Do You Ever Reach the Light?

I can't believe it's almost 2 months since my last post!

Between higher education system go live season (must have new portals and technology ready for the kiddos to register for classes on day one, ya know), and enjoying the HOT summer with many excursions to get out of the heat, it's time to get back to making time for blogging.

And that's it.

We will never reach the end of the tunnel.

There is always more to do, more to accomplish.

How fast do you want to go and what will you make time for?

That's up to you - you drive your journey (or as my colleague Michelle Johnston says, you Architect Your Work)

Don't let it architect you.

Focusing On Getting The "Right" Things Done

I don't know about you, but in today's world of email craziness, crackberries beeping constantly, and immediate, if not 24/7, access to information and people anywhere, it's hard to get tasks accomplished. To boot, we've all become victim of bad habits - from checking email frequently to getting caught off guard surfing the net not just for 10 minutes but for 2 hours.

And, our to do lists keep growing because we don't know when to finally say 'no' to one more thing to pile on top of the list. You mean well, heck I mean well in wanting to help someone or get something done, but when you fail to deliver it doesn't bode well.

So how does anyone stay focused to make progress today? Here are some tips and tricks from what I do and what I've observed my direct reports, peers and managers do:

1. Block That Outlook Calendar
Don't get caught up in meeting hell, especially back to back meeting hell. You know you typically have something to do after a meeting - make sure you plan the time to focus on the follow up from the meeting or get the follow up action carved out in an open time on your calendar. I typically block half my day for "getting things done" leaving the other half for meetings and catching up with colleagues.

2. Set Appropriate Expectations
Can you really turn around something in one hour? In a day? Ensure you are communicating when you can really get something done, and if you need to slip something due to the unexpected, immediately let the other know you are delayed.

3. Start Your Day Listing
Because our to do list is just overwhelming, begin your day planning your to do list, in order of priorities, so that by the end of the day you can feel like a rock star in all the progress you have made that day.

4. Learn to Say No
Do you really need to do what someone just asked you to do? Don't know? Think about if it gets you to any of your end goals for work or life - if it doesn't, then pass or delegate. Remember, you are going to have to give up doing something else to take on that "one more thing" you think you have the time for. Refer to my Opportunity Mojo series for further help in this area.

5. Be Your Own Personal Project Manager
Everything you tackle in life is a project, so, why not leverage project management tools to help you ensure you are balancing what you need to accomplish. This means becoming a good estimator of tasks, scheduler and resource planner. Remember, you can always hire people to do the things you don't like to do without having to own your own company - from maids to dog walkers to virtual personal assistants.

Changing your habits are probably next to impossible, but you can do it if you just incorporate one tip or trick at a time to be more responsive and focused in meeting your end goals.

Remember to prioritize and focus on the tasks to get to your end goals, period.

What's Your Opportunity MoJo? Part 4 - Impact!

We've looked at 2 of the three components in helping you decide if "this opportunity's right for you". So, let's look at the third - impact.

First, you are probably wondering "what do you mean by impact?" Great question. This is really an "eye of the beholder" characteristic - YOU need to define what you mean when you think impact.

For example, does "making an impact" mean to you:

• Influencing a person
• Changing a system
• Becoming recognized or remembered for something

Once you pinpoint the number one "what" it is you want to impact, you then need to further define "what" is, such as

• What is it that you want to do to make that impact?
• Is there a target domain/audience?
• What do you want the end results to be?

For example, for a long time I've personally wanted "impact" throughout my lifetime "education". That's a bit too broad to really feel a sense of impact and accomplishment. So I've had to peel back the onion over the years and ask

• Is it the "system" I want to impact, or the "people" in the system?
• Is there a particular domain of education I am more interested in changing then others?

I've finally honed in on 2 areas for impact

• Making the educational process more efficient and effective (which I am lucky to do at the day job)
• Helping motivate girls to get educated so to open their eyes to the world ahead of them (which is part of side projects I work on)

I'm cheating a bit as I have 2 impact areas (remember, overachiever here), but these are at least well defined reference points I have to help determine if the next opportunity that comes my way is something I want to jump on, or not.

What do you want to impact today, tomorrow and in the future?

PS - Small things do matter. Read The Tipping Point on how little things can make a big difference.

What's Your Opportunity MoJo? Part 3 - Passion

So do you do what you love every day? Or, do you love what you do every day?

Better question - do you know what you love to do?

Even better - do you know what you don't love to do?

No matter what you answered above, you need to build a "passion list" you can reference to help you with determining if you want to take on an opportunity or not. Let's start.

1. Write down the 20 actions that come to mind that you do daily/weekly/month to "be productive" (i.e. volunteer, generate income, etc. - we are not talking about brushing your teeth or cleaning house) Examples may be "operating a website", "cold calling", "managing a team", etc.

2. Write down up to 20 more actions that you don't do today but wish you did or could try.

3. Order your list by most passionate activity up top, least passionate on bottom.

4. Review and update your list periodically - either every time a new opportunity comes your way or once every 3-6 months.

Now that you have your list, and a new opportunity, you now need to ask the following:
1. Is that opportunity within the actions on your list? If it is not would it fall above anything on your list? If so, add it.

2. Where on the list does this activity fall - somewhere high or low?

3. If you thought through taking this on, is there an activity lower on the list you can stop doing today so to replace with the new activity?

So, what is number one on your list?

What's Your Opportunity MoJo? Part 2 - MONEY!

Ok, for some (many) you are probably thinking this is about "how much can I make as fast as I can make it"?

Well, no, not really.

First, believe it or not, not everyone wants to be like Donald Trump and focus on making more and more money. However, most people want to be able to make a bit more money then they need to live "comfortably" from their point of view, and thus, buy and do what they please.

So, what do we mean when we analyze an opportunity from the money aspect?

1. What are your true monetary goals in life?
You need to first come to grips on what you realistically want. We all cannot be as fortunate as Bill Gates or Oprah, but there are many people living their dreams on much less. So, what do you need today and in your future, and are you on track? If you don't really know and don't want to do the analysis it may be worth obtaining a financial advisor to help as they can often take the "emotion" out of making financial decisions for you. I recommend Fox & Company as they are not tied to any particular financial institutuion's products to sell.

2. Will your "hourly commitment" to doing X bring you what you believe you are worth today?
Most of the time, if we are looking at new opportunities from a money perspective we try to determine if this opportunity will turn a profit of at least 20% or more of what I get today.

3. Will your "hourly commitment" to doing X bring you what you believe you will be worth in the future?
This is analyzing an educational investment - be it going to school or volunteering to do something or taking a job at a lower pay to get you somewhere bigger in the future.

4. What do I lose hourly by taking this opportunity on?
Say this is not a new job, but a new side project you want to turn into profit some day. What are you losing by taking this project on - time to invest in education? another project? free time? There is monetary value there - figure it out before making your decision.

Quick tip - Do you *really* know your hourly rate today? Most of us work more than 40 hours a week (some lucky people work less). Track the time you work over the next month and determine your real hourly rate - that may open your eyes to being open for a new opportunity.

We all should love what we do, but, if we can time box certain things and still make the same amount of money, or, open up time to have a side project and make more money, wouldn't you do so?

Up Next: Finding Your Underlying Passion

Concept MEL

No, MEL is not an ode to one of my great friends of all time (sorry if you are reading Mel, but this isn't about you), but MEL is a simple concept I instilled in my team 8 months ago, in that, no matter what role you play on a team - from individual contributor to manager to executive, that you need to live and do MEL every day to make waves.

So, what is MEL?

Managing the Business
Empowering for Excellence
Leading for Growth

Let's look at each aspect a bit further and how it applies to you no matter where you fit in your organization:

1. Managing the Business
Why are you making that investment? What are the goals you need to manage to achieve over the next 12 months?

• Executives: Have you defined the vision for the next year and communicated the goals you want to set to achieve the vision? How are you tracking to your goals and what tools/dashboards do you provide your team, and yourself, to measure goal attainment so to proactively respond to red flags in achieving the goals.


• Managers: Are you making decisions based on the goals in front of you for the year? Have you broken the higher level goals into your team's action plan? You are the guiding light for your individual contributors - continuously make sure they know what you want out of them.


• Individuals: Do you know what you need to do to help your team achieve the goals for the year? Do you know what you need to know to deliver, and thus, continuously learn? When was the last time you asked your manager "how can I help you achieve our goals"?

2. Empowering for Excellence
Are you carving for yourself or your team ways to deliver excellence? Getting rid of obstacles preventing your team from being excellent? Are you an "excellent" role model?

You need to start by defining what "excellence" means to you and/or your team and live it, no matter where you fit in the organization.

3. Leading for Growth
This comes down to everyone, no matter the level, contributing towards two things

• Continuous business improvement (becoming more efficient)
• Harvesting new opportunities (innovation)

You need to make sure mechanisms are in place to become more efficient and to identity and build on new opportunities.

As you embark on embracing MEL, there is one more think to remember - keep it simple, silly. For example, those above me set 2 goals, yes only 2 goals, for my team to achieve this year - a revenue goal and utilization goal. That's it - bottom line goals.

So what are you waiting for - Manage, Empower and Lead today to achieve your goals for 2008! 2 months are already past you.

Practice, Practice, Practice - Another Step in Getting Started

OK, so my first post was on jumping in and getting started. You are probably saying, "Thanks Jaime, I've started, now what?"

Practice.

What, no executing a marketing plan? No putting up a web site? Not finding my first customer?

I'm not saying don't do that, but to get from starting with a good concept and becoming known for a great business, you have to "do" it. That may mean:

1. Giving away something to friends, family, or close colleagues/people you know to get feedback on what you "do".

2. Hold a free seminar, overview, or provide samples to a target audience.

3. Deliver it to yourself.

4. Deliver it to an organization that caters to your target audience (for example a Junior Chamber if you are targeting young professionals, Women in X if you are targeting a female audience, etc.)

5. Start small.

You will learn early on that you have to balance the time you spend planning vs. executing. You will find that planning is needed to save time in the long run, but you don't want to over do it. There will be peaks and valleys on when you will have more bandwidth to plan versus when you have so much business coming at you that you have to focus on executing.

For example, at SunGard Higher Education I apply agile software development methodologies in leading the priorities of a blossoming business (software development methodologies have a lot of great frameworks that can be applied to any business). At the beginning of every week my leaders and I gather to go through our "punch list" of what's on our plate that we either have to tackle this week (execution) or would like to tackle to help in building the practice (planning and marketing activities).

Some weeks we have so much coming at us that we are just executing on the opportunities on our plates. Sometimes we have a bit of down time where we can do more planning and strategic work around packaging and marketing our services. Or, in our down time we focus on practicing - such as learning new skills to help in providing best practices and recommendations to our client or building a new piece of technology to gain that skill while having a new asset to offer a client.

I talk more about practicing what you do, and why, to get and stay ahead at my HubPages blog "Learn to Lead Early and Get Ahead!!" (yup, there is more of me out there!)

As Nike says, "Just Do It". Shouldn't you?

Connect the Dots, Continuously

Today I reflected on how I enjoy "connecting the dots" - be it connecting people with one another for business or personal reasons, or linking business ideas with other concepts to execute. In dusting off a book I received at an Executive Leadership Forum a few years ago called "Connecting The Dots" by Cathleen Benko and Harvard Professor F. Warren McFarlan, I was reminded of why we often look to connect the dots:

"Aligning Projects with Objectives in Unpredictable Times"

I hate to say it, but aren't we always in unpredictable situations? Shouldn't we always be looking to align our projects with objectives we want to accomplish, and thus, always look to connect the dots?

Are you connecting the dots for both yourself and your business/organization you either manage or work within? Here are some tips on making those connections to create tidal wave results:

Connecting the Dots for Yourself

1. Document your strategic goals/objectives for your life.
2. Review the list of things you do for yourself/not for your organization.
3. Does each activity you do for yourself map back to your personal strategic goals and objectives? If not, can you stop doing it? If it does link back, can you find other things to link it to so to make a bigger impact?
4. Who can you connect with, or what can you add to your activity list, to help accelerate meeting your goals/objectives?
5. Make it a weekly or monthly goal to connect with someone new and help make a connection for someone else via an introduction.

Connecting the Dots for Your Organization

1. What is your organization's strategic vision and mission? If you don't know it go find out what it is or recommend getting this figured out asap!
2. Review the projects and activities you are working on.
3. Does each project/activity take your organization one step further to meet the strategic vision and missiong? If not can you stop doing that project/activity? If so is there a way to accelerate the project?

Even though this may seem like a "new year's resolution" alignment process to go through, in actuality you should be doing this type of alignment much more frequently - once a month if not once a week.

Why not begin to ask yourself the above questions when you plan out your goals and objectives for the week?

If you can continuously connect the dots with yourself and for your organization you will be in a much better position for the uncertainty faced every minute.

Getting Started

"You don't have to be great to get started, but you do have to get started to be great."

Debbie Mrazek, The Sales Company

Only one word can describe Debbie - amazing. I've always appreciated her opinion, and this quote of hers comes to mind often.

So, turning the wonderfully young age of 30 almost a year ago jolted me to "get started" on what I wanted to be known for being great at. Though I knew I started already, but something wasn't quite right. Instead of jumping right in at what I wanted to be great at, I found myself diving into a process of asking myself a series of questions around

Who am I?

What am I doing?

Am I where I want to be?

Am I focused on my passions?

Am I leaving the legacy I dream?

Am I a role model for others?

Am I making an impact?

And quickly I realized that in about 50% of my life I was exactly where I wanted to be - building a growing business with amazing potential and colleagues, plus am extremely happy with the people I have come to surround myself with since moving to Dallas. (Yes, I am an overachiever - for many this would be 100% fulfilling, not 50%.)

But 50% was missing. Or more like the other 50% was cluttered with things I either didn't care much about any more or cared about for the wrong reasons, which unfortunately began to affect others, or took me far off my unique path. It wasn't me nor what I wanted to be known for doing.

However, I did not know what was missing, or better yet, should be the remaining 2-3 things I start to focus my energy on. So I couldn't really get started to be great, yet. Instead, I began a process of self discovery and exploration. I read books. I dabbled in different things to see if the glove fit.

By asking the above questions in different contexts I began to see patterns around what has been missing that I want to be known for being great at:

Motivate Others to Make an Impact

Thought Leadership on the Soft and Hard Side of Technology

Making an Impact on Education and Children

So almost a year later, just weeks before turning 31, I have honed in on the 50% that is missing that I want to be great at. Part of what's next is getting through the de-clutter process and setting realistic goals for 31.

So get started to become great. I have.