Strategy – Page 29 – thoughtLEADERS, LLC: Leadership Training for the Real World

Leadership 102: Leading the Thinking

July 19, 2010/0 Comments/in Innovation, Leadership, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Continuing on our theme of articulating your leadership philosophy on one piece of paper (your leadership maxims), we now need to move on to leading the thinking. This concept is the second major section of my upcoming book One Piece of Paper – go get a copy by CLICKING HERE

Once you’ve taken care of defining how you’ll lead yourself (learn how to do so in this post), you need to create some maxims that get you leaning forward and taking your organization to new places. The status quo is never good enough.

I can’t think of a single leader I’ve ever met whose strategy was “Don’t change a thing! Everything is perfect!”

In fact, the best leaders I’ve worked with continuously challenged the thinking, blew up business models, and constantly questioned how they could get their organization to a better place. This is what leading the thinking is all about. This approach is all about thought leadership (and lucky for you we not only cover the topic on this blog but we also teach a course on thoughtLEADERSHIP as well – click here to learn more about bringing the program into your organization).

Obviously the benefits of leading the thinking are that you’ll see new trends and opportunities (or risks) before your competitors. You’ll shape the market rather than the market shaping you. You’ll uncover those huge new breakthrough opportunities that get your team excited and energized about their work.

To do all these great things, you need to establish some maxims that force you to think about new opportunities and set a vision for where you’re headed. On top of that, I highly suggest you set aside some “think time” every month (at least 1/2 day) to take a step back and evaluate how you’re thinking about the business.

Now let’s dive into making leading the thinking practical and pragmatic.

Want a Powerful Business? Take Your Own Medicine

April 12, 2010/2 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Entrepreneur, Leadership, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

You’ve all been to the doctor at some point. There’s always that moment of truth where he tells you to change your bad habits, eat better, and exercise more. It all makes sense and is sound advice.

But how likely are you to follow his advice if he’s wheezing it out because he weighs 350 lbs. and you keep getting distracted by the piece of Ho Ho hanging off his lower lip? Not so much, right?

As a trainer, coach, and communicator I dispense more than my fair share of advice and guidance. A lot of it even makes sense. Occasionally. But there’s something I find more difficult than just about every other aspect of my job: taking my own advice.

The weird thing is I regularly advise leaders on how to improve their businesses yet I sometimes get lazy about doing the same exact things I tell them to do. Why do I demonstrate this shortcoming? Maybe it’s pure sloth. Maybe I run under the misguided belief that all the things I advise others to do I must naturally do myself in my own business dealings.

Then one of my friends proves me wrong. When you surround yourself with incredibly smart people, they tend to ask some really smart questions. Needless to say I get asked smart questions quite frequently. If you stop and listen to those questions though (either from others or the ones you’d ask yourself if you were dispensing advice to you) you can make your business exponentially more powerful. Here’s how:

Two More Traps that Destroy Entrepreneurs (Part 2)

March 22, 2010/2 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Customer Service, Entrepreneur, Sales, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

In my last post I talked about the traps entrepreneurs face with respect to cash (not planning it well enough or managing it rigorously enough) and being your own boss (which means you might not have coworkers to help you make decisions). If you missed the post, go read it here.

Today I’ll cover two more traps that can ruin your business faster than Takeru Kobayashi can destroy a Nathan’s hot dog.

If you’re an entrepreneur you likely have a cool idea for a product or a service. That knowledge and innovation is the core of what you’re about. You somehow intuitively understand a market need and that’s the source of your success. Or failure depending on how you play it. That’s the third trap.

The fourth trap is that as the Big Cheese, you don’t need to sweat the small stuff. You’re the king of rock. There is none higher. Sucka MC’s better call you sire. Well guess what your majesty? You DO have to sweat the small stuff. All of it.

Let’s explore these two traps, shall we?

4 Traps That Destroy Entrepreneurs (Part 1)

March 15, 2010/6 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Entrepreneur, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

From a glance at early responses to our poll on entrepreneurship (see bottom of this page and VOTE if you haven’t already) it seems like everyone wants to be an entrepreneur. It’s sexy. Startups. IPOs. Be your own boss. Right?

Well sometimes it downright sucks. And if you don’t know what you’re taking on, you’re likely tackling much more work and risk than you believe. In fact, in my conversations with other entrepreneurs (man, that’s a big word and it sounds funny) I’ve come across four things that will absolutely destroy your business. We’ve already covered the concept of how entrepreneurs need to bootstrap to win. The traps I’ll cover now go beyond that. They’re so important that I don’t want to give them short shrift so I’ll cover two of them in this post and two in the next.

First, let’s look at why being an entrepreneur seems so sexy and glamorous:

– you get to be your own boss and no one can tell you what to do

– you set your own hours

– you get to make all the decisions

– you can make gobs of cash and you keep all of it

– you get to write a blog with Bozo the Clown pictures without having to run it by corporate communications

Sounds awesome, right? It is. I’ve been running entrepreneurial ventures my whole life dating back to selling hand-painted pencils and comic books in 6th grade (they were two separate business units of course). I’ve been a full-time entrepreneur for over two years now (translation – 100% of my income has come from my ventures at thoughtLEADERS, weBuild, and TiXiT). Yes, it’s awesome. I love it. But I’ve seen 4 things that can wipe you out in the blink of an eye and send you scurrying back to the cubicle farm.

Entrepreneurs Need to Bootstrap to WIN

February 9, 2010/2 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Entrepreneur, Guest Blogger, Innovation, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Today’s guest post is by Brian Link who is a partner of mine in weBuild, thoughtLEADERS, and TiXiT among the many other things he does (yes, both of us have many entrepreneurial interests). This perspective on bootstrapping a new venture is so spot-on it almost hurts. This article is prompted by today’s launch of TiXiT where Brian is the CTO and I’m CEO. Enough context. Here’s Brian:

I’ve seen my share of Internet startups and each entrepreneur, if you asked them, would tell you that getting started is the hardest part. Many people think they have a great idea. Some have even have written it down and dreamed of turning it into something big. But taking those first few steps of talking to other people, committing your own money, finding a team to help build it and figuring out how to tell the world about it is where you need great strategy (and some luck).

One strategy, if you’re lucky enough, is to borrow a million bucks from your rich uncle. You might also find an angel investor or venture capitalist and beat the one in a million odds and get funded before you have a product or revenue. The much more likely scenario and the smartest strategy is much more difficult, if you can pull it off. It’s called bootstrapping.

The term comes from a saying that started in the 1800s: “to pull yourself up by your bootstraps” which implies an impossible task. As a metaphor, it means to better oneself by one’s own unaided efforts. And today it often refers to starting a business that is self-sustaining and created with little or no external help. While bootstrapping is incredibly hard, there are huge rewards.

Bootstrapping is hard. You need to stick your neck out; quit your job; have some money to spend; have a great network to lean on; and have a lot of confidence and guts. It’s certainly not for everyone. But for the brave who have a great idea, the reward can be huge. The best practices for bootstrapping can fill volumes of books, but here’s a quick summary of some ideas and strategies:

The Best of thoughtLEADERS 09: Why Your Team Hates You and Other Gems

December 29, 2009/1 Comment/in Career, Communications, Customer Service, Leadership, Social Media, Strategy, Training /by Mike Figliuolo

I’m an idiot (no comments). I almost forgot to give you this year in review list of the BEST posts we’ve published this year. This list is comprised of our most viewed, most forwarded, quirkiest, most provocative work as judged by you the readers (with a little of our discretion thrown in). We’ve also included a few hidden gems we think deserve another shot in the spotlight. There’s also a kicker bonus post on the list just for good measure (it’s a “wayback” – and speaking of wayback, check out the photo on the trophy… yes… that’s me ’80’s style baby!).

Enjoy. Share. We’ve loved writing them. We hope you’ve enjoyed reading them. Thanks for your incredible support in ’09 and best wishes for ’10! We hope to be a part of your future success!

Enough sentimentality. Here’s the best stuff we’ve written all year:

Most Viewed and Forwarded Post: 10 Reasons Your Team Hates You (They Just Won’t Say It To Your Face). This post was viewed over 20,000 times. In 2 days. Wow. I’m pretty sure I pushed every button I could when I wrote this (insecurity, paranoia, a 10 point list, etc.). Learn the 10 most destructive behaviors you can exhibit as a leader (and learn how to fix them).

Walking Away from the Cash is Good Business

December 21, 2009/6 Comments/in Entrepreneur, Leadership, Sales, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Sometimes there’s nothing tougher than a heaping helping of your own medicine. In this case it involves me, a nice pile of cash, peer pressure, and a tough decision.

You folks know how often I rant about the fact that strategy is about saying “no.” It’s easy for me to pontificate on this point. I tell you about companies I’ve seen do this well and others I’ve seen screw it up.

On Friday, it was my turn to put up or shut up. Today I’d like to recap the thoughts and events that led me to turn my back on an opportunity to earn a decent chunk of change. In sharing this I hope to make this critical strategic lesson accessible and easy to understand so you, in turn, can apply it to your business.

Allow me to bore you for a moment and explain my firm’s strategy so you have some context. I run a leadership training business. Our strategy is to offer training sessions on critical business skills to large companies. We differentiate ourselves with the experience level of our instructors. We value delivering outstanding service to our clients and delivering top notch business results.

We grow by deepening relationships with existing clients (translation: becoming part of corporate universities or recurring leadership programs) and adding new clients. When we’re not teaching, we’re developing new clients, building new classes, or eating Cookie Crisp while watching Spongebob reruns (it’s about a balanced lifestyle folks).

That strategy sounds pretty clear, no? This is where it gets screwed up though…

Lessons from Leonidas the Spartan King: Why Shrinking Your Business is Smart

November 4, 2009/2 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Entrepreneur, Guest Blogger, Social Media, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Today’s guest post is written by Brian Ahearn (no, that’s not his picture at left). Brian’s one of the most knowledgeable guys I know on the subject of influencing people (which is why he’s been a guest here before). Enjoy!

I conducted a workshop recently called Principles of Persuasion. During a break, one of the students said she’d had a conversation with her five-year-old son and expressed parental surprise over something he said. She told him she was going to a meeting about leadership at work. He told her they had talked about leadership at school and he knew what a leader was. He said leaders were people who had followers. Simple and to the point, his definition was right on. Out of the mouth of babes!

Let’s look at this leader/follower idea as it applies to the online world. If you’re on Twitter then you follow people and people follow you. In a sense, for those who follow you, you’re a leader. You might be a leader by virtue of your expertise in an area or simply because people find you interesting. But, by definition of our young friend, people have chosen to follow you and therefore you’re a leader.

Courageous Decision Making – Quit Being a Wimp and Lead

October 19, 2009/12 Comments/in Leadership, Sales, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Waaah. The economy. Waaaaah. Boo hoo. Woe is me.

Stop. Right now. Stop.

Tough times like these demand leadership. I’m sick of hearing how organizations are “hunkering down” until the storm passes. Guess what people? It won’t start to pass until leaders like you make decisions that take us toward a solution.

Of course there’s a balance between being conservative in case the environment worsens and making bold decisions and taking on their associated risks. My argument is simply that we’re doing all of the former and very little of the latter.

The fix to all of this begins with you. The leader. Everyone (your team, your peers, your boss, your business partners, your competitors) is looking at you to see what you’re doing and how you’re acting in this environment. It’s the business equivalent of monkey see, monkey do. If the monkey sees you hiding under the banana tree, they’re going to hide too.

Why is this so important? Because courageous organizations who are aggressive when others are scared are the ones that will kick everyone’s butt when things get better. We’ve told you before that as a leader you have to make decisions (the 4 D’s of decision making) and doing nothing is not an option.

So how do you snap out of the funk? Three steps.

Making HR More Strategic (Part 2)

October 8, 2009/0 Comments/in Leadership, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Earlier this week we teed up how failure to incorporate HR in your strategic planning process ultimately leads to the failure of your strategy. It’s a common and easily avoidable problem (unfortunately too many organizations don’t avoid it).

As you know, we believe we have a responsibility to offer solutions for the problems we identify. This is no exception. To find the cure for this common problem, just pop on over to SmartBlog on Workforce and read Mike Sheehan’s perspectives on how you can avoid the trap of destroying your strategy by ignoring the people implications.

The solutions are pretty straight-forward. It’s simply a question of whether you’ve got the determination to make the required changes. Are you up to Mike’s challenge? Take a look and let us know what you think!

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

Why did your strategy FAIL? It’s the PEOPLE stupid!

October 5, 2009/3 Comments/in Leadership, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

We’re experimenting a bit with a few posts on leadership, strategy, and people issues. The topic: strategies don’t die because they’re bad – they die because organizations foolishly ignore the people implications of the plan. In true thoughtLEADERS form, this won’t be a blathering set of ethereal platitudes. We’re going to give you some concrete steps you can take to stop screwing up your strategy.

Why is it so critical to nail this HR planning piece of your strategy? Failure to do so means the plan fails which means you lose in the marketplace which means you don’t get a bonus. Capice? (That’s Italian for “Do you understand?”).

We’re going to bring you perspectives from three of our team members: Mike Sheehan, Dave Willis, and Mike Figliuolo. We’ll cover this topic both here on the thoughtLEADERS blog and also on SmartBlog on Workforce (it’s an awesome resource that’s also tied to their SmartBrief on Workforce and SmartBrief on Leadership offerings – I don’t recommend many things but I’m TELLING you to sign up for these because they’re great and they’re free. They save you the trouble of finding the good stuff because they find it and summarize it for you!).

Enough preamble. Strategies die for many reasons (bad analysis, poor decision making, flawed assumptions) but the most egregious and most common reason for failure is you botched the people planning. It’s unforgivable because it’s completely within your control – you simply don’t focus on it because it’s not “sexy.”

Porter’s Five Forces? Sexy. Org charts? Not sexy. Right?

Trust Isn’t the Key to Business Partnerships

September 8, 2009/6 Comments/in Communications, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Recently a question was posed to me: what’s the most critical element of business partnerships?

It’s not trust. That’s an overly simplistic answer. Is trust important? Sure it is. But it’s not the most critical element of a business partnership.

Look, I trust my local police force but the Dublin PD is not listed on the business partners page of my website. I trust my physician but we’re not jointly marketing our services. “Trust” is the easy answer to give to this question but that’s not particularly insightful.

The most important element of a business partnership is a shared purpose. That purpose is something that aligns all the efforts of each organization. That purpose creates momentum and energy around every undertaking between the parties. Without a shared purpose, your partnership is more like The Odd Couple than it is a joint venture.

So if a shared purpose is the most important element of a business partnership, how do you identify it and harvest it?

A shared purpose is nothing more than both organizations seek to change a specific part of the world in a particular way. The strength of that sharing comes out in the organizations’ complementary skills.

Hanging light bulbs with glowing one isolated on dark blue background

Executive Communications

Structured Problem Solving

Creating Leadership Maxims

Leading inside the Box

Deliberate Decision Making

Simple Strategic Planning

Storytelling for Leaders

Storytelling for Sales

Executive Presence

Principles of Chart Design

Time Management Mastery

Breakthrough Innovation

Leadership Resilience

Conflict Resolution

Leading through Change

Project Management Reality

Coaching for Impact

High Performing Teams

Everything is Negotiable

Leading with Influence

Building Personal Resilience

thoughtLEADERSHIP

Engagement Management

eLearning Courses on TITAN

Structured Thought: Problem Solving

Structured Thought: Problem Solving

Clearly define a problem, scope all issues related to the problem, generate potential solutions, then analyze and select the best solution by using time-tested critical thinking methods and tools.

Our Course Offerings

Leadership Skills

Communication Skills

Individual Skills