Unavailing Logic

  If you attend church, you may recognize the title of this post as lyrics from a Hillsong Christian worship song. Don't worry, I'm not turning this into a religious blog, but my faith is a part of who I am and has contributed to my belief structure and attitude. What you may not know is that I am a bassist and I volunteer regularly on my church's worship team, so I've played this song dozens of times.  Recently, someone asked me the old question, "What do you do for a living?". I answered his question. I told him I worked as an IT Solutions Architect and was in a pre-sales role selling datacenter and security solutions to our clients. His response, "oh, you're in sales". No. Technically I'm "pre-sales". Then he says, "so you work on computers?". No, I create solutions for clients. As the conversation continued, I got this knot deep in the pit of my stomach because none of those things are what I really am. It's what I...

Tom Petty sang a song called, "The Waiting". In today's instant gratification society, waiting has become unacceptable. Everyone wants it now. No one wants to pay the price to get it. And many are jealous of the ones who have attained success.  [Chorus] The waiting is the hardest part Every day you get one more yard You take it on faith, you take it to the heart The waiting is the hardest part F rom the age of 10, I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I loved computers and technology. My dad owned a business, and when I was 15, I began working for him. I installed the company’s first-ever computer. Eventually, I built networks, taught myself desktop publishing, and learned the printing business so I could produce all of the company’s marketing materials. I also learned what it was like to run a business. During the summers when I wasn’t in school, I’d travel with my dad on sales calls. I was giving presentations to hundreds of people at 15 years old—dressed in a coat a...

  My Dad was a salesman. He could sell anything to anyone. But sales is a rough game. When times are good they are really good. But when times are bad, they are really bad. Dad constantly listened to motivational tapes (remember tapes?). One of his favorite motivational speakers was Dr. Norman Vincent Peale. Dr. Peale had a gravely voice and an excellent understanding of how to use his powerful voice to convey a message. One of the things Dr. Peale preached was "Positive Mental Attitude" or what he abbreviated as "PMA". My Dad adopted this mindset, and constantly reminded me that my attitude dictated my altitude. That whatever I thought, that's what I would become.  Recently I was informed that my job was being eliminated and as I type this, I am jobless. It's scary. Sure, I have some money set back, but it won't last long and starting all over again is a tough pill to swallow. I have a kid in college. I have a wife. A house. Cars. You get the picture. B...

Several years ago I was called to my bosses office and given an ultimatum. Fire one of my direct reports, or be accountable for their actions. If you've been in a leadership role before, you may have encountered a situation where it's "them or me" and you had to make a tough decision. But as a servant leader, part of your job is to lay yourself on the line for your team, and that's exactly what I did. In this particular case, it wasn't a matter of the individual not doing their job, it was the manner in which they were treating those they interacted with. Ultimately the fix was easy. A simple heart to heart chat to make the individual aware of their actions and discover the source. That individual continued to work for the organization and is still there long after I moved on. Who determines if an employee is underperforming? The customer? Leadership? Peers? The answer is clear, it should be the team leader. If goals, objectives, roles, and responsibilities ar...

Robert K. Greenleaf is credited as the father of Servant Leadership. While Greenleaf certainly brought the concept of servant leadership to the forefront with his 1970 essay The Servant as Leader , he did not create the concept of servant leadership. There have been several historically significant servant leaders over the years. Two that come to mind are Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr. To understand what made them servant leaders, let's take a look at the traits of a servant leader: Listening Empathy Healing Awareness Persuasion Conceptualization Foresight Stewardship Commitment to the growth of people Building community If you have even a modest knowledge of history, you can see how the two men were servant leaders. While this blog does not have a religious focus, my Christian faith is built on servant leadership. Jesus was the epitome of a servant leader. So concerned with the well being of others that he allowed himself to be crucified for them. I suspect some of yo...

Back in 2009 I traveled to New York City to study at the American Management Association. It was fairly early in my management career and I thought I was a "big shot" getting to go to NYC and learn management. My class was mostly entry level managers who had never held a leadership role or taken any other leadership training. The instructor had us introduce ourselves and when it came to me, I mentioned that I'd had Six Sigma Team Leader and Total Quality Management training and that I had become a trainer on those subjects for my company. At break the instructor pulled me aside and told me that I was probably in the wrong class as it was for people with no previous management experience. As any great leader does, he recognized my knowledge and skill and put me to use as a sort of co-instructor. We had a great week of class, and the instructor took extra time with me to give me instruction he wasn't giving the rest of the class. One of the things he told me was, ...

Over the past 15 years of my career I have focused on leadership, team building, business acumen, and emotional intelligence. I made this decision after being in primarily technical roles for the previous 15 years. It was spurred by a conversation with a respected peer. The conversation was about how information technology was changing and that soon the "technology generalist" would become obsolete as technology would advance so far that no one could fully grasp every aspect of it. We chatted about how eventually there will be technology workers who support daily operations to "keep the lights on" and IT strategists who support the business by achieving goals and objectives using technology. I've been in the field long enough to remember the days when the "IT Guy" was the go to do it all guy for anything technology related. Need a phone...IT Guy. Need a power strip...IT Guy. Need printer paper...IT Guy. The IT Guy did everything related to just abo...

It's a new year, a new decade, and I'm sure many people are making those annual resolutions to better themselves in one way or another. Why people wait until a new year to make these changes has always been a bit of a mystery to me. We all have shortcomings. We all fail from time to time. We all experience seasons in our lives where things aren't going the way we would like them to go. Why wait to change these things? One of the things I adopted years ago was a continuous improvement strategy. I'm always looking for ways to better myself. Improvement comes in may forms. It may be in the form of education, health, wealth, career advancement, or helping others (which is HIGHLY beneficial both people). So what drives my desire to be a better person? What makes me want to be successful in all that I do? That's easy....fear. Now...it's not the sort of fear you're thinking of. It's not like a fear of heights, or a fear of the dark, or a fear of being hurt. N...

If you have read my other blog posts, you know that I'm a huge proponent of servant leadership. The days of top down authoritative leadership are quickly becoming bygone. We live in the information age, where knowledge of anything is a few clicks away. I remember back in 1987 when I started my IT career there was two ways of learning new technology. You either read a book about 3" thick and memorized as much of it as you could (keeping it on a shelf for reference), or you installed the hardware or software and figured things out through trial and error. This was in the days before everything was GUI driven. You got a blinking prompt, and you had to know what to type. The beauty thing is, nearly every operating system performed similarly, so you simply had to look up the equivalent command from an OS you were familiar with. Logic skills were paramount. Tenacity, patience, and a strong desire to succeed were mandatory traits. There were many times I worked on something for...

When I was in 5th grade we had a talent show. My talent at that age was more or less the same as it is today...being a ham. I signed up and listed my talent as "stand up comedian". Over the next few weeks we had rehearsal for everyone performing in the talent show. Some danced, some sang, some played guitar, etc. One girl recited a poem. We all performed our acts in front of each other multiple times and that poem stuck with me and I have applied its wisdom throughout my career. That poem was called Don't Quit by John Greenleaf Whittier. She only recited the first verse, but what a verse it was. John Greenleaf Whittier Don't Quit When things go wrong as they sometimes will, When the road you're trudging seems all up hill, When the funds are low and the debts are high And you want to smile, but you have to sigh, When care is pressing you down a bit, Rest if you must, but don't you quit. Life is strange with its twists and turns As e...

Besides my love of business, leadership, motivation, and mentoring....I am also an avid music lover. So much so that 9 years ago I decided to learn to play bass guitar. Over the years I have learned that it's not just the notes you play, but how you play the notes, when you play the notes, and how those notes sound. This wasn't something foreign to me as this is the same lesson I learned as a communication major when I was in college. It's not just the words you say, but how you say them, when you say them, who says them, and how they sound. In the music industry, we call this "tone". Musicians spend untold time and money on developing their signature sound or mimicking the sound of their favorite artists. One of the effects often used in music is called compression. Compression is a complicated subject that unless you are a music geek or recording engineer you won't care much about. Basically, compression sets a threshold and any notes you play louder than t...

Chained to fear There are very few things in this world that I'm scared of. I have horrible "needlephobia". Having endured spinal meningitis when I was 5yo and being held down while doctors performed spinal taps left me with an indelible phobia for those evil little pieces of hypodermic horror. As a rational adult, I understand that needles won't hurt me, yet I still suffer anxiety when I have to get a shot or have blood drawn. Our minds are exceedingly powerful, and we have a tremendous internal struggle for conscious thought to overcome unconscious thought. The struggle between rational and irrational. The other thing I am horribly afraid of is failure. I'm not talking about losing a game or something inconsequential. I'm talking about big failings. Failing as a parent, failing as a leader, failing as a person. My entire life I have put a great deal of pressure on myself to be successful and to avoid failure. In 2001 I learned a very valuable lesson o...

I've studied leadership and leaders for years. My dad was insistent that I read books such as "Think and Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill, "Success Is a Choice" by Rick Pitino, and "Iacocca" by Lee Iacocca. I'd spend hours in his car on trips listening to audio tapes of Brian Tracy, Charlie "Tremendous" Jones, and the great Dr. Norman Vincent Peale. When I graduated college, my Dad said he wanted to provide one last piece of education to me, something that changed his life and helped him build a successful business. He always spoke with high regard for the writings of Dale Carnegie and the completion of the well known Dale Carnegie Course. Dad proudly displayed his certificate of completion from the course in his office and often pointed out how valuable the experience was to him. I graduated college in May 1995, and enrolled in the 12 week Dale Carnegie Course in August 1995. Each week Dad would ask me about the class and he would share exper...

As someone who has been responsible for hiring staff for much of my career, I've learned quite a bit about what makes a great hire. When I hired my first employee way back when, I didn't do what most people normally do. I was working for a medium sized company and was one of three employees in the IT department. I was doing a lot of hands on work and needed to bring in someone to do end user support as I focused more on network, server, strategy, and financial matters. Most of the people I interviewed had the required skills. However, what I was seeing in most of the candidates is that they had been doing the same job for years. It made me think, "Why have they been in the same job for so long? Don't they want to advance in their career?" As I continued to interview candidates, I interviewed a young man with very little experience. But he had something no one else had. I remember him telling me, "I can do anything. I may have to learn it, but I can do anyth...