doug smith training

Have you ever had to push a stalled car? When it's not moving, it takes a big push to get it going. Unless you're headed downhill. If you're going to stall, stall headed downhill. Stall only when you're already headed for the finish line. Of course we don't get to pick when our goals will stall. They surprise us. Barriers appear we'd never expected. But we can plan for that. We can support our big goals with a series of smaller goals that keep our momentum going, our team energized, and our plans on track. That big goal might need a few little goals to get your creativity going. Give your big goals all they help they need. Break them into little goals and watch your progress add up. Climb that mountain, but get headed downhill to the finish line as soon as you can -- support your big goals with little goals that matter. -- Doug Smith

How much attention are you giving your team? One of the toughest lessons I learned when I was a beginning supervisor was to give my people enough attention. The struggling performers need attention. The superstars need challenges and support. Everyone on the team needed something, even when (especially when) they didn't make those needs clear. High performance leaders find ways to give each team member the attention needed. Attention is useful. Attention is immediate. Attention is critical. Attention is the sincerest form of energizing your people.  Energize your team. Give them the attention that they need. What's the best and easiest way to do that? Talk about it. Initiate conversations with each team member. Take the talking just a little deeper than usual. Talk about what matters. Ask how they feel. Listen to their hopes, their goals, their motivations. That kind of attention is pure magic. -- Doug Smith

Do you want to bring more creativity to your problem solving? I would guess that the answer is "of course!" More creativity leads to better solutions. Oh, yes and it's more fun. Can problem solving be fun? Absolutely, but only if you bring enough creativity into the process to get past the aggravation and move forward to the fun. Creative problem solving requires creative practice. Find ways to sharpen your creativity. Find ways off line. Go for a walk. Visit a museum. Draw a picture. Make up a joke (that's harder than it might seem). Create! This is your coaches prodding, working on you in this moment: go create something! Practice your creativity the way a great pianist practices their art and craft of playing the piano. You've got you keep your fingers on the keys. Go! -- Doug Smith

Big goals take strength. Ambitious goals take courage. Any goal worth anyone's attention will meet with resistance. Work thru that resistance. Stay the course. Stay patient even when other people, broken processes, and stupid events get in your way. It's not the end of your goal, it's just a moment in a test of your will. Are you certain about your goal? Is it important to you? Is it noble, worthy, and helpful? Then see it thru. When the goal is strong enough, your patience is long enough. See it thru. -- Doug Smith

Have you noticed how much your performance depends on your focus? Whenever I am clear about my focus, and steady in my attention, my performance improves. It can reach the level of flow, where I'm no longer even aware of time passing or skill execution -- but that only comes after mindfully keeping my focus on the here and now, on what I'm doing. How about you? When you start with your focus, do you achieve better results? Are you goals easier to achieve? Even when our mission is clear, we need to keep our focus on identifying that mission and bringing our actions to the front of achieving our goals in service of that mission. Your performance starts with your focus. Do you want to improve your performance? Improve your focus. What's your focus for today? -- Doug Smith

How much does your biggest goal matter? What are you willing to do in order to achieve that goal? Big goals require commitment. Big goals can even require sacrifice. In the famous line from "The Untouchables" Sean Connery as Jim Malone said "what are you prepared to do?" What are your limits? Are you all in or partially committe I'm not advocating the kind of all in personal life sacrifice that Malone was requiring, but it is a question worth asking around our goals. What are you prepared to do? Work overtime? Ask for help? A goal doesn't much matter unless you're willing to pay a price. What price are you willing to pay? -- Doug Smith

Does your mission inspire you? Do you move quickly on your goals in order to get closer to fulfilling your mission? A mission must be inspiring or it's not much of a mission. If your mission doesn't give you energy, maybe it's not your mission. It could be someone else's energy (if they're inspired by it) but it's not yours unless it drive you forward. Rewrite it. Review it. Redo it. Your mission is there for a reason: to guide you to success and happiness. Identify your real mission and run with it full speed ahead. Create a better world. Achieve your most noble goals. Walk a life of happiness: grab a mission with energy and live it for all you're worth. -- Doug Smith

Do you work better when you feel good about yourself? Of course! At least, I do. When I'm strong, confident, and prepared my work is much better. It builds my self-esteem and helps me solve problems and achieve my goals. But, it's up to me to find that self-esteem. It's up to me to build that confidence. No one else can give it to me and my work doesn't care. Have you noticed that your work doesn't care about how you feel about yourself? Your work is your work. Your problem doesn't care about your self-esteem. Your problem just needs to be solved. Will it? It depends on what you bring to your problem. Do you want to bring a great sense of self-esteem? That's up to you. Think about your previous successes. Think about problems you've solved before. Draw on your own clarity of purpose, creativity of design, courage of action, and compassion for others and then realize what a cool person that makes you. Yeah, you. Self-esteem is up to you --

How extreme is your creativity? It can be hard to be a little creative. Once the creativity flows we tend to let it fly - full tilt, unhindered, unmasked, extreme. That can cause problems. Still we must remain creative. To achieve our goals, to solve our problems, we must remain creative. Extreme creativity is often misunderstood. "Why did you paint it THAT color?" "What on earth were you thinking?" "Did you know that would happen?" We can create something so new that people do not understand it. We can also create something that is distinctive yet flawed. I have at times created something that I loved so much that I failed to see its flaws. That's one reason I advocate collaborating in our creativity. Get help. Build a team. Work together. Our strengths left unchecked turn into weaknesses. Working creatively with other people frees us up while holding us up as well. We might need help seeing boundaries that are there for a reason. C

We're either developing ourselves or falling behind. What will you do to develop yourself today? -- Doug Smith

Calling something "common sense" doesn't mean that you don't need it. We're never finished learning. What have you learned today? -- Doug Smith

Who wants frustration? Not me. You? Didn't think so. We get frustrated when our needs aren't meant or our expectations are denied. That stinks. People misbehave under frustration. People break things under frustration, like promises and lamps. It's a mess. Don't give in to frustration. Instead, keep it at bay. Keep frustration away. Achieving your goals eliminates frustration. What's the next step on your biggest goal? -- Doug Smith