doug smith training

Do you team members see you interact with customers? Do you see them? Your team's treatment of customers is a reflection of your treatment of your team.   Treat your team well, and your customers will benefit. -- doug smith

All things being equal, things are never equal. -- doug smith  

How important is commitment to you? When someone tells you that they will do something, are you fine with a casual "maybe they will, maybe they won't" or are you looking for a true commitment? It's not always easy to find these days and yet it is more valuable than ever: commitment. If you want high performance results it takes commitment. If you want quality service for your customers it takes commitment. When there is an easy way out, people will find it unless they are committed to excellence. Everything is optional until you commit. -- doug smith  

Leaders need courage. They also need compassion. We can use our compassion to balance our courage, and use our courage to increase our compassion. Compassion is so vital we must never give up on it. No matter how angry we are, no matter how disappointed we feel, no matter how high the stakes -- stay with compassion. If it cannot be done with compassion, it should not be done. -- doug smith 

A great coach helps you discover how much better you can perform. -- doug smith 

There's more to the score than winning. There is discovering, and perhaps proving your potential.  There is  making adjustments and pivoting. And, maybe most of all, there is learning. Keep score when it's required. But use the score, don't let the score use you. -- doug smith

How much do you practice the skill that is most important to your success? We do best what we do most. Practice. It's the best way (maybe the only way) to get better. You name the skill -- communication, leadership, problem solving, managing conflict, playing music, running, swimming, singing, dancing, acting...practice is the key. -- doug smith 

For a long time now, for many products, it's been a race to the bottom. Offer the basic thing at the lowest price and capture as much market share as you can. As customers, we've gone along with this because we do love low prices. And, it's deceptive because it feels as if many things CAN costs less without sacrificing quality. Cheap TVs are still good. Even cheap cars are better than cars of yesteryear.  But it doesn't hold up for everything -- especially anything involving human interaction, and anything involving customer service. When we reduce staffing to the bare minimums and when we allow robots to answer our questions we are pushing the quality down. Sometimes, better service and higher quality products simply cost more to produce. If we allow the lowest price items to prevail on everything, everything will end up lower in quality.  If we keep rewarding the cheapest price we'll keep creating the cheapest life.  I don't think that's what we want. How ...

  If it's worth learning, it's worth teaching. If you want to be sure that you've acquired a skill, do your best to teach that skill to someone else. You'll quickly find your gaps. You'll humbly stumble in some of the difficulties. And that will all help you learn while you share the knowledge that you are gaining. If it's worth learning, pass it on. -- doug smith

  It's possible to be both tough and tender as a leader. Be tough on the task, and tender on the person. -- doug smith

  Have you ever felt a sudden change that you did not approve of? Maybe your company decides that you have reduced hours. Or, maybe your boss decides that the promotion you were counting on is best given to someone else. Change is like a dance we did not choose the music to. Change is like an invitation to a party filled with strangers. Change rocks our world, and only sometimes makes it better. How are you using change to makes things better? Good luck is a change you can approve of. Bad luck is a change that you do not approve of, but that happens anyway. Change basically does not care what you think. The choice is still up to you. Which next change gives you positive choices? Where is your best choice? -- doug smith

Leaders are paid to produce results. What if the results that leaders produced included optimism? What if they included hope? What if they created great days? Leaders can do that. You can do that. Let's do that. Give people a reason to believe that this is a great day.  Because if you make it happen, it happens. -- doug smith

Are you a hands-on leader? Do you get involved in the work of the work? How much time do you spend "in the trenches" whatever your field is, working like the rest of your crew? Ideas flow. Communication improves. Morale mysteriously grows. And... Some of our best thinking is done with our hands.  If you're blessed with hands that work, keep them working. -- doug smith

  Leadership is a combination of big-picture thinking and attention to detail. One without the other will leave you lacking. Big picture thinking is the inspiration, the invitation, the appeal to all of your senses for some noble cause.  Attention to detail gets it all done.  Everything will work out when you work out the details. Work out the details. -- doug smith

  What race are you racing? We've seen everything possible get gamified - shopping, performing, deciding, status, promotions, ticketing, seating...on and on we are all subjected to points, likes, smiles, and other ways to manipulate us into buying one thing or another, whether or not we want it that way. Let's pause. Let's think about all this gamification. Are the points adding up to significance? Are the likes making the world a better place? Are we at all better off by competing for every nugget of attention? Hmmm? Some people are already reacting. What happens when the old enticements stop enticing? What happens when people focus on what really does matter -- relationships, hope, trust, love, compassion...human interaction? We need to decide quickly, because AI surely does not care, will not differentiate, and will not forgive. The points add up, but people matter more. When the rat race rats stop racing the rat race has to change. Let's change for us, and not for t...

  Ever hear a piece of advice and think "yeah, that's a hard no..."? Or how about this -- ever offer someone a piece of excellent advice and watch them completely ignore it? Advice is funny like that. It's not good advice if nobody takes it. -- doug smith

  Problems are not always caused by mistakes. Sometimes they're caused by good intentions. While it is great to begin with good intentions, what we do still matters more than what we intend. If a leader creates an unfair atmosphere out of the intention to help one particular team member, that could be a problem. If a leader intends to build a high performance team and yet supports without ever challenging team members, that could be a problem. Good intentions are not enough. Right actions matter more. -- doug smith

  How do you feel about the ego? Or, how does your EGO feel about the ego? A healthy self-image is essential. We do better when we feel better about ourselves. But, it's easy to take that too far. It's easy for someone to make critical decisions based only on the impact to the ego. That causes more problems than it solves. Silly ego. We shouldn't let it decide for us. It will learn to get over whatever is going on. Let that ego energize you, but don't let it polarize you. The ego is less dangerous when you see how funny it is. Laugh, and move ahead using your head. -- doug smith

Stretch goals might leave stretch marks but they also build muscle. -- doug smith

  I don't like to get lost. Unfortunately, without reliable directions I would be lost most of the time. Those directions often lead to detours. The original path is blocked, or unavailable, or more problematic than anticipated...something causes the route to change. If the destination is the same, it's still a worth journey. A detour doesn't stop you from going where you want to go. It's just another scenic route. Slow down and enjoy the view... -- doug smith