find the similarities striking too. Moses went above himself to find his way out of his leadership challenge and God was there to answer. We should take this lesson and learn from it as well. When we are challenged as leaders or co-workers, our bosses can help, before things get out of control. But even greater is the power and the answers that can come from a level above if we are to go to God for His answers. For Moses God asked him to pick up a familiar tool in his rod. God will give is our own rod and staff to pick up and a rock to strike if we will just ask and then listen and follow through.

Reference: Exodus Chapter 17 (New Living Testament)

day 341: Delegating

Delegation is one of the hardest skills to teach a new manager or team member. There are a lot of reasons why this is so hard. Mostly, the barriers are excuses that are unfounded. When we hear, "Everyone else is too busy", or, "I don't really have anyone who can do what I do", what is really being said is "I like doing the things I do", "I am good at them", and "If I give them to someone to else, what will I do?" There is also the worry about a loss of recognition by others if someone else does something better than we do. It's a very odd phenomena because delegation is one of the secrets to really being happy within one's work. Those who delegate well are typically the ones who others respect the most, want to work with first, and who gain a reputation as a developer and leader of people. But, still most people hang onto as much work as they can, even to the point of overloading and burdening themselves into burnout mode. This is not a new problem. In the earliest writings of the Bible we are told the story of Moses who after leaving Egypt found himself from morning to night listening to the problems of the people and doing nothing else. It was not until his father-in-law Jethro came to visit him and I imagine had a talk with Moses like some of us have had with our elder relatives who come and visit and we are too busy at work to spend any time with them. Jethro told Moses that he was burning himself out and at the same time the long line of people waiting each and every day was causing a lot of discontent. He told Moses to delegate by picking judges who could handle the routine and mundane complaints and then Moses would be freed up and could focus on the harder problems. So Moses took Jethro's advice and created a system of delegating. His system, by the way, was very analytically based and one to observe on how to break down work by people and numbers. From that day on, Israel had a system of judges and Moses was freed up to get back to his other leadership duties. Are you struggling with delegating today? If you are, think about these simple concepts: if you there are things that you do routinely, things that you like doing and things that you are already good at doing; then these are the things that you should delegate. Others want to learn and they want to do more than you imagine or they tell you. If you give them something that they know you like, then they will feel good about that. It took Jethro harping on him for Moses to see that he needed to delegate. What will it take for you to see?

Reference: Exodus Chapter 18: 13-27 (New Living Testament)

day 288: Coaching

Coaching in the workplace is being talked about again. In the last few months I have been approached to be a coach, been asked about coaching programs, and asked to recommend coaches. What I believe is happening is that the cutback in internal leadership development and human resources support is catching up with companies and executives are looking around and realizing that they they need to have their people developed and coached, but have no where to turn. Everyone could use a good coach. There are no great athletes who succeed that do not credit a coach along the way as part of how they reached their best performance. I would also venture to say that many of us have found our informal coaches as well. These are the people who we lean on to give us advice, shoot straight with us and be a sounding board when we don't have anywhere else to turn. The unfortunate part is that these people don't always have the opportunity to see us live in action, everyday, and be on the sidelines to "coach us along" as we work. That is the added value of having a formal coach. Even one of the greatest men of the Bible had to have, in the ways of the time, a coach. When Moses pushed back on God and told Him that he did not have the skills to approach Pharaoh and represent the Israelites, God gave him his brother Aaron to be there for him. And in this case, Moses and Aaron coached each other and together the two of them performed to God's request. What it must have been like to have been in those pre-Pharaoh meetings and having Moses and Aaron setting their strategy and plans and coaching each other on how best to convince Pharaoh to set the Israelites free. And then having God in the conversation too, well, wow!. This all begs the question of who do we have in our work lives who could be our coach to help us through the struggles of living and working our purpose in our jobs? Is there someone who you work with who shares your beliefs where the two of you, or maybe even more, commit to coach each other and to take the accountability to make each stronger and more capable as role models and examples of the life and ways of Christ? Now may be the right time for you to find that coach and to be commit to being a coach for someone else.

Reference: Exodus 4:27-31 (New Living Testament)

day 287: Throw Off The Covets

I have a friend who just lost out on the job as the senior HR Executive for the one of the "hot" companies in the alternative energy/transportation space. She was called out of the blue by a recruiter who talked her into considering the role, interviewing, falling in love with the company and the management team, preparing on how to communicate her departure from the very good company and very good job that she has now, and emotionally being in the new role. She had gone as far as seeing herself in the new job and she was playing it all out in her mind. Then, last week, after she had gone through all of the interviews and was waiting for the offer to be delivered to her, she got a call from the recruiter that the company had decided to go with someone else for the position. I read the email from her and I braced myself as I scrolled down the message. I expected to hear the disappointment and the border-line anger jump off of the page. But, lo and behold, it didn't, she didn't. Instead, what I read was a very mature and gracious acceptance of the fact that "maybe, it just wasn't meant to be". She then went on to write, and I think say to herself through her note to me, that she works for a great company, she likes her job, she loves her team, and respects her boss, so why should she fret? She said, "I felt honored to be in the consideration, now back to work". I say, "wow", because she is, in my experience, one in ten who can take this attitude. Too many times to count in my career have I watched job and career envy eat someone up from the inside out. If they didn't get the job or the promotion, or someone else looks like they are getting ahead of them, or they feel like they should be the one to get the next promotion, etc., they let coveting take over. We know from the earliest of our Bible teachings that we are not to covet and we most always put that in the context of other physical possessions, etc. But, we can also put that job that someone else got, that promotion that got away from us, that extra bonus payment that a co-worker received, that consulting assignment that a competitor won, all in the bucket of things that we shouldn't covet. My friend is not a believer, but in her situation, she acted like one. As believers and followers of Jesus, we have to be the same way. If you are right now covered with coveting, today would be the day to throw off the covets and let your true faith and assurances shine through.

Reference: Exodus 20:17 (New Living Testament)

day 158: Routines

Mondays come and we find ourselves trying to get back into the routine of the week and each day. We all have our own routines and for the most part these are necessary for our forward momentum and predictability for how we will get our work done. It's funny how we will say we don't like these routines for fear that we fall into a rut but for sure a positive routine is better than not having one at all. There is nothing wrong with being seen as someone who others can count on and predict from us what the answer will be, or the course of action, or how to get a hold of us when we are needed. I have always been one where my routine was fairly well established and others could count on me following a similar course of action each day. I am an early morning person and being in the office early goes back to my morning radio disc jockey days. I like to get up before the sun comes up and get my day started when everything and everyone else is still quiet. Before long people who worked for me got to the point that they knew when I would be in the office, or available by phone, or on email. While I did not particularly like my quiet time being interrupted I always felt it was better that others knew when and where I was versus not. So, the early morning was part of of my routine. We all have routines and the more we can keep to them the better it is for our ability to stay focused and for others to know how to work with us. When we are variable in how we work and what we do we can create all kinds of havoc and anxiety in others. In thinking through this idea of routines it can be seen that God instructed many people in the Old Testament to follow their own routines and to be diligent in ensuring that they followed them religiously (pun not intended). There is example after example to follow. In Exodus 29 the instructions were given to the priests on how they were to go about performing ordinations. Listen to this routine: "Each day you must sacrifice a young bull as an offering for the atonement of sin. Afterward make an offering to cleanse the altar. Purify the altar by making atonement for it, make it holy by anointing it with oil. Make atonement for the altar every day for seven days." These verses and others in the Old Testament tell me that God likes routines. He likes that we become set on what it is that we are supposed to do and then we follow through and we perform our duties in such a way that excellence and continuity can be expected. It is also a great metaphor for the lives we are to live. God has given us our purpose to fulfill and he places us in human situations, like our work, to live out and fulfill that purpose. Within that life comes the opportunity to create the routines that can fulfill that purpose and bring Him glory. It begs the question today of what routines have we established and where does He sit within those routines?

Reference: Exodus 29:36-37 (New Living Testament)

day 132: Taking Ourselves Too Seriously

On our jobs we are constantly reinforced to be growing, developing and improving. In many companies each year we get set down with our boss or HR person and given an annual performance review. We have spelled out to us the things we are good at that we should continue and the areas we should improve. Together these become a grading of comparison of our peers and we get rated and ranked. If we do what we are being asked then we double down on ourselves and we take our talents and we try and become better and better. There is nothing wrong with that, to a point. When is it that the focus becomes too much on ourselves that it gets in the way of working well with others and living to our purpose? I recently made a reference from C.S. Lewis' classic, "The Screwtape Letters" and I want to do so again today. The book is a set of instructional letters on how to corrupt and gain control of the soul of a man. It is written from one devil (Screwtape) to another devil (Wormwood). On the topic of our talents and focus, Screwtape tells Wormwood this: "To anticipate the Enemy's (God's) strategy, we must consider His aims. The Enemy (God) wants to bring the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the fact, without being any more (or less) glad at having done it than he would be if it had been done by another. The Enemy (God) wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbor's talents." Wow. Of course, that is what God wants. He wants us to be selfless and never to take ourselves and our talents so seriously that it gets in the way of our caring for others and our love and relationship with Him. When we start to focus so much on ourselves that we begin to get in the way of others or worse yet, we become competitive, envious or jealous, then we know we have crossed the line. It's clear in the Ten Commandments that we are not to covet anything of others, that would be their talents and skills as well. So today, think through, just how seriously are you taking yourself? Is it healthy, or have you crossed over and begun to put yourself too far up the pedestal? If you find yourself making comparisons (position, title, salary) to others in your profession and fretting when someone else gets an assignment and you don't, or worrying about what it is going to be like if someone else gets promoted over you, then it is time to take the test of yourself and then stop taking yourself that seriously.

Reference: Exodus 20:17 (New Living Testament), C.S. Lewis, "The Screwtape Letters"