day 652: Instruction Manuals and Handbooks

“All scripture is given by the inspiration of God.”

I was recently in a Best Buy where I overhead a customer telling a salesperson that he had just bought a TV and he couldn’t find the owner’s manual in the box and wanted to see if he could get a copy from the store. The salesperson told him that the TV manufacturer no longer prints manuals and that he could go online and pull down what he needed. The customers was caught a little off-guard and then reluctantly said, “okay” and moved on. The following week I was working with an Executive from a good sized private company and he showed me their employee handbook and was asking my advice on how best to update and disseminate policy changes. I found myself giving the same type of answer as the Best Buy salesperson in that it was time for this company to get everything online and then just push out the changes that occur instead of taking on the cost and headaches of printing something that is out of date the day it comes off the printer. We each need to get more and more comfortable with what it means to obtain knowledge from a screen. As you read this, that is exactly what you are doing. And to this, if we know that our customers, clients, employees, etc. are moving quickly to everything being online then we need to get better and better at the communication that we can create for online consumption. Some say that blogs are dying or already dead. The same is being said about websites. So, it is up to us to figure that out and stay ahead of the curve so we don’t fall behind. Better to know than not know in today’s day and age.

Regardless of whether it is online or written on parchment paper, God has given us the ultimate Instruction Manual and Handbook for work and life. 66 different books, written by forty different men all inspired by the same and one God, written over a span of 1600 years and holding up today as well as it did at the time of its’ writing. Like the person who decides to jump into a project before reading the directions or the instruction manual, we can end up going into our work and our lives without direction if we don’t spend time in God’s Word. There is no guarantee that any of us will put together our lives in the best way, but with God’s instruction manual don’t you think that it can be much better than guessing and trying to go it alone? Have you taken the time today to check in and see what instructions there might be for you today?

Reference: 2 Timothy 3:16 (New Living Testament)

day 104: Golden Handbook

Every company has a handbook. Nearly every company I know that has a handbook has a handbook that is out of date. In fact, they are out of date the day they are printed as business is constantly changing and morphing and the procedures and policies that are written are many times so arcane that they have to be updated with any slight change in the business. In my career I resisted, fought, and screamed, when the "handbook update" came to me. I just thought that it made no sense to keep writing down more rules and policies that were being prescribed for the 10% of the population who couldn't manage on their own without having something written down to fall back on when they didn't know what to do. Rather, I was always a big fan of the department store, Nordstroms' handbook. They had two policies. The first one was; In everything we do we serve the customer. The second one was: There is no other policy other than the first one. Everything they do/did at Nordstroms was pulled through that one policy and if you have ever shopped at one of their stores and dealt with one of their employees you can see it working in action. I often think about what is the one handbook policy that each of us should be working and living under and it is one that we all know already but we seem to forget in our daily interactions and work. Matthew 7:12: "Do for others what you would like them to do for you. This is a summary of all that is taught in the law and the prophets." Words directly from Jesus and what has come to be known as "The Golden Rule". If we were writing a personal handbook of how to conduct ourselves at work, there it is all summed up in a few succinct words. We are to approach each day and each situation and instance with the attitude of treating others how we would want to be treated by them if the tables were turned. I do believe we could build a company handbook off of that one principle if we so chose. Sounds almost too simple and true to work, but like Nordstroms says, if we believe that there is no other policy than the first one, then we will construct our work, manage our attitude and approach our day with the Golden Rule as the first and only. Imagine the change we each could bring in our workplaces today if this was the way we truly operated?

Reference: Matthew 7:12 (New Living Testament)