Results - Steve Heston, guest blogger

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Steve Heston, Cedarburg, Wisconsin


If you were playing word association games with most people, the word "end" would be used a lot in affiliation with the word "results."

That's too bad.

Results are also, by definition (except when the headline reads "Joe died as a result of his injuries...") beginnings. Technically, depending on your Faith base, even ol' dead Joe could be off to a rapturous beginning, but I digress...

Results, therefore, are important, because we learn from them.

When I was 10-years-old, I got up in the count, two-strikes-and-no-balls, to Terry Nelson. Terry was 12-years-old. He looked like he was 8'7" tall and his arms looked like my legs. Actually, his arms looked bigger than my legs. Ok, Ok, his arms were, in fact, bigger than my legs, but I had little chicky legs when I was 10. And when I was 14. Pretty much until college, I had stick legs...but I digress again...

Where was I?

Ah, yes. Up 2 & 0 on Terry Nelson, the Babe Ruth of Fairfield, Iowa's Little League, circa 1971. "There is no way he thinks I'll throw another strike," I told myself. He did. On that summer evening, 1971, Terry Nelson hit a ball that either never landed or burned up on re-entry about five miles on the other side of the center field fence. The result of my inexperience, when weighed against his ginormousness and comparative wisdom, was a moon shot home run. Another result was that I never, and I do mean never -- threw three consecutive strikes to a good hitter again.

Later that year, Gary Gardner, the coach of the Little League All-Star team, refused to let me pitch in an All-Star Game. "Heston," he said, "You'll never be able to pitch your way out of a wet paper bag." The result of his arrogance came six years later, when I pitched my first no-hitter. As a high school sophomore. Against a team that he coached. Against a team for which his son (a senior!) was a first-team All State pitcher. I'm not sure that was the result he had in mind when he belittled me six years previously. I'm sure he thought his wilting critique was an ending. Instead, for me, it created the moment that I realized I could play after high school.

Results can be endings, I guess, if you want to just stop where you are.

But if going forward is your plan -- each and every result simply represents a beginning for what comes next. And, in this life, what comes next is all that matters.

If we look at results as endings, we tend to long for do-overs or second chances. If all we see in endings are missed opportunities, games won or lost, feelings hurt or mended, we're not getting the benefit of living. We're not learning, and if we're not learning, well, then, we are, by definition, at an ending.

Results are the beginning of learning, the yardstick of growth. When we accept and understand results, we start learning the big lessons. Learning is the fountain of youth, the spring from which a full life flows.

Results are the seeds that grow up to be tomorrow. The kind of tomorrow whose rear-view-mirror filters out the waste and keeps the useable lessons in focus. Results are beginnings. They're the ticket to whatever act of the play comes next -- and I want a front row seat.

Used with permission. Go to http://steveheston.com/ for more of Steve Heston

Drinking from a Fire Hydrant

Our age is not of the meditative man, it's a sprinting and shoving age with daily antidotes that spring into being and leap out from the newest counters.


- Norman Cousins



I've been told that attending one of my workshops, or just listening to me in general, can be a bit like drinking from a fire hydrant. Friend and colleague Bryan Anderson was out looking at commercial property (he's a Realtor) and took this picture. In the spirit of the drinking fountain's more directed flow, here's a re-cap of recent postings -

A Few Traits of a Great Leader
  • Judgment
  • Justice
  • Decisiveness
  • Dependability
  • Tact
  • Integrity
Great Loan Officers as Great Team Builders
  • Great Loan Officers know that Great Loan Officers have Great Teams
  • Great Loan Officers strive to be Level 5 Team Builders
  • Great Loan Officers work for companies that support Great Team Builders
  • Great Loan Officers know the key sales and marketing person is the one delivering their product or service and any given moment
  • Great Loan Officers know that good customer service is the sign of a good hire (and vice versa)
  • Great Loan Officers work hard at all Top 10 Characteristics of a Great Team Builder
  • Great Loan Officers are passionate about being a Great Team Builder
Top 11 Characteristics of a Great Teambuilder
  • Express a very clear vision and expectations
  • One set of rules for everyone, including themselves
  • Hire the right people, put them in the right place and train continuously
  • Delegate and enable others to develop and deliver results
  • Build trust through robust evaluation and correction
  • Enhances relationships by seeking clarity through what and how questions
  • Team members give open and honest feed-back with everyone
  • Hold themselves accountable and blames no one including themselves for failures
  • Uses various resources to uncover blind spots
  • Pushes themselves and their team to constantly get better
  • Catches team members in random acts of doing well
Missing or Broken Links in Leadership
  • Developing good followers
  • Constantly looking for blind spots
  • Failure to getting better; not learning or learning and not getting better
Pingings - Evaluation and Corrections
  • Pay attention
  • Ask questions, listen to answers
  • Be purposeful; have a mission and a plan
  • Don't be ignorant to what you're hearing and seeing
Personalities Matter
  • Conflicts can be a learning event
  • Conflicts are going to happen
  • Understanding personalities with others can make a difference in how you handle conflict
  • Conflict can be nothing more than misunderstandings due to personality differences
  • Personalities are shaped in part to generational differences
  • Taking a personality assessment can show you your temperament traits
  • Getting trained in how those temperament traits interact in different situations is valuable
Still a lot to drink, but all important and coming at you whether your purposefully swallowing or not. Be meditative about these subjects and purposeful about your getting better.

To that end....

Danny L. Smith

A Few Traits of a Great Leader

It's easy to figure out who isn't a team player. They'll constantly
remind the coach just how good they are.

- Brian G. Jett

A successful team is a group of many hands but of one mind.

- Bill Bethel
A Few Traits of a Great Leader
  • Judgment
  • Justice
  • Decisiveness
  • Dependability
  • Tact
  • Integrity
Examples of the Significance of these Traits
  • Significance of Judgment - sound judgement allows a leader to make appropriate decisions in the guidance and training of he/her team. Effective leaders exercise good judgment and weighs pros and cons accordingly to arrive at an appropriate decision and take proper action.
  • Significance of Justice - the quality of displaying fairness and impartiality is critical in order to gain the trust and respect of subordinates and maintain discipline and team cohesion, particularly in the exercise of responsibility as a leader.
  • Significance of Decisiveness - the quality of character which guides a person to accumulate all available facts in a circumstance, weight the facts, choose and announce an alternative which seems best. It is often better that a decision be made promptly than a "potentially" better one be made at the expense of more time.
  • Significance of Dependability - the quality which permits a team leader to assign a task to a team member with the understanding that it will be accomplished with minimum supervision. This understanding includes the assumption that the initiative will be taken on small maters not covered by specific instructions.
  • Significance of Tact - the quality of consistently treating others with respect and courtesy is a sign of maturity. Tact allows commands, guidance, and opinions to be expressed in a constructive and beneficial manner. This deference must be extended under all conditions regardless of true feelings.
  • Significance of Integrity - a leader's word is his/her bond. Nothing less than complete honesty in all of your dealings with subordinates, peers, and superiors is acceptable.

Other, and no less important, traits of a great leader include unselfishness, courage, enthusiasm and endurance.

Practicing these traits on a day-in-day-out basis is hard. Leaders and managers must be thoughtful and purposeful; think and act strategically.


You'll be the same five years from today as you are today except for
what you listen to, who you associate with and what you read.

Zig Ziglar

I have a few "truths" I live by and this one from Zig lives out as real as any. Jim Collins (of the Good-to-Great fame) has stated in that the most important leadership books are biographies of great men/women and history. Historical data from last year, last decade and beyond shows that we have to be purposeful and get out of our own way to have a chance at the results we strive so hard to obtain.

Learn and change.

Great leaders continuously train themselves and their teams. To learn more about building high performance teams, contact me at 512-773-6528 or danny@rp2development.com.

To that end....

Danny L. Smith


Top 11 Characteristics of a Great Teambuilder

Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.

Andrew Carnegie


Building a highly functioning team takes effort and discernment. Great managers and leaders know they will either live or die by how well their teams function as individuals and a group.

Here are the Top 11 Characteristics (think of them in a never ending circle) -

(this was originally a Top 10 list but has been accurately ammended!)
  • Great Team Builders have and continue to express a very clear vision and expectations of themselves and their team
  • Great Team Builders have one set of rules for everyone including themselves
  • Great Team Members hire the right people, put them in the right place and train them continuously
  • Great Team Builders delegate and enable team members to succeed, develop and deliver the results
  • Great Team Builders build trust through a robust evaluation and correction system
  • Great Team Builders enhances the relationship with everyone on the team and clients by seeking clarity through what and how questions
  • Great Team Builders build teams that give open and honest feed-back with each other and the team leader
  • Great Team Builders hold themselves accountable and blame no one including themselves for failures
  • Great Team Builders uses various resources to uncover blind spots
  • Great Team Builders are always pushing themselves and their team to get better
  • Great Team Builders catches team members in random acts of doing things well
Great teams are built because they've replaced or fixed the missing and broken links of poor followers, blind spots and continuously changed learners.

But it takes purpose. Put the pieces together and be purposeful with your passion and people.

To that end.....

Great Team Building is a CHOICE.


Danny
www.StopWastingHandshakes.com

Missing Link(s)..or Broken?

I look back quite a bit to evaluate and correct my path going forward. Partly, I'm looking for blind-spots. Looking back this morning and I see I've been all over the place; leadership vs management, loan officer commonalities, strategic thinking, goal setting, career questions, blame vs accountability, a couple of book reviews, listening vs hearing, marketing vs selling, Rubbermaid's processes, what Bill Gates didn't say, steweardship, Jack Welch about Green being ok but there needs to be profit, pain-perserverence-character-hope, dress for dollars, looking over your shoulder, wearing blue shirts, do-this-don't-do-that, the pictures-in-our-head...and on-and-on-and-on.

Three times this pass week I've read or heard about "the missing link;" reading about leading, reading about learning and once in a discussion about out-bound vs in-bound marketing.

I think the links are more broken than missing and here's my version -

There are three. One is about Following. We hear about leaders, leading and leadership until it has grown old. Everyone has their version of what is a good leader, or the difference between leadership and managment (how come it's not manageship?). The book "Courageous Follower" is one of my Top 5 Business books.

The second link, broken or missing, is about blind-spots. We think because we can learn so much about processes, strategies, marketing, selling, goal setting, what drives customer service, what makes a good team, how to get more profits, how to build a better widget, on and on and on...we think all this is going to make us better. But we don't pay enough attention to our blind-spots. And we don't even know we have blind-spots unless we're told we have them (that's why they're called blind-spots).

I keep harping on the book "Talent Masters" and Charam/Conaty's opening statement about managing people as well as we manage our money. "Talent Masters" and "Execution" (another Charan) book are also in the Top 5.

Read "Talent Masters" and "Couregous Follower" and you'll get a bit of what I'm saying here -

And the third is learning too much, not any/enough and not using the learning to "get better." By "get better" I mean CHANGE. This one is probably broken and missing!

No matter how good the leadership, we need to be good followers (and have people that follow well). We all need to look around, ask for help and uncover his/her blind spots and Learn Well. None of this is easy, but neither is getting consistent good results.


So...What is your biggest Challenge? (I bet it has to do with people)

What have you been doing about it?

If it's not working.....What are you going to do different?


To that end....

Danny







PS....this posting started out about the loan officer/salesperson's missing link. Maybe it still is.

Pingings - Evaluation and Correction

Do not quench the Spirit. Test everything; hold
fast to what is good. Flee from what is evil.

1 Thessalonians 5: 19-21


Do not quench the Spirit...test everything....hold fast what is good...flee from what is evil. These are words to seriously read, ponder, and pray on. Peter is talking about the same Spirit Jesus referred to when He said He had to leave so the Spirit could come. I ponder and pray on that and I'm drawn to how the Spirit must groan in me..us; He groans is because He sees and feels us going against God's will and He is trying to correct us.

As I ponder and pray about this verse, I have to assume that anyone who believes in Christ wants to follow Him well. To do anything well takes practice and practicing well takes a good discipline of evaluation and correction. Practicing Christianity well is different only in the aspect that it is the most important aspect of an evaluation and correction process, or discipline.

Many authors have touched on this discipline including Jim Collins with the Hedgehog (Good to Great) and Dennis Bakke's "robust evaluation and correction" (Joy at Work). Years ago I heard Max Anders, senior pastor at Grace Covenant Church, give a sermon where he talked extensively about looking back over your shoulder periodically to review how well your walk with Christ had been.

I like the "robust evaluation and correction" thing, but with some twists.In the Navy, I was on a submarine and though a radioman (dit dah dit dit), I was a bit intrigued with sonar. Sonar is primarily passive and active. Active is the type you hear about in movies when the captain orders for a "ping;" the sonarman sends the single pulse (ping) out and then listens for the return. He can then evaluates the distance from the target. Passive sonar is simply listening for threats. In either case, once a sound is recognized, the captain would evaluate and take the necessary action. We would be out at sea for weeks at a time and someone would be in the sonar room at all times....listening and paying attention.

Practicing Christianity well requires a good discipline of listening, paying attention, evaluation and correction when those pings come back at us, whether invited (active), or passive (uninvited). Some behaviors to practice -

- Pay attention to what is going on around you at all times.

- Ask questions about how you are doing - listen to the answers

- Be purposeful about your life; have a mission and a plan to carry it out.

- Be aware that everyone has blind spots, including you and you can't see them from where you are at that is why they are called blind spots.

- Pray for the Holy Spirit to talk to you and be involved in your valuation and correction - this is where the real ROBUSTness kicks in. The bible tells us He is groaning inside us , wanting to help. We just need to listen and pay attention.


- Don't ignore pingings you hear coming through your hull.

Lord God, I pray that I listen to you today. I pray that I pay attention to where I am and what you want me to do - right here. Give me the wisdom and discernment to recognize the corrections that need to be made in my life. Help me to accept those evaluations and move towards the corrections. Help me to uncover and correct the blind spots. You are good and gracious and your mercy is boundless. You never said our lives would be easy and I pray that I am listening and paying attention to my surroundings, that I allow the Holy Spirit to work in my life. Blessed by your name, that I honor your name. Amen

To that end.....

Make it a great Sunday

Danny

(note...in the practice of "spaced repetition," this is an edited re-post from http://godandworkmatters.blogspot.com/2010/03/evaluation-active-and-passive.html)

REALLY? Personalities Matter at Work?

Conflicts with people? Not sure the cause? Do you even care to learn or is your tendency to just drive through....or around the problem?

Conflicts are going to happen. Period-the-end. How you handle them are driven in part by your personality and temperament. Characteristics of our personality/temperament can be a major cause of disruption and bad results in the workplace.

This is the first time in American history where four generations of workers have been employed side-by-side and this factor adds to the personality/temperament problems. Most of us don't know, some don't care, why we are the way we are. Yet our core personality was developed at an early age and has gone through transformations since. If you are a baby boomer, you saw the creation of television, the liberation of women and a huge shift in the workplace - away from the traditional workforce. A Boomer's bent is to define himself by his job.

Gen-Xers experienced the creation of the personal computer, fax machines, mom going to work and tend to define themselves by their hobbies.

The big development during the Millenial's (Ys) upbringing has been the creation of the information highway. Your tolerance for many things is hard to understand by traditionalists, boomers and many Xers. You define yourself by your inner peace and self-talk.

Accepting and understanding our differences can make a big difference in the workplace. A profile assessement, such as the DISC is used in many workplace settings.

The following chart gives a simplistic relationship to how DISC temperaments are in Meetings (notice the word "want") -
 


Again, simplistic but strategically think about these factors as you interact with your co-workers today.

What challenges are you having? What is your biggest challenge? What are you doing about it?

Go back to a recent article in this blog on Strategic Thinking and Building Elite Workforces and think about those articles in relation to these temperaments.

To that end....

Danny
Category
Their Role in The Meeting
Dominant
D’s want to be the leader in the meeting.  They will tend to take charge, whether that is appropriate or not.  They want to walk away with results and a delegated list for others.
Influential
I’s want attention.  They will volunteer to be in charge but will tend to be disorganized and focused primarily on the social aspects of the meeting.
Steady
S’s do not want to go to meetings.  They will tend to sit in the back and hope to not have to talk.
Conscientious
C’s will bring an agenda to the meeting, even if that is not their role.  They want to stay on task and walk away with a plan.

Building High Performance Teams: PTP

Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. It is the ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.

- Andrew Carnegie



Teams can be powerful and productive when they function well. When they aren't functioning well they can be a disaster to the individuals, the team and the organization itself. Bad teams cause far-reaching cultural issues.

Before a group of people can function well together, they have to pass through a series of stages. The challenge of every good leader is to help their team members move through the various phases of team formation until they reach the final stage.

Points-to-Ponder on Building High Performance Teams

Forming Stage - the team is nothing more than a collection of individuals, each with his/her own agenda and expertise and little or no shared experience.

Storming Stage - the group of individuals become more familiar with one another they will go through a phase where personal values and principles are challenged, roles and responsibilities are taken on and/or rejected, and the team/group's objectives and way of working together are defined.

Norming Stage - the team has settled down and has developed a clear identity. Everyone has begun to understand their roles in relation to one another and established a clear vision or goals.

Performing Stage - other norms get established in evaluation and correction process of working together. It is at this stage everyone will work most effectively and get the most results. The confidence level of the team will have reached the point where they are willing to take significant risks and try out new ideas on their own.

Not all teams ever reach a good Performing Stage but instead get bogged down in personalities, bad conflict, blame and inefficient tendencies.

But the teams that have common goals, are able to put temperaments and personal feelings aside, the teams that insist on getting the job done and being professionals....those teams are what makes a company stand above the rest.


To that end......

Danny


The source for this material is from our management/leadership training program; MuRF Systems' Building High Performance Teams.

To learn more about how this program can help you get better results as a manager, leader and follower, contact Danny L. Smith at 512-773-6528 or danny@RP2Development.com

Point-to-Ponder: Problem Solving - Characteristics that Diminish

None of us are totally objective. We all have experience and memories that travle with us and influence how we handle today's events and how we plan for tomorrow.

When attempting to REALLY solve a problem you MUST be open to all avalable information from all parties and then studying that information within a problem solving framework.

This can be a powerful win-win situation for everyone...
  • if your beliefs are validated, then you have gained even more credibility and confidence about the problem (huge Self-Trust deposit)
  • If you learn something new, something unexpectd, you're still a winner - you have new insight to apply to the problem
  • If you disprove your original opiion, you are still wiser and have lost nothing.
Individual Characteristics that Will Diminish Problem Solving
  • Allowing personal bias to determine what facts and data you use
  • Making leaps in logic and jumping to conclusions
  • Taking short cuts in the collection and analysis of data
  • Coming with preconceived ideas

Not only will this type behavior decrease your Self-Trust and Trust others have in you, you are at great risk for overlooking important items and for promoting additional failure in the future.

We'll circle back to Management/Leadership Points in the next few days about Attributes of a Good Problem Solver.

Problem solving is a huge problem (pun intended) and learning how to problem solve correctly makes us want to beat our heads against the wall. The source for this material comes from our Problem Solving online e-Learning course.

People say that not only do they learn, but it changes their behavior.

Now THAT is what Blanchard, Meyers and Hue are talking about!


To that end....

Commonalities in Top Producing Loan Officers: What Are They?

I became seriously interested in commonalities in top performing people in 1992 after reading an article about the nation's Top 20 Loan Officers. The article profiled each of these men and women and it was remarkable to notice the apparent common traits. Yet they were of various ages and backgrounds and while some worked with builders, others worked with Realtors and two worked solely on personal referrals.

What makes up a Top Loan Officer? What makes them tick? Do they need to be extroverted, or does in take an out-going introvert?

 What makes one LO so much better than another?


How high does Communication Confidence need to be?

 What skill level? How about depth of knowledge?
How much does it have to with Empahy?



Math and Logic? or Integrity?

How about Dependability and Time Management?

Is Self-Esteem different than Communication confidence? Can your Self-Esteem be too high?

Creative? How high or low should that trait be in order to be a Top LO?

How do you feel about Behavorial characteristics in general and their importance in hiring and training the right Loan Officer?


Conflict Resolution: 5 Typical Phases of Conflict

We'll be writing on and off in the coming weeks about Conflict, its causes, its steps to resolution, etc.

It should be noted at the very outset that a conflict is not necessarily bad or destructive. Conflict can be an explicit way to resolve tensions between parties, prevent stagnation, stimulate interest and curiosity; it can be the medium "through which problems can be aired and solutions arrived at.

For that matter, conflict can be the root of personal and social change.

But for now...the 5 Typical Phases of Conflict -
  1. Anticipation - you know its coming
  2. Conscious / Unexpressed - word leaks out
  3. Discussion - search for info / start to talk
  4. Open dispute - arguing / picking sides
  5. Open Conflict - positional / win-lose
"The opportunity for successful intervention differs greatly in each stage."


Brad Thomas, pastor at Austin Ridge Bible Church, gives the following advice for dealing with conflict -
  1. respond, don't react
  2. go to the person
  3. expect the best
I'll add...."seek clarity / ask questions, treat the event / not the person and talk straight / leave the right impression."

The source for this material is from MuRF's Conflict Resolution manager/leadership training program. To learn more about this training and how it can help your company achieve better results, contact Danny Smith at danny@RP2Development.com or 512-773-6528.


To that end....

Danny



Protect Your NMLS #

Loan officers need to really pay attention to the guidance they receive and authority they give over to others in the use of their NMLS number. Loan applications you are taking today can have much farther reaching affect on your career than you can imagine.

Of course, this goes for anyone that has an NMLS number, but today it is the LO's number that goes on the loan application and not others involved in the process. Hopefully that will change and everyone will be held responsible. For example: if you, the LO, are given wrong advice about how to structure that loan and years from now it is determined there were inappropriate actions involved in that file, it is your number associated with that file.

One file might not be that big of a problem, but what if it happens on 5, or 10? Auditors look for patterns and history proves they look to licensing numbers for responsibility. (I've been told that the new federal agency's interim director has made the statement "we are coming out swinging and we will make examples."

In part, I'm saying that loan officers can no longer just sloth accountability off to the processor or underwriter any longer. They shouldn't have anyway, but that's what has happened too much of the time. The accountability has been ratcheted up in a lot of ways and this is just one of them.

Be aware of who you are giving access to your NMLS number. It can make a difference to your career.


To that end....Comments and dialog welcome!! See comment section below or email me at danny@rp2development.com or 512-773-6528,
 

Danny









Note: this is an edited re-posting from 28 August, 2010.

Interviews Are Not All Created Equal

Structured interviews use a variety of elements and mechanisms to help the interviewer constructively differentiate among job candidates. Research shows that structured interviews have significant edge in predicting on-the-job performance


Studies have consistently shown that without a structured interview process that interviewers are inappropriately influenced by factors such as the performance of previous candidates and personal feelings about a candidate.





Elements of a Structured Interview:

  1. Base questions on job analysis; functions and duties, competencies, knowledge, skills, abilities needed to perform the work
  2. Ask effective questions; usually open-ended and behavioral in nature so they will elicit useful responses
  3. Ask each candidate the same questions
  4. Use detailed rating scales
  5. Train interviewers
  6. Use interview panels; more than one person conduct interviews with each candidate
  7. Take detailed notes to discuss with interviewers and others involved in hiring decision
  8. Assess candidate responses objectively - use rating scales and use the ratings to score candidates
Structure interviews have several other advantages that contribute to their effectiveness, advantages that are not merely theoretical; fairness and objectivity, professionalism, compliance, acceptance and defensibility.

The source for this material is from MuRF's Building an Elite Workforce manager/leadership training program. To learn more about this training and how it can help your company achieve better results, contact Danny Smith at Danny@DannyLSmith.com or 512-773-6528.


To that end....

Danny


The Hidden Soft Costs of a hiring Mistake

The hidden soft costs of a hiring mistake often do not appear to directly affect the bottom line. These costs however can be the difference between the success and failure of an organization. Soft cost of a hiring mistake can include:

  • Lost productivity
  • Lost business opportunites
  • Increase in workload
  • Lower company morale
  • Poor customer service
  • Increased Emotional Stress for Managers
When researchers look at the validity of various hiring practices, they found that only structured interviews and validated testing provided validity numbers were significantly related to performance outcome.

Background chacks and unstructured interviews only accounted for 17% of the total variance in the hiring process.


Be purposefully about yourself and the talent you hire; it matters to your peace of mind and your bottom line,


Danny







Source for this material is from MuRF's Building an Elite Workforce manager/leadership training program. To learn more about this training and how it can help your company achieve better results, contact Danny Smith at danny@RP2Development.com or 512-773-6528

Building an Elite Workforce: The 9 Most Common Mistakes in Starting Out

Building an Elite Workforce requires you to hire the right people. The late and renowned management specialist Peter Drucker stated that by all accounts, the typical executive's batting average is no better than .333 and in no other area of management would we put up with such miserable performance.

Drucker's statement points to the importance that should be placed on the selection processes in business.

The 9 Most Common Hiring Mistakes

1. Relying on interviews to evaluate a candidate
2. Using only successful people as models
3. Too many criteria
4. Evaluating "personality" instead of job skills
5. Using yourself as an example
6. Failure to use statistically validated testing to predict job skills most critical to success
7. Not researching why people have failed in a job
8. Relying on general "good guy" criteria
9. Bypassing the reference check

A generation ago there was a 20 percent drop in the birth rate and thus we have 20 percent fewer people entering the labor force. Yet, fewer people are retiring and many have lost their jobs due to economic times.

It is important to understand what it means to build, manage and lead an elite workforce. In the midst of all this turmoil, there are legitimate answers and these answers will require change. The future will be singificantly different from the past and you cannot manage tomorrow like you managed yesterday, so HANG ON. It is going to be a wild ride!


Danny








Source for this material is from the MuRF's Building an Elite Workforce manager/leadership training program. To learn more about this training and how it can help your company achieve better results, contact Danny Smith at danny@RP2Development.com or 512-773-6528.


Made for Stewardship - Tim Keller Podcast

We are called to work because God also worked - He created the world! We can work for God by using our gifts for others. We also need rest from our work, which comes for our security in God through Christ.

To listen to this message about work and rest, go to the link below and click on Made for Stewardship

Made for Stewardship


Blessings and work smart!

Jesus Developed Followers Before Leaders

We don't really know a great deal about the first 30 years of Jesus', though we can speculate. Historically, we do know a great deal about the culture, the people, their habits, etc.

But have you ever wondered why there was such a long period of time for him to be revealed for who he was? Was it for him to become an appropriate age? Yes, I'm sure, but can't help but believe it was also for him to be developed as a follower before he became a leader. And only then he begin developing his own followers. Not leaders, that would come later, but followers. Jesus spent 3 years developing followers and at times had hundreds, maybe thousands of people following him.

He taught these men, made in the image of God, to be followers...read more

What Career Path are You Geared For?

The WorkForce Readiness and Career Interest Profile will help determine what career you're geared for best results.

Are you Enterprising?

How about Social?

Realistic or Conventional?

Certain types are Investigative and the Workforce Readiness goes much deeper than mere temperaments and personalities.


Enterprising people prefer to deal with Data and People. These people are typically adventurous, takes on leadership roles, are persuasive and value politcal and economic matters.

Many Enterprising people successfully select college majors in pre-law, business management, international business and political science.

 





Learn more about your own personal Interests, Skills and Personality and how it matches up to the O-Net  (US DOL/ETA sponsored primary source of occupational information) programs sample job match.

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April's Career Awareness Month
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