Coach Andrea

Coach Andrea’s Intro

The topic of “managing my reaction” to events comes up with many of my coaching clients. I liked Alan Zimmerman’s article this week because he provides a formula for determining what your reaction will be.  You can make a difference!

Quote of the Week

“One must fight for a life of action, not reaction.”

~ Rita Mae Brown

Avoid Rejection By Changing Your Reaction

By Dr. Alan Zimmerman

Roger Miller said, “Some people walk in the rain. Others just get wet.” He’s so right.

Have you ever noticed that two people can experience the same thing on a sales call, like getting a simple “no,” but react in totally different ways? I sure have. And that reaction makes all the difference in the world.

Getting “no’s” and resistance on calls is inevitable, IF you are actually placing calls. The “rejection” part is totally optional.

In my seminars, I teach a simple formula. It says E + R = O or Event plus Reaction equals Outcome. You can’t change, prevent, or delete many of the “Events” that happen on calls, or in life, but you do have control over your “Reaction.”

And that’s critical. Your reaction will give you the “Outcome” of celebration or desperation.

So what determines your “Reaction?”

There are three elements. The first element is BELIEF. If you have the right beliefs, and if you believe in the right things, you’ll be on the road to a life of celebration.

Unfortunately, some people just don’t get it. They believe in the wrong things. Just look at people’s bumper strips, and you’ll see what I’m talking about. Last week I saw a well dressed person driving an expensive car with a bumper strip that read, “Life is a bitch, then you die.” How sad!

Contrast that to a person who uses the power of BELIEF. Even though that person might have a challenging life, he or she continues to experience joy and peace of mind.

Perhaps the best example I ever came across was a saying scratched on the wall of a basement in Germany. It was found after World War II, placed there by some unknown Jew who was hiding from the Nazis. He wrote:

“I believe in the sun even when it is not shining. I believe in love even when I do not feel it. I believe in God even when He is silent.”

He or she was living a life of celebration when most people would have thought it impossible to do so. It was a matter of BELIEF.

The second element is FOCUS. What do you choose to focus on? There’s always some good in a bad situation, and there’s always some bad in a good situation. After all, we’re living on earth, not in heaven.

An old ditty says it this way:

“As you go through life, brother, Whatever be your goal, Keep your eye upon the doughnut, And not upon the hole!”

I’m sure you know some sales reps who focus on the hole, and I’m sure those are the same people who live a life of desperation.

It’s like one person I knew who was sent to a seminar by her company. The trip was paid by the employer; the hotel was very nice, and the training was excellent. But this person’s only comment about the entire experience was the fact that the chairs in the training room were uncomfortable. I’m sure they were. But her focus on the uncomfortable chairs kept her from celebrating the rest of the trip.

By contrast, Dr. Marion Stottlemire at the Kansas University Public Management Center says,

“One of the greatest causes of stress in the modern world is unhappiness with our work or our work situation. You CANNOT AFFORD TO BE UNHAPPY ON THE JOB. It is killing you.”

To make his point, Dr. Stottlemire related the following story. He recently met a friend that he hadn’t seen for a long time. Of course, he asked him how he was, and his friend said he was happy and healthy.

As they talked, Dr. Stottlemire learned that his friend had been passed over for a promotion. In fact a subordinate had gotten the job. So he asked his friend how he was dealing with it. He replied, “Well for a while I was quite bitter. Then I realized that I was making myself miserable. I decided that I had always liked this job, and I was just going to keep doing it and make the most of it.” The friend had decided to focus on the doughnut and not the hole.

So the second element that determines your life of celebration or desperation is your FOCUS. Or as one person said, it’s better to grow through your experiences than simply go through them. There’s a lesson in every experience, and if you focus on that, you’ll be in much better shape.

The third determining element is VISION. Whereas as focus deals with what you see in the present, vision deals with what you see in the future. Those who live lives of desperation only see doom and gloom in the future.

While England or Great Britain was arguably one of the best countries in the world and was running the largest empire in the world, there were many prophets of doom. In 1801, Wilberforce said he dared not have any children because the future was too unsettled.

In 1806, William Penn said,
“There is scarcely anything around us but ruin and despair.”

In 1848,
Lord Shaftsbury said, “Nothing can save the British Empire from ship wreck.”

In 1849, Benjamin Disraeli said,
“In industry, commerce, and agriculture there is no hope.”

In 1852, the Duke of Wellington said,
“I thank God that I shall be spared from seeing the consummation of ruin that is settling in around us.”

They did not have a positive or promising vision.

You need a positive VISION of the future if you’re going to live a life of celebration. Tom Layton makes that clear. At 101 years of age, he has won several medals at the Senior Olympics, and he’s a man of great joy. When asked for his secret, he said, “I don’t look at my life as behind me.”

Now that might sound like an odd thing for a person to say who is 101 years old. But Tom has a very different definition of “old.” He says, “Old is when your memories exceed your dreams.”

It’s obvious that Tom still has a lot of dreams. He has a VISION for the future. What about you?

As published in Art Sobczak’s Smart Calling newsletter and from Dr. Alan Zimmerman’s Internet newsletter, the ‘Tuesday Tip.’ For your own personal, free subscription to the ‘Tuesday Tip,’ go to http://www.DrZimmerman.com

Coaching Call To Action

BELIEF, FOCUS, and VISION will give you a life of celebration instead of desperation. I challenge you to work on your FOCUS.

To be specific, select 10 specific events that occur in your life over the next week. For every one of those events, look for the good in each of those events. It may take a little work to find those positive elements, but the more you practice these FOCUS skills, the better you’ll feel and the better you’ll do.

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

After many years of being prompted to write my own Tip, I am sticking my toe in the water this week.  Periodically, I will be sharing my thoughts and learnings with you. Last week’s Tip was from the perspective of a person who has a boss and improving the working relationship with that boss.  This week’s Tip focuses on your behavior, beliefs and assumptions as the boss and how they can get you in trouble.

Quote of the Week

“Contrary to what I believed as a little girl, being the boss almost never involves marching around, waving your arms, and chanting, ‘I am the boss! I am the boss!’”

~ Tina Fey

5 Mistakes That Can Sink a Good Boss

By Andrea Novakowski

If you own a company or manage a department, part of the reason you’ve come this far is because you’re good at what you do. But inspiring the people who work for you to give their best efforts is another skill altogether. It’s hard to complete tasks well and on time if your staff isn’t on the same page with you, or if they don’t share your commitment to success.

Are you frustrated by employees who don’t perform as well as expected? It may be time to take a look at your leadership style. Here are five common mistaken beliefs that may be interfering with your effectiveness as a boss.

1. Good new hires will know how to do the job right out of the blocks.
Hiring a competent person is only the first step. Even if the new person arrives already accomplished in his field, spend time with him so he can get to know your approach and share your vision. No matter what position he occupies, help him become attuned to your strategic plan. It takes time, but the payoff is huge.

2. No one else can do the job as well as I can.
As your organization grows, you’ll be adding people below you. Why did you hire them if not to help lighten your load, so you can focus on what’s most important? (What’s important may even include your own improved quality of life.) Surround yourself with good people, then give them a chance to show they can handle the responsibility. Step back and let them take some of the weight off your shoulders.

3. If I tell them once, they should be good to go.
Not necessarily. Part of the job of a manager is to provide ongoing feedback. Don’t limit this to just once a year during performance reviews: help your people understand how they can do a better job now. Helping them grow and develop increases their value in the workplace, and more important, to your company.

4. I’m too busy to plan – I need to do!
Do you ever feel as if you spend your whole day at work just responding to the biggest crisis? Take time to sit down and map out a strategy for the future. Planning may seem like a luxury when you have so much on your plate already, but if you don’t invest time now, you’ll find yourself operating in perpetual crisis mode later – which, as everyone knows, is a sure recipe for burnout. Don’t try to muscle your way through every issue that faces you. Think before you execute (or delegate the execution to others).

5. My people know they are doing a good job. I don’t have to tell them.
One of the biggest mistakes managers make is failing to recognize their employees’ successes and only pointing out their faults. Think about it – do you perform better when you know you’re appreciated, or when you’re only chastised for your shortcomings? Letting people know you’re pleased with their achievements will encourage them to continue striving to do good work. It’s human nature!

Coaching Call To Action

Would you rate yourself as an inspiring leader with your people giving their best?  If not, choose one or two changes from the above list that will free you and your employees to do the job each of you is supposed to be doing.

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

Michael Neill’s articles always provide a new tool that’s easy to use.  This week’s Tip has you turn around the word “but” to help you increase your success.

Quote of the Week

“Dwelling on the negative simply contributes to its power.”

~ Shirley MacLaine

Reversing “Buts”

By Michael Neill

I believe the credit for this one goes to John McWhirter, a UK-based NLP trainer. I originally came across it as a sales technique for handling objections, but I’ve used it a lot in my own personal development work….

How many times have you heard sentences like this?

“I’d like to hear more about your idea, but I haven’t got time right now.”
“I think you’re a really great person, but I’m not ready for a relationship.”
“It sounds great, but I can’t afford it.”

Most of us have learned to disregard whatever comes before the “but” and take the second half of the sentence as the speakers “actual” message. But what happens if you reverse the sentence, using the “but” as the pivot point, and then take things a step further in the direction we want them to go?

Try reading the following examples out loud, emphasizing the underlined phrase!:

“So you haven’t got time right now, but you’d love to hear more about this? When would be a better time to set up a meeting?”

“Let me see… you’re not ready for a relationship, but you think I’m a really great person? How about if we just hang out together for a while?”

“If I’m understanding you, you can’t afford it, but it sounds great? Well if it sounds great, let’s see if we can’t sort out a way for you to afford it!”

Today’s Experiment:

1. Complete the following sentence stems. You may complete each one as many different ways as you would like.

a. I want to be successful, but…
b. I want to be healthy, but…
c. I want to exercise, but…
d. I want to have more money, but…
e. I want a great relationship, but…
f.  I want to be true to myself, but…

2. Choose your favorite completions from part one. Reverse the “but”, and sell yourself on a new belief!

Example:

1. I want to have more money, but I don’t want to do more work.
2. I don’t want to do more work, but I do want to have more money. What are twenty things I could do to make more money with less work?

Have fun and learn heaps!

Copyright 2011 Michael Neill, author of Supercoach: 10 Secrets to Transform Anyone’s Life.  All rights reserved – Read more tips at www.Supercoach.com.

Coaching Call To Action

This week do what Michael suggests.  I bet you will have some ah-ha’s (and perhaps some ha-ha’s)!

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

As we are getting close to the half-way mark for 2011, I thought it was a good time to check in on your goal progress.  Michael Neill’s article this week gives us permission to put aside the “loaded” goals on your list. You know those goals that you’ve given so much significance and meaning? Just put them aside for now.  Read on to learn more.

Quote of the Week

” Achievable goals are the first step to self improvement.” ~ J.K. Rowling

The Loaded Goal

by Michael Neill

Creating results in the world is fairly straightforward.  If I want to lose weight, I take in less calories than I burn up, regardless of which diet, eating plan, or “lifestyle choices” I make in order to do it.  If I want to accumulate wealth, I spend less money than I create (regardless of how much I create or what I do to create it) and keep the rest.  If I want to write a book, I put words on a page repeatedly until they tell some semblance of a story or create the opportunity for the reader to learn and transform.

These formulas are common sense, fool-proof, time-tested, and will work for every single person that uses them.  So if you’re consistently not achieving something you say you want to achieve, it’s probably not because you don’t know how.

It’s because that goal, whatever it is, has become loaded with so much extra significance and meaning that you can barely face it, let alone achieve it.

The loaded goal is that goal which seems to be your most important and longest standing one – it’s the one that “for some reason, I don’t seem to be able to make any real progress on” and “this year, I’m finally going to handle”.

What makes the loaded goal so frustrating is that it seems as though it should be easy.  “After all”, we tell ourselves, “other people are able to lose weight, make more money, find a partner, write a novel, get fit, etc – why can’t I?”

The reason why it’s so much harder to reach a “loaded” goal than a regular one is that your focus isn’t really on the result you want to create – it’s on you.

When your goal is loaded…

• Getting fit isn’t about being fit and losing weight is no longer about weighing less (if indeed it ever was) – it’s about “overcoming your essentially lazy, good for nothing nature and proving that you CAN do it” or “if I lose weight, that will show that I’m ‘good enough’ to attract a man”.
• You don’t just want to have more money (though that would be nice too) – you want to prove to your spouse/parents/colleagues/self that YOU do have what it takes and YOU will triumph in the end.
• Writing a novel isn’t about telling a story, it’s about “being an author” or “fulfilling your potential”

As a coach, my clients consistently try to convince me that what we should really be focusing on is their loaded goal, whether it’s winning an Oscar, losing weight, or becoming the first non-Asian leader of China.  (Yes, those are all real examples!)

But what I know is that in order to create results, we need to stop talking about what’s wrong with you (your issues) OR about what’s right with you (your self-esteem) and put our attention where it will make the biggest difference – on the results you most want to create in your life and in the world.

And the simplest way to do that is to literally “take a load off” your mind and put that loaded goal off to the side.  Take a few weeks, months, or even a whole year off from trying to deal with it.  Enjoy your life.  Have some fun.  Stop working on yourself and that particular goal for awhile.

What will happen, counter-intuitive though it may seem, is that everything else in your life will start working better and better. Oh, you’ll still be able to work yourself up into a lather about your loaded goal – after all, it’s loaded up with all your favorite hot-button toppings.  But if you’re willing to keep putting it back down and get on with something else you actually want to create for its own sake, at some point, you’ll look at your once-loaded goal in the context of your increasingly wonderful life and wonder what all the fuss was about.

This is our psychological immune system in action – when we let our problems sit for a bit, they are as likely to dis-solve as be solved. When they don’t, chances are we never actually put it down long enough for it to heal, picking at it in our minds like a really yummy scab.

So that’s today’s experiment, and if you like, it’s one of the best experiments I can suggest for 2011:

Make this year the year you DON’T achieve your loaded goal.

That doesn’t mean you can’t go out and create all sorts of wonderful other things in your life.  Just let that one go (for now), and we’ll check back in later and see if it still matters to you.  The only thing you have to lose is a lifetime of stress, angst, and struggle.

What you stand to gain is beyond measure or compare…

Have fun, learn heaps, and enjoy your life!

Copyright 2011 Michael Neill, author of Supercoach: 10 Secrets to Transform Anyone’s Life.  All rights reserved – Read more tips at www.Supercoach.com.

Coaching Call To Action

Summer is here! This week assess your 2011 goals.  Which one is “loaded” for you? Will you put it aside or reframe it and commit to it?

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

Want to learn a quick technique to improve your focus? This week Simon Tyler describes how to apply the same Control-Alt-Delete we use on our computers to our thoughts, to-dos, tasks, etc. Take a few minutes to learn how you can improve your processing time.

Quote of the Week

“The ability to focus attention on important things is a defining characteristic of intelligence.”
~ Robert J. Shiller

Control – Alt – Delete

By Simon Tyler

One of the first actions I take when my PC becomes irritatingly slow at processing tasks is ‘Control – Alt – Delete’ which displays all the processes that are running and the computer’s memory power working on each of them. Lack of further useful knowledge means I rarely do anything with this information but am always curious about what the processes are, are they important, are they good for me, does my PC need to have them at all?

If you are a regular reader of these tipsletters you’ll have guessed already how much I’ll like and use this metaphor.

Coaching dialogues are often the mind version of ‘Control – Alt – Delete’, uncovering the plethora of processes, thoughts, tasks, to-dos that a client is working on, almost all unconsciously.

In my coaching I have noticed how long the list can go for most of us. Every item uses some of your power / focus / RAM – every loose piece of paper on your desk, notes around the home, calls yet to be returned, waiting on apologies or thanks, active tasks, dormant tasks, old mistakes, new ideas, plans, dreams, doubts.

Our brilliant capacity means much of this goes unnoticed and we go about our day comfortably. As the list grows though, our capacity to be at our best and work on new things and challenges can become exhausted.

I talk about this in my new, just released film, which you can view here.

My challenge for you this week is to press your personal ‘Control – Alt – Delete’. Grab a pen and paper and make the list. Go beyond the obvious. For best results work on this with a colleague (or even a coach!). You may wish to keep returning to your list over the course of a few days as new processes come to mind.

Now review your list. There may be obvious items that use up the majority of your memory power, and that tends to be where we apply our focus. Notice the long, long list of seemingly insignificant things that when combined are taking up space in your capacity. What can you complete, let go of, and action right now? DO IT, you WILL notice the difference.

Consider installing ‘Control – Alt – Delete’ as part of your personal maintenance program.

Simon Tyler is one of the world’s leading business coaches. His work simplifies the lives of business leaders and owners. He is an incisive consultant, inspirational writer, provocative public speaker and master facilitator. To learn more about Simon, visit http://simontyler.com.

Coaching Call To Action

Stop! Set your timer for five minutes. Press your Control – Alt – Delete button and begin your list. When the timer goes off, review your list. What 3 items can you delete? Repeat! What are you learning about yourself?

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

I’ve just come back from a week of vacation where my time was very fluid. My husband and I agreed that we would spend the week as if we were retired. Fun! Lots of Self and Inspiring time that Simon Tyler speaks of below. I chose not to participate in Drain time. Now that I’m back at work, I’m going to put time on my calendar for Self and Inspiring so that I continue investing my time wisely.

Quote of the Week

“You have to allow a certain amount of time in which you are doing nothing in order to have things occur to you, to let your mind think.”
~Mortimer Adler

The Return on Investment of Your Time

by Simon Tyler

Many of my clients have such packed schedules; they feel like they are being whipped along in a fast flowing river, with little power to change direction. A frequent result is that some weeks they feel good (and inspired), others they feel bad (and drained) and all points in between. Are you fatalistically allowing the river and its course to have control?

Becoming more deliberate about where you invest YOUR time can in effect become a tiller to steer your journey along your river.

Where do you spend your time?

What is the impact on you during those investments?

Take last week. Let’s say, for arguments sake, you worked 50 hours, what is the split of your time across the following investment categories:

• Self - time in your own space, unhindered, uninterrupted, focused or unfocused, reflecting or in action, just time with you.




• Inspiring – with people or in places that inspire or motivate you, which cause you to think differently, garner new ideas, or feed your reflective time.




• The Turf – with people or in places that is your current ‘turf’, you know it, occasionally challenging, mostly in control of the situation.




• Drain – with people, or places, or tasks that simply take your energy levels right down.

It doesn’t take Sherlock to make the link between your time investment and the feel good or feel bad result.

Become aware, then shift your schedule, minimize ‘Drain’ time immediately. Increasing ‘Inspiring’ time takes a little extra thought and effort, seeking out opportunities. This happens in ‘Self’ time – get some of that, now!

Good luck and keep it simple.

Simon Tyler is one of the world’s leading business coaches. His work simplifies the lives of business leaders and owners. He is an incisive consultant, inspirational writer, provocative public speaker and master facilitator. To learn more about Simon, visit http://simontyler.com.

Coaching Call To Action

Where will you add “Self and Inspiring” time on your calendar this week? If you are already providing this time for yourself, I’d love to hear what you are doing.

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

This week’s Tip does not only apply to Small Business Owners. No matter what your level is in the working world, you could benefit by awareness to how these 7 flaws could be impacting you and the solutions to overcome them. I know I’ve suffered from each of these traits from time to time.

Quote of the Week

“Aim for success, not perfection. Never give up your right to be wrong, because then you will lose the ability to learn new things and move forward with your life.”
~ Dr. David M. Burns

Top 7 Flaws of Small Business Owners

Coaching Call To Action

Where are you holding yourself back by your behavior?  What new habit will you create to overcome this behavior?

What’s New

Thursday, September 23, 2010 – 9 am to noon ET
Pounce on a Project

Welcome back from the summer break!  I hope you all took some time to recharge.  What project would you like to get on top of and accomplish this month? Come to Pounce on a Project VI – - 2010.

Join Coach Andrea on Thursday, September 23rd from 9:00 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. Eastern. We will join as a group by phone and declare what you want to accomplish: preparing a marketing plan for Q4, starting the talk you have to give in two weeks, getting your new website finished, or getting rid of the piles of completed projects that grew over the summer.

During the morning, the group will gather by phone a few times to check progress and get any support needed to finish with a bang. At noon, the group will celebrate their accomplishments. Who says projects have to be boring and tedious? Bring your lightness and fun and join us for the energization.

To sign up or learn more, call or e-mail me by noon on Wednesday, September 23rd. Feel free to share this with friends and co-workers, the more the merrier. (Cost of the program is only the cost of long distance phone calls.)

Thursday, September 23, 2010 – 6:30 – 8:30 pm ET
Being Resourceful at The New England Chapter of ACRP

If you are like most people, you already have more than enough resources (people, places, and things) in your life that can be used for support or help when needed. But, are you using them effectively to increase your productivity and to develop your career?

Join me at The New England Chapter of the Association of Clinical Research Professionals
as I provide tools to show you how to: identify your resources, use your resources to the fullest, and handle resource “roadblocks”.  Capitalize on your resources to achieve the results that are most important to you .at Jasper White’s Summer Shack in Cambridge from 6:30 to 8:30 PM.To reserve your place, contact Patricia Seymour (pannseymour@yahoo.com).

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

I remember reading a story about a restaurant that was having “issues” with its catsup bottles.  The tops kept coming unscrewed and catsup spurted on customer after customer.  The remedy was to offer to pay the dry cleaning bill for the customer covered in red sauce.

Steve Straus would say the restaurant provided first aid, but not “second aid” (finding the core reason underlying the problem). In our businesses, we are all moving quickly and hopefully bringing our key strengths and skills to the office.  If you don’t have the time or inclination to create permanent solutions to your problems, surround yourself with those who do.

Quote of the Week

“Solutions – The first step toward a cure is to know what the disease is..”
~Latin

Second Aid

by Steve Straus

Every Boy Scout and Girl Scout knows about first aid. A 1948 printing of the Boy Scout Manual states that first aid is “the emergency care given to anyone who is badly hurt or who is taken suddenly sick. It is also the immediate care that is necessary to prevent slight injuries from becoming much more serious.” Many people are trained and prepared to administer first aid in an emergency situation.

But what of second aid? The term sounds jarring because we don’t use it, certainly not often. Second aid is what happens after the immediate crisis is over, whether in a medical, life-threatening situation or in our everyday living.

Do you have a good ability to jump in and handle sudden situations in your business, family, community, and spiritual life? Are you good at first aid? Many people are quite good at fixing things, moving from problem to problem “putting splints on the breaks” if you will.

How is your follow-up, your second aid? Do you look for the core reasons underlying the just-solved problem?

Do you create permanent solutions? Do you even enjoy permanent solutions or, instead, get your satisfaction from attacking the next problem?

There is no right or wrong here, there is only understanding how you show up and the results you’re getting. If you’re not interested in second aid, surround yourself with resources which will provide it. If you do like to create permanent solutions, then enjoy doing that.

Self-awareness is the key.

Copyright 2010 Steve Straus. All rights reserved. Steve Straus can be contacted at http://www.StrausUSA.com

Coaching Call to Action

If you aren’t good at second aid, who or what is the provider of second aid in your life?

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

Are you the type of business person who takes a long time to start a project and once started the momentum builds?
Or are you the type of business person who is fine getting the project started, however never know when to stop the project? This week’s article is beneficial for both groups. Either way, you need to know when to end the project and it may be before the project is ‘finished”. Barry J. Moltz recommends including the definition of success and failure in your project plan. I’d always included the results I wanted, but not the point of failure.  What a great idea! Adding this point of measurement during the planning process brings additional clarity to the scope of the project. Don’t you just love getting new insights and ideas?.

Quote of the Week

“Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.”
~ Sir Winston Churchill

Raising the White Flag: No Shame in Surrender

If we define failure ahead of time, we know when to stop pursuing certain paths; we know when to get out, and why to leave.  Again too many times, we think if we stay a big longer or work a bit harder, we can turn it around.  But as Will Rogers said, ‘If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.’

It is almost always harder to quit than to keep going.  So many of us stay past the time when a business or personal relationship is profitable, productive, or healthy.  Part of the reason we stay may be that, by not having defined failure, we create the latitude to keep telling ourselves that we haven’t failed yet.  This is why defining success and failure up front helps us develop the kind of crazy confidence we need to rebound.  Unlike what many of us believe, having the courage to quit can sometimes actually build more confidence than staying the course (Moltz, 2008, p.175).

From:  Moltz, B.J. (2008).  Bounce! Failure, resiliency, and confidence to achieve your next great success.  Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

Reprinted with permission from the OSU Leadership Center, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210, (614) 292-3114, http://leadershipcenter.osu.edu.

Coaching Call to Action

Pull out 3 of your active project plans right now.  Look to see if you have a definition of success and failure noted on the plan.  If you don’t, add them.  If you do, congratulations!  Who else will you teach this concept to this week?

What’s New

Last weekend my daughter, Anna, graduated from college in three years!  Bill and I are so proud of her and look forward to watching this next year of her life unfold.  The plan is that she will take a year off between graduation from Colorado State University and starting vet school.  That’s the plan.  And she’s built into her plan the possibility of not being accepted into a vet program on the first go around.  How do our children get so smart?

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Coach Andrea’s Intro

This morning I was thinking about choices my clients have each and every day.  Steve Straus is correct when he says you can make your own choices or let someone else make them for you.  How will you greet each morning – jumping out of bed with enthusiasm, stretching, breathing and luxuriating or with your head under the pillow?  You get to decide what attitude you bring to a situation – light hearted, thoughtful, serious, or heavy.  As a business owner, it’s up to you to create the culture you want in your company – is it open, lively, and progressive? You choose.

Quote of the Week

“Because you are in control of your life. Don’t ever forget that. You are what you are because of the conscious and subconscious choices you have made.”
~ Barbara Hall

Choices

How good are you, really?

You can either make your own choices or let someone else make them for you.

It’s your choice!

Of course there are times when it’s useful to let someone else make choices for you — when they have more expertise, when they have more time, or when they need to learn something new by making a choice and experiencing the result. But that is not what this Principle is about.

The issue is, do you see yourself as always being at choice, always in charge of your life? Or do you feel constrained, unable to be free to choose? If it’s the latter, you might want to ask yourself why that is so.

Choose to live free. Choose to always be at choice.

Copyright 2010 Steve Straus. All rights reserved. Steve Straus can be contacted at http://www.StrausUSA.com.

Coaching Call to Action

What’s a great choice you made recently? Congratulations!  What’s another great choice you can make this week?

Sunday, May 9, 2010
Moms, Happy Mother’s Day!

Wise advice given by our mothers:

The source of my mother’s love and strength is evident in the advice she gives me every time I leave. A kiss on the cheek, a hug and a reminder to keep God first. I, in turn, share the same advice with my 6-year-old daughter.
Eric Benet, singer. Mother: Joyce Jordan

“My mom once told me to always believe in yourself. Even if your chances are slim, or everyone else doesn’t believe in that, people will look up to you because you’re sticking to what you believe in, and they will admire that in you. That was the best advise I ever got from my mom.”
Lorin, 12, Pennsylvania

“Be happy. For we have only one life and that too is very short.”
Jyoti, Surat

“The best advice my mother ever gave me is “Don’t let other people make the choices for you and don’t let no one push you around.”
Gabriela, 11, Canada

“My mom is always telling me to be independent and follow my dreams and I will live a good, happy life.”
Chris, 12, Alabama

“When I was young and dating men, my mom always told me to watch how my boyfriends treated their mothers. She said they would treat me the same way. I found this to be so true. I have a husband who thought the world of his mom and shows that same love to me. It’s the best advice my mom ever gave me.”
Mary Bentrup

Mom, thank you for your guidance, love and wisdom!

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